That was him in the previous life.
In this life, his appearance looked quite different at first glance, altered by the vagaries of rebirth, but if examined carefully, many familiar traces could still be recognized beneath the surface.
"I wonder whether Senior Qingtu is still alive…"
As for Clarice… she was a short-lived species. Under normal circumstances, she could not possibly have lived into his current era.
Rrakavasha did not think deeply about it, nor did he ever intend to search for them or chase ghosts from another lifetime. It was merely a passing sentiment, a momentary acknowledgment.
People must move forward. Whether regrets or beauty, the past should remain in the past, right where it belongs.
He retrieved a small sachet from his jade storage, the fabric still impossibly soft despite the years. Before his eyes appeared the smiling expression of the girl, her warmth preserved in memory like pressed flowers.
In his mind echoed the question Clarice had once asked, her voice still clear after all this time:
"If I were about to die, would you be willing to remember me as much as possible?"
His answer back was genuine, yet it hadn't been a solemn promise, nor had it carried much weight beyond simple kindness.
After all, their relationship had never gone beyond friendship, never crossed that threshold.
But… the tenderness and warmth she'd given him before his death was enough to be remembered forever, etched into something deeper than mere recollection.
"There was once a gentle girl named Clarice who gave me a hug." His voice was soft, speaking to empty air. "I will always remember that warmth and remember her."
This was his belated, formal reply across the long passage of time, an answer given centuries too late.
Putting away the sachet carefully, a zhongruan appeared in his hands, summoned from his storage.
The wood was deep-colored and finely crafted, its curves elegant despite obvious age.
Among the items he'd obtained in his previous life, only this instrument held no memory attached to it, no emotional resonance.
Perhaps it was tied to unpleasant experiences he'd chosen to erase, so the memory had not carried over into this life through the reincarnation system.
"…Forget it."
Recalling the past only increased his sorrow, opened wounds that never quite healed. Its blurred and incomplete edges were equally uncomfortable, like trying to grasp smoke.
Thinking about how the Xianzhou's Mara also had countless connections with memory made it even worse, and turned speculation into something approaching dread.
For hundreds of years after retiring, Rrakavasha had never stopped secretly researching Mara and the power of Abundance, working in the shadows.
Relying on biological and mnemonic knowledge accumulated from his previous life, he'd achieved certain results that would have shocked the Alchemy Commission.
Yet such behavior was dangerously sensitive in the Xianzhou Alliance. If the Ten Lords Commission learned of it, judges would surely invite him for "questioning" that might never end.
Physicians of the Alchemy Commission's Mara department possessed immunity and could legitimately research Mara and Abundance without fear of persecution.
But their goal was curing it, eradicating the curse entirely, unlike his.
Rrakavasha had never intended to cure Mara completely.
Why?
Because of a very real, very uncomfortable problem:
If the Xianzhou could completely cure Mara, how would life and death be defined anymore?
The consequences of immortality were already written in blood across the Alliance's history, lessons learned through catastrophe.
Infinite population growth, resource conflict, class division, endless turmoil and civil war. The Era of Three Calamities had proven what happened when lifespans were extended too far.
To discuss it openly would be more dangerous than any heresy.
Thus, even if Mara were solved completely, it would never be publicized, never announced to the masses.
People could tolerate truths hidden in darkness, secrets kept by the powerful. But not truths placed in the open for all to see.
Mara was an implicit balancing weight maintaining order, an unspoken consensus among those who truly understood.
Rrakavasha only delayed his mother's Mara rather than curing it for precisely this reason, walking a razor's edge.
Every gain has a loss. Some things must never be studied, no matter the temptation.
When he returned home, Rrayan was still awake, sitting by the window.
Seeing him enter calmly, her lips moved slightly, and confusion flashed in her eyes like distant lightning.
Rrakavasha sighed inwardly, recognizing the signs.
"It's almost midnight. Why aren't you asleep?" He kept his voice gentle, non-threatening. "Did you want to talk about something?"
His reminder seemed to clear her expression momentarily. She gestured for him to sit beside her.
"Rrakavasha… while you were meeting General Teng Xiao, I thought a lot about many things…" She paused, gathering strength. "You should go back to the Cloud Knights."
"…Mother?"
He froze, caught completely off guard. He knew what she meant, understood the weight behind those words.
She held his hand between both of hers, her grip still surprisingly strong.
"I've been losing focus lately, more and more often. I forget what I was thinking mid-sentence… my time is coming much faster than I had hoped…"
"Mara is the fate of long-lived species. I've lived to 995 and yet became the shackle binding you for half your life…"
"You don't need to comfort me by saying it was voluntary, that you chose this freely. Whether I spoke my fears or not, I influenced your choice simply by existing."
"If I had died in battle like your sister and father… would you still have retired?" The question hung heavy between them.
He understood her heart completely, yet didn't want her remaining years to be filled with guilt and self-recrimination.
As Xianzhou people neared Mara's final stages, buried negative emotions amplified exponentially, surfacing like poison.
Her face still looked barely twenty, frozen by longevity. But her eyes held centuries of weariness, the weight of too many losses.
"When I was small, your grandparents and uncle died on the battlefield…" Her voice grew distant, remembering.
"When I was young, your father and I swore atop piles of abomination corpses to destroy them all, every last one."
"At that time, my world only had your father. Later, I had you children, and everything changed."
"People change. Starting with your sister's birth, then when you were born… I realized something fundamental had shifted..."
"Whether I left you orphaned or you fought on battlefields near death constantly… both were equally cruel to you."
"After your sixth birthday, I discussed letting you choose your own path instead of forcing the Cloud Knights on you as tradition demanded."
"But your father insisted on ancestral rules, wouldn't budge an inch. We fought viciously… even physically at times…"
She tightened her grip on his hand until it almost hurt.
"I'd lost so much since childhood… I feared losing more, feared it consuming me entirely…"
"But I still lost your sister and father anyway… even though your father was stubborn and rigid beyond reason…"
"He was still the man I loved my whole life, flaws and all…"
"I was cowardly afterward. After the battle, I used not losing you again as an excuse and trapped you by my side for centuries…"
"I'm sorry to the ancestors, to your father's memory, and to you most of all."
"You were the only one in generations to grab a weapon during the child-grasping ceremony, the only one who seemed destined for this path."
"I didn't believe in fate before that, refused to. But your talent forced me to reconsider everything."
"For centuries, no descendant was summoned back to service. Now you're nearly six hundred, and the General personally visits, breaks protocol."
"I can feel something big coming, some disaster looming. I can't selfishly lock you up anymore, not when the Alliance might need you."
Rrakavasha held her hand firmly, anchoring them both.
"If one cannot protect a single home, how can one protect the lights of ten thousand homes?"
His voice was quiet but steady. "If protecting ten thousand homes costs one home, someone will always have to sacrifice. That's the cruel arithmetic of war."
Tears shimmered in her eyes, threatening to spill over.
"This… is our family's silent choice throughout history… unwilling, yet resolute. They were all unwilling heroes who never wanted glory."
"Rrakavasha, I don't want you to be a hero, don't want statues built in your name. But I also don't want our two-thousand-year honor tarnished because of my selfishness."
Feeling her warmth, the trembling in her fingers, his emotions surged like a tidal wave.
"…I understand, Mother."
After a moment, he smiled gently, trying to ease her burden.
He had always understood this moment would come eventually.
But he was only human in the end.
Even Xianzhou generals died helplessly when their time came. How could he be different, special, exempt?
He had no grand ambition burning in his chest, no desire to be remembered by history.
He only wanted to protect his mother and his home for as long as possible.
That was all he'd ever wanted.
Mother… even if you never said it aloud, I was always destined to let the family's heroism fade into quiet obscurity.
Because my original reason for joining the army was never, truly never..
...the Xianzhou Alliance itself.
If the day comes when I die on the battlefield, sword in hand and blood on the snow, I too will be what you called…
An unwilling hero.