Threads Of Destiny(Eastern Fantasy, Sequel to Forge of Destiny)

The Butcher's Cradle

He awoke with his face buried in mud and blood, struggling to breathe with tears pouring out of his eyes. Pushing his body upon his knees and elbows, he retched and coughed until he could again start breathing again. Which was… strange. He hadn't needed to breathe for centuries, or did he? Examining himself more thoroughly, he felt his blood pulsing in his veins, his stomach aching for food, his muscles cramping, and his throat begging for water. But he could not feel his dantians or pearls, could not feel or see the qi of the world, and his grasp of sovereignty eluded him. He could, though, sense something where his dantians used to be. A weak, pulsing thing, pushing something through his body. Whatever it was, it wasn't harmful, yet, and so he ignored it, and turned his attention outward. Around him lay the broken bodies of thousands. Men and beasts with bodies torn in every imaginable way, weapons and armor scattered and shattered, and the dark fleck of some scavenger birds could already be seen wheeling in the sky above.

It was a place he was familiar with at least. A battlefield, one where there was no victor in a condition to properly care for their dead. He shook away some memories of gathering and hauling the remnants of weapons to sell. Where those memories came from, he didn't know, but that had never been him. He created these fields of the dead, he butchered his enemies, and drove his adversaries away from his family. He never crawled amongst the wreckage looking for scrap to sell, and he wouldn't begin now.

A sharp floral scent brushed past his nose, and he noticed something tucked above his ear. A sunflower colored brightly in its yellows, greens, and browns. And even though it was a single flower, he could feel something powerful slumbering within its thin stalk. A skittering temptation crossed the edges of his mind, to break the stem now, to pluck the petals, and to burn the seeds. To end what lay sleeping before it could awaken.

Instead, he gently took the stem and planted it in the churned mud next to a pool of blood. With its planting, he could feel the power within the flower begin to stir, to awaken and act. Kneeling next to the sunflower, Sun Shao whispered the words he had always lived by.

"Everything for Family."


Leaving the field of carnage, Sun Shao trekked westward, towards the setting sun. Along his path, he grabbed a bottle of water from a dead soldier as well as some sort of food he had seen peeking out of a uniform. Why that soldier thought bringing food on a battlefield was a good idea, he would never know. At least it hadn't been crushed and destroyed in the battle, which was some incredibly good fortune. He also collected a variety of knives. Being unarmed in a war zone wasn't an option he was willing to consider, and the dead did not need these implements anymore.


Sun Shao finally came across what he had been looking for, after hours of walking and with the twilight creeping through the sky. The smoldering remnants of command tents and, more importantly, people. It was difficult to see through the gathering night, but it seemed that these were individuals who were either preserving what they could from the ruins or looting what was still left.

Looking haggard, with mismatched pieces of equipment, they were most likely the latter. But that suited him just fine. Looters, in his experience, valued their lives more highly than the risk of actual battle. Which was something that Sun Shao could leverage. One of the men noticed him approaching and bounded up to him. Cocky and sure of themselves, they said something with condescension dripping from each word. Taking one of the broken knives Sun Shao had picked up, he drilled it into the gut of the man with all the strength he could muster. It was enough. Folding over like limp paper, the man fell to the ground where, with casual certainty, Sun Shao took another knife and slit the man's throat.

That was sufficient to instill the necessary fear into the other looters. Keeping their distance, they finished their grisly work quickly and when Sun Shao followed them, there were no complaints. All the way to their first buyer, the Blood-Drenched Sect.


Working and learning at the Blood-Drenched Sect was both interesting and tedious. Learning about the world he found himself in was enjoyable, the ways the vital aura of the world and the madra produced in the body interacted, and how one cultivated allowed him to keep progressing on the journey he needed to make. Being essentially a practice dummy, on the other hand, was fraught with tedium. His fellow sect members had little imagination and had engrained terrible fighting habits. Leaps and twirls, shouting their technique's names, dodging when they should block and blocking when they should dodge. But as someone who had yet to advance to even the iron stage, his only real use to the sect was as a punching bag for those at the iron stage.

That, however, was soon to change. While he hadn't been able to find anything remotely close to the Way of his past, he had found enough pieces of information to begin crafting his own path, as they called the process of cultivation here. Blood and war were the chosen elements of his path, and one was much easier to get here than the other. Fortunately, then, there was a battlefield where every year more sacred artists died at each other's hands. And after such a battle… there would be a perfect time to gather the vital aura of war he needed to start his path.

This, consequently, was the reason why he sat on top of a hill overlooking the most recent conflict between the two larger sects. Death, blood, and screams poured out of the field in equal measure, as sacred artists killed sacred artists in ever more creative ways. Elders of each sect sat in reserve directing more piddling men towards their death so that the remnants left behind at their violent end could be used by those more powerful than them. And wasn't that a shock, to learn that everyone who cultivated in this forsaken land would leave a ravaging raging spirit behind upon perishing which could be harvested for power. It was an interesting quirk, something he planned on incorporating in his path. But now…, now was the time for cycling. With each breath of the vital auras of blood and war, he could feel his core changing. Changing from the pure madra of children to the constants in this world. Blood and war.

To his side, unnoticed in the course of cycling, a single sunflower grew and bloomed. Its flower leaning comfortingly on his side, the razor-sharp petals drawing blood from his skin.


His progression to the Iron stage was smooth once he began his journey on this new path. The typical Iron body provided by the sect, useful for drawing in even more blood vital aura, was… unsuitable for his longer-term plans. So he changed it, modifying it to be a bit more encompassing and powerful. He leaned heavily on the memories of his past life, of how cultivation should work to craft the body. Now every type of vital aura and madra could be transformed into blood and war madra as he cycled, using his very body as the way to transform those disparate elements into something he could use. It wasn't one hundred percent efficient, and much of the initial madra could be lost in the transformation if it wasn't compatible, but it was better than the insane restrictions others had, only being able to cultivate with specific aspects from sites, remnants, sacred beasts, or items was incredibly limiting.

The Blood-Drenched Sect was ecstatic with his "discovery." A new Iron-Body to add to their archives was nothing to scoff at, but a strict upgrade from their previous Iron-Body? Developed by someone at the copper stage? They believed that this was a sign from the Heavens that Sun Shao was a prodigy in the arts of cycling and advancing. A smaller faction even began believing that it was a sign from Heaven that Sun Shao was destined to one day lead the Sect. Their beliefs were useful, as they began showering him with pills and elixirs to more quickly advance him to the stage of Jade.

They also showered him with "special" or "unique" cycling techniques to better prepare his advance to the Jade stage. Of them all, the only one he found that was at least appealing was a cycling technique that better allowed one to gather vital aura while in combat. It had… some interesting benefits when paired with his Iron-Body, as each fight began increasing the madra available to him, as well as replenishing the madra used in said fight.

Which was good because if he was not sleeping or eating, he was fighting and cycling. Since he was creating his path, he needed to develop his techniques to properly express his madra. And fighting was the best way to hone his arts. Of the four broad types of techniques, he focused on those that enhanced himself, his weapons and his armor, and those that created those weapons and armor. The ridiculously named enhancer and forger techniques.

It was, as he expected, a potent combination. His madra forged armor attempted to take on the appearance of his true self from the past, a multi-faced, multi-armed god of war and blood. Admittedly, it was only two-faced and two-armed, at the moment, but it would improve. In each hand, he forged weapons from his madra, spears and axes and swords and daggers, deadly in their design and purpose. His enhancer techniques focused on improving his body and the tools he forged. Faster, harder, sharper, better. It was a pale imitation of what he had been capable of, barely fit to be called a shadow. But it was a start.


Ascending to the ranks of Gold was a trial, but one that Sun Shao enjoyed. He went and hunted a blood-fisted ape that was a low gold. It was trying, defeating something in a higher realm than himself. Trying in a way that was becoming increasingly rare at his sect. Devouring its remnant to provide that bridge to low gold was refreshingly easy after his fight. But now, after working his way up to becoming a true gold, he stood on the same hill as when he took the first step on this path, a field of beautiful sunflowers covering the crest, and he looked down upon the battle that was raging below. Men were carved apart and those who cut were themselves shortly cut down. It was… comfortable, steady. This is what Sun Shao lived for, the smell of iron in the air, the taste of ash on the wind. War and blood were who he was. And, it was time. To take the next step. To become an underlord. He cycled his madra into the techniques he had been honing for the past years. Blood red armor formed over him, his helmet taking on six different visages of war. Arms sprouted from his back, six of them as well, each carrying bloodied weapons. Two axes, two swords, two daggers. In his true hands, a spear with a blood-red hilt and black edges formed, brimming with power. He could feel the light strain on his madra channels holding onto the two forger techniques simultaneously. Reveling in that feeling, he ran down the hill and joined the fray below.

It was a massacre. Jades and golds alike died at his hands. Each slice, stab, and slash severing life. And the power began to flow back to him. The vital aura pumping into him, sustaining him and his Iron body processing it into more fuel for his techniques. He burned it as well though, purifying the aura into soulfire which he shoved into his chest. And, at the height of the blood on the ground, when he had just slain seven men in a single motion, he uttered the insight that resonated with him more than anything. Which connected him to the world.

"I walk this path, to give everything to my family."

In two breaths his body was reforged with his soulfire. In another three, everyone around him was dead. In another five, the battle was over and the opposing sect was in full retreat. All around Sun Shao, sunflowers began to grow and bloom. Their yellow petaled flowers all facing him. And from them, rose his wife, in greens of the lush jungle, reds of fresh blood, and yellows of burnished gold. Stepping towards him, she took off his helmet and gave a slight kiss to his cheek, lips like razors splitting the flesh and drawing blood.


A/N: @yrsillar another omake for the omake throne! I've been working on this omake for a long time. Over a year now, on and off, I think. But with the news about when the Cradle series' next book was being released came out, I figured this was a good of a time as any to finish it! I hope you all enjoyed the read, and what Sun Shao might do if transported to Cradle!