That night, little Fu sat beside a quiet stream in the garden.
She reached out toward a colorful flower, trying to copy it — she wanted to gift it to her mother.
She never knew that moment would become her trap.
From the shadows emerged XuXu, her steps slow, like a bad dream come to life.
She raised her hand toward Fu, eyes gleaming with a sharp, sorrowful light.
"Forgive me, Fu… I need your power."
But before she could touch her, Huo Feng burst forward like a storm, seizing ShuShu's wrist with fury.
"You dare?! I won't let you!"
In that instant, the ground trembled—
and from the depths of the garden rose the Great Darkness,
a colossal shadow that devoured every trace of color around it.
Suo, the son of the noble clan,
rushed from his house, his eyes blazing with a rare light.
He saw the shadow lunging at Huo Feng and Fu—
without a second of hesitation, he threw himself before them.
The darkness pierced through his body.
He screamed, but his body did not fall—
instead, it shone like a blazing flame, rising slowly into the sky.
Silence fell.
He had ascended—immortalized by his sacrifice.
WuXin followed next,
charging forward to protect Huo Feng with unwavering resolve.
He swung his sword, but the darkness was far greater than anything mortal.
It tore through him; his body trembled and fell.
Huo Feng knelt beside him, calling his name,
her trembling hands trying desperately to stop the bleeding.
Her heart shattered.
She wanted to protect everyone—XuXu, Fu, WuXin—
but everything unfolded like a flood, unstoppable, merciless.
When the darkness finally faded away,
only silence remained.
Fu had vanished.
XuXu was swallowed by the shadow.
Suo had ascended beyond the mortal realm.
WuXin lay wounded, still breathing.
Huo Feng sat weeping in the ruins, her voice hoarse, her eyes empty.
From the distance came Revered Bi Hua,
his gaze calm, untouched by shock.
He looked at the scene and spoke in a deep, echoing voice:
"The trial is not over…
A gate has opened—
and the journey now begins."
The revered Bi Hua sat beneath the white tree,
its falling leaves glimmering like faint sparks of light.
He watched the wounds that had exhausted WuXin's body,
dark stains of blood marking the ground like a map of sorrow.
Huo Feng knelt beside him, trembling,
her hands clutching his as if afraid he would vanish like light at dawn.
She lifted her tear-streaked eyes and whispered:
"Master… tell me, what should I do?
His wounds won't heal… everything I've learned is useless!"
Bi Hua pressed his eyelids together, listening to some distant echo, then spoke in a deep voice that weighed down the air:
"Not every medicine is made from herbs, girl…
Sometimes, the cure flows in the blood itself."
Huo Feng stared, bewildered.
Her master Bi Hua sighed, as if summoning memories buried centuries ago:
"Hundreds of years before the Earth's time,
the Celestial Realm faced an attack that is still remembered.
The Monster King sought the blood of the Tree of Life,
the blood that grants immortality and fertility.
And on the other side, the Shadow King coveted the forbidden spell… the Spell of Duplication.
That night, the blood of Heaven met the shadows of Earth,
and your father, Jin Hai, fell protecting the remnants of our light."
Huo Feng gasped, a shudder opening an old wound in her heart:
"Father… that night…"
Bi Hua interrupted, eyes seeing far beyond the present:
"Your blood, Huo Feng, is no ordinary blood.
The essence of the Tree of Life flows within you.
If you wish to save WuShen, you must feed him with it."
She recoiled, panic twisting her heart.
She looked at WuXin's bloodied lips, then at her trembling fingers.
She knew what Bi Hua would not say aloud:
Her blood carried the light of the Tree,
but her body… her body was forged from the ashes of the magical furnace.
She was a mixture of life and destruction,
of creation and burning.
"My blood… if it carries the Tree's essence,
what about the body that holds it?
Will it burn him instead of saving him?"
Bi Hua smiled faintly, a mysterious smile full of fate's cunning:
"Your blood can be either his doom… or his salvation.
The choice is yours, the outcome beyond my hands."
She clenched her teeth, then pricked her palm with her nail.
A droplet of blood appeared—not red like human blood,
but glowing with golden-green luminescence, like the morning dew of a celestial tree.
Slowly, she brought her hand to WuShen's lips,
her eyes brimming with tears and inner turmoil.
"If my blood holds the furnace's flame…
and within it, the breath of the Tree…
let Heaven decide what it keeps from both."
Then, she let the first droplet fall.