The night swallowed the Broken Peaks as Mo Lianyin and Zevian descended the northern path toward Yingshui Lake. The moonlight barely reached the narrow trail, and the wind hissed through the pines like a thousand whispered warnings.
Lianyin kept her steps steady, though the warmth of the bone mask fragment in her sleeve was growing. It pulsed against her skin with a rhythm too close to her heartbeat, as if it had burrowed into her veins.
Zevian walked ahead, his figure a pale shadow in the gloom. "Stay close. The lake's wards will try to turn you around before we reach the shore."
"I'm not easily led astray," she replied.
"That's what they all say."
They reached the edge of a cliff where the ground sloped sharply toward a valley veiled in silver mist. In the center, Yingshui Lake spread like a polished obsidian mirror, utterly still despite the wind.
No ripples. No waves. No life.
The surface reflected the stars with unnatural clarity, but Lianyin noticed one thing immediately—the reflection of the moon was missing.
"Why—"
"It's not missing," Zevian interrupted. "It's beneath the surface."
She turned to him. "The moon is above us."
"Here, the lake decides what the sky shows."
He didn't give her time to respond. With a flick of his wrist, he drew a narrow talisman from his sleeve and tossed it toward the shore. It caught fire midair, burning a deep blue before vanishing. The mist around the lake thickened, curling upward into a wall that shimmered like glass.
Zevian stepped forward and pressed his palm to the barrier. A circle of ancient runes flared under his hand. "Touch it," he said.
Lianyin hesitated, then laid her palm against the same spot. Cold flooded her arm instantly, biting into muscle and bone. The runes shifted, reconfiguring into a spiral that began to turn.
The lake moved.
Slowly, impossibly, the black surface drew inward, creating a depression in its center. The water did not splash or churn—it folded downward like silk being pulled through a ring, revealing a staircase made of shimmering light.
Lianyin's breath caught. "It's… breathing."
Zevian nodded once. "And it only inhales for those it accepts. Keep moving before it exhales."
They descended.
The steps carried them into an impossible space—the deeper they went, the brighter the light became, until it seemed they were walking through liquid moonlight. The surface of the lake now arched high above them like a translucent ceiling, holding back the weight of an entire world of water.
At the bottom lay a single structure: a black lotus carved from stone, its petals open around a glowing sphere suspended in the air. The sphere pulsed faintly with the same rhythm as the bone mask fragment in Lianyin's sleeve.
Zevian's voice was hushed. "The anchor."
She approached cautiously. The sphere's glow wasn't warm—it was sharp, almost metallic, and the closer she came, the more she felt the Severance Art within her stir like a predator scenting prey.
"This isn't just a blood anchor," she murmured. "It's… alive."
"Not alive," Zevian corrected. "Awake."
The petals of the stone lotus shifted ever so slightly, and the sphere trembled, sending a ripple through the air. Lianyin felt the pull immediately—it wanted her blood, her name, her soul.
"If you bind to it, it will obey you," Zevian said. "But it will never let you go."
She stood before it, her reflection fractured in the sphere's surface. In it, she saw herself as she was now—tired, scarred, eyes shadowed by too many sleepless nights—but also a flicker of something else. A stranger wearing her face, eyes burning black, smile sharp as a blade.
The Severance whispered in her ear: Bind me. Feed me. I will give you the strength to tear down the world.
Zevian's hand brushed her shoulder. "You don't have to decide tonight."
"Yes, I do," she said, her voice low.
Before she could act, the lake shuddered violently. The staircase above warped, the liquid ceiling darkening as if storm clouds had passed over the moon.
Zevian's head snapped upward. "They've broken the second seal."
The sound of that distant war drum returned, deep and relentless, and with it came a crimson light bleeding through the lake's surface.
Lianyin reached for the sphere.
If the Crimson Lotus Court reached this place, there would be nothing left to decide.
Her fingers closed around it—
And her blood turned to fire.