Zero

Zero, born Sabre Hunt and known to Leo as Master Kasu, is the Qi teacher whose grief after the first Dalki war turns him into the founder of Pure. He trains generations of agents, covertly takes control of human institutions, and accumulates stolen Qi in pursuit of Immortui's promise to restore his dead family. Erin kills him when he attempts to sacrifice her as the final part of that bargain. (Chapters 1083, 1442, 1851, and 1960–1964)

Biography

The Temple, Leo, and the First Dalki War

Sabre continues his family's tradition of teaching Qi at an isolated mountain temple and adopts the abandoned, blind Leo as one of his children. He wants the community to remain outside the Dalki war, but Leo's public use of Qi exposes them. The military relocates the group to an orange-portal planet to gather crystals, where a Dalki attack kills everyone except Sabre and Leo. Sabre blames both the military and Leo rather than accepting the peace treaty that follows, returns to the empty temple, and renames himself Zero because he believes he has nothing left. (Chapters 1851 and 1961–1962)

Zero confronts Oscar, demanding the Supreme Commander's life for conscripting and then failing his family. Oscar defeats him with a demon-tier sword, leaving him near death and partially frozen. In that threshold state, Immortui offers to restore Zero and eventually return the dead if Zero becomes his follower and completes assigned tasks. Zero accepts without knowing the being's full nature; the marking heals him and confirms to him that the promise may be real. His desire to reverse his loss, rather than merely reunite with the dead, becomes the justification for everything that follows. (Chapters 1961–1963)

Building Pure and Governing through Proxies

Zero founds Pure around hostility to the ability system and passes Qi to its members, while concealing both his original name and his own later ability. He raises Chris as a weapon against Leo, making repayment of Chris's personal debt serve Zero's older grievance. By the time Zero is first discussed directly, even Chris describes him as a great teacher but a personally weak man who guides others toward power he cannot possess. That reputation conceals how extensively Zero will later enhance himself through Qi taken from other lives. (Chapters 1083, 1160–1174, and 1851–1853)

As a Board member, Zero helps Pure capture political control of Earth while presenting that power through respectable institutions. He stages a confrontation with Quinn at the Board's tournament and uses subordinate operations to force or eliminate opposition. His willingness to control others is distinct from their agency: Chris carries out Pure's work from loyalty and debt, but after Leo defeats Chris, Zero abandons him and flees rather than share the expected final stand. That choice breaks Chris's allegiance and exposes the difference between Zero's rhetoric of common purpose and his overriding private goal. (Chapters 1442–1457 and 1848–1854)

Immortui's Bargain and the Last Hunt

Zero's Immortui marking lets his patron communicate directly and eventually grants celestial energy. In return, Zero gathers souls and prepares a portal through Agent Four, while also receiving the task of killing Erin. He has an independent reason to accept that order: Erin holds immense refined Qi, and draining it would make him harder for Immortui to betray. The bargain is therefore founded on mutual use rather than complete trust, even though Zero remains convinced that Immortui can restore the people he lost. (Chapters 1938, 1945–1960, and 1969)

Zero joins Erin and Agent Four against the celestial Gorgath because survival and the portal operation temporarily require cooperation. He spends enormous stores of stolen Qi on named soul strikes and activates fourth-stage Qi, then fights Chris when the latter openly rejects him. Despite having already faced a celestial, Zero's reserves and control let him overwhelm Chris with homing Qi attacks; Chris's werewolf endurance forces Zero to keep expending power, leaving him tired for the betrayal both he and Erin expect. (Chapters 1945–1958)

When Zero attempts to kill Erin with a Qi-suppressed sword stroke, her summoned familiar intercepts the blade and the Boneclaw wounds him. Erin drives the demon-tier sword through his chest, interrupts the power rising from his marking, and uses Qi drain on his head. Zero dies recognising that the stolen lives and ruined relationships did not restore his family; Erin inherits both his own Qi and the accumulated power of his victims. Later references consistently treat him as dead and as another follower deceived by Immortui. (Chapters 1960, 1964, 1975, 2333, and 2435)

Appearance and personality

Zero's apparent age changes over his long life. When Leo meets him again, he looks like a middle-aged man in his forties rather than the elderly teacher Leo remembers, with a scruffy beard, a fierce expression, and long hair tied in a ponytail. He later wears a tight robe, carries two blades, and uses a false face to hide the forehead marking that glows during Immortui's communications. His defining qualities are patience, technical discipline, and an inability to release grief. Those traits make him an effective mentor and strategist, but grief narrows into blame, secrecy, and a willingness to treat followers and victims as fuel for an outcome only he values. (Chapters 1824, 1851, 1960–1961, and 1964)

Powers and abilities

Qi teaching and combat control

Zero is the source from whom Pure's practitioners learn Qi and is described late in the story as one of its most skilled controllers. He uses first-stage Qi to reinforce muscles and healing, second-stage Qi as an immense condensed barrier or a sharp layer capable of parting fire, and third-stage Qi as an invisible force that repositions an opponent. His technical control lets him suppress almost every fluctuation during an ambush, but doing so also removes his passive defence; the Boneclaw pierces him precisely because he has reduced his Qi to avoid Erin's perception. (Chapters 1083, 1946, 1953–1955, and 1964)

Fourth-stage Qi releases exceptional power by drawing beyond normal reserves into life energy, turning the user's skin dark red. Pure regards it as a last resort because users can die after exceeding their limits. Zero can activate it against Gorgath, gaining the speed and force to wound a celestial, but the form has a time and energy cost and contributes to his exhaustion before his later fights. (Chapters 1948–1949)

Qi drain and accumulated soul strikes

Zero knows Qi drain, which removes both Qi and life energy from a target and leaves a dried corpse. Over roughly a millennium he takes the energy of hundreds of thousands of lives and stores it for combat. His named sword techniques expend measured portions of that reserve—100,000, 120,000, and later 160,000-soul Qi strikes—condensing the stolen power into immense cutting attacks. The pool is vast but finite: successive battles and larger releases reduce what he has available, and Erin ultimately reverses the technique on him, acquiring the remaining accumulation. (Chapters 1592, 1946, 1949, 1954–1955, and 1964)

Targeting ability and swordsmanship

Zero secretly possesses an ability that allows attacks to reach a designated target and lets him hold and control projected Qi in the air. He scatters dozens of sword slashes around Chris, then activates the ability so that they converge from every direction and continue in successive waves. The effect makes ordinary evasion ineffective, but it does not guarantee penetration: Chris breaks or endures many strikes through werewolf strength, healing, and reinforced Qi. Zero is also an expert swordsman whose timing, condensed cuts, and awareness let him contend with much stronger bodies. (Chapters 1852–1853 and 1953–1955)

Dedicated-follower marking

Immortui's mark restores Zero from near death, prolongs his life, enables direct communication, and can supply celestial energy. Its power supplements rather than creates Zero's Qi techniques; Zero explicitly says his first strike against Gorgath is his own. The mark also binds his progress to Immortui's demands. When Erin impales Zero, the black power emerging from it retreats as he dies, showing that patronage does not make him immortal or protect him from a decisive physical and Qi-draining attack. (Chapters 1946, 1949, 1960, and 1963–1964)

Relationships

• Leo: Zero adopts Leo, teaches him Qi, and later makes him the focus of his blame for exposing the temple. He raises Chris to kill Leo, but regrets his failure and apologises internally only while dying. (Chapters 1083, 1851–1853, and 1961–1964)
• Chris: Zero saves and trains Chris, turning gratitude into long service and preparing him as Pure's sword. He abandons Chris after Leo's victory, and their last fight begins after Chris recognises the lives and autonomy Zero has stolen. (Chapters 1083, 1851–1854, and 1952–1958)
• Immortui: Immortui rescues Zero at the point of death and promises to restore his family in exchange for souls, a portal, and Erin's death. Zero serves him for centuries but retains enough suspicion to seek power against a possible betrayal. (Chapters 1938, 1960, and 1963–1964)
• Erin: Zero cooperates with Erin because their immediate interests align while planning to kill her for Immortui and her Qi. She anticipates the betrayal, kills him, and takes his accumulated power. (Chapters 1945–1964)

Items

No inventory item is configured for Zero in the supplied manifest.