The dining hall of the Cloud-Reaching Pavilion was an architectural marvel of white jade and sandalwood, designed to catch the mountain mist so that diners felt they were floating amongst the stars.
Tonight, however, the atmosphere was less "celestial grace" and more "executioner's courtyard."
Luo Zhi sat at the head of the long, low table. His silver hair had been loosely gathered with a simple silk cord, falling over a robe of pale dove-gray. He looked devastatingly serene, a stark contrast to the two men flanking him who looked as though they were vibrating with suppressed spiritual pressure.
To his left, Ah Ran poked at a dish of sautéed spirit mushrooms with a pair of gold-tipped ivory chopsticks. The Poison Sect Leader's blond hair seemed to glow even brighter in the candlelight, but his expression was sour. He kept glancing at Luo Zhi's throat, as if debating whether to kiss it or collapse it.
To his right, Xu Bin sat like a statue carved from shadow. The Demonic Sect Leader didn't eat. He simply stared at Luo Zhi, his dark eyes tracing the line of Luo Zhi's jaw with a hunger that was distinctly non-gastronomic.
"The tea is... remarkably salty," Luo Zhi remarked mildly, setting down his jade cup.
Ah Ran stiffened.
"It's a cleansing tonic. It's supposed to be bitter. If it's salty, it means your humors are out of balance because of the memory loss. Or," he added, his voice dropping to a hiss, "it means I'm trying to see how much you'll endure before you snap and call me a 'venomous snake' again."
Luo Zhi tilted his head, his silver fringe swaying.
"Did I call you that often?"
"Daily," Xu Bin interjected, his voice a low rumble that vibrated through the table. "Usually right after you told me my presence made the air in the room feel 'thick with the stench of blood.' Do you find the air breathable now, Luo Zhi?"
Luo Zhi took a slow, thoughtful breath.
"It smells of sandalwood and... perhaps a hint of rain. It's quite pleasant, actually."
Xu Bin's hand tightened on the table, leaving a faint indentation in the reinforced wood. This was the problem. The "new" Luo Zhi was polite. He was observant. He was gentle. To two men who had spent three years fueled by the heat of Luo Zhi's hatred, this sudden cooling was like being plunged into an ice bath. It was agonizing.
"Stop it," Ah Ran snapped, slamming his chopsticks down. "Stop acting like a lost lamb. You were the one who suggested this arrangement! You were the one who said that if the three of us combined our sects and our cultivation bases through the Triple Soul Binding, we would be invincible. You used us for power, and then you treated us like shackles."
Luo Zhi looked at his hands.
"If that is true, then I was a very pragmatic man. But why did you agree? If I was so terrible, why bind your souls to mine?"
The question hung in the air, heavy and suffocating.
Ah Ran opened his mouth, then closed it, a faint flush creeping up his neck. He couldn't say the truth: Because when you look at someone, even with hatred, it's like being seen by the moon itself. Because I wanted to own the thing that everyone else feared.
Xu Bin was more direct.
"Because I wanted to break you," he said, his voice devoid of emotion. "I wanted to see the Lone Moon fall into the mud. I thought if I tied you to me, I could drag you down to my level."
"And did you?" Luo Zhi asked softly.
"No," Xu Bin rasped. "You just went colder. Until you weren't even there anymore, even when I was holding you."
Luo Zhi felt a pang of something in his chest—not a memory, but a resonance. The Soul Binding was reacting to their distress. It was a strange sensation, like a phantom limb itching. He reached out, his hand hovering over the table between the two of them.
"I cannot apologize for a man I don't remember being," Luo Zhi said, "but I can see that I have caused you both a great deal of grief. If this marriage is a cage, perhaps we should find a way to unlock it."
"Unlock it?" Ah Ran laughed, a sharp, jagged sound. "The Soul Binding is eternal, Luo Zhi. To break it, one of us has to die. Or all of us. Is that your new plan? Suicide by amnesia?"
"I merely thought—"
"Don't think," Xu Bin interrupted, standing up. His black robes billowed behind him like a funeral shroud. "Eat your salty tea and sleep. Tomorrow, we begin the restoration. I've summoned the Mind-Reading Monks from the Western Border. If your memories won't come back willingly, we will tear them out of your subconscious."
Luo Zhi looked up at the towering demonic leader.
"That sounds... invasive."
"It's necessary," Ah Ran added, though he looked slightly pale at the mention of the monks. "We aren't living in this limbo with you. I'd rather have the man who hates me back than this... this ghost."
As they both turned to leave, abandoning the half-eaten feast, Luo Zhi watched them go. He noticed the way Ah Ran's shoulders were hunched, as if he were carrying a physical weight.
He noticed the way Xu Bin's stride was too fast, as if he were running away from the very person he claimed to want to break.
Once the doors clicked shut, Luo Zhi picked up his tea again.
He took another sip. It really was dreadfully salty.
He stood up and walked to the balcony, looking out over the misty peaks of his sect. He was a man with two husbands, no memory, and a soul tied to two people who seemed to be in a competition to see who could resent him more.
"Luo Zhi," he whispered to the wind, "what kind of person were you?"
He looked down at his silver hair, shimmering in the moonlight. He felt a strange sense of freedom. If he was a ghost, then ghosts didn't have to follow the rules of the living.
The next morning, the "restoration" did not go as planned.
The Mind-Reading Monks arrived at dawn, their golden robes clashing with the somber mood of the Pavilion. They were led by an elderly man with eyes that looked like clouded marbles.
"The mind is a labyrinth," the head monk intoned, gesturing for Luo Zhi to sit in the center of a complex array of spirit stones.
Ah Ran and Xu Bin stood at the edge of the circle, watching with bated breath. This was it. The polite facade would crack, and the real Luo Zhi—their Luo Zhi—would return.
The monks began to chant. The air grew thick with incense and golden light. Luo Zhi closed his eyes, feeling the mental probes reaching into his consciousness.
It felt like cold fingers leafing through an empty book.
Suddenly, the head monk gasped. His eyes flew open, the clouded marbles turning blood-red.
"There is nothing!" the monk cried out, his voice cracking. "It's not a block! It's not a seal! It's a void! A Great Emptiness!"
The array shattered. The spirit stones turned to dust. The monks were thrown backward by a sudden, violent burst of silver spiritual energy.
Luo Zhi remained sitting, untouched by the blast. When he opened his eyes, they weren't the pale gray they had been. For a split second, they were a blinding, incandescent silver.
"The Lone Moon," the monk whispered, trembling on the floor. "He didn't lose his memory. He burned it. He used his own soul as fuel to reach a higher state of cultivation. He's... he's no longer the man you knew. He's ascended halfway to godhood in his sleep."
Ah Ran's face went white. Xu Bin stepped forward, his hand trembling as he reached for Luo Zhi.
"Luo Zhi?" Xu Bin whispered.
Luo Zhi looked at them, and for the first time, there was a flicker of something in his eyes. It wasn't hate. It wasn't love. It was a profound, cosmic curiosity.
"I remember something," Luo Zhi said, his voice echoing with a strange, double-toned resonance.
Ah Ran leaned in, his heart thumping against his ribs.
"What? What do you remember?"
Luo Zhi looked at the blond man, then the black-haired man. A small, enigmatic smile played on his lips—the kind of smile one gives to a particularly interesting insect.
"I remember... that I chose you both because you were the only two things in this world loud enough to keep me from drifting away." He tilted his head. "It seems I've drifted away anyway."
He stood up, his silver hair floating as if he were underwater.
"I think," Luo Zhi said, looking at his two husbands, "that it is time for us to get to know each other again. From the very beginning. And this time, I won't be the one seeking power."
He walked past them, the scent of cold moonlight following in his wake.
Ah Ran and Xu Bin stood in the wreckage of the meditation room.
They had wanted him back.
They had wanted the man they could fight with, the man they could obsess over. Instead, they had something much more terrifying: a version of Luo Zhi that didn't need them at all.
"We're in trouble," Ah Ran whispered, clutching his green silks.
"No," Xu Bin said, his eyes darkening with a new, even more dangerous fire."We're just finally playing a game where the stakes are real."