Mu Chen turned to leave.
But then, behind him, Patriarch Wen Huan's voice thundered once more:
"Leaving already…? Will you not even ask why your mother entrusted the secret of the hidden library to us? Or why we failed to protect her?"
The air shifted....cold, sharp, heavy. A storm seemed to gather overhead. Trees swayed violently in the sudden gusts, leaves rustling, carried by the roaring wind.
And though Mu Chen's body froze, his heart staggered. Wen Huan's words struck the very depths of him.....the depths he had always avoided facing. He remained rooted to the ground, unmoving.
The Patriarch stepped forward, his figure cutting across the path, blocking Mu Chen's way. Behind him, Wushi Taoyi also came forward, quietly taking her place beside her honored master, Hoi Ye Shi.
Wen Huan's intentions were not dark. He had no scheme to entrap Mu Chen in deceit. No.....he only sought to dispel the hatred and rage consuming him, to make him recognize the worth that lay buried within his own spirit.
The Patriarch drew a deep breath, as though lifting a great burden from a heart long weighed down. His words carried the heaviness of confession, the tone of a man unveiling a truth locked away for far too long.
"Years ago, when I first came to Cang Ming Yuan Academy, I met your mother. By the tradition of the White Dove Rite, we were paired as partners.
Your mother's heart… was calm and clear, like the surface of water. She longed to help the poor, though she herself had little wealth. But the deceit and treachery of that era… was far greater than even today.
It was then that she founded a faction...Shuang Ying, the Twin Shadows.
That faction was like a double-edged blade. We stole the ill-gotten riches of the wealthy and distributed them to the poor. By the creed of our faction, there would always be one principal master and one chosen disciple, known together as Shuang Ying.
Your mother.....Wey Zu Shen.....was my great master, my Tsenru. I was her Yan disciple. A disciple may never inherit the title of Tsenru, no matter how strong or skilled they may become. That is why you… became the Shu An of my daughter, Fushi Xuan Ten.
And as for your mother's suffering....do not think we did not try. We tried not once, but countless times to help her. We would go to her home under the guise of collecting debts, only so we might give her aid. But she always forced us away, drove us out… because she would never allow the secret of the hidden library to be exposed.
We knew the truth only so that we might guard it for you.
And then.....behind our backs, in the shadows of one night.....she was murdered.
Before her death, she entrusted this to me… to pass on to you."
From within his robes, Patriarch Wen Huan drew out a delicate ornament....a hairpiece, shimmering faintly in the light. He extended it forward, offering it to Mu Chen.
But Mu Chen stood like stone, paralyzed, incapable of moving. The weight of it all pressed too heavily upon him.
And then, all at once, his body gave way. He collapsed violently to the ground.
"Shu An!" Wushi Taoyi rushed forward immediately, catching him before his head struck the earth.
Wen Huan placed his palm upon Mu Chen, channeling a surge of his own strength into the young man's body. But it was futile. For when the wound is carved into the heart, no medicine applied to the skin can ever heal it.
The winds that had only moments before howled with sudden fury now rose to an even fiercer pitch. Clouds rolled over the sky, and the cold gusts turned into a sharp, biting gale....the kind that even chilled a man's breath.
Mu Chen had lost all strength. They propped him against a tree; his eyes were shut, his hair whipped by the wind as if the breeze itself tried to lift him. Nearby, Wushi Taoyi and Patriarch Wen Huan remained seated in stillness, eyes closed, utterly absorbed in their meditation. Around their bodies....and around Mu Chen's.....glowed a pale, white halo. The light shimmered like a ring of dawn: a dual-soul mantra-seal, a formation used to channel one person's power into another. That was precisely what Wen Huan and Wushi Taoyi were doing.
After a while, Mu Chen's eyes opened slowly. He felt empty, as if life had been hollowed from him....burdened more by the weight of his own emotions than by the Golden Threads that had bound him. When he looked, Wushi Taoyi and Wen Huan sat before him in calm silence. He had no strength left even to argue.
As his gaze fell upon his hand, he discovered the hair ornament....his mother's hairpiece.....nestled there. At once a strange illusion gripped him, and for a fleeting second he believed his mother had taken his hand. The phantom comfort broke as quickly as it came; reality snapped back and there was only the rustle of leaves. He did not notice when tears welled, when they streamed down his face, or when his grief showed itself.
He tried to stand, but his legs failed him and he collapsed. The sound snapped Wushi Taoyi and Wen Huan from their focus. Seeing him fall and then seated again, relief and life returned to their faces...he was alive, if still wrapped in anger.
Wen Huan looked at him with a softness that carried more pity than reproach. He spoke gently:
"Hoi Ye Shi.....you are the Shu An of this faction, and Wushi Taoyi is your Yan disciple. We know you bear great anger toward us, and that anger is not without cause. Yet you must also understand this: you hold no enmity toward Crown Prince Heng Yao Ren. In truth, your mother and the late queen's first wife were close friends. After her death, when the king married Queen Xiyen Zhaori'an, the decline of the realm began.
"You know as well as we do that Prince Heng Yao Ren is the son of the king's first wife. We suspect the Queen of foul play. Until now we have never seen him at any assembly. If Shui Han Lei.....her appointed heir...ascends the throne, the remaining realm will one day fall entirely. We cannot allow that to happen.
"We cannot openly accuse the Queen, so we must find the Prince quietly, and bring him here to Jinghua Yulian Mountain.....into Cang Ming Yuan Academy. And that task… none can undertake it but you."