The next morning came too soon.
The sun rose like it didn't know what it was taking from me. The sky was clear. The air was too still. As if the world had decided to be peaceful just to spite the ache in my chest.
The ritual was held in the temple. Goddess of Water temple.
The one built in our name, surrounded by water and stone and incense that always burned a little too sweet. It should have been a place of prayer, of honor.
Today, it was the place I would lose her.
Lianshui sat at the center of the soul separation array, her hands folded in her lap, her head bowed in quiet calm. The light from the rising sun pooled around her like a blessing she didn't ask for. She looked peaceful.
And I hated it. Because I wasn't ready. I would never be ready.
Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji stood at opposite ends of the circle, their robes pristine, their expressions unreadable. But I could feel it—the weight of what they were about to do. It would take enormous spiritual strength to guide a soul into the next life and leave the vessel intact. Only they were capable of it.
They had volunteered. Because they knew I couldn't ask.
Yuling was the first to step forward. She crossed the circle slowly, knelt beside Lianshui, and wrapped her arms around her.
"Thank you," she whispered, voice barely holding. "For protecting Mei Lin. For letting her be with us. I'll never forget you."
Lianshui smiled.
Ming Yu stepped forward next.
He stood at the edge of the array, hands at his sides, shoulders tense beneath his robes. For a moment, I thought he wouldn't say anything at all.
Then his voice came—quiet, steady, but low with something breaking underneath.
"Lianshui," he said, "I will never forget this selfless act of yours."
His eyes never left hers.
"Thank you for everything."
Lianshui met his gaze with that same calm smile. The kind that made it feel like she was comforting us, even now. Even at the end.
Ming Yu bowed his head to her. Fully. Deeply. And when he stepped back, his hands curled slightly into fists, like he was holding something in—something he didn't trust the world to see.
Shen Kexian was the last to come forward.
He didn't say anything at first. Just stood there, eyes already glassy, jaw clenched so tight I could see the muscle twitch. He crouched down in front of her, slowly, like lowering himself hurt more than standing.
Lianshui looked up at him.
And for the first time, her composure slipped.
Tears welled in her eyes, and before she could stop them, they slid down her cheeks in silence. One. Then another.
And something in me broke. Completely.
She reached for his hand and held it like it was the last thing tethering her to this world.
"Kexian," she whispered, her voice trembling, "next life… I promise I won't run away again."
He didn't answer right away. He just nodded.
Then leaned forward and pressed a kiss to her forehead—slow and lingering.
Whatever he wanted to say… he had already said it last night.
She nodded to Lan Wangji and said "I am ready"
As the array began to glow faintly beneath her, lines of light curling around her like threads of silk, Lianshui looked up—at no one in particular, or maybe at everyone.
And then she spoke.
"Miss Mei Lin," she said softly, her voice thick with tears, "don't be sad."
She smiled, even as more tears slipped down her cheeks.
"Be happy. And live to the fullest… for me, alright?"
Her voice broke on the last word. But the smile stayed.
Lianshui… I—
I promise.
That was all I could manage inside her mind.
The array grew brighter.
A faint tingling in my fingertips, like the memory of a sensation returning from somewhere far away. Then my palm flexed, slow and uncertain. My elbow bent. My shoulders pulled inward. One by one, I could feel the pieces of myself slotting back into place.
My body was mine again.
Completely.
I sat in the middle of what was left of the array, watching the last faint light disappear into the stone beneath me.
Then the grief hit—not sudden or dramatic, just heavy. Like something settling over me I couldn't push off.
I slumped forward, hands braced against the floor, my forehead pressed to the cool surface. The stone was smooth, worn down by time and too many people who probably came here hoping for answers. But I didn't have prayers. Just shaking breaths.
At first, the tears were quiet. A few sharp exhales, the kind that catch in your throat. Then they got worse. Louder. Messier. My whole body trembled, and my chest hurt from trying to keep it together when there was nothing left to hold onto.
I cried until I couldn't think straight. Until my throat burned and my arms ached and I didn't know what else to do.
Because she was gone.
Because I had let her go.
And because now I had to live with it.
Footsteps came closer, slow and careful across the temple floor.
I didn't look up.
My hands stayed pressed to the stone. My chest kept stuttering around sobs I couldn't quite get under control.
Then he crouched next to me. I felt it more than I saw it.
"Mei Lin?" Ming Yu's voice was quiet, like he was afraid even saying my name might make things worse.
I turned just enough to see him through the blur. His face was tight, worried, like he wanted to fix something but didn't know how.
"She's gone," I said. Then I said it again, louder. "She's gone."
The words scraped out of me like they didn't want to leave.
He didn't try to answer. He just pulled me into his arms, slow and steady, like he'd been waiting for me to fall so he could catch me. And maybe he had.
I just sank against his chest, my fingers clutching at his robes, the sobs shaking me quietly now. There weren't any words left. Just the echo of her name in my mind, and the hollow ache where she used to be.
He held me like he'd never let go.
Just so I didn't have to grieve alone.
And in that moment, it was the only thing keeping me from disappearing too.
***
In the days that followed, we decided to give Lianshui a proper shrine.
Not just a stone, not just a name whispered in prayer—but a place of her own. A space carved into the world where people could remember her, speak to her, offer her the same reverence they had once given me.
Because she was the real Goddess of Water.
And she deserved more than to be a secret.
She deserved to be known.
The shrine was nestled beside a quiet inlet, where the water reflected the sky like glass and the reeds whispered in the breeze. Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji anchored the circle with ancient sigils, their spiritual energy woven into the stones like threads of protection. Shen Kexian brought her favorite flowers and placed them at the base without a word. Ming Yu lined the steps with polished river stones, each one gathered by hand. Yuling, with quiet focus, carved her name into the shrine's face, stroke by deliberate stroke.
And I—
I wrote the inscription.
It took me three days to finish. Not because I didn't know what to say, but because each word felt like letting go—slow, careful, and heavier than I expected. I had to write it one breath at a time.
When it was finally done, I lit the incense, bowed before her image, and whispered the only thing that still felt solid in my chest.
Thank you.
For staying.
For loving.
For letting me live.
***
The next day, Shen Kexian came to find me.
I was standing beneath the willow tree by the lake—the same one we used to sit under during quiet afternoons, when the world outside the palace felt impossibly far away. Now, it shaded Lianshui's shrine, its branches dipping low over the water, casting ripples of shadow across the stone. The incense I lit that morning still lingered, curling faintly through the air, the scent of lavender and ash threading through the breeze like memory.
The silence was heavy. Sacred.
And then I heard him.
His footsteps were soft, but I knew them. Steady. Familiar. Measured like always.
He stopped a few paces behind me.
"I'm leaving," Shen Kexian said.
His voice was quieter than I expected, as though even he wasn't certain the words should be spoken out loud. They hung between us, delicate and final.
I turned slowly.
He was already dressed for travel—his robes simpler than usual, his armor stored away, his hair pulled back into a high knot. He looked every bit the diplomat again, calm and composed.
There were dark circles beneath his eyes. His face was pale with exhaustion. And there was something in the tight line of his mouth, the way he stood with one hand gripping the scroll at his side, that told me he hadn't slept. Not really.
"I'm going back to the West."
The words didn't land all at once. They dropped piece by piece, like stones sliding down a slope—sinking, settling, cracking into my chest.
"What?" I breathed. My voice came out thinner than I meant.
He stepped closer, but not enough to touch. Just enough to be near.
"I have obligations," he said, his eyes searching mine. "Reports to deliver. Borders to stabilize. And after… everything… it's better if I'm not here."
I blinked, but the tears came anyway.
"You're leaving," I said, trying to process it out loud. "Now. After everything. After I lost Lianshui—you're leaving too?"
The silence that followed said more than any apology could.
"I can't—I just—" My hands curled uselessly at my sides. "Why does everyone keep leaving?"
"It's time," he said gently. "For both of us."
I stared at him, stunned.
"You don't have to go," I said. The words were fragile, built more of hope than logic.
He smiled—if it could be called that. It was faint, heavy. A flicker of something old and worn down.
"You know I do," he said.
I knew he was right.
Of course I did.
Staying here—staying with me—would only draw out the pain. A slow, quiet unraveling neither of us deserved. Because what would it mean, to see me every day? To watch me reach for someone else's hand? To listen to my laughter echo across the courtyard, a little softer, a little sadder, but not for him?
He had just said goodbye to Lianshui. To stay and watch me move on would be another kind of goodbye. A crueler one.
He needed time. Time to grieve in his own way.
"I'm not saying goodbye forever," he said, softer now. "But for now…"
I knew the truth but then the selfish part of me slipped out. The part that couldn't let him go without one last thread to hold on to.
"What about my power?" I said, voice breaking before I could rein it in. "I can't use it without you."
He looked surprised for a heartbeat, then softened.
He smiled. That same calm, infuriatingly gentle smile he always used when he was trying to soothe me without making promises.
"I'll run back if I have to," he said. "We have a link, remember? But somehow, I think you'll be too busy blessing people and ignoring your full potential."
It was meant to be light. A tease. But it didn't land that way. My state of mind was already splintering, unraveling beneath the weight of everything I hadn't said. Everything I'd swallowed, buried, pretended not to feel.
And before I could stop myself, I stepped forward and reached for him.
My fingers caught the fabric of his sleeve, clutching it like it was the only solid thing left in a world that kept shifting beneath my feet.
I didn't mean to hold on so tightly but I did.
His breath hitched—barely audible, but I felt it in the air between us.
"Kexian," I whispered, forcing my voice past the lump in my throat. My eyes found his, and I didn't look away. "That night… with Lianshui…"
The words stuck. My chest burned. But I had come too far to turn back now.
"I felt it," I said softly. "All of it. Your feelings. Your words."
I paused. My grip tightened.
"Those three words you said. Were they… for me?"
I had held that question inside me. I turned it over in my mind until it became too heavy to carry. I had told myself I didn't need the answer. That I shouldn't ask.
But now…
Now, I needed to know. Even if it broke something. Even if it changed everything.
He froze.
Not dramatically. Not visibly.
But I felt it—in the way the air shifted, in the stillness that slipped between us like a blade waiting to fall. His expression didn't change, but something in his eyes flickered. Uncertainty. Hope. Fear.
He didn't answer right away.
Because he knew that this was dangerous territory.
The place he always guarded. The invisible line drawn between us since the moment I gave my heart to someone else. Since the moment I was no longer his to want.
The place where his love had always lived in silence. Protected. Hidden. Kept behind walls built out of respect for a boundary he never dared cross.
Because he had only heard it from Lianshui.
Never from me.
Now I was standing on the edge of that wall—the one he had built so carefully between us. Reaching. Asking for something I hadn't dared to before.
And he stood there, caught between hope and heartbreak. He took a breath.
Then, finally, he spoke.
"At first… I saw her," he said quietly. "Lianshui. The way you moved, the way the water answered you. I thought she had returned." His voice faltered, barely, before he found it again. "But when I realized she was truly gone—that you were someone else—I decided to let her go."
He looked at me then, really looked at me. "And after that… I started feeling something I shouldn't have."
"I told myself it was a memory," he went on. "That I was only drawn to you because of what you reminded me of. But it wasn't that. Not anymore. And once I knew it… I felt like I'd betrayed her. Betrayed what she meant to me."
My chest tightened.
"I know you love Ming Yu," he said, and the honesty in his voice cracked something in me. "I see it. I feel it. But this connection I have with you—it keeps telling me otherwise."
He exhaled, the sound almost bitter. "And when Lianshui appeared… when I heard her voice again, felt her presence again—I was overwhelmed. Confused. Guilty all over again."
He took a step closer.
"But that night," he said, his voice steady now, eyes locked on mine, "those three words... they weren't for a memory. They weren't for the girl I thought I lost."
A pause. A breath.
"They were for you, little monkey."
His voice softened.
"They've been for you… for quite some time now."
And just like that—It shattered something in me.
It hurt.
Not like a cut, clean and sharp.
But like something unraveling deep beneath the skin. Like I'd been stitched together with threadbare hope, and his words were the thing that finally pulled it loose.
I couldn't breathe. I couldn't think. Because I had waited so long to hear those words, imagine them, crave them in quiet moments I never admitted to anyone—not even myself.
And now they were real. Offered freely. Gently. But I couldn't say them back.
Not without hurting the one person I had already promised everything to.
So I said nothing. I did the only thing I could.
I lifted my hand. Held it out to him—open, trembling, aching with everything I couldn't speak.
He stared at it, eyes widening. Searching my face.
Are you sure? he asked without speaking.
I nodded.
Because words were too dangerous now. And maybe… just this once… I can show him without using my words.
He took my hand—gently, like he was afraid I might disappear.
And then he activated our connection.
The moment our hands touched and the connection flared to life, I didn't hold anything back.
I poured everything into it—every buried feeling, every word I'd been too afraid to speak, every truth I'd only let myself feel in the dark.
The way I watched him when he wasn't looking.
The way my heart always settled just a little more when he was near.
The way I memorized the sound of his voice in quiet moments, and the shape of his smirk in noisy ones.
How I'd come to rely on him—not just in battle, not just in duty—but in the silence that came after grief. In the moments where everything hurt and he didn't ask for explanations.
I let it all rise.
Every unspoken thread tangled in my chest. Every look I pretended not to notice. Every laugh felt like a lifeline. Every word that came dressed in sarcasm but carried something gentler beneath.
And most of all, I gave him the one thing I had never let myself feel completely:
How much he meant to me.
How afraid I had been to let him see me fully.
Afraid that if I gave even a corner of my heart to him, I would be stealing something from someone else.
But here, in the silence between us—there were no oaths. No expectations.
Only truth.
So I gave it to him.
All of it.
And when the connection finally faded, when the weight of it settled between us like dust after a storm, I realized quiet tears rolling down my cheeks—steady and unrelenting.
He reached up and gently wiped the tears from my cheeks, his touch feather-light, reverent. Then he leaned in, closing the small space between us—not to take anything, not to linger—but to give something back.
He pressed a soft kiss to my forehead.
A goodbye in its purest form.
"Thank you," he whispered.
Just that.
No more, no less.
Then he smiled—gently, like it was all he had left to give me without breaking apart—and let go of my hand.
He didn't look back as he walked away.
He didn't have to.
Everything that needed to be said had been said. Everything that needed to be felt had been shared.
And now…
Now we both needed time.
To heal.
To move forward.
To carry each other quietly, somewhere deeper than memory.
When I finally turned from the shrine, the world felt suspended—like time had slowed just long enough for me to take one fragile breath.
The incense had nearly burned itself out, its last ribbon of smoke curling into the afternoon air, drifting skyward like a spirit finally set free. The offerings sat quietly at the base: flowers, polished stones, a single hairpin. The wind rustled the branches overhead with a gentleness I hadn't noticed before.
My heart still ached.
But it wasn't the sharp, splintering kind. Not the kind that kept me up at night, raw and relentless. This pain was quieter now. Settled. A dull echo that moved with my breath, a quiet presence I'd learned to carry.
It wasn't a wound anymore.
It had become a scar.
A mark of something that had mattered. That still did. Not in body or voice, but in memory. In the hush between moments. In the weight behind silence. In the ache that reminded me: I had loved. I had been loved.
I stood beneath the willow tree for a long time. Not quite ready to walk away. But no longer needing to stay.
That's when I saw him.
Ming Yu.
He was waiting, just beyond the drooping branches, standing where the path curved gently back toward the temple courtyard. Still. Composed. His hands rested quietly at his sides. He didn't speak. He didn't move.
He just watched me.
With the same steady patience that had always been there—quiet, sure, asking nothing, offering everything.
When our eyes met, there was no need to speak.
I crossed the distance between us, each step peeling me further away from everything I had just let go. And when I reached him, he simply held out his hand.
I placed mine in his. His fingers curled around mine, warm and strong and certain. Like grounding. Like shelter. Like home.
We didn't speak. There was nothing left to explain. He already knew.
He knew the pieces I had lost. The grief I had swallowed. The truth I carried quietly now—the girl who fell into another world, who lost a soul she had shared a body with, who had learned too much about letting go.
And still, he stayed.
We turned together, hand in hand, and began to walk.
Not toward certainty. Not toward answers.
But forward.
And somehow, in the hush that followed all our storms, that was enough.
It felt like beginning again.
—The End.