Ying...

Dong... dong... dong...

Ying jolted upright, her breath coming in shallow gasps. The night drums echoed in her ears, a resounding warning.

"Jing'er?" she called, waiting for the shuffle of feet, the creak of a door—anything.

Silence...

Jing'er always answered... 

She strained her ears, but only a deathly stillness came from beyond her corridor. A sense of unease crept over her, and Ying brushed it off—night had always unsettled her.

Maybe her maid had gone to check on the twins.

Ying shivered and pulled the thin robes bound loosely around her tighter. Had the fires died out? Their smoke usually filled the stone flues in the walls and floors until the room became stiflingly hot. Like most winter nights, she wore only a sheer robe to keep from sweating. But now, a chill seeped into the air.

She would have to light the brazier. Scooting out of bed, her bare feet tapped against the cold floor as she crossed the room. Strange for the heat to vanish so suddenly in the night. The duke could more than afford coal. Ying let the thought slip from her mind when she approached the brazier. 

Coal pieces were stacked in a pan neatly beside the brazier. Ying picked up a few of the black lumps and tossed them into the bronze pan. Reaching for the fire striker, she struck the flint against the steel, sending a shower of sparks onto the dried kindling nestled beneath the coals.

She blew gently, coaxing the embers to glow, until the kindling crackled with small flames. Taking the fire rod, she prodded the coals, feeding the growing fire and waiting for the heat to catch. Slowly, the coals darkened with heat, their edges glowing red, until the brazier came alive with warmth.

Gong... gong... gong...

Ying counted three beats before the sound drifted away, swallowed up by a howling wind that blew through the eaves. The duke had promised to return with the third watch. The palace gates weren't far—perhaps court duties delayed him longer.

Ying retreated to her bed, took a seat, pulled her blanket around her and waited for her husband.

Time inched slowly. Still, the Duke did not show up. The unshakable dread that had clung to her all day returned. Ying was certain third watch was nearing its end. Was it possible that the king had requested an audience with him instead?

The duke's legal wife was Dà Fūrén, who he married out of duty, nothing more. And Dà Fūrén, was the Queen's dearest cousin, and both despised Ying—not only for being a lowly concubine, or capturing the duke's heart, but for carrying the only surviving royal heirs to term. She had given birth to not one but two twins, nearly a year old. Had Dà Fūrén stirred up trouble again?

"Fūrén..."

A voice. Soft. Gentle. Familiar came from the doors. 

"My lord..." she breathed. 

"Let me in, please..." His voice drifted into her ear like a soothing lullaby.

She raced for the doors. Finally, the Duke had returned.

Ying hesitated when her fingers gripped the wooden latch but slid them aside. 

He was home. He was safe. That's all she could think about. 

Creaaak... the doors inched open.

A gust of wind sent her stumbling back, tossing her long hair into a tangled mess. She brushed it from her face. "My Lord-" Ying looked up her entire body locked in place.

A shadow from her past loomed in the dim light, his stretched smile greeting her, as if murmuring, finally, I found you.

No...

The figure standing in the doorway was not her husband. Not the duke.

No. No. No.

The words caught in her throat. The blood drained from her face.

There, beneath the ghostly light, he towered before her, wreathed in a storm of white. Black hair cascaded down his shoulders, his robes a liquid crimson against the stark snow, clinging to his taut frame—motionless, untouched, as if the wind itself bent to his will.

Ying stared in disbelief. Impossible. He hadn't aged. Not a single day.

"Mao—Mao Zhen..." she finally choked out backing as far away from the door as she could.

"Oh? You still remember my name." He let himself inside, moving with an eerie grace.

Ying's breath caught as his shadow stretched—thin and distorted—creeping unnaturally toward the lamp above the door, the brightest light in the room.

Then—it flickered out.

Mao Zhen was the greatest demon cultivator but not this powerful. His very presence seemed to devour the room, swallowing the air, drowning the space in a suffocating darkness.

Ying's gaze darted to the single candle sputtering atop her tea table. Then to the brazier. But its embers, too, flickered weakly, unable to hold back the void seeping in behind him.

"Ying..." Her name rolled out, low and hollow. "I thought you were dead."

Outside, the wind roared in anguish. Snow swirled into a violent storm, swallowing the courtyard whole.

"I survived..." Her gaze flicked to the open door.

She was in the duke's palace. The king's brother. Soldiers were everywhere.

So why had no one come?

No alarms. No footsteps. No warning.

Then—she saw them.

Outside, admist the swirling snow, shadows slumped motionless against the stone walls. The soldiers... were already dead.

"Ohhhh..." His voice was disturbingly calm, sending her stomach tumbling. "I even buried your corpse."

Ying knew there was no excuse that could hide the truth. She had faked her death. She had run. She had done anything to escape him.

"What are you doing here?" she finally asked, careful not to show any aggression towards him.

Mao Zhen studied her in silence. Then—a slow, breathy chuckle. Hollow. Void of warmth answered her. "What am I doing here?" His voice was full of mockery. "What are you doing here? So far away from me, from home. You and our children." His fingers flexed at his sides.

Our children? Ying didn't like the sound of that at all but it was not the time to argue with him. "I'm not leaving with you." Her voice wavered, but she steadied herself. "I have a home. A husband. My children—"

A bitter smile flickered across his lips.

She knew that smile. What it meant.

"Ying... "

He stepped forward, no more like glided in effortless.

Ying felt it—the yin energy. A power not of the demon realm. Not of the heavens. Something beyond.

She forced herself to stand her ground. To not let him see her fear. But instinct screamed—run.

And she took a step back.

"I'm not leaving here without you,' he said. "Or our children."

There was a realization in his words that she knew he would make certain on.

"I buried you." Mao Zhen's voice was eerily soft. "Then, I went to the Bloodborn's tomb. A man with nothing left. A man ready to take revenge."

Ying's stomach twisted. To challenge the Bloodborn was suicide...

"I tried to break Haoran's Seal of Purgatory," he continued. "The one that cannot be undone."

His gaze darkened.

"It turned my own flames against me. Burned me. To near ashes."

"I never wanted you to suffer as you did," she said, she didn't want to be the cause of this. "You shouldn't have gone to the tomb. Haoran's seal is meant to kill."

"Death is beyond me."

In a blink, he was by the brazier. His hand hovered over the fire. The flames curled and licked at his skin—yet he remained untouched and dimmed.

"There's a different pain now." His voice dropped, low and dark. "A hunger. Ever burning."

A chill slithered down Ying's spine. Something monstrous had changed him. He was neither human nor fox spirit anymore.

She backed away until the tea table dug into her spine.

Mao Zhen turned to see her. His eyes glinted with amusement.

"We once scurried like rats beneath the Bloodborn's feet," he mused. "We cowered at the slightest shadow of Haoran. But there are more of us now, Ying. Including your children."

She would never let him have her children. Ying's blood boiled, her fox demon snarling within her. But she forced it down, biting back her fury.

"I will restore our clan. And soon... Haoran and the Bloodborn will die."

She had once believed those words. In that vengeance. They had whispered it to each other in the dark, when the world turned against them. They had sworn to rise again. But she moved on. Found the duke. Chosen peace. Chosen love. Mao Zhen had not.

"Do you know what I found when I awoke in the tomb?" His voice was distant, recounting a truth that twisted inside him like a blade.

Ying didn't want to hear anymore. "Mao Zhen, revenge will destroy you."

He ignored her. "A palace built for kings," he murmured. "For the celestials who slaughtered thousands. The ones Haoran claimed to have eradicated."

"And yet—" his eyes flickered with rage, "there they were."

"Four of them. The Heavenly Emperor's own generals. The Bloodborn. Sleeping beneath the Seal of Eternal Night. Preserved. Guarded. Protected by Haoran."

His smile stretched.

"And us?" His voice turned violent. "We were the stain on their legacies. The filth beneath their boots."

Mao Zhen lifted a hand, staring at it as if remembering the pain. "I was beyond healing. Even my fox demon spirit could not restore the damage."

She knew what was coming before he even spoke. Ying read all the scrolls.

"But there was a great power inside that tomb. One strong enough to save me."

Dread coiled deep in her gut. The Bloodborn survived on blood and qi. They carried an awful curse in their bites that could burse others.

"No..." Her voice barely escaped her lips. "What did you do, Mao Zhen?"

His next words sent ice through her veins.

"I drank from him. Until nothing remained but a husk."

Ying's breath caught. "You... you killed him?"

A slow, chilling laugh rumbled from Mao Zhen's chest.

"No. He is weakened but not dead."

"Why would you do this?" she whispered. "Mao Zhen—you've marked yourself for death. Haoran will hunt you the moment they find out."

He turned back to her, as though returning from a distant thought.

"Let them come." His voice was soft, almost wistful.

Then, he moved.

Ying's breath caught. Fear rooted her still.

A soft whisper curled around her. "Ying..."

A power—so terrifying, so unnatural—rose in the air.

Shadows closed in on her.

The candle flickered—once, twice—then snuffed out.

"Mao Zhen—"