That night, the skies rumbled loudly and sleep refused to visit Zhang Yue.
The heavy rain battered the tiled roofs of Ironwood Manor. Each drop drummed against the eaves. Thunder roared loudly across the heavens, shaking the windows from time to time. The lightning flashes briefly illuminated the room in cold white light before plunging it back into darkness.
Zhang Yue lay awake on her bed, staring at the wooden ceiling.
The blanket was warm.
The room was safe.
Yet her mind refused to rest.
The shrine in the Northern Forest, a sanctum where generations of Zhang family had prayed for the lost souls, had disappeared.
Wu Qian Jun was nowhere to be found.
No one in this era had even heard his name.
How's that even possible?
It was as though the deity who had thrown her into this absurd situation had vanished without a trace.
Without him returning home was nothing more than wishful thinking.
Zhang Yue wasn't merely lost anymore.
She was stranded.
Stranded in an ancient world where Spiritual Essence determined a person's worth, while she possessed none.
At first, she was optimistic and had believed this might be an opportunity.
A second chance.
A chance to rewrite her fate before tragedy ever found her.
But now that she learnt how this world works, the reality began to hit her.
She wasn't the heroine of a transmigration novel with no helpful system guiding her.
No mysterious old master waiting to teach her.
No convenient power waiting to fall into her lap.
And apparently...
No deity willing to explain why she had been dragged across twelve generations.
"Think, there must be a way."
Zhang Yue got out of her bed and sat in front of her small writing table.
She raised the intensity of the lantern light and opened a sheet of paper toward herself. She took the inkstone and rubbed it to create ink.
"Thank God. My calligraphy classes are finally useful." She muttered.
"If this really is transmigration, there has to be a pattern."
Zhang Yue dipped the brush into ink.
If years of binge-reading web novels had taught her anything, it was that impossible situations usually followed impossible rules.
She began writing.
RETURNING TO 2025
Plan A
Find Wu Qian Jun.
Result:
Failed.
She stared at the words before adding another line.
Plan B
Find another deity.
The Heavenly Father.
The Dragon Emperor.
Mother Nature.
Anyone willing to answer questions.
Result:
Unreliable.
She frowned.
There was no guarantee any of them even knew who she was.
Or cared.
She sighed and continued writing.
Plan C
Die.
The brush stopped moving.
"..."
That looked considerably more insane once it was written down.
"In those fictional stories, people usually transmigrate when they die...so...did I actually die?"
Zhang Yue searched her memories.
Rain.
The ancestral shrine.
A cup of ancient wine.
Wu Qian Jun.
Then...
Nothing.
She couldn't remember collapsing.
She couldn't remember pain.
Only darkness.
All of sudden a loud thunder roared across the sky, shaking Zhang Yue's thoughts.
Unless...
"Lightning?"
She slowly turned toward the rain-soaked window.
The sky flashed brilliant white.
Thunder followed a heartbeat later.
"Was I struck by lightning?"
She frowned. It did rain on the ancestral ceremony day..that too a thunderstorm.
"Did I really die that day?"
Another uncomfortable thought surfaced in Zhang Yue's mind.
Qing Yue, the young miss who belonged to Wing family got into a terrible accident. Every one is saying that it was an accident, what if it's not?
What if the original owner of this body had thrown herself from a cliff?
What if she had reached death's doorstep?
Was that why Zhang Yue had arrived?
Did one soul leave...so another could enter?
If that was true...
Then...
Would dying here send her back?
Or simply kill her?
Zhang Yue stared at the final line on the page and rewrote the words.
Plan C
Near-death... or death.
A bitter laugh escaped her lips.
"What a ridiculous plan."
She set the brush aside and leaned back against the bedpost.
Outside, lightning tore across the heavens once again.
Its pale light reflected in her dark eyes.
"Is this really a second chance?"
She whispered into the empty room. Her life was an absolute tragedy.
She wasn't afraid of dying.
She had already lost almost everything worth living for.
Her parents.Her child.Her career.Her home.
Even the future she had promised herself.
But that doesn't stop herself from trying to live a decent life. It was her way of penance.
The only reason she'd struggled these past weeks was because she'd believed she could still return to her timeline and live.
Now...
That hope was slipping away.
"No, I won't let it happen.'
The decision settled over Zhang Yue with frightening calm.
Without making a sound, Zhang Yue slipped out of her seat and eased the wooden door open.
Outside, the corridor was dimly lit by a single lantern.
Lianhua lay curled against the wall, asleep on nothing more than a folded blanket, one hand still resting near Zhang Yue's door.
She had fallen asleep while keeping watch.
Zhang Yue stopped in her tracks.
"Why?"
The girl was barely sixteen.
She could have slept somewhere warm.
Instead, she chose a cold stone floor simply because her master had been unwell.
A sharp pang of guilt pierced her chest.
"I'm sorry..."
Zhang Yue whispered so softly that even she barely heard it.
Then she stepped past Lianhua and walked carefully to the backyard of the Ironwood manor.
Due to the downpour, even if she makes a tiny noise, there is no way anyone could hear it .
The rain struck her the instant she left the shelter of the manor.
Within seconds, her clothes clung to her body.
The storm swallowed everything.
The wind.
The trees.
The world.
Zhang Yue walked into the middle of the courtyard until there was nothing above her except the raging heavens.
Tilting her face upward, she screamed.
"Wu Qian Jun!"
Thunder answered.
"I know you're listening!"
Another flash split the sky.
"You dragged me here! So come out! Take me back!"
Her voice cracked.
"I don't want this! I don't want another life!"
"I already had one and I already buried everyone I loved. What more do you want from me?"
Rain streamed down her face like tears.
"I don't care about changing fate anymore!"
"I don't care about awakening!"
"I don't care about this stupid world!"
"I just want to go home!"
Lightning exploded overhead.
She laughed through her tears.
"What? You send me here and now you're hiding?"
"You coward! If you wanted someone to save this world, you picked the wrong person!"
She screamed at the sky, with tear running down her cheeks.
"I don't want to live in this world, powerless. Not being able to save anyone. I don't want to see my loved ones die again."
A sob tore from her throat.
"So send me back..." Zhang Yue clasped her palms together and prayed,
"Please, please...let me die. Take me away."
Her cries disappeared in the downpour.
Only rain.
Only thunder.
No deity answered.
No miracle came.
Only the endless storm.
"What are you doing?"
A pair of powerful hands seized Zhang Yue's shoulders and pulled her backward.
She stumbled straight into someone's embrace.
"Uncle..." Zhang Yue uttered in absolute disbelief.
Zhang Jun stood before her, drenched from head to toe, breathing hard as though he had run across the entire estate.
His face was pale.
Not with anger.
With terror.
His fingers trembled around her shoulders as he spoke.
"Are you trying to throw your life away again?"
Zhang Yue lowered her head.
She couldn't tell him that she was trying out a method to cross the timelines.
That silence was answer enough.
Zhang Jun's expression broke.
"Why?"
His voice cracked beneath the rain.
"Why are you so desperate? What is this power you keep talking about? And who..who is Wu Qian Jun?"
Zhang Yue opened her mouth.
"He's..."
Another clap of thunder drowned the words.
Zhang Jun closed his eyes for a moment before pulling her into a fierce embrace.
"I already watched my mother die. I buried my sister."
His voice shook against her hair.
"Don't make me bury you too."
Something inside Zhang Yue finally shattered.
She didn't cry.
She simply stood there, frozen in his arms, unable to tell whether the warmth on her face came from rain or tears.
By then, the manor had awakened.
Lanterns bloomed one after another along the corridors.
Servants rushed into the courtyard, startled by the commotion.
Lianhua arrived barefoot, her face white with panic.
"You... Young Miss..." She has already started crying.
Without asking questions, the maids hurried forward and wrapped thick quilts around Zhang Yue's soaked body.
No one spoke.
No one dared.
They only looked at the young mistress standing motionless beneath the storm, held tightly by the uncle who feared losing the last member of his family.
For the first time since arriving in this era...
Zhang Yue realized that while she had been longing for the family she had lost
Someone in this world had already begun fearing the thought of losing her.