The silent winds of the third realm howled across the barren lands where Fan Zhi now wandered, a traveler with no memory etched into others' hearts. Two years had passed since the sealing — two years since the day his powers erupted uncontrollably, leading to the deaths of those closest to him.
The girl who called him "brother"… gone.
The comrades who once stood beside him in battle… gone.
And now, even his name was a whisper scattered by the wind — forgotten by the world, buried by time, and entombed by guilt.
His footsteps made no sound as he walked along the cliff's edge. His presence was so ordinary that even the fabric of this new dimension seemed to ignore him. That was the curse of the "Ordinary Rank" — not weakness, but invisibility. His power was not gone; it slumbered, coiled like a sleeping dragon beneath his skin. But without emotions, without reason to awaken it, it remained sealed, along with the boy he once was.
A sudden gust carried a faint fragrance past him. Jasmine.
He froze.
His mind did not react, but somewhere deep — buried beneath emotionless layers — something stirred.
A memory.
It was not from the battlefield, not from the sealing, not even from the years of struggle. No, this memory was softer. Quieter.
A dark mall.
A frightened girl clinging to his sleeve.
Her trembling hand holding onto him as the world above them crumbled.
He hadn't used his powers then — couldn't. But he gave her something far more powerful: warmth.
A hug.
A calm voice.
A steady heartbeat in the chaos.
Ming Yue.
He hadn't even known her name back then. Just a girl caught in the collapse with him. But she had remembered.
Unlike the world. Unlike his so-called comrades. She remembered. And she searched.
But even she didn't know that after the sealing, he didn't die.
He vanished.
Not because he ran. No. He had waited for death. Waited to be ended. But he was unkillable — even the 10,000 Supreme Beings couldn't destroy him. They feared what he might become and instead sealed him to the lowest cultivation stage: "Ordinary Rank."
Then, the unknown force came.
Even the Supreme Beings couldn't stop it. One moment he was bound in chains of divine runes, the next — swallowed by a tear in space.
And now… here. In a dimension of silence. A forgotten space, drifting between worlds.
As he walked, a flicker of light shimmered above the valley below. For a brief moment, it took the shape of a girl — silver hair flowing, her eyes glowing with stars.
Not Ming Yue. But one of her.
Liuyue, the clone of clarity.
Fan Zhi didn't stop walking. Didn't react.
But deep inside — something cracked. Just a hairline fracture in the vast wall built around his soul.
---
Meanwhile, in the Celestial Azure Sect, far away in another world…
Ming Yue stood beneath the moonlight, her fingers tracing a thread of spiritual silk. Her gaze was calm, but her heart — it had not been at peace for years.
She had searched every sect, scoured forbidden libraries, and even stepped into forbidden realms, all to find a single trace of him.
Fan Zhi.
No one remembered him anymore. His name had been erased from the ancient mission scrolls. His records had vanished from the cultivation registries.
But she remembered.
She would always remember.
The warmth in the darkness.
The arms that shielded her.
The boy who had no reason to care… yet did.
She would find him.
Even if he was in another world.
Even if he no longer remembered her.
Even if he had no emotions left.
Because what they had — however fleeting — was real.
And real things never vanish.
Not truly.