The second gate's groan echoed across the clan like a dying beast. Lin Feng moved alone through the outer perimeter, deliberately sloppy—letting his footsteps crunch leaves, allowing a shadow of his silhouette to flicker where Lin Hao's spies could see. Draw the eyes. Buy Yue Li and Xiao Qing time.
But the system's warning had already begun to unravel him.
The bloodline fragment pulsed hotter with every step, no longer content with fragments. It flooded him.
And suddenly he wasn't in the night-shadowed grounds anymore.
He was six years old.
The small courtyard behind the outer residence smelled of jasmine and medicinal broth. His mother—Lin Mei—sat on the low wooden bench, pale blue robes faded from too many washings, hair pinned simply because she had no maids left. She was humming. The same lullaby she always sang when the pain in her meridians grew too sharp to hide.
*"Little phoenix, fly beyond the storm…
Even when the sky forgets your name…"*
Lin Feng (the child version) climbed into her lap, pressing his small hands to her too-warm forehead.
"Mother, you're sick again."
She smiled—gentle, heartbreakingly gentle—and smoothed his messy hair.
"It's nothing, Feng'er. Just the seasons changing."
But he had seen the blood in her handkerchief when she thought he wasn't looking.
In the memory, she told him stories that night. Real ones, not the polished clan tales.
She had not always been Lin Mei, discarded wife of a fallen branch.
Once, she had been Mei Lan of the distant Cloudveil Valley—a minor noble house known for its healers and spirit singers. She had met his father, Lin Jian, during a grand tournament when she was nineteen. He was the true heir then, brilliant, kind, already whispered to be the next clan patriarch.
They fell in love against every warning.
Her family begged her not to marry into the Lin Clan—too political, too ruthless. His father's own brothers plotted in the shadows, jealous of his talent.
But they married anyway.
For seven years it was almost beautiful.
Then Lin Jian died.
"Officially, a training accident," his mother whispered in the memory, voice trembling as she held the child Lin Feng. "But I found the poison in his meridians the same night. The same Shadow Orchid they later used on you."
She never told the clan. She swallowed the truth to protect her son—the last piece of the man she loved.
She stayed. Endured the sneers, the demotion to outer branch, the slow erosion of status. She raised Lin Feng alone, teaching him quiet strength, mercy, the songs that could soothe qi imbalances.
And when Lin Hao—half-brother born of a concubine—began his campaign of cruelty, she took the poison meant for her son.
Twice.
The first time she intercepted the tea. Drank it herself so Lin Feng wouldn't.
The second time… she was already too weak.
In the memory, her final night:
She lay on the thin mat, skin translucent, breath shallow. The elder with the vault ring—Elder Zhu, the clan's secret treasurer—had visited earlier under the guise of "checking on the widow."
Lin Feng (the adult, trapped in the vision) watched helplessly as the memory played.
Elder Zhu had leaned close to her ear while pretending to offer medicine.
"You should have stayed quiet, Mei Lan. Your husband knew too much about the coming gates. The Dominion Apocalypse was never meant for the weak. The Lin Clan will offer sacrifices… and you were always the perfect one. Quiet. Loving. Easy to erase."
His mother had smiled through the pain.
"For my son… I would erase myself a thousand times."
Then she turned her head toward the young Lin Feng hiding behind the screen.
"Feng'er… come here."
He crawled to her side.
She placed her cold hand on his cheek.
"Don't hate them too much. Hate blinds you to the people still worth saving. But if the day comes when you must choose… choose to live, my phoenix. Even if it means burning the sky."
Her last song was broken, voice cracking on every note.
The lullaby faded into silence.
The memory shattered.
Lin Feng stumbled in the present, slamming one hand against a tree to stay upright. Tears—actual tears—streaked his face before he could stop them. The amplified guilt from the system penalty crashed over him like a tidal wave.
He had failed her.
In the first life he had been too weak to protect her.
In this life he was becoming the very monster she feared—consuming, cold, willing to sacrifice others to win.
The black thread inside him recoiled for the first time, as if even the Sovereign's remnant felt the weight of her final wish.
[Ding! Bloodline Resonance Overload]
[Hidden Memory Fully Unlocked: "Lin Mei's Lament"]
[New Revelation: Your mother carried a fragment of the Cloudveil Valley's ancient Spirit Song bloodline. It was this fragment—not the regression artifact alone—that awakened the Eternal Dominion System in your blood. She knew the apocalypse was coming. She tried to warn the clan elders in secret. They silenced her instead.]
[Consequence: Every time you suppress mercy or kindness, the Spirit Song fragment will inflict increasing emotional backlash. Ignore it long enough and it may reject the Sovereign Path entirely.]
Lin Feng dropped to one knee, chest heaving.
He fought it—clawed at the doubt, at the self-loathing.
*She wanted me to live. Not to become this.*
But the system answered coldly.
[Ding! Penalty Escalated: Emotional Overload now 3×. All romantic and protective bonds will mirror your mother's final pain until you resolve the contradiction in your path.]
Pain lanced through his heart—phantom, yet real. He felt what his mother felt in her last hours: the terror of leaving her child alone, the love so fierce it hurt more than the poison.
He gasped.
Footsteps approached—light, urgent.
Yue Li appeared from the shadows, sword drawn, face pale with worry. Xiao Qing trailed behind her, eyes wide.
"Lin Feng!" Yue Li dropped to her knees beside him, hands framing his face. "What's happening? You're crying—"
He tried to pull away. Couldn't.
The overload forced the truth out in broken pieces.
"My mother… she took the poison for me. Twice. She knew about the gates. She tried to save the clan and they killed her for it. And I'm becoming the thing she feared. I keep choosing revenge over… over people like you. Like Xiao Qing."
His voice cracked on her name.
Xiao Qing made a small sound and pressed her hands over her mouth, tears spilling instantly.
Yue Li's eyes filled too. She pulled him against her without hesitation, arms tight around his shoulders.
"Then stop choosing alone," she whispered fiercely, voice thick. "Let us help carry her wish. Let me."
For one long moment he let himself break—forehead against her collarbone, silent sobs shaking his frame while the system screamed warnings in his mind.
He was making another bad decision.
Letting them see this weakness.
Letting them in deeper.
But for the first time, the Spirit Song fragment inside him… quieted. Almost hummed.
[Ding! Temporary Resonance Balance Achieved — Spirit Song fragment soothed by genuine bond. Penalty reduced to 1.8× for 24 hours.]
Lin Feng pulled back just enough to look at Yue Li.
Her face was wet. Not just for him—for the mother she would never meet, for the boy who had lost everything twice.
"I'm scared I'll ruin you," he admitted, raw.
"Then ruin me gently," she answered. "And I'll ruin you back with hope."
Xiao Qing stepped closer—small, trembling—and placed her healer's hands over both of theirs.
"I'll sing for you one day," she said softly. "The way your mother did. So you remember the part of you she loved."
In the distance, Lin Hao's forces moved toward the gate zone—searching for the "running" trash.
But for a few stolen heartbeats, Lin Feng wasn't sovereign or trash.
He was just a son remembering his mother's song.
And the sky above the second gate tore wider, as if the heavens themselves were weeping with him.