The Seven stood like statues, motionless, cloaked in crimson so deep it seemed to bleed into the shadows. Each wore the same porcelain mask—blank, emotionless, expressionless—but each mask was cracked differently.
Seven assassins.
Seven sins the Empire never acknowledged.
Shen Liun didn't know their names.
But he knew their legend.
The Seven Shrouded Blades — once cultivators, once heroes, now nothing but weapons refined by imperial cruelty. They were said to kill without sound, strike without emotion, and vanish without trace.
And now they had come for him.
---
A ripple of heat shimmered around Liun as the ember flames swirled to protect him. His pulse was steady, but beneath the calm, rage stirred—not the wild anger of vengeance, but the still-burning fury of a soul refused justice.
Yan Wudi took a step forward, his saber humming softly.
"Blades forged from silence, huh?" he muttered. "Let's see if we can make them scream."
Ranyi raised her hands, ice forming into delicate razors that spun around her like a frozen halo.
The lead assassin moved.
Without warning. Without sound.
One moment he was there—
—The next, he was right behind Liun.
But Liun had seen the shift.
He turned, flames bursting from his palm just in time to clash with a blade of black glass. Sparks flew. The assassin didn't flinch. His mask remained still even as the force of Liun's strike cracked the stone beneath their feet.
The blade wasn't physical. It was emotional.
Pain. Grief. Sacrifice.
Liun's eyes narrowed.
"They're not using spirit energy."
Ranyi parried another strike, her breath frosting the air. "They're using regret."
---
All seven Blades moved as one—perfect coordination, no wasted motion. It was like fighting a memory, something already decided, something inevitable.
But Shen Liun no longer believed in inevitability.
He ducked, twisted, let a blade of sorrow pass an inch from his throat, then countered with a surge of fire that pulsed not just with spirit… but with resolve.
Cindervow answered him.
Aoshen's voice echoed faintly:
> "Burn not the flesh, but the bonds that chain you."
The flame turned from orange to pale silver.
The assassin closest to him hesitated.
And that one moment was enough.
Liun's fist struck the assassin in the chest, not with power—but with truth.
The mask cracked in half.
And the assassin froze.
Underneath the porcelain, a boy barely older than Liun stared at him. His eyes were wide. Tears welled silently, as though the years of emotion had been sealed beneath that shell.
Liun caught him before he fell.
"I know," he whispered. "I know what they made you become."
---
But there was no time to mourn.
The six remaining Blades surged forward with fury, their silence now a scream.
Yan Wudi and Ranyi moved in unison.
Ning'er darted between them, daggers dancing, cutting at weak points with precision. She wasn't the strongest, but she was the fastest—and the boldest.
"Cover Liun!" Ranyi shouted.
Liun didn't respond.
He had fallen into the flow now—not just of battle, but of memory. The embers of the Sunken Library responded to his will, circling him, feeding his flame.
Each ember he passed absorbed pain, translated regret, turned grief into fuel.
Each blow from the assassins made him burn brighter.
---
Another assassin lunged, blade of despair aimed straight at his heart.
Liun caught it—not with a weapon, but with bare hands. Fire surged, and he screamed—not in pain, but defiance.
"I've felt despair," he growled. "I was despair."
The blade cracked.
The assassin wavered.
And then he, too, crumbled—mask shattered, soul released.
---
The remaining Blades began to falter.
One turned on her own brother.
Another dropped their weapon entirely.
Whatever bond that had held them was weakening.
Ranyi trapped two in a spiral of ice and memory. Yan Wudi cleaved a third cleanly in half—saber singing with the weight of unspoken rage.
Finally, the last assassin fell to his knees before Shen Liun.
His mask slipped.
An old man's face. Wrinkled. Tired. Eyes hollow from too many lives taken.
He looked up at Liun and whispered:
> "Do not become what we became."
Liun nodded solemnly.
"I won't."
And then, with a final pulse of fire, the old man was gone—freed by death.
---
The chamber fell silent.
The embers around them flickered, then began to settle again—calmer, as though something broken had been healed.
Yan Wudi dropped his saber and exhaled hard. "You alright?"
Liun nodded slowly. "Yeah."
Ranyi stepped beside him, voice low. "They weren't assassins. Not really. Just… echoes. Tools of a system that forgot their names."
Liun clenched his fists.
"No more."
He looked at the embers that still floated, still whispered, still remembered.
"I'll carry them all. Their pain. Their truth. Their rage. Until the heavens see us again."
---
As they left the Sunken Library behind, the flames followed — no longer caged, no longer whispers.
But witnesses.
---