The garden was too quiet.
Not the soothing quiet of serenity, but a heavy, unnatural stillness that made the fine hairs on my nape rise. Even the cicadas had stilled their song, as though the very insects had fled or hidden from something unseen.
My hand lingered above the silk ribbon at my waist, fingers flexing instinctively as though I still held a blade. After the duel, my body remained taut, primed for danger. It seemed my instincts had not yet abandoned me from my past life.
Something is wrong.
The lanterns swayed faintly in the breeze, casting long shadows across the moss-covered stones. The scent of night-blooming jasmine mingled with the copper tang of qi-thickened air. I narrowed my eyes. My steps slowed.
The garden was supposed to be sacred ground within the sect—no disciple dared to fight here. And yet…
The faintest scrape of metal against stone reached my ears.
Before thought, before hesitation, I dropped into a roll, silk skirts whispering against damp grass as a blade of condensed qi hissed through the air where my neck had been. It cleaved through the lantern behind me, splitting it in half with surgical precision.
A trap.
I rose swiftly, breath sharp in my chest, eyes scanning. Shadows bled from the garden's corners. One by one, figures emerged—cloaked in dark fabric, faces masked, weapons gleaming faintly under the moonlight.
Assassins.
So it begins.
The Ambush.
They didn't announce themselves. No posturing. No threats. Efficient—professional. Their silence confirmed the truth: they had not come to intimidate. They had come to erase me.
The first one lunged. His dagger dripped with a faint green sheen—poison. My body moved before my mind caught up, pivoting, striking with my elbow into his wrist. The blade skittered from his grasp, but another attacker replaced him instantly.
A blur of qi-cutting lines arced toward me. Threads of energy strung between trees shimmered faintly, waiting to ensnare.
"Spirit-wire traps," I hissed under my breath. Memories surged—scrolls I had studied in my first life, diagrams of assassins' techniques used in the Obsidian Court. So that's their game.
I ducked low, twisting, letting momentum carry me into a slide beneath one glowing line. Sparks danced as it brushed the end of my sleeve, slicing clean through fabric as though it were silk paper. My pulse hammered, but my lips curved in grim defiance.
If these shadows thought I was a helpless pawn, they were about to learn otherwise.
"Three paces left," I whispered to myself.
I shifted just as a hidden glyph underfoot flared. A seal carved into the soil ignited, releasing a burst of explosive qi. But I had anticipated it. I angled my palm, channeling raw instinct and the fragment of power I had recently awakened.
The qi detonated—but its force bent, redirected, slamming into one of the assassins who had been circling behind me. He cried out, body flung into a tree with bone-crunching impact.
Two down. Four more to go.
I had no sword, no talisman. Only my mind, my body, and my stubborn refusal to die.
The next assassin struck high, twin blades crossing in a scissor strike toward my throat. I dropped, sweeping my leg. He vaulted to avoid it—just as I had intended. His leap carried him straight into another wire trap.
The line sang, slicing across his chest. He fell heavily, gasping.
Blood sprayed the moss. My breath came ragged, my limbs already trembling with exertion. I was alive only because I remembered. Because I had seen such techniques before—studied, endured, survived.
But knowledge only carried me so far. My new power thrummed within me, unrefined and sharp, like a blade fresh from the forge. Each time I touched it, it cut me as much as it cut them.
And still…
I fought.
I staggered against the base of a cherry tree, chest heaving. For a moment, the garden seemed still again, though the copper tang of blood thickened the air. My pulse slowed. Perhaps… perhaps I had survived it.
Then the world whispered.
Not a sound. Not a footfall. But a sensation—a brush of air cold against the back of my neck.
The true strike.
Too fast. Too silent. A blade, finer than silk, honed with cultivation so deep that even my sharpened senses failed to catch it until too late.
I turned, but my body knew—this one, I could not avoid.
So this is how I die? Again?
But the strike never landed.
Instead, obsidian-and-silver robes cut across my vision, a wall of cold strength interposing itself between me and death. A ripple of qi shattered the blade's momentum, dispersing it into harmless fragments of light that glittered like broken starlight before fading.
Kael.
He stood before me, tall and unmoving, his aura coiled like a predator's. His hand lingered in the air, fingers still crackling with restrained force.
"You attract trouble like moths to flame," he said, his voice low, edged with something I couldn't place. Not warmth. Not anger. Something sharper, more dangerous.
I pressed a trembling hand to my chest, forcing my racing heart to steady. My lips curved in spite of myself. "Perhaps trouble simply enjoys my company."
His gaze flicked to me, eyes like polished obsidian reflecting moonlight. For the briefest instant, I thought I saw recognition—an echo of something deeper. But it vanished as quickly as it appeared.
The garden was too quiet.
"Who sent you?" I hissed, my voice low, mocking.
The assassin said nothing, but the flicker in his eyes told me enough: silence, loyalty—or terror of the one who commanded them.
They fanned out, circling. Predatory. Patient.
I smirked.
"Come, then. Let us dance."
One threw a talisman. Paper ignited in blue light, exploding midair into chains of spiritual force.
Ah. Clever.
The chains lashed toward me, intent to bind. My instincts screamed trap—not to kill, but to capture. Which meant someone didn't just want me dead. They wanted me removed.
Past-life knowledge surged. I traced a counter-seal in the air with my blood-slick fingertip, whispering a name no one in this era should remember.
The chains unraveled with a hiss, snapping apart like rotted rope. The assassins froze, startled.
That heartbeat of hesitation was mine.
I struck. One fell, throat slit. Another staggered, shoulder pierced. A third barely dodged, leaving a spray of crimson petals as my blade cut a rose stalk instead of flesh.
But three remained untouched—and growing more cautious.
And then—the world shifted.
A ripple of qi, so subtle only someone attuned to death itself would notice, passed through the garden. The assassins faltered as though their bodies suddenly remembered fear.
Kael.
An assassin's strike faltered a half-inch from my throat, his hand trembling. Another found his footing slipping on stones that moments ago were dry.
I laughed under my breath. "My, how the Heir came to my rescue."
But even with Kael's interference, the last assassin pressed harder, drawing out a blade laced with venom. Its edge glowed sickly green, qi-infused poison. One scratch, and I'd collapse before dawn.
The strike came fast. Faster than my body could follow.
Instinct took over. My vision blurred—then sharpened. Time fractured, the assassin's movements stretched into strands of possibility. I saw the path of his blade, saw my death a hundred times, and chose differently.
A New Awakening.
My palm flared with pale violet light, unfamiliar yet innately mine. A surge of qi burst outward, not from training, but from memory—knowledge dragged from my past life.
The force struck him square in the chest, hurling him into the rose trellis with a scream. The wood cracked. His body crumpled.
I stared at my hand, shaking, glowing faintly with that impossible violet sheen. My heart thundered.
So. The first piece of power returns to me.
Silence fell over the garden. Only my ragged breath and the drip of blood into earth.
I straightened, smoothing my gown, ignoring the sting of shallow cuts. If anyone looked upon me now, they would see not a girl nearly assassinated, but a woman untouched—serene, mocking, unbroken.
But I knew the truth. Someone had tried to erase me. Not kill. Not yet. Capture, bind, silence. That made them dangerous.
Above, I felt eyes. Watching. Measuring.
Kael.
"Enjoyed the show, did you?" I murmured into the night. No reply came, only the whisper of retreating steps.
The corpses lay cooling at my feet. Only one assassin still breathed, unconscious, blood pooling beneath him.
I knelt, fingers brushing his mask away. His face was ordinary. Forgettable. That made it worse—someone who existed to be invisible, expendable.
But tucked into his collar, I found it. A sigil, embroidered faintly in red thread. A lotus, half-bloomed.
My blood chilled.
Not a sect insignia. Not a mercenary brand. Something more secret, more insidious.
I pocketed it, lips curving into a dangerous smile.
"So. The game begins."
From the balcony overlooking the far wing of the estate, I caught the faintest silhouette—a woman's form. Watching. Silent.
The rival's eyes burned, distant yet venomous. Her lips moved soundlessly. A vow.
I tilted my head, mocking. "Come, then. I'll play."
The night swallowed her, leaving me with corpses, secrets, and one undeniable truth—
Someone wanted me dead.
And they had just made their first mistake.