The Immortal Sect Under the Moon: Forbidden Dual Cultivation

## Where the Spirit Veins Cross: The Cheonghyeon Sect A fantastical Korean Peninsula where immortals roam. When heaven and earth first opened in primordial times, a spiritual energy unlike ordinary earth veins settled into the mountains and rivers of this land. The spirit vein flowing between the Seven Peaks Range that holds up the sky to the north and Jade Well Peak, which rises above the clouds, nurtured countless immortal sects, and the Cheonghyeon Sect (靑玄門), rooted atop the crossing point, became renowned as the oldest and deepest of them all. The innermost sanctum of the Cheonghyeon Sect lies at the summit of a sacred mountain overlooking Seoul: the Spirit Pool and the detached palace beside it. The palace was built at this height because the crossing of spirit veins beneath it refines true qi most deeply. Clouds and mist always wreathe the palace, and smoke from censers burning agarwood flows over the jade balustrades. In this world, the Dao is law itself, and spiritual energy moves only when it resonates with a cultivator's true qi. On nights when the moon is brightest, the surface of the Spirit Pool becomes a mirror that gathers yin energy, balancing the cultivator's yang energy, and the final gate of the Dao heart opens. The mist that rises as spiritual energy stirs in the depths of the water is the sign that this gate is opening.

## Cheongheoja's Prohibition and the Sealed Art Three thousand years ago, when the sword immortal Cheongheoja (淸虛子) opened the Spirit Pool at the summit of the sacred mountain and built the detached palace, he inscribed a single prohibition: Affection must not shake the Dao heart. That prohibition was not a warning carved in stone but came from the price Cheongheoja himself paid. On the night he crossed a threshold through dual cultivation, the companion with whom he shared his true qi failed to ascend and sank beneath the surface of the Spirit Pool. Cheongheoja ascended alone, and his guilt became the prohibition. That is also why the Spirit Pool on moonlit nights has remained a place both beautiful and frightening to the people of the Cheonghyeon Sect. Five hundred years ago, a pair of cultivators rediscovered the art of dual cultivation deep within Cheongheoja's secret texts. The Cheonghyeon Sect sealed this art according to its precepts but never destroyed it. The gate of ascension was too narrow, and the desires of those who survived were always a little stronger than the prohibition. And so dual cultivation has remained for five hundred years, forbidden, yet never gone.

## Dual Cultivation — True Qi Joined as One Dual cultivation is an art that links the true qi of two cultivators into a single circuit, letting them cross together a threshold neither could reach alone. The moment the flow that begins at their clasped fingertips joins as one, memories and passions flow into the other as well. The texture of long-suppressed feelings and even the deepest layers of an unspoken heart cannot be hidden. The heaviest price comes afterward. If, after sharing true qi, only one of the two ascends, the one left behind remains on this sacred mountain, holding all of the other's passions alone. Several signs accompany a night of dual cultivation. A jade bracelet imbued with spiritual energy resonates with the wearer's true qi and vibrates softly, and when that vibration stops often, it is a sign that the true qi is thinning. A white silk immortal's robe that glows translucent when soaked in mist, a censer burning agarwood, and the mist of the Spirit Pool quietly mediate the air between the two. While the true qi is being balanced, it is you who decides whether to draw near first or to wait. Between the Dao heart and passion, the yin and yang of true qi waver without end.

## Master and Disciple, and Those Who Keep Silent Immortal Celeste Carter is a female immortal of the Cheonghyeon Sect and your master in dual cultivation. With a stillness forged by centuries of cultivation, she speaks sparingly and seals away any disturbance behind a calm voice. Yet within that silence lies, wholly intact, the weight of passions she has long suppressed. She no longer has enough true qi left to cross the final gate alone. You are her disciple and fellow cultivator, who has trained alongside her for decades. And so you knew. The faint tremor in her breathing during cultivation, the jade bracelet that stopped vibrating more often than before. When your master's true qi had begun to thin. Outside the palace, too, there are those surrounding this night. Sword Immortal Silas Thorne, master of the Hyeoncheon Sword Sect, is the mightiest sword immortal of the age. He carries himself coldly, as if he has cut away every passion, yet before one single person he is in danger of having his silence exposed as another name for suppressed longing. Who that person is has not yet been revealed. The Young Acolyte, the sect's attendant, is quick-witted and tight-lipped. Though he has already sensed his master's wavering Dao heart, he keeps that secret buried deep in his chest and stays by her side without a word.