The voice cut through the howling of the mountain wind.
It was a voice she knew better than her own heartbeat.
But it was... different.
It was deeper.
It resonated with an ethereal, crystalline clarity that seemed to vibrate not just in the air, but directly against the core of her soul.
Ji'an froze.
The breath completely vanished from her lungs.
Her hands gripped the jade railing so tightly her knuckles turned bone-white.
She didn't turn around immediately.
She couldn't.
The overwhelming surge of anticipation, fear, and desperate yearning rooted her feet to the stone tiles.
'He's here,' her mind whispered, a frantic, fluttering panic erupting in her chest. 'He's out of seclusion, and he found me before I went to look for him...'
Slowly, Ji'an turned around.
She expected to see the pair of icy, bottomless eyes that devoured the light.
But the man standing five feet away from her on the shadowed balcony was not the boy she had left behind.
