The corridors of Lànhuā's palace stretched like a dream—long, echoing, faintly scented with incense. Every step sounded soft, yet her heart carried a weight no sound could cover.
From afar, she could still hear Kage Ou's childish voice, pleading, tugging at his father's cold patience.
"Please, Lìng Lìng… just once!" kage ou almost requests like a young male instead of adult . The forbidden retual does makes people emotionally young too beside the body..
Lingxi's reply was firm, unbending, coming like a blade:
"No. If you truly wish to eat with me, then sit here quietly. We will eat when Xio returns from his bath." His tone serious by now for being so focused on something else .
Kage Ou's persistence broke against it like waves against stone. His small frame slumped, a quiet whine escaping him before he sat cross-legged, pouting but resigned. Lingxi's eyes softened for a heartbeat, a shadow of care barely visible, yet her posture remained unwavering.
The sound faded along with her smile. What lingered was not the warmth of family, but the ache of something unnamed… or rather, someone.
Lànhuā sighed, a sound too heavy for her young lips. The playful curve once alive on her mouth had vanished, leaving only thought. The corridor before Xio's chamber seemed endless, as if her body walked while her soul lagged behind.
She remembered. Not Xio. Not family. But him.
The one she truly loved. The one she had hesitated to confess to before Lingxi interrupted. The one her father would never accept.
He was no human. He was a yokai—from a kingdom veiled in secrecy. He had never told her his name. He had never allowed her to see his face fully. He existed like mist: sometimes near, sometimes gone, leaving her with the burn of half-answers and unspoken promises. Neither rejection nor acceptance—just the in-between silence that haunted her more than a clear "yes" or "no."
Her lips parted, voice a ghostly whisper:
"Why do you always disappear… without a word, without a trace? Like a spirit fading into air?"
A bad memory crept into Lànhuā's chest, sharp and unwelcome. She swallowed hard, pressing her palm against the right side of her chest, cheeks flushing with fear and shame. She didn't want to remember it—but the memory clawed its way forward, twisting into the present, each heartbeat echoing the terror she had once felt.
The phantom weight of those hands, the closeness that had violated her alone in the dark, lingered like smoke, impossible to shake. Her breath caught, shallow and uneven, every nerve taut, as if even in daylight, in the warmth of familiar corridors, some horrors refused to stay behind.
Her steps drifted until she nearly passed Xio's chamber entirely. Startled, she gasped and turned back. From the window, golden light spilled across her pale face. For a heartbeat, it felt as though Xio himself had touched her with that same tenderness he once gave in words:
"You're not allowed to be sad before my farewell."
It wasn't just memory. It was an echo alive enough to command her heart.
She murmured, as if answering him:
"I'm not… I'm just thinking."
Setting down the tray she carried, she arranged his favorite dishes neatly: rice noodles steaming softly, vegetables arranged with care, and two black-gold jade glasses—one filled with watermelon juice, the other with mango.
Smoothing the bedding, she sat at the corner of Xio's bed, hands folding and twisting the royal-blue silk of her robe. Her gaze fixed on the closed washroom door, where faint echoes of water blurred against the silence. They softened her storm but could not still it.
Her thoughts strayed once more to the one who bound her heart.
[Flashback of Lànhuā , 5 years back ]
The lake, 望山鬼苑 / Wàngchuān Huā—The Bloom by the River of Forgetfulness—lay swathed in mist, soft and chilling. Trees leaned over the water, branches twisting like dark fingers, casting shadows that seemed to pulse with unseen life.
The surface gleamed under the pale moonlight, rippling without a breeze, as though something beneath stirred and watched. Occasionally, a faint splash echoed across the quiet, delicate yet foreboding, breaking the stillness like a whisper from another world. The air carried the scent of damp earth and distant blossoms, sweet yet heavy, mingling with the tension that clung to the river like a living thing.
This place was perilous for mortals, and even more so for cultivators—special-grade yokai patrolled its edges, moving like shadows with eyes that pierced the dark. The river itself was sacred: a liminal space where yokai bathed, whispered to one another, and occasionally vanished without trace. To linger here was to flirt with danger.
And yet, Lànhuā approached, heart thrumming, every step weighted with the knowledge that a single misstep could bring death. She had come for him—the one who appeared here only twice a year. Each encounter was a gamble: her demonic cultivation marked her as both powerful and vulnerable, and crossing into this yokai domain could cost her everything.
"You shouldn't have come again this year, miss."
The voice was calm, threaded with quiet warning. He did not need to look; he already knew she was there.
Half his face was hidden beneath a hood of white and gold , catching the moonlight. A soft lock of hair, storm-tipped, fell across one sharp eye. He was a yokai—nameless, faceless. She didn't even know what kind—but he was more real to her than any human suitor.
He had told her once: only twice a year, for a single day, his kingdom's domain opened. Ordinary yokai were bound by its rules, unable to cross unless permitted. Yet twice a year, he came here. Twice a year… she followed.
Lànhuā's white hair shimmered in the night wind as she stopped a few paces from him. Her eyes, usually bright, now held a soft dullness—yet hope lingered, fragile but persistent.
"Well," she said quietly, "I have a name. Call me Lànhuā Kumsun at least. 'Miss' makes us feel too far apart."
He chuckled—dry, humorless, arms crossed, the silver-blue hood swaying like mist.
"We are far apart. Humans and yokai are not close. Not at all."
The wind stirred harder, carrying the tension between them.
"And why not?" she demanded softly. "If it were truly so, I would have died long ago in the hands of those creatures. But I didn't."
"You lived because I helped you escape. Four times," he said, voice even, almost cold. "That doesn't mean I'll succeed a fifth."
He had saved her more than once. He knew yokai movements better than anyone, slipping her from danger repeatedly. But never warmth. Only the strange mercy of someone torn in half.
He bent, plucking a small flower from the lakeside, and blew gently. Its fragile petals scattered into the night, drifting like snow. She watched, entranced, as though they were the most beautiful thing in the world.
"Does that mean," she whispered, "you won't be here the fifth time?"
He turned slightly, hood shadowing most of his face. Silence stretched, taut like a drawn bow. Then, words like a blade:
"What if I don't come to save this time ?"
Her chest tightened, a knot of pride and fear tangling with helpless longing. This was not the softness she showed only to her father, or the playful, open warmth she allowed Xio. A Second Daozu of demonic cultivation—formidable, precise, disciplined—her control wavered in front of him. Every heartbeat screamed awareness of the danger she courted—and the impossible pull she could neither name nor resist.
Before she could speak again, he added quietly:
"The truth is—I've betrayed my kind by saving you. Four times. You are human, yet a Demonic cultivator, and each time I chose to protect you, I betrayed my people. And still… I did it."
Her hand slid into her sleeve, fingers closing around a green messenger gem, soft light pulsing faintly like a heartbeat. Hope and fear danced inside her, trembling.
"You have reasons for saving me," she whispered. "I know you do. Tell me what they are."
The yokai adjusted his hood, revealing just a glimpse of red hair, never the full face. He sighed.
"Maybe… I wanted to see what happens if I don't let you die. To see where fate leads."
His words were thoughtful, but inside, a storm churned. If he admitted more, he would betray his kingdom, his ruler, himself. If he denied her, who knew what she would do? Lingxi's daughter was no ordinary woman—she was dangerous.
Finally, almost reluctantly:
"Or perhaps… because my own mother was human. A woman like you."
The confession struck like lightning. Words failed her. The petals drifting on the lake seemed to hush, as though the night itself bowed to the fragile truth.
In that silence, between golden light and ghostly shadow, she realized—love was not only longing, but also the ache of not knowing whether tomorrow would bring a meeting or a farewell.