Extra 3: The Valley of Parting

The valley lay before them like a forgotten dream, its emerald slopes cradled between towering peaks that scraped the heavens. A thin mist drifted between ancient pines, their branches heavy with the weight of centuries. The air hummed with latent spiritual energy, undisturbed by mortal footsteps—perfect for long slumber, perfect for forgetting.

Su Min stood at the cliff's edge, her silhouette sharp against the fading twilight. She tested the air with her spiritual sense, probing for any trace of corruption. "The energy here runs deep and undisturbed," she declared at last. "No demonic taint, no lingering resentment. It's... suitable."

Behind her, Xie Yingying wasn't looking at the view.

She was watching Su Min—the way the evening breeze played with loose strands of her hair, how her fingers absently traced the hilt of her sword when deep in thought. Over these past three months, something imperceptible had shifted between them. The ice in Xie Yingying's gaze had thawed, her smiles came easier now, especially when Su Min said something unexpectedly sharp or dryly humorous.

She wondered if Su Min noticed the change.

"You chose well," Xie Yingying said softly, stepping forward to stand beside her.

Su Min's lips quirked in that half-smile Xie Yingying had come to recognize. "You gave me the task. I don't do things halfway."

A comfortable silence settled between them, filled only by the whisper of wind through the trees. Xie Yingying studied the valley below, her fingers tightening imperceptibly around her sleeves.

"Su Min," she began, her voice carefully light, "you know... three hundred years is nothing to cultivators like us. Your revenge could wait until after—"

"No." The word cut through the air, final as a blade's descent. Su Min turned to face her fully, eyes burning with that familiar, relentless fire. "I won't sleep while they walk free. Not until I've carved a mark they can't erase." Her voice dropped lower. "Besides, the Demon Queen recovers her strength with each passing year. The sooner I face her..."

Xie Yingying's throat tightened. She knew that tone—knew nothing would sway Su Min when her mind was set. Still, she couldn't stop herself from pressing, just once more. "Golden Core isn't easily achieved. Even with your talent—"

"And what alternative do I have?" Su Min countered, her gaze unyielding. "Wait centuries and risk her returning to full power?" A bitter laugh escaped her. "No. This path is mine to walk. Now."

Xie Yingying looked away first, her chest aching with something she couldn't name. Foolish, perhaps, to hope Su Min might choose differently. Foolish to hope she might choose... her.

The silence stretched between them, heavy with unspoken words.

Finally, Xie Yingying reached into her sleeve and withdrew a small silk pouch. "The last of the herbs from the outer chamber," she said, her voice carefully even as she pressed it into Su Min's hands. "They'll help your cultivation."

Su Min's fingers closed around the pouch, warm against Xie Yingying's cooler skin. For a moment, neither moved. Then Su Min tucked it away with a quiet, "Thank you."

The first stars were beginning to appear when Xie Yingying spoke again. "When you come back..." She hesitated, then lifted the jade pendant from around her own neck. "This will guide you."

Su Min stilled as Xie Yingying stepped closer, the pendant's cord brushing against her skin as it settled around her neck. The jade was cool against her collarbone, faintly pulsing with Xie Yingying's spiritual signature.

"It will pulse ten years before the Golden Core Avenue opens," Xie Yingying murmured, her fingers lingering for a heartbeat too long. "That's when you'll come for me."

Su Min's hand rose to cover the pendant, her thumb tracing its smooth surface. "I'll be there," she said, the words rough but certain.

Dawn's first light crept over the mountains, painting the valley in hues of gold and rose. Xie Yingying stepped back, the Xuantian Mansion's aura already shimmering around her like mist.

"Don't die," she said softly.

Su Min's answering smile was sharp as a drawn blade. "I don't plan to."

Then the seal took her, the world folding inward until Xie Yingying was gone, leaving behind only the pendant's weight against Su Min's chest and a promise hanging between the stars.

Alone in the breaking dawn, Su Min touched the jade once more before turning away.

She would wait.

And then she would return.

And yet—

Su Min did not yet understand what it meant to wait.

At forty-five, with the blood of battle still fresh on her hands and vengeance singing in her veins, she had only ever known time as something to outrun. Her immortality—that cruel, glittering gift—had not yet taught her the true weight of centuries. She had not yet seen dynasties rise and fall, nor watched mortal allies wither like autumn grass while she remained untouched. Still, right now she had never felt the parting. Not truly.

Xie Yingying would be the first, and maybe the only one.

The first to slip past her defenses, not with force, but with quiet persistence. The first whose absence would leave a hollow space Su Min could not name. In the years to come, as Su Min carved her path through blood and quiet rage, she would tell herself this was simply an alliance of convenience—that the warmth she felt in Xie Yingying's presence was nothing more than the comfort of a kindred spirit.

Or so she told herself

It would take her a decade—perhaps longer—to recognize the truth. That Xie Yingying had been the crack in her armor, the one who made her pause in the midst of her warpath and think, however briefly, of something softer. By the time Su Min reached Golden Core, by the time the years had sanded down her edges and forced her to confront the solitude of her eternity, it would be too late to close the door Xie Yingying had already stepped through.

The jade pendant would pulse one day, ten years before the Golden Core Avenue opened, and Su Min would realize, with a quiet, devastating clarity, that she had been counting the years without meaning to.

But for now, as she turned her back on the sealed valley and the woman sleeping within it, all she knew was this:

She had a war to win.

And a promise to keep.

[Notes]

Su Min's immortality is both her greatest strength and her deepest wound. She does not yet understand that eternity is not measured in battles fought, but in the people who leave marks upon the soul. Xie Yingying, unwittingly, has become the first—the only one who slipped through the cracks before Su Min learned to guard them. By the time she realizes what has happened, it will already be too late to pretend indifference.

(And perhaps, in the end, she won't want to.)