The silver tear in the fabric of space hesitated for a tenth of a second before spitting out the cold air of the South and swallowing the warm breeze of the valley.
Mò Yán was the first to cross the distorted veil. The white‑haired young woman stepped onto the packed‑earth road of Qīngshān Village, walking humbly ahead and pulling the heavy leather reins of the four black horses. The immense beasts snorted, dragging the colossal carriage out of the rift with a dull thud of iron wheels against the uneven ground.
Behind the carriage, the spatial rift flickered.
Zhì Yuǎn crossed the boundary of reality, his black silk cloak fluttering with the wind of the portal that closed with a mute snap behind him. He walked on the packed earth, his steps silent and absolute. Beside him, hand in hand with their husband, came Yù Qíng and Yù Méi.
Mò Yán, still holding the reins of the startled horses, blinked slowly. The diplomat's scarlet irises swept across the landscape before her. There were no mountains piercing the heavens like spears. There were no iron‑chain bridges swinging over abysses, nor palaces of polished stone flaunting the millennial pride of ancient clans.
There was only a simple dirt road, flanked by rice paddies swaying in the afternoon sun, and rustic houses with thatched roofs of straw and clay. The air smelled of woodsmoke, crushed grass, and damp earth. It was the very definition of stagnant, peaceful mortality.
Mò Yán's rigorous mind was seized by an overwhelming, terrifying reverence.
This is his cradle, the snow‑haired young woman thought, her pale fingers tightening on the leather reins as her heart hammered against her ribs. The god who crushes space with a wave of his hand, the abyss that brought the leaders of the South to their knees in a pool of blood… was not forged in a palace of jade. He was born from clay. He walked on this common dust.
To Mò Yán, that humble village suddenly seemed more sacred than the Record Hall of her own sect. The warm wind that swayed the rice stalks carried the weight of the origin of the calamity she now blindly worshipped.
Behind the carriage, Yù Méi released Zhì Yuǎn's hand. The village wind tousled her radiant blonde hair.
Only a few weeks had passed since the day she had left on this same road, sitting on an old cart that creaked at every stone. But as she looked at the clay houses and the sea of bamboo rising majestically at the back of her family's lands, the younger sister felt as if she had lived millennia. She had left there as a broken girl, swallowed by carnivorous envy.
Now, the void in her chest had been filled by the fire of the man who had taken her. The world seemed incredibly small, bright, and welcoming.
Yù Méi broke into a wide, radiant smile, free from the shackles of bitterness.
"Mother! Father!" her melodious voice vibrated with infectious energy, echoing across the rice paddies and breaking the quiet routine of the afternoon.
Sū Huì came out of the main house's kitchen, drying her calloused hands on a cotton apron. The woman raised her eyes to the dirt road and froze. The straw basket she was carrying slipped from her fingers, falling to the ground with a muffled thud, vegetables rolling into the dust.
The old mother could not believe what she saw.
The girl approaching through the courtyard did not walk. She glided. Using the Floating Lotus Step her sister had taught her, Yù Méi's bare feet hovered exactly millimeters above the packed earth. The stunning golden silk dress with thigh‑high slits rippled around her, perfectly clean, its hem never touching the dirt of the ground. Her hair, once a soot‑stained blonde, now gleamed in a vibrant, pure gold, and her skin glowed like milky jade.
Is she an imperial noble? Sū Huì's mind failed, her eyes welling with shock. A goddess from legends?
"My girl?" Sū Huì whispered, her voice trembling, retreating half a step before the unattainable majesty of that woman who had her daughter's face.
Yù Méi dispelled the technique in mid‑air and landed softly on the wooden veranda, throwing herself into her mother's arms. The embrace was of millimeter tenderness; the girl's absurd vigor and lethal strength were now under absolute control, tenderly contained so as not to crush the fragile bones of the mortal matriarch.
"I'm back, Mother!" Yù Méi laughed, her face buried in the old woman's shoulder, inhaling the familiar scent of bread and firewood.
Yù Chéng, who had been in his office checking the coal mine records, hurried out to the veranda. The father's tired face lit up at seeing his youngest daughter safe and sound, but his attention was soon drawn to the entrance of the courtyard.
The immense black carriage entered the property, guided by the obedient steps of a stunning white‑haired woman. And walking just behind the vehicle came the two pillars of that family.
The contrast between the rustic earth floor and the presence of Zhì Yuǎn and Yù Qíng was overwhelming. The eldest daughter's navy‑blue dress flowed in the air as she too floated beside her husband. The cold lethargy and cosmic apathy Zhì Yuǎn displayed to the mortal world had evaporated; the man's unfathomable gaze now shone with a warm, silent, deeply affectionate light at the sight of his adoptive parents on the veranda.
"We are back, our father," Yù Qíng said, her bare feet finally touching the veranda's planks as she bowed her head in respect. Her voice was soft, devoid of any trace of the sadistic priestess who ruled the South. There, she was merely a daughter.
Yù Chéng descended the veranda steps and grasped Zhì Yuǎn's broad shoulders, the old miner's eyes moist with relief at seeing his son‑in‑law had kept his promise.
"I knew you would return whole," Yù Chéng murmured, his voice choked, gripping the protagonist's charcoal‑gray tunic.
Zhì Yuǎn nodded slowly, his large, calloused hand resting on his father‑in‑law's arm with unshakeable certainty.
Mò Yán, maintaining the invisible, strictly obedient posture of a servant, continued pulling the reins of the four massive horses. Without needing orders, the diplomat led the beasts and the monumental carriage toward the storage structures and stables of the Yù family, at the back of the property.
Zhì Yuǎn watched her movement from afar and turned back to Yù Chéng.
"The carriage, the horses, and the iron chest locked in the back of the wagon now belong to the family, Father," Zhì Yuǎn declared, his tone grave and calm. "There are enough gold bars to ensure the mine operates without the burden of imperial tributes and for you to live in abundance for generations. We will only take the leather sacks from the compartment before we leave."
Yù Chéng opened his mouth, stunned by the casualness with which an incalculable fortune capable of buying the empire was being discarded in front of his simple home.
While the commotion of arrival and Yù Méi's smiles filled the courtyard, Zhì Yuǎn and Yù Qíng exchanged a silent glance. The couple's expanded senses swept the main house in a fraction of a second. Something was missing from the painting of that nostalgia. A fundamental trace of the family portrait was absent.
Zhì Yuǎn's dark eyes rested on the wooden veranda. The rustic bench leaned against the pillar, where the old matriarch always sat to watch the horizon with that sharp gaze that seemed to see through time, was painfully empty. The silence of that seat weighed more than all the gold in the carriage.
Yù Qíng's smile faltered. The blue goddess gripped Zhì Yuǎn's hand tightly.
"Father," the eldest daughter's voice lowered, her black eyes fixing on the bench, a cold apprehension dominating her features. "Where is Grandmother?"
The laughter on Sū Huì's face vanished instantly, and the woman's hands released Yù Méi's shoulders. The younger sister, who had been radiating the euphoria of arrival, froze.
Yù Chéng followed the couple's gaze to the empty bench. The old man sighed deeply, the father's broad shoulders yielding under the burden of time that governed all living men except the three before him.
"She is gone," Yù Chéng answered, his voice hoarse and serene, laden with sad acceptance. "Four days after you left on the dirt road to Qīngshí."
An icy shiver of loss ran down Yù Méi's spine. The Brutal Blade felt a thick knot form in her throat, her vision blurring instantly.
"She felt no pain," Sū Huì hurried to explain, wiping her own tears on her apron. "In the last days before you left, she was growing quieter. She would just sit on the veranda and smile at the wind. That night, after we had tea, she lay down to sleep, and simply… her body shut down. Time collected its debt with the greatest peace heaven could grant."
Zhì Yuǎn remained in absolute silence. The lethargic apathy of his Inner Universe was torn by a deep, dense melancholy that flooded the blackness of his irises. Wisdom reminded him of the old woman who had been the first to see the spark in his orphaned eyes, the first to recognize that the adopted boy possessed something ancient in his soul. The only mortal in the village who understood, without needing words, that the sparks of eternity were awakening in those youths.
"The spark in your eyes has grown… Be careful. The fire that warms can also burn."
The torn echo of that ancient voice crossed Zhì Yuǎn's memory. His hand squeezed Yù Qíng's pale fingers firmly, anchoring his wife, offering her the unshakeable structure she needed not to collapse in the sudden grief of her own blood's mortality.
"Where does she rest?" Zhì Yuǎn asked, his baritone soft, overflowing with the respect of an undeniable mourning.
"She was buried next to my father," Yù Chéng answered, swallowing hard and nodding slightly toward the back of the property. "We prepared a simple headstone, as she wanted. It is at the back of the main house, more to the right… on the edges of the entrance to your bamboo grove."
Zhì Yuǎn nodded slowly. He took Yù Qíng by the hand, and Yù Méi followed in silence, her golden eyes moist, leaving their parents behind in the courtyard as they walked toward the dark grove. Mò Yán, emerging from the storage area after finishing locking and securing the carriage beasts, perceived the weight of the atmosphere instantly and followed at a polite, silent distance.
The walk to the eastern edge of the bamboo grove was filled only by the sound of dry leaves breaking underfoot. The wind blew between the green stalks, singing the same ancient, solitary song they had heard since childhood.
There, in the shade of the immense bamboos swaying peacefully, two modest headstones of dark stone stood side by side on the soft earth.
Yù Méi knelt abruptly, not caring about soiling the silk of her dress. She pressed her forehead against her grandmother's cold stone, letting tears fall silently onto the soil. She had returned whole, powerful, and loved, but the sorrow of the wise old woman who had always believed in her departure was a painful price.
Yù Qíng stopped before the grave, her black eyes fixed on the engraved letters. The priestess did not sob or slump her shoulders, but a solitary tear ran down her porcelain skin—a mute, heavy tribute to the oldest root of her own tree.
Zhì Yuǎn made no grand speeches. He bent his knees beside his two wives, his black silk cloak spreading over the damp earth and dry leaves of the bamboo grove. The man whose hands held the Laws of Destruction and Space rested his calloused fingers on top of the small mound of earth. He bowed his head in a solemn, deep reverence, honoring the mortal woman who had embraced him as her own blood.
There, in the nostalgic, icy silence of the grove where their cultivation had begun, the Universe and the Snow prostrated themselves before the memory of the root that had finally returned to the earth.
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