The Bell Coffin shook like a giant heart that hated to beat.
Inside, Qi Shan Wei stood over the three-layer knot ring—JUDGMENT, SILENCE, RETURN—his Heavenpiercer Ruler resting on the writing like a judge's finger on a death sentence. His silver hair moved only a little, even as the coffin world trembled, because the air itself was scared to touch him.
Outside the coffin, Drakonix roared again.
The roar was not just sound. It was pressure. It was fire. It was a living command that said: mine.
A new crack opened on the coffin wall, thin as a needle, but bright with prismatic flame. Bell writing sizzled into black dust. The coffin tried to heal the crack. Drakonix's flame refused.
Qi Shan Wei watched the crack like a formation master watching the first ripple in a trap.
"One breath," the Witness had said.
One breath was not a lot.
But for Qi Shan Wei, one breath was enough to change a world.
He lifted the ruler.
He did not swing wildly. He did not shout.
He tapped the knot ring once.
The sound was soft, like metal kissing stone.
The coffin answered with a bell echo that tried to erase the tap. The walls brightened, tightening, crushing inward—like the coffin was angry that a mortal dared touch its clean-law spine.
Qi Shan Wei moved his hand and wrote a prismatic glyph directly on the word RETURN, using the blood line still warm on his shoulder. His blood did not drip. It drew.
The glyph was simple, sharp, and calm:
RETURN — CLAIMED.
The knot ring hissed.
The coffin tried to wipe the glyph away.
Qi Shan Wei's golden eyes cooled.
He pressed his palm down on the glyph and sent a thin stream of prismatic force into it—not a burst, not a show—just a steady emperor's pressure.
The bell writing trembled.
Then the word RETURN dimmed.
The knot loosened.
For the first time, the coffin world hesitated.
And in that hesitation, Qi Shan Wei stabbed.
Not the wall.
The knot.
The Heavenpiercer Ruler's tip pierced the three-layer ring like a needle through cloth. The rune-light on the ruler flared once with his heartbeat, and the knot ring cracked in a clean circle.
The Bell Coffin screamed without sound.
A slit of real space opened.
Not wide.
Not stable.
A thin doorway of air and dust and screaming battle—opening for a single breath.
Qi Shan Wei stepped into motion at once.
He did not rush like a desperate man.
He moved like a commander who already decided what must be saved.
Through the slit, he saw the ruin in one sharp snapshot.
Zhen stood in front of the cocoon like a broken tower, his armor plates peeled back, his barrier layers trembling like thin glass. Mei Yulan was on her knees, both hands glowing with life light, tears falling as she forced healing into cracks that did not want to close. Xuan Chi lay on the ground with frozen-law scars crawling across her skin and the stone around her, turning the battlefield into a cold grave map.
And beyond them, bell monks gathered their law symbols, trying to slam the world shut.
Above the dome, a court bell mark formed—huge, heavy, final—ready to crush the entire area like a stamp on paper.
Qi Shan Wei did not blink.
He thrust his left hand through the slit.
The coffin tried to bite his arm off with law pressure.
His prismatic aura tightened like armor.
His fingers reached the real air.
He grabbed it.
Not physically—he grabbed the space.
He drew a small formation circle in the air with two fingers, so fast it looked like a spark.
A lifeline formation.
A pull-line.
A "return rope" made of prismatic law.
The line shot across the ground toward Xuan Chi like a thin ray.
The moment it touched her, her body jerked.
Her frozen-law scars reacted violently, like a wounded beast seeing a hunter.
Ice lines flared, trying to freeze the prismatic rope.
Qi Shan Wei's eyes sharpened.
He sent a second line into the rope—warm spring life resonance, pulled from the bond mark he had planted with Mei Yulan.
Inside Mei Yulan's chest, that bond answered like a bell of its own.
Her eyes widened.
"Shan Wei…!" she whispered, voice cracking.
She did not hesitate. She pressed her palm to her heart and released a clean wave of life light into the bond.
Not a large wave.
A focused one.
A healer's perfect dose.
The life light ran along Shan Wei's prismatic rope and wrapped around Xuan Chi's frozen-law scars like warm cloth around a trembling child.
The ice stopped fighting for one heartbeat.
That was all Shan Wei needed.
He pulled.
Xuan Chi's body slid across the stone, dragged by the rope, her hair trailing like frost smoke. The bell monks saw it and screamed.
"Stop him!"
"Close the slit!"
"The prisoner is escaping!"
They slammed bell chains toward the opening.
Drakonix roared again—closer now, hotter, angrier.
The cocoon's shell split wider.
A full prismatic wing pushed out, not small anymore. It was huge for his size, edged with rainbow flame-feathers that burned without smoke. The wing spread like a royal banner.
And when Drakonix flapped once, the air itself screamed.
Contracts in the bell monks' hands caught fire.
Not normal fire.
Prismatic fire that hunted rules.
The black paper charms turned to ash before they could be thrown.
One monk stared at his burning contract and screamed, "It's burning the clause! That's impossible!"
Drakonix's golden-crimson eyes locked on the bell mark forming above the dome.
He opened his mouth.
A thin, focused breath of prismatic flame shot upward like a spear.
It struck the bell mark.
The mark did not explode.
It melted, like wax realizing it was never meant to face a sun.
The air filled with the smell of dead law.
But the bell monks did not run.
They panicked—and panic makes people cruel.
They turned their bell symbols toward the weakest point.
Toward Zhen.
Zhen's voice sounded, flat and calm, even as his chest core flickered.
"CORE INTEGRITY… ONE POINT NINE PERCENT."
Mei Yulan sobbed harder.
"Stop talking like that!" she cried. "Please!"
Zhen did not look at her like a person would. He looked like a guardian who only knew one truth.
"IF I STOP, MASTER DIES."
Then, for the first time, his voice shifted slightly—like an old machine learning a new word.
"UNACCEPTABLE."
He stepped forward.
His armor plates unfolded again, not into weapons, but into shields—layer after layer—forming a moving fortress shape around the cocoon, Mei Yulan, and the incoming rope line pulling Xuan Chi.
"IMPERIAL SHIELD MATRIX… THIRD LAYER," Zhen said.
The dome around them thickened.
Not just a barrier.
A living barrier that moved with them.
Bell chains slammed down.
They hit Zhen's shield.
The shield did not break.
Zhen did.
Cracks raced across his golden-black plates. His shoulders split with light. His chest core flickered like a dying star trying to stay alive out of pride.
Mei Yulan screamed, "No—!"
Zhen did not fall back.
He moved one step forward again and took the chains a second time.
The ground under his feet caved.
Still, he stood.
In the slit, Qi Shan Wei's eyes did not widen. He did not panic.
But something colder entered his gaze.
Not fear.
Decision.
He pulled harder.
Xuan Chi slid closer, breath shallow, eyes half-open.
Her lips moved.
No voice came.
But her eyes said it clearly: don't leave me.
Qi Shan Wei's voice was calm, low, and absolute.
"I won't."
He reached farther through the slit.
The coffin world screamed inside him, trying to slam shut.
He ignored the pain.
His fingers finally caught Xuan Chi's wrist.
The moment he touched her, the Hidden Awakening system reacted.
Not a full awakening.
Not yet.
But a near-awakening ripple.
Xuan Chi's frozen-law scars flared in a circle around her like a moon-shaped wound opening.
A pale moon shadow appeared behind her for a blink.
Then vanished.
The air froze.
Not just cold.
Frozen rule.
Even the bell writing on the dome hesitated.
One monk stumbled back, eyes wide.
"She's… she's freezing the law!"
Xuan Chi's body shook.
Her near-awakening was unstable.
If it completed like this, she could shatter from the inside.
Qi Shan Wei held her wrist firmly.
He did not squeeze like a frightened man.
He anchored her like an emperor placing a pillar into earth.
He sent a slow stream of prismatic force into her arm—balanced, steady, half-winter, half-spring.
He used Ling Xueyao's frost thread memory as a guide, and Mei Yulan's life resonance as support.
Cold to stabilize.
Warm to heal.
The frozen-law scars stopped spreading for one heartbeat.
Xuan Chi gasped.
Her eyes focused a little.
Tears froze at the corners.
"Leader…" she whispered, voice thin.
Qi Shan Wei pulled.
Xuan Chi's body slid through the slit.
Halfway.
Then the Court struck back.
The bell writing on the slit changed.
It was not just closing.
It was rewriting the doorway itself.
A giant bell symbol appeared inside the slit like a stamp coming down.
SEAL: FINAL.
The Witness inside the coffin lifted its hand, alarm flickering through its blur-face.
"This is the worse seal," it warned. "If it lands—"
Qi Shan Wei's voice stayed calm.
"It won't."
He did something simple.
He turned his ruler sideways.
And he wedged it into the slit like a bar through a door.
The Heavenpiercer Ruler's runes flared.
The slit screamed under pressure.
The bell stamp pressed down, trying to crush the ruler and close the opening.
The ruler did not break.
The ruler pulsed with Shan Wei's heartbeat like a beast answering its master.
The stamp trembled.
For one breath, the slit stayed open.
Outside, Zhen's core flickered harder.
"CORE INTEGRITY… ZERO POINT SIX."
A bell chain pierced through the third layer shield and stabbed into Zhen's side.
His body jerked.
Mei Yulan screamed again, and her life light surged, trying to close the wound.
Zhen's head turned slightly toward her.
His voice was quieter.
"DO NOT WASTE LIFE ENERGY ON ME."
Mei Yulan shook her head violently.
"You saved us! You saved him! You're not a tool!" she cried.
Zhen paused, like he was searching for a new answer.
Then he said, blunt and honest, "I AM NOT A TOOL."
He looked at the cocoon.
"I AM A WALL."
Then the wall broke further.
His chest core flickered into a strange state—white, thin, unstable.
A zero-point flicker.
A last defense mode that could save others… by destroying the self.
The bell monks felt it and panicked.
"He's going to self-burst!"
"Stop him!"
They threw a bell spear at his chest.
Zhen raised his arm and caught it.
The spear drilled into his forearm and kept pushing.
Zhen did not move.
He shoved it back.
Then he stepped forward again.
That one step shook the battlefield.
His voice rang like a verdict.
"PROTECT COCOON. PROTECT ALLIES. PROTECT MASTER."
The bell monks screamed as the third layer shield thickened again, powered by Zhen's own life core.
Qi Shan Wei pulled Xuan Chi the last distance.
Her body slid out of the slit and slammed into the ground beside Mei Yulan.
Mei Yulan instantly wrapped her arms around Xuan Chi, shaking.
"You're here," she sobbed. "You're here—thank heavens—"
Xuan Chi could not hug back. Her arms trembled too hard.
Her eyes lifted to the slit.
To Shan Wei's hand still reaching through.
Her lips moved again.
A silent promise.
I won't forget.
Qi Shan Wei did not answer with words.
He answered by turning his gaze to the battlefield like an emperor seeing the whole board at once.
He saw Yin Yuerin in the shadows, fighting masks.
He saw new masked elites arriving—Pavilion elites—moving with a strange calm.
And in their hands were blades wrapped in black contract light.
The brutal clause had activated.
KILL WITHOUT KARMIC DEBT.
One elite spoke, voice cold behind a shifting mask.
"Shadow Queen," he said to Yuerin. "Return, and the Court cannot punish us."
Yin Yuerin's eyes narrowed.
"So that's the trick," she murmured. "You want to murder like it never happened."
She lifted her hand.
Shadows behind her rose like curtains.
Her voice turned soft and dangerous.
"Then I'll make sure it happens," she whispered.
She vanished.
The elites struck.
Their karmaless blades cut through shadow bodies—
But this time, one blade met something real.
A shadow mask formed over Yin Yuerin's face for a single heartbeat.
Not full awakening.
A near-awakening pressure.
The elite's blade stopped in the air like it hit an invisible wall.
The elite stiffened.
His mask trembled.
Yin Yuerin's voice came from behind him, calm as poison.
"You can't avoid debt," she whispered. "You can only choose who you owe."
She tapped his mask.
The mask cracked.
The elite collapsed, not dead—empty-eyed, like his mind had been erased and rewritten.
The other elites stepped back.
For the first time, the Pavilion looked unsure.
That alone was terrifying.
Inside the slit, the Witness spoke urgently.
"Now," it said. "Leave. The breath ends."
Qi Shan Wei's eyes flicked once to Zhen.
Zhen was still standing.
But barely.
The zero-point flicker was spreading like white fire through his chest core.
If it completed, he would explode in a shield burst that could protect everyone… and end him.
Qi Shan Wei's face did not change.
But his voice became colder.
"Zhen," he said, not loud, not soft—command level.
Zhen's head turned slightly toward the slit.
"MASTER?"
Qi Shan Wei's eyes locked on him.
"Do not die," he said.
It was not a plea.
It was an order.
Zhen paused.
For a tiny moment, it looked like he did not know how to obey that order.
Then Mei Yulan shouted through tears, "Please! Listen to him! Please!"
Drakonix roared, furious, wings spreading wider, prismatic flames licking the bell dome like hungry stars.
The cocoon shook.
More shell broke away.
A claw emerged.
Sharp.
Royal.
Alive.
Drakonix's wing swept again, burning contract blades in the air. The Pavilion elites backed away from the flame, and even their karmaless clause started to blacken at the edges.
Drakonix's flames were not just fire.
They were a law that said: your paper means nothing to me.
Qi Shan Wei pulled his hand back through the slit.
The coffin tried to slam shut.
The bell stamp pushed harder.
The Heavenpiercer Ruler groaned under pressure—but stayed.
Qi Shan Wei reached into his chest and touched the consort thread mark.
Not the full bond.
Just the thread memory.
His fingers brushed the frost debt label in his mind.
LING XUEYAO — DEBT PAID.
His eyes narrowed.
He whispered one line, so quiet only fate could hear:
"I will collect you back."
Then he pushed his prismatic force into the ruler one last time and twisted.
The ruler snapped free of the slit like a sword pulled from a wound.
The slit began to close.
Fast.
Violent.
The bell stamp slammed down.
The opening vanished.
The Bell Coffin sealed shut again.
Outside, the battlefield shook.
But the coffin did not fully stabilize.
The crack Drakonix had burned into it still existed, faint and angry.
Qi Shan Wei stood inside the coffin again, alone with the Witness.
The Witness's blur-face flickered like it was losing certainty.
"You used one breath," it said. "You saved one."
Qi Shan Wei's gaze was cold.
"I saved the one who could not be replaced," he said. "Next, I break the coffin."
The Witness's voice dipped.
"If you break it wrong, the Court will rewrite you."
Qi Shan Wei's eyes did not blink.
"Then I rewrite them first."
The coffin wall suddenly changed.
A new line of bell script appeared where the crack had been.
Not the debt label.
Not the old mark.
A fresh verdict.
LING XUEYAO — COLLECTION BEGINS.
Qi Shan Wei stared at it.
The air inside the coffin turned heavier, like the world itself knew that something had just crossed a line.
The Witness whispered, almost afraid.
"They have moved."
Qi Shan Wei's voice stayed calm.
But the calm now felt like the silence before an emperor's war.
"Then so have I," he said.
And in the distance—far beyond the coffin, far beyond this ruin—somewhere cold and high, a frost moon trembled.
Ling Xueyao's chest tightened like a chain had just touched her heart.
Her eyes opened.
And the world around her turned slightly colder.
To be Continued
© Kishtika., 2025
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