The morning mist drifted low, soft and quiet, wrapping the path ahead in silver haze. The air was cool and still, the kind of silence that made every heartbeat sound too loud. Jian Wu walked first, his steps slow on the damp soil. Mei Xue followed behind him, her robes brushing the wet grass as her thoughts spun like the fog itself circling, endless, restless.
He had spoken little since last night, about the world "remembering" him, about the breath of something ancient stirring beneath the earth. It all sounded like a myth… yet nothing in Jian Wu's eyes had felt like a story.
"Jian Wu," Mei Xue called softly. "If the world truly remembers you, does that mean… you're part of its memory?"
He stopped before an old hollow tree, running his fingers along the rough bark. "Maybe," he said quietly. "Or maybe I'm just what remains of something the world tried to erase."
Mei Xue's gaze softened. "And now that forgotten thing is writing itself back."
He turned slightly, smiling faintly. "You sound like a poet."
"I learned from someone who speaks less than he should," she replied, her tone light but trembling at the edges.
The wind passed gently between them, carrying the scent of wet leaves. There was peace in that moment, fragile, almost unnatural. The kind that often came right before the storm.
They walked until the forest opened to a narrow cliff. From there, the valley below stretched wide and drowned in fog. In its heart, the ruins of an old temple rose from the earth, half swallowed by vines and time.
Jian Wu stared for a long moment. "That place," he murmured, "I've been there before… though I don't know when."
"In a dream?" Mei Xue asked.
"No," he said slowly. "In someone else's memory."
They descended carefully. The closer they came to the ruins, the heavier the air grew, as if time itself thickened around them. On a crumbling wall, Jian Wu noticed the same spiral symbol that glowed faintly beneath his palm.
Mei Xue's voice was tense. "It's reacting again."
He raised his hand toward it, but before his skin could touch the stone, the air quivered. The spiral flared to life, opening like a doorway of light.
From it stepped a figure in white.
"Jian Wu," a gentle voice said, calm but edged with something sharp. "You still seek answers, even after the world warned you."
Mei Xue tensed. "You… you're the Keeper of the Primal Law?"
The woman lowered her gaze. "Not anymore. I'm only what's left of a promise that was never fulfilled."
Jian Wu's breath caught. "I made a promise to you, didn't I?"
Her lips curved into a trembling smile. "More than one. And each time you kept it, the world rewrote fate to destroy it."
For a moment, no one spoke. The air felt alive with something unseen.
Bai Lian, for that was her, took a step forward. The ground shimmered faintly beneath her feet, as if light followed her every move. "But this time," she said softly, "things are different. The laws that bound us are breaking. And you, Jian Wu… you are the fracture through which freedom returns."
He frowned. "Freedom… or ruin?"
"Sometimes," she said, "they begin as the same thing."
The light around the ruins brightened, scattering against the cracked stones like falling stars. Mei Xue looked between them, heart heavy with a strange ache she didn't have a name for, part fear, part jealousy, part grief.
Bai Lian turned to the rising light. "I'll wait where the two worlds meet, where all promises are born."
"Bai Lian!" Jian Wu stepped forward, reaching out.
But her body had already begun to dissolve, her form fading back into the mist like a memory returning to silence.
All that remained was the faint scent of white blossoms flowers that didn't grow anywhere near that valley.
Jian Wu stood still for a long time before whispering, "If the world forgets her again… I won't."
Mei Xue looked at him quietly. "And if the one forgotten… is you?"
He turned his face toward the sky, where fog was giving way to morning light. "Then let the world remember for me."
The wind rose, sweeping away the last of the ruins' dust.
Somewhere beneath the earth, a faint tremor echoed like the pulse of something vast, waiting.
And Jian Wu knew, this was no longer a path of mort
als.
The world had begun to wake, and it was remembering him too well.