The world beyond the mountains was like a graveyard devoid of color.
Wind howled through the ravine, carrying dust that tasted of iron. The banners of the Crimson Court had long disappeared behind us, and the road ahead wound through black cliffs veined with ash. Even the sky seemed bruised, a heavy violet bleeding into the gray.
We reached the border fortress at dusk. It wasn't a castle anymore. The walls leaned like exhausted men, half-swallowed by sand. The watchtowers stood hollow, their bells rusted silent.
Ya Zhen dismounted first. "Welcome to the edge of the Empire," she said softly. "Where the court hides what it can't explain."
Inside, soldiers moved like shadows. Their armor bore no insignia, only red lacquer smudged with soot. Smoke drifted from the inner yards, not from kitchens, but from the forges that burned day and night. The air pulsed faintly with qi, sharp and metallic, the same energy I'd felt around the weapon cores.
A sentry guided us to our quarters that were built into the fortress wall. The damp, windowless, room smelled of mildew and stone. Only one candle and one mat present for each of us.
Ji Ming dropped his pack with a dull thud. "So this is exile."
"It's more like a vault," I said. "A place for secrets to decay."
He turned, faint amusement tugging at his mouth. "Still poetic, even now."
"I talk so I don't have to listen," I admitted.
"To what?"
"The silence." My voice hitting the emptiness around us.
He didn't answer. The silence stretched between us until the candle wavered.
Later, Ya Zhen summoned us to the lower hall. The light came from oil lamps set into the floor, making every face glow from below like specters. A table stood at the center, covered with blueprints.
"This," she said, pointing to the sketches, "is the Emperor's border project. They call it The Mirror Forge."
The drawings showed circles of runes surrounding crystal pylons — each one shaped like the talisman marks used to regulate qi flow. But in the center of every design were two silhouettes bound by threads of light.
"A couple?" Ji Ming said quietly.
Ya Zhen nodded. "The throne believes a pair linked by resonance can channel divine energy. They've tried with soldiers, monks, even prisoners. None survived."
"So we're next," I murmured.
Her eyes met mine. "Unless we find out what kills them first."
She handed me a folded page of medical notes in a precise, unfamiliar script. Nervous system degradation. Qi inversion. Spiritual collapse.
The candlelight trembled across the ink. "They're burning souls to make weapons," I said, my eyes wide.
Ya Zhen's voice was calm, but the tremor in it betrayed her. "And they even call it progress."
When the meeting ended, we stepped into the courtyard. The night had cleared, revealing a sky littered with stars that looked cold enough to cut.
Ji Ming's breath fogged in the air. "If she's right, we can't just leave."
"She's always right," I said. "And that's what terrifies me."
He glanced down at my hands, still shaking from reading the report, and without a word, took one between his palms. His touch was rough, warm from the forge's heat.
"Steady," he said.
The bond flickered like a pulse of silver light between our skin, brief and alive. I felt his heartbeat through the thread. It steadied mine before either of us pulled away.
The silence afterward wasn't empty anymore.
We sat by the outer fire pit, eating what apparently passed for stew, salted roots in a thin broth. Ya Zhen hadn't joined us; she was still below, studying the forge blueprints.
"She's risking her life," I said.
"So are we."
"Do you still believe in the sects?"
Ji Ming stared into the fire. "I used to. Duty, honor, the usual illusions. But once the court decided my faith was convenient, it stopped being mine."
He looked at me then. "What about you?"
"I believe in living," I said. "Everything else burns too easily."
For the first time since leaving the Court, he smiled… small, but real.
The bell tolled again somewhere beyond the fortress walls, low and broken. Wind rushed through the parapets, scattering embers. I thought of the note Ya Zhen had left us with before retreating underground: Listen for silence — it hides the truth better than lies.
When the bell stopped, the quiet that followed felt wrong. Too deep… expectant.
Ji Ming's hand went to his saber. "They're testing something," he whispered.
A faint vibration rolled through the ground it wasn't thunder, but qi discharge. The lamps along the walls flickered blue for an instant, then died.
In the dark, I heard Ya Zhen's voice echo up from the lower hall: "Get out of the courtyard… now!"
The air cracked open, light flaring from beneath the stone like a buried sun.
And as the ground split, I realized what the Emperor's weapon truly was: not something made by men, but something that had awakened beneath their feet.