Tang Zhou turned his face slightly, his eyes dark and unreadable, shifting like light moving through deep water.
Beneath her sleeve, Yan Dan slowly curled her fingers into a fist. A faint tremor moved through her body -- anger or fear, she couldn't tell which. She had always believed Ying Yuan felt nothing for her, and who could she blame for that? Love required two willing people. But this? This back-and-forth -- was it supposed to be funny?
The silence stretched long before he spoke, his voice barely above a whisper.
"Yan Dan. I miss you so much."
"I know you traded half your heart for my eyes. For a time, I did confuse you with Zhi Xi. But when I saw you by the Jade Pool, I knew it was you."
Yan Dan smiled. "I see." She was quiet for a moment. "It's alright. That was my own choice. You don't need to carry it."
Tang Zhou paused. His expression darkened slowly.
"Yan Dan. I think I fell for you. A long time ago, before I even understood it myself."
"The one you fell for," she said, "was the Yan Dan who stayed beside you when you couldn't see. The one who eventually healed your eyes. That was never me, and it never will be." She thought for a moment. "Back then, I was the only one there. But everything changed after you recovered. Even now, what you regret is only that I crossed the Cycle of Reincarnation in front of you."
Tang Zhou gave a short, quiet laugh. "So you think I've lost the ability to understand my own feelings? When you smile, there's a dimple on your right cheek. The corners of your eyes lift, like the smile comes from somewhere deep. I would never mistake you for Zhi Xi."
The Diya Palace stood empty as always, its corridors quiet and rarely walked.
Yan Dan rounded a corner and stopped sharply. A dark shape crouched ahead. She stepped back, her voice unsteady.
"What -- what is that doing here?"
Tang Zhou stopped walking. "Hmm? That's the Ghost King. You've seen it before."
She stamped her foot. "I know it's the Ghost King. I'm asking how it got here."
Her voice must have carried, because the Ghost King -- silently kneeling on the stone floor, dragging a cloth across the bluestone bricks -- looked up and stared at her. Its eyes were hollow. Yan Dan shuddered and walked past it quickly.
He was doing this on purpose. Acting unbothered, giving her nothing to push against.
Inside the library, Tang Zhou opened the window. A pond stretched beyond it, clear and still. Lotus season hadn't arrived yet; the broad leaves floated in clusters, deeply green. Yan Dan leaned against the frame and looked out.
"I don't remember there being a lotus pond here."
"The plants have been here a long time," he said. "But they've never bloomed. I keep wondering if this will be the year."
Yan Dan was quiet. Then she exhaled.
"I don't think they will." She turned from the window. "Ying Yuan. Let's say what needs to be said. What's the point of pretending none of it happened? It's been a long time, yes. But what was done was done, and it doesn't erase. This isn't calligraphy -- you can't just tear up the page and start again."
She reached out and closed the carved window, cutting off the view outside. Then she walked to the desk and picked up the sandalwood incense burner sitting on it, tracing its edges.
"I truly admired you, Ying Yuan. Even in the underworld, I couldn't stop. I thought I would eventually..." She set the burner down. "I drowned in the River of Oblivion. I couldn't forget my past life. I couldn't reincarnate -- only dissolve into those corpse-things below. I have never forgotten any of it. I don't think I ever will." She paused. "But what does that change?"
She lifted the lid of the incense burner.
"You place a whole piece of agarwood inside and touch a spark to it. It catches. It burns all the way down. When the ash is gone, you place a new piece in and start again." Her voice stayed even. "But once it's been reduced to ash -- once it's truly burned out -- no spark will catch it again. That's what this is. I've already burned it down to nothing. Not even an ember. Only the warmth left behind after the fire has gone."
She tipped the burner slightly.
The agarwood ash scattered across the floor and disappeared into the stone.
She looked at him and smiled.
"Even that last warmth will cool. And then there will be nothing. Same as before we ever met."
Tang Zhou left.
Yan Dan slid slowly down the wall and sat on the floor, every word finally spent. What she had needed to say was said. All of it -- the clinging and the grief and the stubborn, lingering attachment -- was gone. She could feel it. From this moment, she was free.
Sunlight came through the closed window at an angle, casting broken shadows on the wall, soft and unclear.
Not long after, light footsteps approached and stopped.
Someone had been following them, arriving just as Tang Zhou left. Yan Dan looked up.
The face looking down at her was the same face she had seen in the bronze mirror that morning.
Zhi Xi tilted her head slightly. "I came for a book." She moved to the desk, set down what she was carrying, and walked toward the shelves without another word.
Yan Dan stood and looked at what Zhi Xi had left: a notebook with a yellowed cover, with something resting on top. She moved the book aside.
Underneath was a small, round mirror.
She stared at it. Zhi Xi had never liked mirrors. Why would she carry one?
Yan Dan picked it up.
The surface shifted -- and suddenly she was looking at the mortal world. A woman in coarse cloth and a plain hairpin moved through household tasks while a boy pulled at her from one side and an older woman stood with one hand on her hip, voice raised in scolding. The woman turned her head, as if looking directly at Yan Dan, her face worn through with bitterness.
"What do you think?"
Yan Dan startled and put the mirror down. She turned.
Zhi Xi stood a few steps away, a thick book held against her chest, a thin smile on her face. "Zhang Deng. What do you make of her situation now?"
Yan Dan looked at her and felt something shift -- something unfamiliar in Zhi Xi's expression. She shook her head. "Nothing. She's no better off than I was."
Zhi Xi's smile sharpened. "No. Being born poor isn't enough. There are millions born into poverty. One more or less means nothing." She walked to the table, placed the book down, and said quietly, "After she was banished to the mortal realm, I went to find her."
Yan Dan already half-knew. "Did you--"
"Yes. I unlocked her memories of her past life. When she recognized me, she was nearly frightened out of her mind. She hasn't spoken since."
"Zhi Xi. You did this for me. What if someone finds out?"
"I didn't do it for you." Zhi Xi raised her chin, her tone flat and final. "And no one will find out."
Yan Dan understood then. That night watching the fireworks in Nandu -- she had truly seen the Lantern Fairy there. Whether it was Yan Dan or Zhi Xi, the sight of her always brought fear. But Zhi Xi had gone anyway.
Zhi Xi tucked the round mirror back into her sleeve. She looked toward the other end of the room.
"You're not coming back here. Are you."
"Probably not. But you can always come find me in the mortal realm."
Zhi Xi pressed her lips together. A long pause.
"I won't come. What would be the point? We've known each other too long for that."
Yan Dan looked down, unable to stop a small laugh. "Yes. We came from the same root. Even if we never meet again, we're still--"
The closest. Of everyone in the world, no one closer. Bound not by promises but by something older and deeper than words.
Yan Dan watched Zhi Xi's figure disappear around the corner, then noticed the yellowed notebook still sitting on the desk. She had walked off without it.
Yan Dan picked it up and turned a few pages. It was filled with old records about their clan -- small, scattered details. She didn't know where Zhi Xi had found it. Then one line stopped her cold:
The heart of a four-leaf lotus can bring spring back to all things and cure all diseases.
Bring spring back to all things.
She pressed her hand to her chest. Her heartbeat was slow and steady beneath her palm.
An hour had passed since she crossed from the mortal realm to the Heavenly Court. If she turned back now for Yelan Mountain, it wouldn't take too long.
Yan Dan held the Water-Stabilizing Pearl in her closed hand. It was cool and smooth, with a faint current of light drifting through its center. Ao Xuan had told her: if this pearl ever fell to the ground by accident, three months of flooding would follow in the mortal world. But placed at the bottom of a dried lake, it would call up a living spring.
She walked through the winding corridor and found the Antarctic Immortal standing by the fishpond, hands folded behind his back. He turned when he saw her, his face creasing into a grin.
"Yan Dan! Look how you've grown."
She pouted a little and came to stand beside him at the water's edge. "Immortal. Do you still want that beard of yours?"
He stepped back quickly, laughing. "You little troublemaker -- did you go see your master? He was furious with you."
Yan Dan looked into the pond. A large tiger-whiskered fish was leaping and darting through the water, restless and full of energy. "Was he really that angry?"
"Of course! He was counting on raising a high immortal to prove his teaching, and you went and ruined it. How could he not be?" The Antarctic Immortal stroked his beard. "If you'd stayed at the edge of the earth even a few more days, you would have advanced to immortal rank."
"That can't be right. My cultivation is shallow. I know that."
"Normally it wouldn't have been enough. But with the Extraordinary Eye, it's different. A thousand years of cultivation, handed to you for nothing. Do you think that's a small thing?"
Yan Dan's chest tightened. Her voice came out unsteady. "The -- the Extraordinary Eye?"
"Yes. A lot went wrong that year. Your master came to me, asked me to pass the Extraordinary Eye to Donghua Qingjun to handle. But somehow it was lost -- which cost me three years of my immortal salary. And shortly after, the Nine-Finned Fish I'd been raising for years vanished too. When misfortune comes, nothing goes right."
"Isn't the Nine-Finned Fish right there--?" Yan Dan pointed at the tiger-whiskered fish still cutting through the water.
"That one? That's just a strange catfish. Not a patch on Nine-Finned. If I hadn't mistakenly thought Nine-Finned disliked the females in the pond and assumed he preferred males, I'd have let this one go long ago." The Antarctic Immortal recounted the whole sorry tale, then finally gave in and planted his foot firmly on Tiger Whisker's back, pushing it under. "And now here it is, carrying on like it owns the place, eating for free, still can't take human form. Useless."
Yan Dan asked carefully, "Nine-Finned -- was that the small one? The one that looked fragile, with red eyes?"
The Antarctic Immortal glanced at her. "Yes. Their whole clan is gone now. In the old days, they could fly higher than dragons." Before he finished, Tiger Whisker broke the surface again, heading for his feet. "Move along, or you're getting nothing today." The fish reluctantly sank back.
Yan Dan stood at the edge of the pond and thought of Yu Mo.
She saw him again the way she always did -- the clean, decisive motion of his arm as he threw the strange eye into the Zhangtai River. His voice when he exhaled and said: You don't want it, and you won't let me throw it away. What do you want from me? And his last smile. Those who watch a play, knowing it isn't their story -- after a while, the story slowly becomes their own. He had watched his own story play out and walked into it anyway.
She had believed that twenty years was enough to understand Yu Mo.
Standing here now, she could see how wrong she had been. What she had understood in those twenty years was only the surface. Only the shape of him, never the depth.
She had always thought that when they were together, she was the one who talked more, and he simply listened. That she was always the one pulling at him, dragging him from place to place, while he was merely tolerating it. She had never once truly tried to understand another person.
Had anyone ever loved her like that?
Had anyone ever waited for her with that kind of patient silence?
There had been someone in this world who matched her -- she simply hadn't seen it. There had been someone who understood her all the way through, and she had missed him at every turn, from the very beginning to the very end.
She had missed him completely.