The chamber held its breath, every crack in the stone walls whispering of the battle that had scarred it. The shadows clinging to the surface still writhed faintly, echoing the rhythm of Yan Zhi's strained breathing.
He sat cross-legged, trembling. Blood crusted at the corner of his lips, yet the pain in his flesh was nothing compared to the weight gnawing at his mind.
"The more you resist… the deeper I root myself."
The voice no longer felt separate. It pulsed with his heartbeat, threading into the marrow of his thoughts. Each time he guided the current of his Shadow Vein, another current slipped in—cold, invasive, leaving wounds unseen.
"This is my body… my soul!" Yan Zhi gritted his teeth.
But his shadow disagreed. It cracked open, spilling faces from its darkness—Lian. His father. Fellow disciples. All of them smiling in ways that were never kind.
He shut his eyes. The harder he tried to banish them, the clearer their faces became, burned into the back of his eyelids.
And then, something stirred. From the fractures in his mind, a deeper shadow rose—not foreign, not hostile, but sharp and resolute. His own.
It whispered, calm yet unyielding:
"A shadow is not your enemy. A shadow is the proof that you exist."
Yan Zhi froze. For the first time, he wasn't only being invaded—he was being reminded, by himself.
The foreign voice snarled, lashing in fury. The false faces shattered into black dust and scattered.
His eyes snapped open. Though his body shook, his gaze was steady. The scars inside him hadn't healed, but a truth had rooted itself: as long as he accepted his own shadow, the intruder could never fully rule him.
"Then stay," he murmured, cold and clear. "But remember—I hold the reins."
The shadow on the wall rippled, then settled. The air thickened, no longer suffocating but heavy with promise—of a struggle that had only just begun.
---