Chapter 15: The Shadow That Wears His Name
The Haunting Begins
For days after the battle at Willowfang Keep, Lin Feng barely slept.
When he did, his dreams were fractured. In them, he stood beneath a crimson sky, a vast field of swords jutting from ash. Voices called his name, but none were his own.
Each time he woke, another memory flickered and faded—a birthday song, his mother's favorite poem, the sound of his first laugh.
He clutched the Ashen Saber as though it were the only tether left between past and present.
Liang Yue noticed.
"You're burning too fast," she said softly one evening, tracing the outline of a scar on his chest. "Even fire needs time to breathe."
"If I don't burn bright enough… people will die."
"You're not a weapon, Feng. Not to them. And not to me."
---
Yan Zhen's Revelation
Yan Zhen returned that morning with blood on his boots and news in his mouth.
"The Sky Mirror Sect… never vanished," he said. "They fractured—like a mirror cracked from the center. Half went underground, joining the Red Hand. The other half… they stayed hidden, working from behind kings and empires."
He dropped a scroll on the table. "This came from an informant in the Black Lotus Market."
It was a family tree.
Lin Feng's name sat near the top.
But there—just below—was another name.
Lin Xun.
His twin brother.
Dead at birth.
Or so he'd been told.
---
Blood Revealed
"I don't have a brother," Lin Feng said, stunned.
Li Wei, sitting nearby, frowned. "My clan kept records of all Lineage births. There was mention of twins once—but they said one was… unstable."
Yan Zhen leaned in. "Not unstable. Stolen."
Liang Yue read the notes aloud. "Lin Xun… born the same hour as Lin Feng. Qi born in reverse. One flame. One mirror. Two halves of a single fate."
Lin Feng stepped back, heart racing. "You're saying the leader of the Red Hand… is me?"
Yan Zhen shook his head. "Not you. But someone forged from the same soul thread. They call him the Crimson Mirror. He commands the Red Hand. He looks like you. Sounds like you. And every time you use Soulfire, he grows stronger."
Liang Yue whispered, "That's why your memories are vanishing."
"They're not just fading," Lin Feng said. "They're being taken."
---
A Message From the Enemy
That night, a message arrived via a dying raven.
The scroll bore no seal.
Just a line of jagged script:
> "We are not enemies, brother."
"Only reflections."
"You burned first. I was left behind."
> "But now, the world will burn with me."
– Lin Xun, Crimson Mirror
---
The Soul Archive
Guided by desperation, Lin Feng, Liang Yue, and Yan Zhen traveled to the ruins of the Soul Archive, an ancient subterranean vault said to store fractured memories of lost cultivators. Only soulwalkers could enter without losing themselves.
Li Wei, still recovering, stayed behind with a contingent of Flameborn sympathizers.
Inside, they found walls pulsing with stored echoes—spirits trapped in crystals, whispering secrets to no one.
Lin Feng approached the Chamber of Reversal, where memory and reflection blurred. There, he saw it: a vision of Lin Xun.
He was identical—but his eyes were hollow mirrors.
In the vision, Lin Xun was taken as an infant by Sky Mirror sect remnants. They infused him with distorted qi, made him relive Lin Feng's memories—but always from the other side.
He watched their parents smile at Lin Feng.
Watched them die… in his arms.
Watched Lin Feng wield the saber—while he held nothing.
He wasn't born evil.
He was born forgotten.
---
The Lotus Reclaims
As the vision faded, Lin Feng collapsed, blood running from his eyes.
Liang Yue caught him, whispering, "Don't let him inside. Don't let him rewrite you."
But when Lin Feng looked up, a faint mark had appeared on his chest:
A mirror fragment.
The saber pulsed in his grip, struggling between fire and reflection.
> "Ashen Sovereignty – Phase IV: Reclamation Bloom."
A technique that steals memory back—but risks fracturing the soul permanently.
Lin Feng now faced a choice:
Use it… and reclaim his memories.
Or let them vanish, and protect his identity.
He made his choice.
---
Reclamation Bloom
As Yan Zhen and Liang Yue formed a defensive circle, Lin Feng planted the Ashen Saber into the ground, knelt, and channeled everything into the core.
The chamber ignited with golden fire and spectral lotus petals.
Memories surged back—
His grandfather's smile.
His first duel.
Liang Yue's tears the first time they kissed.
But along with them—
Came memories not his own.
Lin Xun's screams.
His loneliness.
His rage.
Lin Feng screamed as the saber tried to burn both truths at once.
But then—Liang Yue stepped forward.
And placed her hand over his.
"Let me carry part of you. Even the pain."
The fire calmed.
The lotus solidified.
And when it cleared—
Lin Feng remembered everything.
---
A Flame Forged in Two
He stood, breath ragged, but clear-eyed.
"I know what he's after," he said. "He's going to the Cradle of Origins—where the Ashen Saber was first forged. He means to corrupt the source."
Yan Zhen nodded. "Then we go."
Li Wei appeared at the cave entrance. "And we're not alone. Other sects are joining. They've seen the Red Hand's wrath. They're ready to rise."
Liang Yue looked at Lin Feng.
"You ready for war?"
He shook his head.
"I'm ready for truth. And if my brother wants to end the world… he'll have to go through me."
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End of Chapter 15