The war chamber in the Southern Celestial Wing pulsed with quiet tension. Floating scrolls hovered like silent witnesses, inscribed with battle reports and star patterns. Realm globes turned slowly, casting fractured light on the polished jade floor.
A map of the border flickered midair—marked with burning sigils where fresh conflict had broken out. A minor skirmish, the scholars called it. But the names of dead soldiers still shimmered red.
Xuanyan, draped in silver robes, gestured to the constellations shifting above them. "The stars haven't aligned for retaliation. We wait. Study the movements. There's meaning in the silence."
Xuanlie's jaw clenched. The golden edge of his armor gleamed under the lanterns, too polished for someone who hadn't slept in days.
"We wait?" His voice cut across the chamber. "How many more 'minor' deaths do we tally before the stars agree with us?"
Silence.
Zhao Yan didn't flinch. She sat at the head of the table, posture calm, expression unreadable. Her fingers tapped lightly on the carved armrest, one beat after another.
Xuanyan didn't respond, but a flicker of irritation passed behind his eyes.
Xuanlie continued, stepping forward. "We carry blades, and yet it's others that commands?"
Zhao Yan stood. Not fast, not dramatic but enough to silence the breath of the room.
"Without vision," she said, voice even, "the blade strikes blind."
"That's easy to say when you've both," Xuanlie snapped back. "Wisdom and a sword. But not all of us were born with balance."
Zhao Yan's gaze settled on him. "Then train your balance. Not your resentment."
His fists clenched. "You think I don't see it? The sages are growing bolder. Their influence spreads. They speak in riddles and move armies from behind curtains—"
"They see patterns that save lives," Zhao Yan interrupted. "Your strength is needed, Xuanlie. Not your suspicion."
Xuanlie's voice dropped low. "We lose ground every time we wait. You may trust the stars, General... but I trust the men who bleed."
The chamber stilled. Even the floating scrolls paused, as if holding breath.
Zhao Yan stepped forward, close enough that only he could hear the steel in her next words.
"Then honor them by holding your oath. You swore to uphold peace, not feed chaos."
A flicker of hurt crossed Xuanlie's eyes but he said nothing. Just stepped back, silent, jaw still set.
The sages kept their eyes lowered. The other commanders watched Zhao Yan, as if waiting for her to fracture, too.
But she didn't.
The war chamber quieted as the last murmurs faded, officers excusing themselves under the weight of tension still hanging in the air. The celestial globes above continued to rotate, showing the Southern Void pulsing with faint crimson. Xuanlie being the last one to leave the hall.
Zhao Yan remained by the strategy table, eyes on the projection of the disturbed border realm. Xuanyan stood beside her, conjuring sigils with a flick of his sleeve. Data streamed through the air, glyphs pulsing around a red-tinted ripple expanding across the Southern quadrant.
"This disturbance—it's not just imbalance," he said. "It's deliberate."
Zhao Yan gave a sharp nod. "It moves too cleanly to be natural chaos."
He rotated the projection, showing a steady point of origin. "It isn't spreading outward like corruption. It's tunneling. Burrowing inward."
A pause. Zhao Yan's brow furrowed.
"Any patterns?"
"Not yet. But it's silent… and organized."
Her fingers tapped the edge of the table. "That rules out demonic interference."
"Not necessarily. A higher form, maybe. Or something else entirely."
She frowned. "If it's not demonic or divine… then it doesn't belong in the cycle at all."
Xuanyan glanced toward her. "Xuanlie's call for retaliation will be louder by tomorrow."
"I know. And if we act blindly, we give whatever this is exactly what it wants."
He folded his arms. "Then we need better eyes."
"Send scouts past the Southern Seal," Zhao Yan said. "Stealth units only. And inform Meihua—she'll know if this distortion echoes through the celestial threads."
"She won't like being involved this early."
Zhao Yan's expression didn't waver. "She warned me once about something without name or form. If she remembers more, now is the time."
Xuanyan nodded. "And Xuanlie?"
"I'll speak to him," Zhao Yan replied. "His anger clouds his reason, but it's born from loyalty. I won't let him spiral."
The projection flared. The void shimmered—another pulse, just faint, but there.
Zhao Yan watched it, her voice low. "We didn't stop the war. We just buried it."
Xuanyan didn't respond.
Because it was true.
The projection flared once more—another pulse in the void, slow but steady.
Zhao Yan leaned forward, her voice low and decisive. "Summon Meihua. Now."
Xuanyan lifted a brow. "She hates being pulled from meditation."
"All the more reason to do it myself," Zhao Yan said dryly. She lifted two fingers, forming the sigil of summoning. The air shimmered, a lotus-shaped ripple blooming midair.
Moments later, Meihua materialized in a gust of plum-scented wind, robes of soft violet swirling as if she were walking through a garden instead of appearing mid-war council.
She took one look at Zhao Yan, then another at Xuanyan, and visibly scoffed.
"Oh. It's you." Her tone aimed squarely at the Sage, ignoring Zhao Yan's straight face entirely.
Xuanyan didn't blink. "Good morning to you too, Lady Meihua."
"Don't good morning me. You never call unless something's falling apart. Or when you want to be smug." Her eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Is it both today?"
Zhao Yan pressed a knuckle to her lips, hiding the twitch of a smile. "We need your threadsight. There's a disturbance in the void—abnormal, patterned. Xuanyan believes it's deliberate."
"Of course he does," Meihua muttered. "He always thinks it's deliberate. The last time I listened to him, I ended up with three cracked mirrors and a cursed moth following me for a week."
Xuanyan cleared his throat, lifting one palm to the projection. "This is no guessing game. The pulse repeats every thirty-six celestial counts, which suggests rhythm. Intent."
"Oh please, even rain has rhythm." She flicked a finger, and a pale pink thread shot from her sleeve, coiling through the rotating globe. Her gaze turned serious. "But this…"
Her lips thinned.
"…This is stitched wrong."
Zhao Yan's gaze sharpened. "How wrong?"
Meihua traced the crimson pulse with her finger. "It's not unraveling like decay. It's stitching inward. Reinforcing something—binding it. And the threads aren't divine."
"Not demonic either," Xuanyan said, voice taut.
Meihua gave him a sidelong look. "Did I ask for your opinion?"
Zhao Yan sighed. "Children, please."
"I'm centuries older than him," Meihua muttered, yanking her thread back.
"Then act like it," Xuanyan said under his breath.
"I heard that."
Zhao Yan cut through them both. "Meihua. Can you trace the origin?"
Meihua hesitated. "Not from here. I'll need the Divine Loom, and you'll owe me tea, fire peaches, and at least two nights of uninterrupted silence."
"Done."
Meihua's eyes flicked back to Xuanyan. "And I'm not working if he's in the room."
Xuanyan gestured grandly. "Gladly. I'll meditate. Far, far away."
Meihua turned back to Zhao Yan, already pulling threads from her sleeves, sighing like the weight of the realms was now her personal headache. "Honestly. Can't even stitch the skies without tripping over sage boy and his smug eyebrows."
Zhao Yan just smiled faintly and stepped back as the chamber filled with the scent of plum blossoms and humming threads of fate.
The Divine Loom did not sit in any one palace, nor hover in any sky. It drifted.
Rooted in a sanctuary between realms, suspended on threads too fine for mortal eyes, the Loom was a sanctuary made of silence, memory, and raw law. Only those who could read its patterns were permitted to walk its bridges.
Meihua stepped through the veil with practiced grace, sleeves pulled back, hair loosely tied. Her jade comb glinted under the starlight as she walked barefoot across the glass thread bridge that pulsed beneath her with each step.
The chamber was immense—a sphere without walls. Threads crisscrossed the endless space like a giant spider's web, vibrating with echoes from the past, present, and something else more… invasive.
"Tch."
She knelt at the heart of the Loom where the spindle turned slowly, eternally, untouched. She exhaled and pressed her fingers together, releasing her inner sight.
Threads snapped into view—colors, weights, twists. She searched, not for paths, but fractures. Misalignments. Threads that buckled against their nature.
And then she saw it.
Not one fracture.
Dozens.
No—hundreds.
All knotted around a single scarlet core, buried deep within the Void's eastern quadrant. Hidden behind imperial stars, beyond the reach of normal divination.
"…What are you?"
She pulled a single thread.
It screamed.
It was soundless, but her vision dimmed. Her temples ached. The Loom stuttered.
Meihua jerked back, breath ragged.
No divine thread should resist her hand. No celestial bond should scream.
She stood quickly, pressing a warding talisman to her chest. Her lips moved fast, conjuring a scroll to record the anomaly, then another to seal the fragment she touched.
Before she could roll it tight, a thread behind her twitched.
Xuanyan.
"You're not supposed to be here!" she snapped, not turning around.
His voice drifted in, low and calm. "I didn't step through. I only sent my voice."
"How generous of you," she muttered, brushing stray threads off her shoulder. "Go be smug elsewhere."
"What did you see?"
Meihua hesitated. Her eyes fell on the spindle again. "Something ancient. And artificial."
"Artificial?"
"Someone… made this, Xuanyan. Wove it deliberately. Bound it in red."
She pressed the scroll to her chest, suddenly uneasy.
"Tell Zhao Yan," she whispered. "Quietly. This should only be made known to us and His Majesty."
Taingong Palace, inside Dijun's private chamber.
The chamber was soundproof, warm, and dimly lit, with only the light of suspended constellation-lamps rotating like slow galaxies above them. Ancient maps and shifting diagrams filled the curved walls. The four of them gathered around a low obsidian table etched with the timelines of realms—some bright, others fraying.
Zhao Yan stood with her hands behind her back, spine straight. She wasn't armored, but there was something sharp in how she held still. Beside her, Meihua leaned against a scroll case, legs crossed and expression unreadable. Xuanyan stood across from her, arms tucked inside his sleeves. He had already corrected the orientation of two floating maps since they entered.
At the center of it all sat Dijun, lounging sideways on a hovering seat like the fate of the heavens wasn't at stake. Which it might be.
"Alright," he said, flicking a piece of dried plum into his mouth. "Let's hear it. Which of you broke the Void?"
Zhao Yan didn't roll her eyes, but the silence she gave was weighted enough.
Xuanyan spoke first, ever the efficient one. "We investigated the disruption near the Western passage. The balance was off. We initially suspected a natural deviation caused by timeline drag."
"Turns out," Meihua interrupted, "it wasn't natural."
Dijun raised a brow. "Someone broke the laws of time again? I thought we fined the Time Sage last cycle."
"No," Zhao Yan said. "It's not about time. It's about—" she paused, looking toward Meihua.
Meihua uncrossed her arms and brought out the scroll she had been keeping since the Loom.
"There was a thread," she said. "Deep inside the Loom. Bound in red. Not spun by any of our sanctioned weavers. It wasn't alive, but it reacted when I touched it."
"Artificial," Xuanyan added. "Constructed. Like a binding spell pretending to be a soul thread."
"It shouldn't be there," Meihua said, more pointedly. "And it was wrapped around a void scar. That's a crime waiting to explode."
"Scarred void, unnatural thread, suspicious intent," Dijun repeated, ticking off on his fingers. "Lovely. Exactly the kind of thing I like waking up to."
Zhao Yan stepped forward. "We think it's a tampering attempt. Possibly divine in origin, but not logged in our records. Someone's hiding something."
Dijun sat upright now, interest sharpening. "You're saying someone wove a red thread, buried it in a faultline between realms, and tried to mask it like fate?"
"Yes," Meihua said. "And it responded. Like it was waiting."
"Could it be a tether?" Dijun asked.
"Possibly," Xuanyan admitted. "But if it is… it's dangerous. If the thread is pulled too tight or cut—"
"Boom?" Dijun guessed.
"Unraveling," Meihua corrected. "Not a boom. Worse."
Dijun exhaled, running a hand through his hair. "I need this realm to stay intact at least until the end of the quarter."
"That's your concern?" Meihua muttered.
Zhao Yan shot her a look, gentle but firm. "Let's stay focused."
Xuanyan cleared his throat, glancing at Meihua, then away. "We'll trace the origin of the thread. See who might've planted it."
"Try not to mess up the mapping array this time," Meihua muttered under her breath.
"I didn't—" Xuanyan's tone pinched. "That was a calibration error. And it was one time."
"One time too many," she shot back.
"Okay," Dijun clapped his hands once. "Enough flirting."
The two fell silent immediately.
Zhao Yan coughed into her fist, lips twitching. "They're not flirting."
"Could've fooled me," Dijun muttered, grabbing another plum. "Anyway. Proceed with caution. Zhao Yan, you have operational oversight. Xuanyan, investigate the origin quietly. Meihua—"
"I'll keep watch on the Loom," she said before he could finish. "If it shifts again, I'll know."
"Good. If you need backup, send word. But for now…" Dijun leaned back, smirking faintly. "Try not to kill each other. Or worse—try not to banter each other to death."
"I'm not the problem," Meihua muttered.
"Of course not," Xuanyan said flatly. "You're perfect."
"That sounded like sarcasm."
"That's because it was."
"Alright!" Zhao Yan stepped in between them, not raising her voice but somehow cutting clean through the tension. "We're dismissed. Let's move."
And as they began to file out of the chamber, Dijun called out lazily, "If any of you start falling in love because of this mysterious red thread nonsense, I'll revoke your reincarnation privileges."
Zhao Yan didn't dignify that with a response.
But Meihua, grinning faintly, said, "Don't worry. I have better taste."
Xuanyan muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like, "Unfortunately."
Outside the Grand Hall, the sky above the Celestial Palace was clear—too clear. Even the clouds looked like they were holding their breath.
Zhao Yan walked slightly ahead, her posture still stiff from the meeting. Meihua followed, muttering under her breath while trying to adjust the wrapped scrolls in her arms. Xuanyan trailed a few steps behind them, arms tucked neatly into his sleeves, unreadable as ever.
"I still don't see why we couldn't have just burned that thing," Meihua said.
"Because if it burned, the Heavens would've screamed," Zhao Yan answered without looking back.
"I wouldn't mind hearing it scream once in a while," Meihua muttered.
They reached the jade steps where their paths would diverge. Golden clouds hovered like waiting mounts—one destined for the Northern Loom Pavilion, the other for the Celestial Observatory.
"Try not to trip over your own robes, Xuanyan," Meihua said casually as she floated onto her cloud. "You might accidentally divine the wrong constellation."
He gave her a look—dry, disinterested, and absolutely unreadable. "Thank you for the concern. I'll be sure to check the stars for your humility. Though I suspect it's still missing."
Zhao Yan raised a brow. "Children."
"I'm older than him," Meihua said flatly.
"In maturity?" Xuanyan asked, without missing a beat.
Zhao Yan exhaled a slow sigh. "Enough. Both of you. Focus."
The two clouds pulled away in opposite directions—Xuanyan vanishing into the upper skies, and Meihua descending toward the Loom Pavilion.
For a moment, the wind picked up, carrying stray plum blossoms between them. And just before Meihua disappeared behind the veils of the pavilion, she muttered, mostly to herself:
"He's probably looking at charts right now. Overthinking. As usual."
Far above, in the observatory, Xuanyan paused mid-step. A sneeze escaped him.
"…Someone is slandering me," he said quietly.
Xuanlie's Quarters, Southern Barracks
The halls of the Southern Barracks quieted once the sun dropped below the Heavenly Ridge. The war drums had ceased. Only the occasional echo of guards patrolling broke the stillness.
Zhao Yan approached the door without fanfare. She didn't knock.
Xuanlie looked up from his bench. He was untying the last strap of his gauntlet, arms tense, shirt sticking slightly to the sweat on his back. His brows lifted when he saw her.
"I expected someone else," he said.
"You're not that lucky," Zhao Yan replied, stepping in. She shut the door gently behind her.
The room was as plain as ever—polished stone walls, a cot barely used, weapons leaned in corners like silent witnesses. No comforts. No warmth.
She remained standing while he finished removing his armor, piece by piece. The silence wasn't awkward. They'd shared worse silences.
"Are you here to scold me again?" he asked, voice neutral.
"No," she said. "I'm here because you didn't listen the first time."
Xuanlie's jaw twitched. He dropped his gauntlet onto the bench with a clank. "So now we're doing this in private."
"You wanted to speak freely. I'm giving you the space."
"I didn't say I wanted it." He looked away. "But fine. Let's talk."
She crossed her arms. "Then talk."
A long pause. Xuanlie shifted his weight like he was bracing for impact. "It feels like we're always waiting. Waiting on signs, waiting on orders, waiting for Xuanyan to draw a line in the stars before anyone moves."
"Strategy isn't cowardice," Zhao Yan said calmly.
"I didn't call it that." He looked at her now, jaw tight. "But when I stand in that room, I don't feel like a general. I feel like a blade—put away until it's needed. Never asked. Never told."
Zhao Yan studied him. "That's what the council is. We balance each other."
"And what am I balancing?" he snapped. "I know my role, Yan. I was made for war. But sometimes I wonder if anyone sees anything beyond that. If I'm even allowed to be anything else."
She stepped closer, slowly, grounding the space between them.
"You were never just a weapon," she said, voice steady. "Not to me."
Xuanlie's shoulders dropped, barely perceptible. He sat back down on the bench, hands resting on his knees.
"Then why does it feel like everyone forgets that the moment I raise a sword?"
"Because they're afraid," she said.
"Of me?"
"No," she said, kneeling slightly so they were eye to eye. "Of what you're willing to become for the sake of everyone else."
He stared at her. Then looked down, hands curling into fists.
"I don't want to lose myself in this," he muttered. "Not again."
"You won't," Zhao Yan said quietly. "Not while I'm here."
He gave a half-laugh, bitter but soft. "You always say things like that. Like you already know how everything ends."
"I don't," she replied. "But I trust you. Even when you don't trust yourself."
He closed his eyes briefly. When he opened them again, some of the tension had left his face, but not all.
"You're still going to lecture me next time I shout in the war chamber, aren't you?"
Zhao Yan smirked. "Absolutely."
He snorted. "Great."
She stood. "Get some rest. The next wave of trouble isn't going to wait on us."
As she walked toward the door, he spoke again, quieter this time.
"Thanks for coming."
She didn't turn around. "Don't make it a habit of needing rescue, Xuanlie. I'm not always going to be this patient."
That made him chuckle.
And for a brief moment, the heaviness lifted—just a little.
The outer perimeter of the Heavenly Realm, near the southern veil.
Two celestial scouts stood watch, stationed at the edge of the known heavens. They were seasoned—silent, alert—but something in the air made even the older one grip his spiritual blade just a little tighter.
Ahead of them, across a short expanse of worn stone and brittle grass, the air had torn.
Not cleanly. Jagged. Uneven. Like a beast's claw had raked through the divine barrier. The crack shimmered faintly, edges glowing with violet threads. Wind didn't pass through it, but energy did. Slow, seeping, wrong.
The younger scout adjusted the grip on his spear. "That wasn't here this morning."
"No," said the older one flatly. "It wasn't."
The tear pulsed—once. The air rippled outward, heavy and hot like breath from a sleeping beast.
"There's chanting," the younger said.
The elder didn't answer right away. "Not chanting. Vibrations. Something on the other side is moving."
There was silence, then a flick of his sleeve. A jade slip slipped into his palm, already etched with a transmission seal.
He whispered low, fed a sliver of spiritual energy into it.
The crack is real. It's spreading.
He let go, and the jade blinked, then vanished in a flash of gold—straight to the Tiangong palace.
The younger scout dared another step forward.
"Should we—?"
"No." The elder's tone cut him off. "Do not cross that line. Do not engage. That's not a wound. It's a door. And someone wants it open."
"But this is the edge of the divine sky. What could possibly—"
"Enough."
The younger stopped. He looked back at the breach. It pulsed again, more rhythm now than accident.
The jade slip appeared with a quiet snap in the air. Dijun didn't even look up from his tea. The cup paused at his lips.
A twitch of his fingers.
The message unraveled, glowing gold, the words sharp and clipped.
Crack in southern barrier. Not natural. Not accidental. Vibrations felt through the veil.
A long exhale left his nose.
"Trouble never knocks anymore," he muttered. "Just barges in."
He stood, joints creaking—not from age, but from power being pulled tight. The Court around him responded at once. Scrolls lifted. Lamps flared. The Mirror of Realms beside him shimmered into motion.
With a flick of his sleeve, Dijun summoned the veil-map. It hovered midair, a grand celestial replica of the Heavenly Realm's borders. Southern edge: frayed. Black streak like spilled ink.
He stared at it. Then sighed again, louder.
"Someone's trying to be clever."
A moment later, the doors burst open. An attendant god bowed low, panting. "Your Majesty—"
"I know," Dijun interrupted. "They found the crack. I'm already on it."
He snapped his fingers.
Golden lines streaked from his fingertips, tracing through the map, anchoring themselves into the tear's location. They dug deep, fast, weaving like stitches into a wound. The power he summoned wasn't flashy—but old. Foundational. A raw authority that smelled like lightning and silence.
Still, the breach resisted.
He gritted his teeth. "You stubborn little—"
Then someone laughed from behind.
Meihua, leaning on the doorframe, arms crossed. "You look like an old man trying to fix a roof leak."
Dijun didn't turn. "And you look like someone I didn't summon."
"I came anyway," she grinned. "Because you're bad at asking for help."
He rolled his eyes. "If I wanted sass, I'd call Zhao Yan."
"You did. She's coming."
Dijun groaned. "Great. Now it's a committee."
He turned back to the map, fingers weaving faster now, binding seal upon seal.
"Can you hold it?" Meihua asked, stepping beside him.
"For now," he said. "But it's not just a crack. It's a message."
She glanced sideways. "From who?"
He didn't answer. Just pressed his hand flat over the breach.
The room dimmed.
Then a pulse of light—sharp, blinding—erupted outward. The celestial map trembled, then stilled. The black streak dulled. Not gone. But contained.
For now.
He exhaled and shook his hands off like he'd just put out a fire. "Barrier reinforced."
"And the tear?"
"Like a sealed wound," he murmured. "But we better find what caused it. Before it festers."
Meihua glanced at him. "You mean before they do."
He didn't answer.