Lin Yue's POV
"No!" I screamed as the blood-covered Empress version of me reached for my throat. "This isn't real! I would never—"
Her hands closed around my neck, and suddenly everything shifted. The destroyed hall vanished. I blinked, disoriented, and found myself standing in a different place entirely.
Azure Cloud Sect. Three years in the future, according to the date carved on a nearby pillar. The sect was intact, prosperous even. Disciples trained in the courtyard, laughing and chatting.
"What...?" I touched my face, my arms. I was still me, still in my body. But something felt wrong. Heavy.
Then I looked down and saw my hands. They were covered in blood.
"NO!" A woman's scream pierced the air. I spun around to see Mei stumbling backward, her face white with terror. "Lin Yue, what have you done?!"
I looked past her and my heart stopped. Chen Hao lay on the ground, a sword wound through his chest. His eyes were open, staring at nothing. Dead.
And I was holding the bloody sword.
"I didn't—" I started, but the words felt hollow. The weight in my hands was real. The blood was real. "This isn't me!"
"You killed him!" Mei sobbed. "He was trying to apologize to you, and you just—you just stabbed him! Lin Yue, how could you?!"
Memories flooded my mind—but not my real memories. These were the trial's illusions, forcing themselves into my consciousness. I remembered (except I didn't, but it felt real) Chen Hao coming to me weeks ago, begging forgiveness. I remembered feeling nothing but cold satisfaction as I drove my sword into his heart. I remembered thinking: "This is what you deserve for betraying me."
"No, no, no!" I dropped the sword, backing away. "I wouldn't do this! I'm not a killer!"
But more memories crashed in. Master Qingfeng, dead by my hand for participating in the core extraction plot. The Sect Master, throat cut while he slept. Bai Shuang, drowned in the same abyss they'd tried to throw me into.
Seven years of revenge. Seven years of hunting down everyone who'd ever hurt me. Seven years of becoming exactly the monster they'd feared.
"The trial said seven years," I whispered, my mind reeling. "It's making me live through this as if it's real."
"What trial?" Mei asked, still crying. "Lin Yue, you've lost your mind! Ever since you gained that Empress's power, you've been different. Colder. Crueler. We tried to help you, but you pushed everyone away!"
Guards rushed into the courtyard, surrounding me with weapons drawn. Their faces showed fear and hatred.
"Murderer!" one shouted. "You've killed dozens of our sect members over the years! Today, it ends!"
I wanted to fight back, to escape. But another memory surfaced—one that made my blood run cold. In this illusory timeline, I'd killed over fifty people across seven years. Sect elders, disciples who'd mocked me, even servants who'd turned a blind eye to my suffering.
I'd become a mass murderer, justifying each kill as "justice."
"This is what accepting your truth looks like," the Empress's voice echoed in my mind, though I couldn't see her. "This is who you become when you stop pretending to be good. When you embrace your rage fully. When you make them all pay."
"But I don't want this!" I screamed at the empty air. "I never wanted to become a killer!"
"Didn't you?" The Empress materialized beside me, invisible to everyone else. "Be honest, Lin Yue. When Chen Hao betrayed you, didn't you imagine killing him? When Bai Shuang mocked you, didn't you want her dead? Every time someone hurt you, you fantasized about revenge. I just showed you what happens when you act on those fantasies."
She was right. I had imagined it. In my darkest moments, I'd wished them dead.
But wishing and doing were completely different things!
"The trial wants you to accept this truth," the Empress said coldly. "That the line between thought and action is thinner than you believe. That you're one bad day away from becoming me. Accept it, or stay trapped in this illusion forever."
The guards attacked. I moved on instinct, my body responding with the Empress's combat techniques. Three guards fell before I even realized I'd moved. Their blood splattered across my face.
Mei screamed, running away from me like I was a demon.
And maybe I was.
Days blurred into weeks. The sect hunted me, but I was too powerful. I killed anyone who came close. The body count rose. Twenty. Thirty. Fifty.
I tried to stop myself, but the trial's illusion was too strong. My body moved without my permission, driven by the false memories of seven years of hatred and revenge.
Months passed. I became a wanted criminal, hunted across multiple territories. But I was unstoppable, fueled by the Empress's power and my own buried rage.
I killed them all. Everyone who'd ever hurt me. Everyone who'd stood by and watched. Everyone who'd called me worthless.
By year five, I stood alone in a field of corpses. Azure Cloud Sect was destroyed. Its buildings burned. Its disciples dead. Even the innocent ones who'd done nothing wrong—I'd killed them too, because they were "complicit" in the sect's crimes.
Mei's body lay at my feet. She'd tried one last time to reach me, to remind me who I used to be. I'd cut her down without hesitation.
"See?" the Empress said, walking among the dead. "This is your truth. This is what your 'justice' looks like when you have the power to enforce it. You're no different from me. From any tyrant who claimed to fight for the weak while drowning the world in blood."
I fell to my knees, surrounded by corpses, and something inside me broke. "You're right. This is what I would become. This is my truth."
The Empress smiled triumphantly. "Finally, you accept—"
"But it's not my whole truth," I interrupted, standing up slowly. "Yes, I have rage. Yes, I've imagined revenge. Yes, there's a part of me that could become this monster. But there's another truth you're ignoring."
The illusory world flickered.
"I also chose mercy," I continued, my voice growing stronger. "When I had the power to destroy everyone at the Northern Wastes battle, I protected them instead. When I could have let Chen Hao die to the Soul Devourer, I saved him. I sacrificed my own cultivation to shield people who tried to kill me. That's ALSO my truth!"
The Empress's smile faded. "Those were foolish choices made in moments of weakness—"
"No!" I shouted. "They were conscious choices made by someone who KNEW she had the capacity for cruelty but chose compassion anyway! You want me to accept that I could become a monster? Fine. I accept it. But I also accept that I've repeatedly chosen NOT to be one, even when it cost me everything!"
The illusion shattered like glass.
I stood once again in the white void of the trial space, gasping for breath. The seven years of false memories faded, though their emotional weight remained. I'd FELT every kill, every moment of becoming the monster.
But I'd also remembered every moment of choosing differently in my real life.
"The first trial is complete," a voice announced—neither the Empress nor Celestial Master Yuehua, but something ancient and neutral. "You have accepted the truth about your capacity for darkness while maintaining your commitment to light. You pass."
The relief was so intense I collapsed. I'd survived. Seven years of hell compressed into what felt like moments outside, but I'd survived.
Before I could catch my breath, the white void changed. The trial wasn't giving me time to rest.
Suddenly I was standing in a throne room made of ice. Sitting on the throne was a figure I recognized instantly, even though his appearance was twisted and wrong.
Shen Yifeng.
But this version of him had black eyes instead of red, and dark energy poured off him like smoke. He looked corrupted, evil, wrong.
"Welcome to the second trial," the corrupted Shen Yifeng said with a cruel smile. "This trial tests truth about your fears. And your greatest fear..." He stood, walking toward me menacingly. "Is losing me. Is watching me become the monster you almost became. Is having to choose between saving me and saving yourself."
My soul bond mark burned on my arm—the real Shen Yifeng, outside the trials, could feel my terror through our connection.
"No," I whispered. "Please, not this. Show me any other fear. Make me face death, torture, failure—anything but this."
"That's precisely why it must be this," corrupted Shen Yifeng said. He grabbed my throat, lifting me off the ground effortlessly. "In this trial, I've been consumed by demonic cultivation. I'm going to destroy everything you love. Everyone you care about. And you have three choices: kill me to stop me, let me continue killing innocents, or sacrifice yourself trying to save me."
He threw me against a wall. Through a window, I saw a city burning below. Screams echoed up from the streets.
"I've already killed ten thousand people," he said casually. "Every hour you delay, I'll kill ten thousand more. So what will it be, Lin Yue? What matters more—your love for me, or your commitment to protecting innocents?"
My heart shattered. This was impossible. How could I choose between Shen Yifeng and innocent lives? How could the trial ask me to—
Then I felt it. Through our soul bond, the real Shen Yifeng's emotions flooded into me: Love. Trust. Faith that I'd make the right choice, whatever it was.
He was telling me it was okay. That he'd rather die than let me suffer watching him become a monster.
But I'd already lost him once across lifetimes. I couldn't do it again.
"I refuse your three options," I said, standing up despite my shaking legs. "I reject this entire scenario."
Corrupted Shen Yifeng laughed. "You can't refuse the trial! You must choose—"
"No," I interrupted. "Zhang Wei said the key was creating a third option. Rejecting the impossible. So here's my answer: I'll find a way to purge the demonic corruption from you WITHOUT killing you, AND save the innocents. I'll do both. Even if it seems impossible."
"There is no technique that can purge that level of corruption!" the trial voice boomed.
"Then I'll invent one!" I shouted back. "I'm the reincarnation of the Heaven-Defying Empress! She created forbidden techniques that broke the laws of cultivation! If she could do that in pursuit of revenge, I can do it in pursuit of saving someone I love!"
The throne room flickered uncertainly.
I pressed forward: "My greatest fear isn't losing Shen Yifeng. My greatest fear is giving up on him. Is accepting that some people can't be saved. But I reject that fear! I've been saved from darkness! He pulled me back from becoming a monster! I can do the same for him!"
"But how?" the trial demanded. "What technique could possibly—"
"I don't know yet!" I admitted. "But I'll find it! I'll research it! I'll spend years developing it if I have to! That's my truth about fear—I'm not afraid of the work it takes to save people! I'm only afraid of giving up!"
The corrupted Shen Yifeng stared at me, then slowly smiled—a real smile this time, not cruel. "You really would spend years trying to save me, wouldn't you? Even knowing you might fail."
"Yes," I said firmly. "Every time. For as long as it takes."
"The second trial is complete," the ancient voice announced. "You have faced your fear and refused to let it break you. You pass."
The throne room dissolved.
But I barely had time to process my success before the third trial materialized.
I stood in a beautiful garden. In front of me was a table with two items: a crown made of starlight and a healer's simple robe.
"The third trial tests truth about your desires," a new voice said. This time it was my own voice, speaking from everywhere and nowhere. "You must choose. The crown represents power, status, revenge against everyone who hurt you. With it, you become the Empress reborn—feared, respected, untouchable. The robe represents service, healing, saving others at cost to yourself. With it, you remain Lin Yue the compassionate—loved, but vulnerable."
I stared at both items, feeling their pull.
The crown whispered promises: "No one will ever hurt you again. They'll bow or die. You'll have everything you were denied."
The robe whispered differently: "You'll heal the broken. Save the suffering. Give others the help you wished someone had given you."
"You want both," my own voice said. "That's your deepest desire—to be powerful enough that no one can hurt you, while also being good enough that you deserve love. But you can only choose one. Power or compassion. Protection or service. Which matters more?"
My hand hovered between them, trembling.
This was the cruelest trial yet.
Because unlike the others, this wasn't testing something I could overcome through stubbornness or cleverness.
This was asking me who I truly wanted to be.
And as I reached for my choice, I heard screaming from beyond the garden—Shen Yifeng's voice, yelling my name in agonized terror.
The soul bond flared with pain.
Something outside the trials had gone horribly, catastrophically wrong.