He didn't bind my hands.
He didn't blindfold me.
He simply said, "Walk," and I followed.
Not because I had to.
Because I wanted to.
Murong Yan moved like a shadow given form — silent, precise, untouchable.
We left the estate, passed through a hidden gate in the mountain, and descended.
No torches.
No guards.
Just a narrow path carved into black stone, spiraling down like a serpent's coil.
The air grew colder.
The walls hummed — not with magic, but with memory.
And then, at the bottom —
a single chamber.
Round.
Empty.
Walls lined with mirrors.
Not glass.
Not silver.
Obsidian.
Each one tall, seamless, reflecting nothing — not even my face.
"This is the Mirror Prison," Murong Yan said, voice low. "No bars. No locks.
But no one who enters ever leaves… unless I allow it."
I stepped forward.
Touched one.
The surface rippled.
And then —
it changed.
A woman in a tattered robe, kneeling in a pool of blood, whispering a poison formula as soldiers broke down the door.
Another — burned alive, screaming not in pain, but in laughter.
Another — drowning in a lake, her hands clutching a black lotus.
Another — stabbed by her own sister.
Another — poisoned by her lover.
Another — executed by the Azure Sect, her last word: "Again."
Six women.
Six deaths.
Six times the Poison Queen had been erased.
And now, the mirror showed me — standing here, in this chamber, with Murong Yan beside me.
I turned to him.
"You've done this before."
He didn't deny it.
"I've held six before you.
All claimed to be her.
All died."
His pale eye studied me.
"You're different."
"How?"
I stepped closer.
"Do I look less guilty? Less dangerous?
Or do I just remember better?"
"You used the Black Flame Invocation," he said.
"No one knows that formula unless they've lived it.
Unless they've burned with it."
He paused.
"The others… they lied.
You?
You smell like her."
I froze.
"What?"
"Poison Queens leave a trace," he said.
"Not in cultivation. Not in aura.
In scent.
Jasmine. Iron. And something… older.
Like ash from a fire that never went out."
He inhaled.
"That's you."
I didn't move.
Didn't speak.
Because he wasn't wrong.
Every life, I'd worn the same perfume — a blend of night-blooming jasmine and crushed ironroot, a scent that masked poisons.
A scent only I knew.
And he…
he remembered it.
Not from records.
Not from books.
From her.
From them.
He crossed the room, lit no flame — just pressed his palm to the central mirror.
It flared.
Not with images.
With sound.
A voice — soft, broken, familiar.
"You don't have to do this."
A woman — me, but not me — pleading.
"I love you. Even now. Even knowing what you are."
Silence.
Then, colder:
"Then burn me. But know this — I'll come back. And next time, I won't love you."
The recording ended.
I stared at him.
"You kept her voice."
"I keep them all," he said.
"Their deaths. Their lies. Their final words."
He turned.
"But hers… was the only one that haunted me."
"And now?" I said. "Will you erase me too?"
He stepped forward.
Close enough that I could see the crack in his blindfold.
Close enough to feel the heat of his breath.
"You're not her," he said.
"You're worse."
"Why?"
"Because she believed in love.
You?
You don't believe in anything."
His voice dropped.
"And that makes you free."
I laughed — low, sharp.
"Is that why you brought me here? To confess? To warn me?"
I tilted my head.
"Or did you bring me here because you're tired of being the executioner?"
He didn't answer.
But his hand twitched — like he wanted to reach for me.
Like he wanted to stop me.
Like he already knew he'd fail.
That night, I didn't sleep.
The mirrors showed nothing now — just darkness.
But I felt them.
Watching.
Waiting.
I sat in the center of the room, tracing the Book of Ash's formulas in the air with my finger.
Then — a whisper.
Not from the mirrors.
From the wall.
"Don't trust the blind eye.
He sees too much.
And loves deeper than he admits."
I stood.
Pressed my ear to the stone.
Silence.
But the scent lingered.
Jasmine. Iron. Ash.
Mei Lianhua.
She wasn't just a message.
She wasn't just a ghost.
She was here.
Or her echo was.
And she was warning me.
Not of Murong Yan.
But of myself.
Because the greatest danger wasn't being erased.
It was remembering how to feel.
Author Note:
They say the heart breaks once.
But I've had seven lifetimes of heartbreak.
And the worst one?
The one where I start hoping he'll choose me…
over his duty.
— Gopalakrishna