The brazier crackled softly in the corner of the study, casting golden light over Yujin's face.
She looked composed. Not a strand of hair out of place. Not a tremor in her hand.
But Wuyin had learned how to read beneath the skin.
The stillness was too precise.
The silence too practiced.
"…You said he was dead," Wuyin finally said.
Yujin smiled faintly, but it didn't touch her eyes. "He was. Or rather, he was supposed to be. We buried him five years ago. Or thought we did."
"What changed?"
Yujin looked out the window, as if the shadows could answer for her. "The Crimson Vow Cult never dies. It just changes its face."
Crimson Vow.
The name stirred something in Wuyin. A vague flicker from half-buried memories. Pain. Fire. Eyes watching from the dark.
She filed it away.
"Tell me about him," Wuyin said.
Yujin was quiet for a long time.
Then, without looking at her, she said, "His name is Yan Zhaoxing. He used to be a war hero. Revered. Admired. I remember his hands—scarred from the battlefield, but gentle when he carried me. Before everything changed."
Wuyin didn't interrupt.
"He built a sect from nothing," Yujin continued, her voice low. "Raised disciples like they were sons. But when the court turned against him, when his enemies rose with knives in smiles—he… broke."
"And turned to the Crimson Vow."
"No," Yujin said. "The Crimson Vow turned to him."
That caught Wuyin's attention.
"They offered him power, revenge. And he took it. For years, he hunted those who betrayed him. Until the sects declared him a heretic and stormed our mountain home."
She looked down at her hands.
"I was twelve. My mother died in the siege. I ran. Hid in a silk chest like a coward."
Wuyin said nothing, but she sat beside her now.
Close.
Not touching—but near enough for Yujin to feel the weight of her presence.
"I heard him scream," Yujin whispered. "When the final flames took him."
She closed her fan with a sharp snap.
"But maybe they didn't. Maybe he survived. Maybe he's been watching this entire time."
Wuyin tilted her head. "And you?"
"I survived. And built something clean. Something stable. Trade, order, names on contracts instead of graves." Yujin looked up, the fan trembling slightly in her grip. "But if he's alive, then none of it will matter."
"…Because he'll try to drag you back?"
Yujin smiled bitterly.
"No. Because he thinks I'm the last piece he needs."
---
The next morning, Baojing woke to news.
A sect outpost from the Emerald Whip Alliance had been burned to the ground outside the eastern gate. All twelve guards killed. Throats cut with ritual blades.
A single sigil was drawn in blood across the gates: a blooming lotus with black petals.
The mark of the Crimson Vow Cult.
Wuyin examined the site herself, crouching beside the corpses.
They'd been dead less than six hours.
She reached into one of the robes, withdrawing a torn message scroll. Half-burned.
Still legible enough.
> "The daughter remains in the merchant's hands. The vagrant shadow has made contact. Our watcher failed. Requesting orders."
Wuyin's eyes darkened.
They know about me.
---
That night, she returned to the Bai estate rooftop, where Yujin stood in the wind, arms folded, eyes tracing the stars.
"I know who they're watching," Wuyin said without preamble. "You. Me. Both. They've already sent blades into the city."
Yujin didn't look surprised. Only tired.
"Then we have little time."
Wuyin studied her.
"You still haven't told me what he really wants."
Yujin was silent for a long time.
Then she reached into her sleeve and pulled out a small jade pendant.
It bore the same black lotus sigil.
"I was born from a pact," she said quietly. "Not of marriage, not of love—but of cultivation."
Wuyin's eyes narrowed. "…Explain."
"My mother was an inner disciple of the Heavenly Silk Pavilion. My father, the Crimson Vow's hidden blade. He used her bloodline to seal a demonic technique. I am the vessel."
Wuyin stepped forward.
"You mean—"
"If I die under the right ritual," Yujin said, calm as snowfall, "he inherits a technique that can devour the martial foundations of sects in one breath."
Silence.
Then Wuyin asked, very softly, "And you're telling me this now because…?"
"Because you deserve to know why they're hunting me. And why staying close to me is a risk."
Wuyin stepped closer. Slowly. Deliberately.
"I don't walk away from risks," she said.
Their eyes met.
The wind tugged at Yujin's hair. Moonlight kissed her cheek.
"You're not afraid," Yujin whispered.
"No," Wuyin murmured. "But they should be."