Night came slow to Cloudveil.
The embers had died down, but the smoke still lingered—thick in Yanlong's lungs, heavier than the weight of the dead girl's body still lying beneath the blackened tree.
He hadn't moved.
Not since she left.
The girl in white.
The one whose silence felt like a sword between his ribs.
The one who looked at him like he was a curse she'd been waiting her whole life to destroy.
And yet… she didn't strike.
---
He crouched beside the stream, scooping water in his hands. Steam hissed off his palms as the cold met his skin. His reflection twisted in the ripples—golden eyes, ragged hair, and flames flickering just beneath the surface of his throat.
He was supposed to be used to this by now.
Eighteen years, and his soul had never aged.
The Heavenly Flame didn't let him.
It just kept burning.
---
"Who was she…" he muttered aloud.
The words felt strange. Like asking a question the world had already answered—but he'd missed it.
That look in her eyes—it wasn't hatred born of one death. No. It ran deeper than that. As if her soul had carved his name into its bones and left it there to rot.
But I didn't know her.
Did I?
---
A gust of wind rattled the scorched branches overhead. One of the few remaining cherry blossoms dropped into the stream, drifting until it brushed the corner of something lodged in the shallows.
He knelt closer.
It was a shard of jade.
No larger than a thumb. Cracked down the middle. Glowing faintly beneath the moonlight like it had once been touched by divine hands.
He picked it up.
And the moment his fingers closed around it—
flame erupted behind his eyes.
---
A vision—not real, not quite memory.
But something.
---
A hand.
Small. Delicate.
Placing the jade pin into his palm.
"You'll lose it," a girl's voice whispered.
"Then I'll find it again," he heard himself say.
---
The image shattered.
Yanlong staggered back, the jade shard slipping from his grasp, clattering across the rocks.
His hands were shaking.
The air around him crackled.
"Who… are you?" he breathed again, to no one.
But her face burned behind his eyes.
And it was tearing him apart.
---
He rose slowly, the weight of the moment settling into his spine like old iron. He didn't care about the sect's disciples coming for revenge. Let them come. He wouldn't raise his blade again tonight.
He couldn't.
Not while that face still haunted him.
He turned toward the east ridge. Her aura had gone that way, silent and clean, like snow falling through fire.
I should leave.
I should forget.
But the jade shard had cut deeper than any sword.
And somewhere in his gut, where the flame of Heaven once lived pure—
He felt something other than wrath.
He felt regret.
And he hated it.
---
The path east was steep.
Twisting trails of ash clung to the wind like dying breath, scattering across scorched stone and fractured roots. Each step crunched underfoot, like walking over bones.
Yanlong moved slowly.
Not because he feared pursuit. He'd killed enough men in his youth to silence most sects. But because every step toward her presence—toward that girl—felt like wading through memory.
And he didn't trust his memory.
Not anymore.
---
A pair of starlings flew overhead. They weren't real. He could tell. Spiritual constructs, illusions of some outer ward watching over the sect ruins. Probably sent by the remaining elders to scout for survivors… or monsters.
He ignored them.
He wasn't a monster tonight.
He was just… lost.
---
A small shrine came into view. Half-buried in stone and fire-marked wood, it looked like it hadn't been touched in a hundred years. A stone fox lay cracked at its base. Ash blew through the prayer slips still fluttering between two broken columns.
And beside it—
She stood.
---
Lianxin hadn't heard his footsteps. Or if she had, she didn't turn.
Her back was to him. Her sleeves were torn, hair unbound, one shoulder smeared with blood and soot. She was kneeling by something—a patch of earth he couldn't see around the broken pillars.
He didn't call out.
He just watched.
And for the first time in years…
He didn't feel like the one holding power.
He felt like the one begging for it.
---
He could have left.
Turned and vanished into the trees like smoke. Let her bury whatever pain she carried and pretend none of it mattered.
But she did matter.
That was the terrifying part.
She mattered like a scar he'd forgotten about until it started bleeding again.
And something in his gut—beneath the flames, beneath the curse—wanted to know why.
---
"You shouldn't have followed me," she said suddenly.
No magic. No fury. Just quiet steel.
His throat tightened. "I didn't mean to."
Lianxin rose slowly, brushing dirt from her knees. The wind caught strands of her hair, fanning it like the tail of a dying comet. When she turned to face him, she didn't draw her blade.
But she didn't hide her hatred, either.
---
"Another disciple is dead," she said. "Her name was Fei Lan."
Yanlong swallowed hard. "I didn't know."
"I know," she replied.
And somehow, that hurt more.
---
"I'm not here to make excuses," he said after a pause. "I'm not even sure I deserve to speak."
Her eyes flared. "Then don't."
He should've obeyed.
But instead…
He took a single step forward.
"I saw your face once," he said, voice low. "In a vision. I don't know if it was a dream or something older. But you handed me a jade hairpin."
Lianxin didn't blink.
But her breath hitched. He saw it.
So did she.
---
"It was cracked down the center," he continued. "And you said I'd lose it."
"I did."
Her words froze the wind.
"You already lost it," she said, stepping toward him. "The first time you lit the sky red. The first time you destroyed the world I loved."
Yanlong flinched.
Not visibly.
But inside, something shattered.
---
"I don't remember," he said. "Not all of it. Maybe not even half. But when I look at you…"
He trailed off.
Lianxin's voice was colder than any sword. "When you look at me, you see the last thing you didn't kill."
"I see the only thing that makes me hesitate."
---
She drew her dagger.
Not with fury. Not with rage.
But with the calm of someone who had accepted death. His, hers—it didn't matter.
She held it to his throat.
And still, he didn't move.
Let her do it.
Let her finish what fate started.
But the blade trembled.
Just for a moment.
---
"Why don't you strike?" he asked.
"Because if I do…" Her voice cracked. "I'll become what you are."
---
He didn't touch her. He wouldn't dare. But his voice dropped to a whisper.
"You don't even know what I am."
She met his gaze—eyes like broken stars.
"No, Yanlong," she said.
"I know exactly what you are."
---
And just like that—
She stepped back.
Blade lowered.
Tears unshed.
And walked past him like he was already ash.
---
Yanlong stood alone in the shrine as the wind howled around the crumbling stones.
He didn't turn. Didn't chase her.
He just stared at the space where she had been.
And wondered…
How do you burn something that still bleeds?
End of Chapter 2