Yin said nothing. The amused mask was completely gone now, replaced by an impassive, unreadable stillness. His silence was more telling than any denial.
Nian Shi pressed his advantage, a slight, cold laugh escaping his lips. "If you think I am nothing but a shortsighted fool, Yin, then you have underestimated me greatly."
He tapped his own temple. "I am the God of Time. I monitor the past, the present, and the countless threads of the future. I see patterns. I find clues. I connect echoes across epochs."
His tone grew sharper, laced with a grudging respect and deep-seated anger. "Although I have to admit... you successfully fooled me with your other self. A masterful deception, to have a fragment operating outside the seal without my knowledge. I did not calculate that."
