After Xue Cuo left, in accordance with his wishes, Yin Feixue arranged a grand and proper funeral for him.
In truth, those words had likely been spoken in jest. He had never cared for his own life or death, so how could he have cared for empty reputation?
Yet he must also have known that there were people in this world who loved him. If he were to vanish without a trace, they would carry that worry for years. Better, then, to hold a funeral and tell everyone plainly that he was gone, and need not be mourned.
That, too, was very much like him. So free-spirited, and such a fool. If people could truly let go so easily, where would all the longing and resentment in the world come from?
The little demons had died in the heavenly tribulation without understanding why, and awoke just as inexplicably.
The city destroyed by heavenly fire stood once more as though nothing had happened, its streets neat and orderly as ever. They gathered together, bewildered and at a loss.
The commanders searched everywhere for their king, but found nothing.
The fallen flowering tree had put out new branches, restored to its former state. Beneath it remained stores of fine wine. In years past, Yin Feixue had brewed it himself, thinking there would be a long future ahead, that one day they would finish it together.
Now there was only him, and he had no desire to drink.
Yin Feixue found that he was perhaps stronger than he had imagined. At the very least, he had not disgraced himself by seeking death, nor simply drawn a blade across his throat and ended it all.
And yet, as he sat in the tree, he felt utterly drained, as though every bone in his body had been shattered once through. The pain numbed even his breathing, and his Dao-heart seemed to crack with a sharp sound, a piece breaking away.
Strangely, he did not panic. Instead, he felt a quiet, genuine relief.
He had promised to live, for as long as he could. But there was no reason to resist the natural decline of the body, no reason to force himself to endure.
Whether Xue Cuo had ever loved him, or merely liked him as one might like a kitten or a pup, no longer mattered.
From that day on, there was always a dull ache in his chest, and he could no longer bear the sight of the dying sun.
The first to find him was Kong Yun. He located Yin Feixue within the city and dropped before him, fierce and pressing, his voice sharp with urgency. “Where is he?”
Yin Feixue lifted his head. The look on his face made Kong Yun falter, a sudden unease rising in his chest.
“He is here,” Yin Feixue said.
Kong Yun looked around, but saw nothing.
In that instant, it was as though his feet had rooted into the tree. Something seemed to click into place. He had imagined countless endings, yet never prepared himself for this one. Almost instinctively, he rejected it. “You’re lying.”
Yin Feixue smiled faintly, though there was not a trace of warmth in his golden eyes. “No. You simply refuse to believe it.”
“You’re lying. I’ll kill you.”
Whether he truly did not understand, or simply would not, he struck out at Yin Feixue.
Not wishing to damage the tree, Yin Feixue drew him up into the sky. The black blade was still in his hand, but its edge was no longer sharp.
Kong Yun had been Xue Cuo’s closest friend. Yin Feixue would not harm him.
When the furious sweep of peacock feathers came crashing down, he nearly abandoned all resistance. Yet the moment they touched him, a ring of talismans rose around him, shielding his body.
They were small, cut into the shapes of butterflies, painted in bright, playful colours. There was only one person in the world who would leave such things behind.
The one who had made them had never imagined this moment, nor the expression that would cross Yin Feixue’s face when he saw those teasing butterflies.
In that instant, he seemed to age. His features remained handsome, yet all vitality drained from them. He stared blankly at the butterflies, unable to speak.
He truly could not find the words. How could something so cruel exist?
He knew it already. He knew that Xue Cuo was gone, that he would never find him again. And yet—
Neither of them spoke. Even their breathing felt cold.
Kong Yun’s expression went vacant. He staggered back, step by step, then suddenly turned and shot into the sky, flying towards the Qianyun Mountain in the southern seas.
Yin Feixue reached out. A blue paper butterfly came to rest upon his fingertips. He gathered it gently into his palm and pressed it against his heart, his pale jaw trembling faintly.
Word soon spread that the Peacock King of the demon clan had caused a disturbance at the Sage’s domain and been suppressed beneath Goddess Peak to reflect upon his actions.
By the time others began arriving in Tiandu City, they had already gone before the Heavenly Mother and learned the truth of what had happened.
Thus, those who came after were not as reckless as Kong Yun.
They arrived upon drifting immortal clouds.
At their head was a woman. The world around her seemed frozen in that single moment. She was not expressionless so much as emptied. Her face was pale as paper, her eyes red and swollen. She wore plain robes, and upon her back was a broken broadsword.
Behind her stood a tall, slender youth, his gaze cool and still. Yet as they neared Tiandu City, something in him faltered, a grief that would not disperse lingering in his eyes.
An eagle, transformed into human form, followed behind them, his expression heavy with worry as he watched the unsteady figures before him.
Yin Feixue spoke first. “You’ve come. Then… who are you?”
The woman in plain dress stood silent for a long while. When she finally spoke, her voice was like ice breaking, each word falling in fragments. “I am Xue Cuo’s mother.”
“Xue Cuo’s mother…” Yin Feixue paused, then said nothing further.
Before coming here, the Heavenly Mother must already have told them everything. There was nothing left for him to explain.
One cloud came, then another.
Loose cultivators from Qianyun Marsh, disciples from the Goddess Temple, all gathered from the lands of the southeast to mourn their eldest shixiong.
It should have been a lively scene. Instead, every face was stricken, not a single smile among them.
What troubled Yin Feixue most was a certain golden dragon. It cried without restraint, weeping until heaven and earth seemed to darken, until its grief collapsed bridges and flooded the land.
At last, unable to bear it, Yin Feixue said, “If you keep crying, I’ll strip your scales and snap your tendons.”
The little golden dragon, no longer what it once had been, wept even as it lashed out. In the end, Yin Feixue could only hand it one of Xue Cuo’s paper butterflies to calm it. That, at last, stemmed the tears.
Had Xue Cuo seen it, he would surely have laughed for days.
Yin Feixue’s lips curved faintly at the sight of the dragon’s foolishness, only for his gaze to dim once more.
A pity. He would never see it.
Gu Ruhui shut himself away for a night. When he emerged the next day, his mood remained low.
“I will carve a statue for eldest shixiong,” he said.
Yin Feixue did not refuse. He looked around at the silent crowd. Not just him. Everyone needed something to do, if only to give form to their grief.
The day of burial was chosen for its wind. Orioles flitted, grasses grew, flowers scented the air.
The golden dragon crafted the coffin. Within it lay a set of robes made by the Dragon Might Swordmaster, woven from rare spirit herbs, light and otherworldly. Had he seen them, he would surely have liked them.
Gu Ruhui carved a small statue. Fang Longxi and the others brought incense for calming rites.
Kong Yun arrived last, haggard, feathers in disarray. He sat beside the grave, silent, his expression cold.
Xi Tao and Ren Shu stood nearby, solemn and wordless.
There was also a black tortoise, who for some reason looked perpetually uneasy.
He edged forward, peering cautiously at Xue Zhenzhen. “Swordmaster… please accept my condolences. Sometimes… some things… might be used in other ways… ah…”
Xue Zhenzhen opened her eyes.
When grief reaches its extreme, perhaps this is what remains. She stood with her sword upon her back, as though sighing, as though unable to let go, yet also harbouring a deep and terrible self-reproach.
She could not weep. She could not accept it.
In the end, she turned and left, carrying her sword into the mortal world. For six hundred years thereafter, she roamed, slaying demons, walking the seams between realms, searching without hope.
That day, many other beings came. Mortals with their families. Small creatures that had gained sentience.
A gentle wind rose.
A woman in yellow, her features indistinct, descended by the grave. A noble cyan peacock cried out, bearing a sprig of green grass in its beak before vanishing into the forest.
The once-barren mountain burst into life, spirit herbs sprouting in abundance, green woods stretching in lush waves for miles unending.
Even the sun dimmed its brilliance, the sky sinking into a muted grey.
Beyond these signs, mortals came in whole clans to pay their respects, grateful for his grace. In time, they settled by the stream below, their descendants guarding the mountain for generations, clearing paths, sweeping fallen leaves, tending the land without change for a thousand years.
That year, at Mid-Autumn—
Tiandu City blazed with lantern-light, sleepless and resplendent. Stars shimmered overhead. Moonlight lay soft upon the quiet forest.
In that pale glow, a figure could be seen before the grave. From day into night, he folded sky lanterns, one after another, until the once-lonely tomb was bathed in gentle warmth.
He did not cry. He did not speak.
When the last lantern had been released, he simply leaned against the headstone and sat there, lost in thought.
Year after year, on every festival, he would come. Alone, he would busy himself with whatever new trinkets or curiosities he had come across.
He climbed Goddess Peak, kneeling all the way from its summit to the far reaches beyond the Ninth Heaven, asking the Sage where that person had gone.
The Sage had never given him an answer. Only that once, they said, “The secrets of heaven must not be revealed.”
So Yin Feixue returned.
He governed Tiandu City and guarded that stretch of great marshland. Over time, the cultivators of the Goddess Temple and the Tiandu Guard grew ever closer, until they were as one family.
To outsiders, Yin Feixue was still Yin Feixue… refined and courteous, yet no longer warm with laughter.
He was not like Kong Yun, who went to extremes, forbidding anyone to speak Xue Cuo’s name, clashing time and again with the Sage, harbouring a bitter hatred for the new heavenly order, and shutting himself away night after night in cultivation, waiting for the day he might ascend and storm the heavens.
Gu Ruhui, by contrast, was not so single-minded in his cultivation. He wandered the mortal world, seeking understanding amidst the dust of life. Yet every year, on that same day, he would return with Xi Tao and the others to pay their respects.
On the third day of the third month, Yin Feixue went alone to the mountain where they had once drunk together.
The stone table had long since toppled. The cups were gone. Friends who had once gathered in twos and threes were now scattered to the ends of the world.
And the one who mattered most was gone as well.
Alone, he watched the shifting clouds and mist among the mountains, as though they might take root and become grass and trees. His Dao-heart ached faintly, never again able to reach completion.
Xue Cuo… are you still watching me?
Yin Feixue had spent years searching, trying every method he could think of, yet never found so much as a trace.
Time and again, the figure of that young man walking away in disappointment seemed to repeat itself.
At last, he climbed the mountain where his beloved lay buried. He lay flat upon the ground, as though he could hear another heartbeat still lingering there.
Unsteady, he stripped off his armour, cast aside the black blade, and let beast’s ears grow from his head, transforming into a white tiger to keep vigil beside the grave.
There, he dreamt.
In that dream, distant mountains lay in pale shadow beneath a sky filled with morning light. A young man in blue reached out and ruffled his head, smiling softly.
“Are you Feixue?”
“I am.”
“Why don’t you look like yourself?”
“How do I not?”
“Why have you grown so thin?”
Yin Feixue curled his tail around him. Even in the dream, his heart ached unbearably. He held on tight, refusing to let go.
“Don’t leave.”
“I won’t. I won’t.”
And so he held him, through spring blossoms, through summer leaves, through autumn fruit, through winter’s deep and endless snow.
Layer upon layer the snow fell, until the mountains held nothing but the sound of birds in flight and insects in the quiet.
Until one day—
Footsteps crunched through deep drifts of snow, entering that sacred forest, startling the beast buried beneath the white.
Those golden eyes flickered, momentarily dazed, before meeting a pair of calm, still eyes.
The newcomer wore robes of deep blue, his hair dusted with snow.
For the first time in six hundred years, Yin Feixue heard the sound of his own heart beating once more.
