The girl fled from Wu Xin and from his palace as if the very ground beneath her feet were set aflame. She could no longer bear the memory that pierced her chest like a thorn—the memory of his cruelty, his punishment, the terrifying moment when she had still been just a tiny whirl of wind circling him before taking her human form.
She ran with the weight of that darkness clinging to her, breathless, shaken, as though she had just escaped a nightmare that had hunted her for centuries. She wasn't merely afraid of him… she was afraid of the version of herself that memory awakened.
By the time she reached the old master, she was nearly collapsing—her eyes dim, her breaths sharp and broken, her whole being trembling beneath the burden of what she had relived. A heaviness shadowed her features, the kind that grows from wounds too old to bleed but too deep to forget.
Her knees gave way beneath her, and she fell before him as though the earth had drained her of all remaining strength.
The old man startled—his brows rising, his posture tightening with a sudden ripple of alarm. He leaned toward her, searching her face with worry. He did not understand what had happened, but something in her trembling unsettled him deeply. It was the same ache he had felt centuries ago, whenever that lost little spirit cried in her sleep.
She spoke between ragged breaths, the words stumbling in her throat as though refusing to leave it.
"Old man… let's leave now. Please… I don't want to stay here any longer."
He did not ask why.
He didn't need to.
The sorrow threading her voice was enough. He felt her fear—raw, shaking, overwhelming—and it pained him to see her so undone.
Without a word, he took her hand. In a whirl of wind and warmth, they rose into the sky and flew toward the highest peak of the Sacred Mountain—toward the "Dust Kingdom"… their land, where no one else existed but the two of them.
The summit embraced the clouds.
By night it drowned in mist, and by day it basked beneath golden sunlight that wove itself into shifting halos of magic. The stones glimmered with a faint pulse, as though remembering ancient secrets only the heavens could read.
There, upon that untouched summit, stood an ancient tree—stubborn against time, unbroken by the cruelty of humankind, its twisted trunk telling tales no mouth could utter. Its leaves danced coyly with the soft breeze yet slapped the wind with fierce defiance when it grew too bold.
Beneath its shade, the old master and Huo Feng settled. He then asked her to cast a concealment charm over them, so no one could find their whereabouts.
She looked at him, her wide eyes still full of lingering fear, and said quietly:
"But… can I really cast it? I've never learned how."
He answered with a calm certainty that wrapped around her like a warm cloak:
"If I can cast it, then surely you can. You became a reflection of me the very first day you stood before the furnace."
Time passed—long for Wu Xin, short for the girl.
He searched for her relentlessly, not merely to know why she had run, but because… he missed her. Perhaps more than he dared admit.
Meanwhile, she spent her days on the mountain's peak doing nothing of value—playing, laughing, napping on branches like a lazy firefly whose only concerns were sunshine and sleep.
The old master tried to push her toward training, to sharpen her talent—whatever it might be—but she always slipped away with the mischievous innocence of a child.
Even he did not know what she was.
He knew nothing of her lineage, her story, or what had happened to her before she had been sealed in the furnace five hundred years ago.
All he had was a memory—a vision from thousands of years back, when he had still been Emperor of the Heavenly Kingdom. He had been resting on this very mountain, suspended between wakefulness and dream, when a wandering spirit appeared before him: exhausted, fractured, alone. She wept with the ache of being lost… and of remembering nothing at all.
She had approached him trembling, begging softly:
"Protect me… please."
He asked her gently:
"And from what shall I protect you, poor thing?"
She had whispered:
"I don't know… perhaps from the betrayal of those I loved… or from enemies who seek my end… or maybe from both."
Then her voice grew thinner, more fragile:
"But tell me… can you protect me from myself? I fear I am the villain in my previous life. Could you… change my fate in the next?"
The emperor fell silent, torn between fear for her—
and fear of her.
He wished to answer, but she interrupted softly:
"Not yet. Wait until I burn in the furnace. Only then decide. Either protect me from my own darkness… and let me perish.
Or protect me by guiding me… and let me become the darkness itself."
Then she vanished—like a fading light—yet the memory of her shone forever within him like a solitary star in a forgotten sky.
And now… centuries later… she followed him everywhere like a small pup, mimicking his movements in secret, never disobeying a single instruction.
Years passed, indistinguishable from one another. Her abilities did not improve, as if she were stubbornly freezing time itself—too afraid to open a new chapter.
Perhaps she feared something she could not name.
Perhaps stepping forward meant facing a destiny waiting with open jaws.
So she chose stillness… chose decline before the rise.
One day, she sensed someone approaching their sanctuary—someone dangerous.
It was that masked man… the enemy who had once tried to kill the old master.
Her hatred for him ran deep.
She told the old master, and he wondered uneasily:
"What could bring him here after all these years? What does he seek?"
At last, the masked figure arrived.
He stood before them, his cloak shifting like silent storm clouds, his mask reflecting a cold, unreadable darkness. His piercing eyes fixed on them without blinking.
Huo Feng asked, her voice as cold as winter steel:
"What are you doing here? And how did you bypass the concealment charm?"
He replied with maddening calm, his gaze locked onto hers:
"Why such hostility? Am I not allowed to visit an old friend?"
The old master stepped forward, speaking with harsh firmness:
"I see no friend of yours here. State your purpose."
The masked man continued provoking, his tone soaked in sly arrogance:
"Why such anger? Am I not entitled to reclaim what belongs to me?"
The master tightened his stance, trying subtly to shield the girl behind him:
"You searched for it once in the furnace and found nothing. Why pursue me still?"
The masked man smirked beneath his mask, his voice turning sharp:
"I am not pursuing you…
I am hunting for my enchantment. Release her—
or I will finish the task of killing you this time."