The secluded cultivation chamber of the Floating Fortress was sealed with nine layers of
forbidden formations. Inside, Su Mei sat on a lotus of black ice. The Heartless Sword Sutra
floated before her, its pages turning on their own, whispering ancient, cruel truths into her mind.
Outside, Li Wei sat on the balcony of his apartment, watching the purple clouds churn. He held
a cup of cold tea. He didn't drink it. He was waiting for the axe to fall.
[System Alert: Beneficiary Cultivation Critical.] [Stage: Nascent Soul Peak -> Spirit
Severing.] [Method: The Severing of the Seven Emotions.] [Current Emotion being
severed: Nostalgia.]
Li Wei felt a sharp pain in his chest—phantom pain, echoed through the Soul Resonance. It
wasn't physical. It was the sensation of a photo album being thrown into a fire.
He closed his eyes and saw flashes of memories disappearing from the shared void: The smell
of the Golden Phoenix shop. The taste of the wedding wine. The sound of his laugh. They
weren't just being forgotten; they were being deleted to free up disk space for raw processing
power.
BOOM.
A pillar of gray light erupted from the central spire. It pierced the sky, turning the purple clouds
into swirling vortexes of monochrome ash.
The temperature in the fortress dropped instantly to a level where air turned liquid. Li Wei's
Body of the Golden Lotus flared, consuming his vitality to keep him from freezing instantly, but
he still fell out of his chair, shivering violently.
The door to the central spire blew open.
Su Mei walked out.
She did not look like a goddess anymore. Goddesses have majesty. She looked like a law of
physics. She was simply there, an absolute fact of the universe.
She walked—no, she materialized—onto the balcony where Li Wei lay shivering.
She looked down at him. Her eyes were no longer blue. They were gray. Flat, reflective, endless
gray mirrors.
"Su... Mei?" Li Wei chattered, his teeth clicking together.
She tilted her head. She observed him. She didn't offer a hand. She didn't warm the air.
"Spirit Severing," she said. Her voice had lost its melodic quality. It sounded like wind blowing
through a canyon. "I see it now. The threads."
She reached out and plucked at the air.
"Fear. Anger. Joy. Sorrow. They are just strings pulling the puppet. I have cut the strings."
She looked at Li Wei. She stared at him for a long, uncomfortable minute.
"Why do you not die?" she asked.
It wasn't a threat. It was a genuine scientific inquiry.
"I am... your husband," Li Wei whispered.
"That is a title," she dismissed. "I am looking at your biology. You are mortal. Your cells are
decaying. Yet, a force sustains you. You bleed gold. You do not age past thirty-nine. You are an
anomaly."
She crouched down, her face inches from his.
"I have severed my attachment to you, Li Wei. I look at you, and I feel... nothing. No warmth. No "But because I feel nothing, I can see clearly. You are not just a man. You are a construct. A
vessel."
Her gray eyes narrowed.
"Who made you? Why are you tethered to me?"
Li Wei's heart stopped. She was seeing through the System's veil. The Heartless Sword Sutra
granted the 'Eye of Truth'. She was beginning to see the strings of the System itself.
"I love you," Li Wei lied—or told the truth, he wasn't sure anymore. "That is the tether."
Su Mei stood up. She looked disappointed.
"Love. A chemical defect. If that is your answer, then you are truly broken."
She turned to the edge of the balcony.
"I am an Ancestor now. The Spirit Severing Realm. I can shake the foundations of this world. I
do not need a mascot anymore."
She didn't kill him. Killing required intent. Killing required a reason. To her, he wasn't worth the
effort of raising her hand.
"Go back to your room, Li Wei. You are disrupting the Feng Shui of my breakthrough."
She flew off into the gray sky to test her new powers.
Li Wei lay on the freezing balcony. He realized the System was right. She hadn't killed him
because she loved him. She hadn't killed him because she hated him. She hadn't killed him
because you don't kill a chair when you walk past it. You just ignore it.
He was safe. And he was completely erased.