The first thing that filtered through the haze of returning consciousness wasn't sight or touch—it was sound. Voices, broken and hollow, drifting through the darkness like ghosts of themselves.
"He's... he's still not breathing." Mei Ling's voice, barely above a whisper, cracked with exhaustion. "It's 3 been . His chest isn't moving. His skin is so cold..."
My awareness flickered like a dying candle, but I couldn't move, couldn't speak. The system's revival protocol was working, but slowly—rebuilding my body cell by cell while my consciousness floated between life and death.
"But he promised that he would return, right?" Lin Yue's normally strong voice wavered like a child's, desperate for reassurance that would never come. "He... he said he'd always come back to us. He promised..."
A single word cut through the air like a blade, heavy with bitter grief and shattered faith:
"Liar."
