In the capital city of Asterion, within the grounds of the Asura Clan mansion, Crystal lay on her bed. Maids and guards stood around her, their faces etched with concern as they watched the unconscious young miss. The room was quiet except for the soft rustle of fabric as people shifted their weight, the occasional whisper exchanged between worried servants.
After a while, Crystal's personal maid arrived. Her name was Mari, a woman in her mid-twenties with kind eyes and the efficient manner of someone who'd been serving the Asura family for years. Behind her came a healer, the same elderly physician who'd been summoned earlier, his expression serious as he approached the bed.
The healer moved to Crystal's side and reached for her wrist, his fingers finding the pulse point with practiced ease. He stood there for a long moment, eyes closed in concentration as he read what her body was telling him through that connection.
After a while, he sighed. It was a heavy sound, laden with concern and confusion. But before he could stand up, before he could deliver whatever diagnosis he'd formed, something happened.
Crystal's hand moved.
Just a twitch at first, fingers curling slightly. Then her eyes began to flutter beneath closed lids, the rapid movement suggesting consciousness returning.
It was shocking. The guards straightened from their relaxed positions. The maids gasped softly, hands flying to their mouths. Even the healer's eyes widened in surprise.
He had checked her pulse thoroughly, used all his skill to assess her condition. Yes, she had a pulse, her heart was beating. But he could tell something was fundamentally wrong with her body. There was a strange energy flowing through her meridians, something he didn't recognize, foreign and unsettling. And her cultivation pathways were blocked, completely sealed off as if something had deliberately shut them down.
A patient in that condition shouldn't be waking up. Not this quickly, not without extensive treatment first.
Yet here she was, eyelids fluttering open, pupils contracting as they adjusted to the morning light streaming through the window.
Crystal's eyes opened fully, and she looked around the room. Her gaze was unfocused at first, confused, as if she didn't quite understand what she was seeing or where she was.
The healer leaned forward, his professional concern overriding his surprise.
"Young miss, can you hear me?" he asked, his voice gentle but firm. "Do you know where you are? Can you tell me your name?"
Crystal's eyes continued to move, scanning faces, taking in details. Her expression was still blank, still processing.
"Young miss Crystal," the healer continued, checking her pulse again even as he spoke. "You've had an accident. You've been unconscious. How do you feel? Any pain? Dizziness?"
Her eyes gradually cleared, the confusion fading as whatever fog had been clouding her mind began to lift. Her gaze sharpened, focused, and the first thing she truly saw, the first face that registered with full clarity, was her maid Mari standing near the foot of the bed.
Mari. Her personal maid. Her friend, in the way that nobles and servants could be friends when they'd grown up together.
Mari, who was supposed to be dead.
Crystal's eyes went wide. Her mouth opened. And then she screamed.
"Ghost! Ghost!"
She scrambled backward on the bed, sheets tangling around her legs as she tried to get away. Her hand shot out, pointing at Mari with a shaking finger.
"Stay back! You're dead! You died!"
The room erupted into chaos. Maids gasped. Guards moved forward uncertainly, not sure if they should restrain their young miss or protect her from whatever threat she perceived.
Crystal continued scrambling, trying to get off the bed, trying to put distance between herself and the supposed ghost. In her panic, she grabbed one of the guards, a large man who looked completely bewildered, and tried to use him as a shield.
"Protect me!" she demanded, peering around his broad shoulder at Mari with terrified eyes. "Don't let the ghost get me!"
She then attempted to escape, still using the poor guard as cover, pushing him toward Mari while she backed toward the door. It was a very comedic scene to watch, this teenage noble girl treating a skilled warrior like a mobile wall while fleeing from her own maid.
But it also made everyone worry. Their expressions shifted from confusion to genuine concern. Had their young miss finally gone mad? The injury must have been worse than they thought. Perhaps her mind had been damaged somehow.
"My lady!" Mari stepped forward, her voice calm despite the chaos. "My lady, please, it's me. I'm not a ghost. I'm alive. You're safe."
Crystal stopped her awkward retreat, still half-hiding behind the confused guard, and stared at Mari with wide eyes. Was she? Alive? But she'd died. Crystal remembered it clearly. Or wait, no, that hadn't happened yet. Or had it happened? Time travel was confusing.
The other maids moved in, speaking in soothing tones, trying to calm their young miss down. They explained gently, patiently, as if speaking to a frightened child.
She had been at the new pavilion, they told her. It was a beautiful structure in the capital, recently completed, where nobles often gathered. Prince Noah had come to the capital, the second prince, the one all the young noble ladies were infatuated with.
Crystal had been there, they explained carefully. While trying to get his attention, to position herself where the prince would notice her, she'd had an accident. The details were unclear, but she'd been injured somehow and knocked out cold.
It was actually Prince Noah himself who had carried her back to the Asura mansion, they added, their voices taking on a dreamy quality. How romantic, how kind of him, to personally ensure her safety before leaving to return to his sect.
As Crystal sat on the bed listening, her expression shifted. It became indifferent, blank in a way that suggested she'd shut down emotionally. No one noticed this change except Mari, who knew her lady's expressions intimately, could read the subtle shifts in her face that others missed.
But this wasn't one of Crystal's normal expressions. This was something new, something cold and distant that made Mari's stomach clench with worry.
Crystal listened with a deadpan look on her face. But inside, it was like her emotions were about to erupt, a volcano building pressure beneath a thin crust of control. She felt like killing Noah. Not just once. Millions and millions of times. She wanted to kill him, revive him, and kill him again. Over and over until the universe itself grew tired of witnessing his deaths.
If you looked closely, if you were paying attention to more than just her face, you would notice the air around Crystal had grown cold. The temperature in the immediate space around her had dropped several degrees, frost beginning to form on the edge of the sheets near her hands.
Mari was looking at her lady carefully, and even though it was small, barely perceptible, she could sense it. A faint killing intent leaking from Crystal despite her blank expression, like poison seeping through cracks.
Crystal continued to listen as they finished their explanation, particularly focusing on the part where they said Noah had carried her. Her hands clenched the sheets tightly, knuckles going white.
After they finished speaking, Mari took control of the situation. She turned to the guards and most of the maids.
"Everyone out," she said firmly. "Our young miss needs rest and quiet, not a crowd staring at her. Go back to your duties."
The guards bowed and filed out. The maids curtsied and followed, though a few cast worried glances back at Crystal before leaving.
Mari then turned to the healer, who had been observing everything with a professional eye, no doubt forming his own theories about Crystal's mental state.
"Please check her pulse one more time," Mari requested.
The healer nodded and approached again. He took Crystal's wrist gently and checked her pulse, his brow furrowing as he concentrated. After a moment, he pulled out a small notebook and began writing.
"I'm prescribing some medicine," he said, speaking mostly to Mari since Crystal still seemed distant. "Herbs to help with the energy blockage and something to calm her spirit. Her qi pathways are sealed somehow, and that strange energy I mentioned is still present. I'll need to consult some texts, see if I can identify it."
He tore the page from his notebook and handed it to Mari, then bowed to Crystal even though she wasn't really looking at him.
"Rest well, young miss. I'll return tomorrow to check your progress."
With that, he left, closing the door softly behind him.
Mari moved to a cabinet where medicines were stored, preparing to put away the prescription to be filled later. Crystal remained sitting on the bed, but her eyes were moving now, looking around her room properly for the first time.
Her room. Her actual room. The one she'd grown up in, with its familiar furniture and decorations. The desk where she'd studied cultivation techniques. The weapon rack holding practice swords. The window overlooking the peach tree garden.
Her maid, Mari, was alive and moving about the room with familiar efficiency.
Crystal remembered everything. Mari was supposed to be dead. When Noah had destroyed the Asura Clan, Mari had died protecting her, buying her time to escape. Crystal had found her body later, and the grief had been crushing.
Even when the screen in that void had said she was going back in time, Crystal hadn't truly believed it. I mean, who would? Time travel was myth, legend, the stuff of ancient tales that nobody took seriously.
It had just been a small hope, a desperate wish formed in that blood world where she'd been trapped and alone. A hope that maybe, just maybe, she wasn't completely lost.
And now she had actually come back in time.
The feeling was unreal at best. Impossible. Wrong in a fundamental way, like reality had been broken and rearranged into a configuration that shouldn't exist.
Crystal looked around again, taking in every detail with fresh eyes. The morning sunlight. The sound of birds in the garden. The smell of incense burning in a corner holder. The weight of her body, young and healthy and alive.
Fresh tears began to well in her eyes. She could feel them building, a pressure behind her eyelids that grew until she couldn't hold them back anymore. Her eyes stung, and she blinked, which only made the tears spill over faster.
Mari turned around from the medicine cabinet, and what she saw made her freeze.
Crystal was looking at her with an expression Mari had never seen before. It was hope. Pure, desperate, overwhelming hope mixed with grief and joy and a hundred other emotions all tangled together. Tears were streaming down Crystal's face, but she was smiling through them.
"My lady?" Mari rushed back to the bed, genuinely alarmed now. "What's wrong? Are you in pain?"
Crystal smiled at her, and it was the most genuine smile Mari had ever seen on her lady's face. Tears were still falling, tracking down her cheeks and dripping onto her nightgown, but she didn't seem to notice or care.
She spoke in a small voice, almost too low to hear, barely more than a whisper:
"I have a second chance."