The arena had long since emptied, but the echoes of battle still clung to its stone walls like lingering ghosts. Li Fan sat at the edge of a pine grove near the southern terrace, his shirt stripped to the waist, exposing the tapestry of fresh wounds and bruises along his chest and arms. His hands, wrapped in rough bandages soaked with medicinal paste, trembled slightly as he dipped them into a basin of steaming herbal water.
The pain was dull now—a deep throb that spread from his cracked ribs to his shoulders and spine. Yet, beneath it, a strange energy pulsed gently. The Fourth Cauldron hummed in his dantian, as if savoring the battle it had just devoured.
From behind the trees, footsteps approached.
Li Fan didn't need to turn. He already knew the scent of blood and frost that clung to the figure.
"Come to finish what we started?" he asked, voice calm.
Yan Yue stepped from the shadows, his right arm bound tightly in linen and tied to his chest with a sling. His steps were light but not hesitant. The tiger mark across his cheek had reopened slightly, red against pale skin.
"I should," Yan Yue said coolly. "It's the tradition of my clan. When someone defeats you… you take their head so it never happens again."
Li Fan raised an eyebrow, then dipped a cloth into the basin and pressed it against his ribs. "You going to follow that tradition?"
A pause. Then Yan Yue sat cross-legged across from him, wincing slightly as his arm brushed the ground.
"No," he said after a moment. "Tradition is a chain forged by the dead. I don't follow ghosts anymore."
Li Fan glanced at him, intrigued.
For a while, neither of them spoke. The wind rustled through the pines, and the basin steamed between them like a silent offering to the mountain.
Finally, Yan Yue broke the silence.
"You should've killed me," he said, voice low. "In the arena. You had the chance."
Li Fan looked down at his blood-streaked hands, flexing the knuckles. "I didn't win to kill you. I won to prove I could."
Yan Yue snorted. "You're arrogant."
"So are you."
Another silence passed. Then Yan Yue reached into his robe and pulled out a small lacquer box. Inside it rested a single crimson pill, wrapped in delicate golden thread.
"Blood Essence Reforge Pill," he said, offering it. "Rare. Dangerous. It helps accelerate marrow regeneration—if your body doesn't explode first."
Li Fan took it without hesitation, examining the strange script engraved on the pill's surface. "Why give it to me?"
"Because next time," Yan Yue said with a faint grin, "I want to beat you at your best."
Li Fan laughed, the sound dry and sharp. "You're assuming there'll be a next time."
"Oh, there will be," Yan Yue said. "I don't care if I have to follow you into the immortal realms."
The two didn't shake hands. There was no need.
In that moment, something passed between them—not friendship, not hatred.
Rivalry.
Pure, burning rivalry.
And far above, atop the northern terrace, a figure in silver robes watched them through a crystal lens.
"She's forming bonds," whispered the Moon Sect envoy. "Good… That makes them easier to break."