Chapter 130: Beneath the Ashen Veil

The winds howled like wounded beasts across the Valley of Whispering Dust. Even the bones of ancient titans, half-buried in the crimson sands, seemed to tremble under the storm's fury. Far in the distance, shadowed spires jutted from the earth like broken swords—what remained of the once-mighty Skyfall Sect, now reduced to relics and ruins after the war of the Nine Suns.

Zhao Lianxu stood at the precipice of the collapsed canyon, his robes flapping around his lean form like the tattered wings of a dying phoenix. The storm bit into his skin, but he barely noticed. His eyes were fixed on the crevice below—on the darkness that pulsed like a heartbeat at the earth's core.

There, in that abyss, was the place he feared yet needed most: the Vault of Silence, a forgotten remnant of the First Age. Said to have been carved by the God of Despair himself, it was the last known entrance to the Ashen Veil—a realm that existed neither in time nor in space, where memories bled into reality and even the soul's fabric could unravel.

He drew a deep breath, tasting iron and thunder on his tongue.

Behind him, a quiet rustle broke the wind's song. Zhao didn't turn. He already knew who it was.

"Is it truly worth this, Lianxu?" Her voice was soft—almost too soft to belong to someone called the Blood Lotus Princess. But in that whisper, he heard everything: worry, sorrow, defiance... and a love she still refused to name aloud.

Zhao turned slowly, his gaze falling upon Yue Qingshuang. Her red-and-gold battle dress shimmered like embers in twilight, her dark hair streaked with silver from the last tribulation she barely survived. Her hand hovered near her waist, where her celestial dagger—Whisperthorn—was half-sheathed.

They hadn't spoken properly since the betrayal. Since she had driven that very dagger into his side under moonlight at the Eternal Alliance Summit.

He said nothing. What could he say?

"You don't need to do this," she continued, stepping closer. "You've already awakened your third bloodline. You wield the Space-Time Sovereign's Legacy. Even the Elders of the Abyssal Realm fear your name. Going into the Veil... it could consume you."

"I'm not afraid of being consumed." His voice was quiet, graveled with fatigue. "I'm afraid of what happens if I don't."

Qingshuang's brow furrowed. "Then tell me. Make me understand. What is in there that the future Emperor of the Multiverse cannot find elsewhere?"

Zhao looked away, his jaw tightening. For a moment, it seemed he wouldn't answer. Then:

"My past."

The wind fell silent.

"The real one," he added. "Not the fragments scattered across the star realms. Not the memories sealed by my father. Not the visions given by the legacy. I need to know who I was before the multiverse touched me. Before I became Zhao Lianxu."

Yue's breath caught. "You… you think your entire identity is a lie?"

"I know it is."

His gaze dropped to his hands—calloused, bloodied, glowing faintly with the faint crackle of chaotic lightning and dark essence.

"There are echoes in my cultivation path that don't belong to any of my three bloodlines. A rhythm in my qi that feels... wrong. As if I'm playing a song composed by someone else. Something was done to me. Something I can't remember."

Yue stepped closer, her voice trembling. "So you'll walk into a prison of memories and death to chase shadows?"

"I must." Zhao's eyes locked with hers. "Because if I don't, I will never be whole. And if I am not whole, how can I protect what I love?"

Her eyes shimmered then—not with light, but unshed tears.

"You never said that before," she whispered.

Zhao said nothing.

He turned back to the abyss.

"I'm going with you," she said suddenly.

Zhao's body went still.

"No," he said firmly. "You barely survived the Trial of Black Flame. Your soul is still healing. The Ashen Veil is not a place for the wounded."

"You're not the only one haunted by the past," she said, chin lifting. "And you're not the only one who loves blindly enough to jump into darkness."

Zhao hesitated. "You might remember things in there… things you buried for a reason."

"I know."

He looked back at her, meeting her gaze fully now. There was no fear in her eyes—only a fierce resolve, forged in blood and betrayal.

Finally, he nodded.

"Stay close," he said. "And whatever you see… whatever you remember… do not let it define you."

She smiled, faint and sad. "That's what I should be telling you."

Together, they leapt.

The fall into the Ashen Veil was not a descent but a dissolution. The light peeled away first—every ray of sun stripped from their skin like burning parchment. Then came the sound, pulled from the air until the silence crushed their lungs. Their senses warped, stretched, inverted. Yue screamed, but her voice turned into birdsong, then ash.

Then there was nothing.

And then there was everything.

Zhao awoke on a field of glass, under a sky that bled colors he could not name. The ground pulsed like a heart beneath him. Above, constellations formed shapes from his memories—a broken sword, a bloodied crown, a silver mask falling into a lake.

He stood, and the world adjusted to his thoughts.

Beside him, Yue gasped, kneeling in the black grass.

"I can see it," she said, voice shaking. "All of it. The night I was born. The first time I killed. My mother's tears—"

Zhao touched her shoulder gently. "Breathe."

But already, the air shimmered.

A shadow was walking toward them.

No—not a shadow. A boy.

Zhao's breath caught.

He knew that face.

It was his own.

But younger.

Innocent.

And terrified.

"Who are you?" Zhao asked.

The boy looked up, eyes wide. "I'm the memory you erased."

Yue stepped back.

Zhao swallowed hard. "Why was I erased?"

The boy blinked. "Because if you remembered… you'd never want to be Emperor."

The words struck like thunder. Zhao stumbled.

"Who did it?" he demanded. "My father? The Prime Minister of the Multiverse? My mother?"

The boy shook his head.

"No. You did."

The air twisted. Yue was gone.

Zhao looked around wildly. "Yue?!"

But only the boy remained, and a mirror rising from the ground.

In its glass: A battlefield. Millions dying. Entire worlds burning. And standing at the center of it all—a man cloaked in stars and blood, wielding a sword made of time itself.

His face…

Zhao staggered.

It was him.

But older.

Colder.

Unrecognizable.

"What is this?" he asked, voice hoarse.

The boy—his younger self—looked away.

"The man you are destined to become... if you continue down this path."

Zhao's knees buckled.

"No."

"Yes," the boy whispered. "And you knew it. That's why you sealed me. Why you shattered your own soul. To forget what you were."

Zhao knelt, breathing hard, the weight of a thousand lifetimes crushing down upon him.

"I didn't want to be a monster," he whispered.

"You weren't," the boy said gently. "But you were willing to become one to protect those you loved. That was your curse. And your strength."

Behind them, a wind rose.

Reality tore.

Yue reappeared, stumbling through a veil of fire. Blood streamed from her nose, her eyes glowing.

"Lianxu," she gasped. "I saw it too. The future. The death. The madness. I—"

Zhao stood, steadying her.

"I remember now," he said quietly.

And for the first time in a hundred chapters of silence, of war, of pain—

He wept.