Chapter 4: Her Name Was Tang Xinyi
There was no warmth in the void—only silence.
Not darkness. Not light. Just the ache of something lost so completely that even time forgot it existed.
"Where… am I?"
The voice didn't echo. It didn't travel. It simply was—shaped from memory, pain, and the lingering weight of unfinished desire.
In that formless expanse, a flicker sparked.
A name.
A soul.
A curse that refused to die.
Rebirth
New Luyang City — Underground Medical District, 2:13 A.M.
A young girl sat upright on an autopsy table, gasping as if torn from drowning. Her body trembled under the dim red emergency lights.
Her name—at least according to the morgue tag—was Tang Xinyi.
Age: 17.Time of Death: Two hours ago.Cause: Unknown.Soul Status: Reclaimed.
But the girl in her skin was not the girl who died.
She blinked, disoriented, and stared at her hands. Pale. Delicate. Familiar—but not hers.
"No... this isn't right. I was… someone else."
The metal table beneath her buzzed with residual spirit energy. The room stank of antiseptic, regret, and recently extinguished candles.
System Alert: Identity Fracture DetectedSpirit Core Imprint: IncompatibleMerging Attempt: Success (Unstable)New Host: Tang XinyiPrevious Identity: CLASSIFIEDEmotion Core: Sorrow. Anger. Love. Betrayal.
Memories Like Shattered Mirrors
She stumbled off the table and collapsed to the floor.
And then—
Flashes.
A burning temple.A boy with midnight eyes holding her as her world fell apart.Her own scream—echoing between dimensions.
"Zhao… Feng?"
She clutched her head as thousands of fractured thoughts burned behind her eyes.
She was Tang Xinyi, top student at the Advanced Spirit Academy. But she was also someone else—a cultivator from another era. A girl with crimson hair, a forged soul, and a heart that had shattered in battle.
"Why was I reborn? What unfinished path... brought me back?"
The Awakening
Lights exploded as spirit arrays around the morgue short-circuited. Lightning flickered. The dead room breathed.
A pulse of qi burst from her chest, slamming drawers open and sending metal instruments skittering across the floor.
Spirit Root: Crimson-Black Lotus (Hybrid Type – Banned)Cultivation Awakening: Completed (Tier 0 → Tier 3)Hidden Trait Unlocked: Dual Core Memory IntegrationWarning: Mental instability likely. Use caution during spirit channeling.
Her eyes flared violet.
She remembered everything now.
Zhao Feng.The system.The sword that shattered a realm.The boy who held her dying body and begged her to live.
"So this is my second chance," she whispered. "Then I'll burn every sect that tried to erase me. And I'll find him. I'll find Zhao Feng."
Elsewhere...
Across the city, Zhao felt it.
A pulse—sharp as pain, intimate as love. His soul trembled.
System Alert: Resonance Spike DetectedSoul Link Signature: 63% MatchName: [Redacted] (Tang Xinyi)Emotional Link Detected. Memory Thread Reconnecting.
He dropped the sword.
"Xinyi…?"
Bai Qian looked at him sharply. "What is it?"
"She's back."
"Who?"
He didn't answer.
Tang Xinyi: First Kill
Back in the morgue, footsteps echoed.
A man in a bloodstained coat walked in, flanked by two masked guards from a black-market soul trafficking ring.
"Well well," the doctor murmured. "Subject 41 woke up after all."
He raised a needle glowing with cursed spirit liquid.
"Too bad. You won't stay conscious long enough to scream."
Xinyi raised her head slowly.
Her lips curled.
She was trembling—but not with fear.
With rage.
Skill Activated: Crimson Soul Surge (Lv. 1)Ignites latent soul force to enhance reflexes, spiritual perception, and raw emotion power.Warning: Blood Core overload possible at Stage I.
The air exploded.
She blurred, moving faster than a mortal eye could track. Her hand snapped the syringe mid-air, reversed it, and plunged it into the man's throat.
He didn't even scream—just collapsed with wide, disbelieving eyes.
The guards moved to draw their spirit weapons.
Too slow.
She was already behind them.
Three seconds. Two lives.Blood hit the floor like rain.
She looked down at her hands, shaking.
"This power... it's mine. And it's his.""I don't know who I am fully yet. But I know what I have to do."
She walked out of the morgue, barefoot, drenched in blood and moonlight.
Her spirit burned behind her eyes.
Mission Accepted: Find the Soul ReaverObjective: Reconnect the Lost ThreadWarning: Your past enemies remember you too.
Post-Kill Stillness
Tang Xinyi stood in the middle of the blood-soaked morgue, breath ragged.
Her fists clenched, nails biting into her palms.
The pain grounded her.
"I'm alive. But who the hell am I now?"
The rage was real. The confusion, too. But underneath it all… was something softer.
Something that ached.
She turned toward the reflective steel cabinet and looked into her own eyes.
Except they weren't just hers.
They were… hers and hers-from-before.
Fragmented Memory Thread:
A moonlit bridge.A boy with quiet fury in his voice.His hand brushing hers."If the world takes you, I'll burn it down to find you again."
She gasped.The memory was too bright. Too warm. Too real.
Her chest clenched, and for a moment she forgot how to breathe.
"Zhao Feng…""You kept your promise."
She didn't remember his kiss. Not yet.But she remembered the way he looked at her — like she wasn't broken, even when the world shattered around her.
Final System Message (Chapter 4):
Soul Thread Resonance: 48%Emotional Surge Detected: Regret / Longing / ProtectionTriggering Passive Trait: Phoenix Mark (Dormant)Note: Flame inheritance partially reactivated. Restraint advised.
Tang Xinyi stepped over the corpses without hesitation.
She reached the exit, pushed the double doors open—
—and vanished into the cold neon streets of New Luyang.
She didn't know what was coming.But fate had just reawakened an old weapon in the shape of a girl.