The wind had turned cruel.
It howled through the ancient beams of the Xu household, rattling shutters and slipping cold fingers under doors. The first snowfall of the year had come early—sheets of white coating the courtyard stones, the roof tiles, the skeletal branches of plum trees. Winter was not only approaching. It was arriving with force.
Inside the main residence, the servants moved with quiet urgency. Firewood was doubled in the hearths. Thicker blankets were aired. Medicines were crushed and simmered. All for one reason—Shu Wenyan's illness. Every winter, it returned. A relentless cold that gripped his lungs and wore down his strength. The physician said it was something congenital, some weakness of the body he was born with. But this year, it felt worse.
That night, despite the heat of the brazier beside his bed, Wenyan shivered beneath layers of silk and fur. Sweat clung to his skin. His breath came shallow. The fever was rising.
And with it came the dreams.
---
He stood at the edge of a palace that floated in the sky.
The clouds swirled around its base like waves around a mountain. Towers of silver rose above him, shimmering with runes that pulsed like veins. The sky was black—not night, but a vast void glittering with stars that hummed like they were alive.
He looked down at his hands. They were older. Stronger. Etched with faint lines of gold that glowed when he moved. A blade hung at his side—not the one he trained with, but something ancient, curved and carved with dragon-like script.
People knelt before him. Rows upon rows of figures dressed in white and blue, heads bowed, hands clenched over their hearts.
"Lord Xuanming," someone said behind him.
He turned.
And she was there.
Qin Yelan. Or someone like her. She wore robes of twilight silk, her long hair braided with silver thread. No mask this time. Her face was bare—stern, regal, but eyes soft like dusk. She walked toward him without fear.
"Are you going to leave again?" she asked, voice distant, like a memory.
He tried to answer. The words caught in his throat.
"I told you," she whispered, "if you walk that path, you walk it alone."
Lightning cracked across the sky. Thunder rumbled, and the clouds turned red.
"Why are you showing me this?" Wenyan asked—except he hadn't moved his lips. The voice had come from within the dream itself.
The palace trembled.
In an instant, fire swept across the clouds. Screams echoed in the distance. The kneeling figures were gone, replaced by shadows—men, beasts, monsters—screeching, howling, fighting.
Blood spilled across marble steps.
And there—at the top of the palace stair—he saw himself, standing cloaked in darkness, his face hidden behind a mask of ice, his blade pointed at the sky.
"Li Xuanming," the woman screamed from below. "Come back! Please—don't forget!"
He reached toward her. Their hands touched.
And everything shattered.
---
Wenyan shot up in bed, his chest heaving. The room was dark except for the flickering of the dying brazier. His hair clung to his face, drenched in sweat. His hands trembled as he clutched the edge of his blanket.
His heart thundered.
Again—that name. Xuanming.
It wasn't just a sound anymore. It was becoming a presence. Like something ancient buried within him was fighting to rise.
He looked at his hands. In the dream, they had glowed.
Here, they were pale. Human. Weak.
But the feeling lingered. That terrible, vast loneliness from the dream. That final scream. That woman's face.
Qin Yelan.
He had never met her—not truly, he told himself. Not without the mask. Not without the danger. Yet her voice echoed in his mind like they had parted a thousand times before.
He stood, stumbling slightly. His knees felt cold and unsteady beneath him. But he moved to the window, pushing it open despite the freezing air. The wind cut across his skin like blades. Snow drifted in silence. The sky above was still dark, the moon veiled behind thick clouds.
Wenyan stared into the night.
He didn't know who Li Xuanming was.
He didn't know what that dream meant.
But something inside him—something buried deep—ached to remember.
---
In the capital, Qin Yelan sat alone in the silent study of her inner palace.
A brazier burned low. Scrolls lay untouched on the desk. She hadn't been able to focus for days. Since that night. Since him.
She touched the sleeve of the robe she had worn in disguise. There was a faint tear, now stitched neatly by palace maids. But her thoughts weren't on the fabric.
They were on a dream. One she had woken from only moments ago.
A palace in the sky.
A boy with gold-lined hands.
A name she hadn't spoken aloud since she was a child: Xuanming.
She clenched her jaw, her hand tightening over the fabric.
Something was coming. Something old.
And for reasons she didn't understand, Xu Wenyan was at the center of it.
---
Back in the western province, snow continued to fall, covering the ground in a blanket of silence.
But beneath that silence, fate stirred.
And in the heart of a fevered boy, dreams began to bleed into waking life.