Subtitle: When vows sink into the bloodstream, silence itself becomes an omen.
The moment the mirror-light died, the entire Seventh Prince's Manor seemed to exhale its final breath—leaving only the echo of breaking glass suspended in the air like frozen raindrops. In that hollow silence, even the shadows seemed to hold their form too carefully, as if afraid to disturb the delicate balance between what had been shattered and what was yet to break.
The night was a pool of spilled ink as the carriage raced through the capital's back alleys, its path a frantic stitch through the city's dark seams. The urgent rhythm of wheels grinding against the cobblestones made the carriage tremble, as though fleeing the suffocating illusion they had just survived. Each jolt sent fresh tremors through Chu Hongying's body, a physical echo of the spiritual violence they had endured in the mirror hall.
Inside the carriage, Shen Yuzhu leaned against the wall, his face as pale as mourning paper. Each fragile cough tore at his wounds, blood blooming like winter poppies at the corner of his lips. In the flickering lantern light, his features seemed carved from moonlight and pain, the elegant lines of his face blurred by suffering. Chu Hongying tore a strip from her inner robe, her movements precise yet trembling as she staunched his bleeding. Her knuckles were split from blocking the mirror-images, their blood now mingling in silent covenant upon his chest—a darker, more intimate vow than any they had sworn with words.
Lu Wanning's fingers found his pulse, her voice hushed with dread. "Energy depleted, spirit hollowed out by the mirror array's backlash, entwined with the cold poison sleeping in his veins..." Her fingertips pressed deeper, seeking a rhythm that wasn't there, tracing the fragile thread of his life force as it wavered. "Time is slipping through his fingers. His very essence is being pulled into the abyss." She watched the shallow rise and fall of his chest, counting the spaces between breaths like a merchant tallying dwindling coins, knowing each one slipped closer to ruin.
Gu Changfeng's voice drifted through the carriage curtain, unnervingly calm, as if he had always known this road would lead to blood: "The tails are gone. We're safe for now." But his eyes, when they caught the moonlight through a gap in the curtains, held a strange, knowing darkness—as if he understood this was merely the eye of the storm, not its end.
Chu Hongying didn't answer. Her world had narrowed to the face before her, to the memory of how he had placed himself between her and the shattering glass without a moment's hesitation. The warmth of his blood on her cheek still burned, a brand more permanent than any mirror's mark. She remembered the exact curve of his lips as he spoke those final words in the hall, the way his eyes had held hers even as his body faltered.
"This time, let me protect you."
The words were a brand upon her soul, searing deeper than any physical wound. Now, as she held his chilling hand, she felt the weight of that promise in her bones—the terrible, beautiful burden of being worth someone's sacrifice. Her thumb moved unconsciously over his knuckles, tracing the delicate bones beneath the skin as if memorizing their shape.
At a secret safehouse in Returning Cloud Manor, the night deepened around them like a bruise. The place smelled of dust and dried herbs, of secrets kept too long in dark places.
Candlelight danced across the walls, painting restless shadows that seemed to watch them with ancient, knowing eyes. Chu Hongying wrung out a cloth, the water dripping like forgotten tears as she gently wiped the cold sweat from his brow. Her touch, usually so sure with a spear, now trembled with unfamiliar tenderness—the hands that could split a falling leaf in midair now fumbled with a simple cloth, undone by concern.
Lu Wanning monitored his fading energy channels, her expression grim. The air itself tasted of herbs and blood—a wound beyond any medicine she knew, a sickness that seemed to breathe in the spaces between moments. She pressed her fingers to his wrist again, feeling the irregular flutter beneath his skin like a trapped bird beating against its cage.
Then, the wind held its breath.
For a heartbeat, even the candle forgot to breathe, and an eerie silence fell upon the room—a silence so profound it seemed to have weight and texture, pressing against their skin like velvet.
A faint, ancient scent of medicine began to permeate the air—a memory made fragrance, haunting and familiar.
In the profound stillness, the wind returned with a whisper from the void, carrying a child's melody laced with frost:
"To open the door requires three locks,
One lock burns with blood-fire.
Two locks, the mirror knows me.
Three locks—"
The third line was torn away by the wind, devoured by the night before its secret could be spoken.
Chu Hongying's spear was in her hand before the echo faded, its metal cry sharp in the silence—a warrior's instinct sharper than any blade. On the bed, Shen Yuzhu convulsed, his unconscious whisper raw with terror: "That song... is the key's lament... it must not be sung again..." His hands clutched at empty air, grasping for something only he could see in the dark behind his eyelids.
The nursery rhyme vanished as suddenly as it came. The medicinal scent thickened into a presence, wrapping around them like invisible silk.
Chu Hongying turned. Beyond the door, an ancient medicine lantern swayed in the wind—and then the Medicine Elder stood within the room, as if she had always been there, her arrival as natural as moonlight finding its way through clouds.
"Still that same troubled energy," the woman said, her voice calm as deep water. "When it tangles, I must come to unravel it." She moved without sound, her feet seeming not to touch the floor, her presence both impossible and inevitable.
Chu Hongying's breath caught. "You... live?" The question felt foolish even as she asked it, but the sight of the ageless woman defied all logic.
The Medicine Elder's lips curved like a fading moon. "General, your words sound like a curse. The wind never stops; why would medicine ever end?" Her eyes, ancient as forest shadows, held a knowing amusement as she looked from Chu Hongying's bleeding hands to Shen Yuzhu's still form.
She moved to the bedside, her fingers finding Shen Yuzhu's wrist with the familiarity of one reading a well-loved book. After a moment, she sighed—a sound of centuries, carrying the weight of countless lives she had watched begin and end. "He walked outside fate's web, and now destiny has turned to bite its own tail." Her touch lingered, as if tracing the patterns of his suffering in the air above his skin.
Lu Wanning stared in awe, her medical training warring with wonder. "You are truly... the Medicine Elder?"
A dismissive wave, elegant and final. "Names are cages. But your hand with needles—I know its lineage." The acknowledgment was subtle but unmistakable, passing between them like a shared secret.
Chu Hongying stepped forward, her voice raw with a fear she would never admit in daylight. "Can you save him?"
"Save him?" The Medicine Elder's tone was flat as stone. "I can only lend him time. What he needs is a heartbeat more; what you seek is an ending. Whose obsession falters first will be the first to die." Her words were merciless in their truth, offering no comfort but the cold clarity of a mountain stream.
As she spoke, the mirror brand on Chu Hongying's hand flared with sudden heat—a pain both sharp and sweet, like a remembered promise.
The Medicine Elder's knowing smile returned, touching her eyes but not warming them. "What you carry is not just a mark, but a choice. Those who bow to fate will never open the true door; those who refuse... might just breach the impossible." She leaned closer, her voice dropping to a whisper that seemed to come from everywhere at once. "The question is not whether you believe in fate, but whether you believe in yourself enough to defy it."
Chu Hongying's gaze never wavered, though the weight of those words settled in her bones. "I decide what to believe." The declaration was quiet but absolute, forged in the fires of countless battles and this single, devastating night.
A spark of approval in the ancient eyes—the barest flicker, but unmistakable. "That is why I came back for you."
"The wind carries my message to fate—it owes you a choice."
A gust swept through the room, scattering the medicinal scent to dust, leaving only memory in its wake. Only the medicine lantern remained, its gentle light caressing Shen Yuzhu's pale features like a blessing, painting gold along the sharp line of his jaw.
In the deep quiet of the night, Chu Hongying kept her vigil. Moonlight streamed through the window like a silver river as she placed her palm against Shen Yuzhu's icy back, pouring her warmth into him. Their blood-oath marks glowed, twin strands of light weaving together in the dark—a visible manifestation of the bond that now connected them beyond mere words or promises.
Then the vision took her—
An endless darkness unfolded, bronze light pulsing in its depths like a sleeping heart.
It was not a door, but a breath—ancient, distant, yet humming in the marrow of her blood.
Her chest tightened, an invisible lock clicking shut around her heart, both prison and protection.
In that moment, she understood: something was stirring within her, waking from a long sleep, and its awakening would change everything.
She looked down at Shen Yuzhu's face, pale yet peaceful in repose, his features softened by shadows and suffering. The usual sharp intelligence in his eyes was hidden away, leaving only the vulnerable man beneath—the one who calculated risks yet threw himself between her and danger without a second thought.
Leaning close, she whispered into the space between them, her voice barely a breath yet filled with the steel of vows:
"If this life, this fate, is the price to unlock destiny's seal... then I will be the one to turn the key."
She sat in the growing dawn, her fingers tracing the warm brand on her hand—a permanent reminder of choices made and choices yet to come.
Shen Yuzhu's breathing had steadied, a soft tide in the quiet room, each breath a small victory against the darkness waiting to claim him.
Beyond the window, the horizon bled crimson, daybreak painting the sky in wounds and wonders, the night's violence giving way to morning's fragile peace.
"If the price is me—so be it."
The words were not resignation, but acceptance—the difference between being broken by fate and choosing to break oneself upon it for something greater.
The wind swept over the rooftop, carrying away the night's last breath, and in the stillness that followed, something new began.