You must trust your partner with all your being. They will hold your life, your cultivation, and your very soul in their hands. -Dual Cultivation: A Warrior's Guide to Spiritual and Romantic Connections

I didn't want to. I knew what I was going to see. Ash was all that remained of the garden that once shone like a star in the darkest night. The flowers I created for Chouko, the Heaven's Lilies that I altered to have purple stripes instead of pure silver petals, they were gone. There was nothing I could do about that.

So…

Why did he want me to open my eyes? What was the point?

"Yoru," Lin squeezed my hands. "Open your eyes. Trust me."

It was hard. I did trust him, but facing the fruits of my own madness was something I resisted with every fiber of my being. Despite what was surely before eyes, he was calm, and even a little playful. The Lin I knew, that I trusted, would never play with my feelings like that.

With several shaky breathes, I built my courage and opened my eyes.

The light was nearly blinding, and I was forced to blink several times before I could truly see what stood in front of me. When I did, I was stunned into silence. Lin's hands slipped from mine, and I walked forward into the most beautiful garden I'd ever seen.

It had no paths, nor minders keeping the weeds at bay. The flowers grew without restraint, thriving in clusters and groups that each numbered twenty or thirty blossoms strong. They shone like lanterns, as each blossom glowed brightly, its blue and silver petals standing like stars in the blackness of the void.

They were Heaven's Lilies, without question. I'd seen enough of my sister's favorite flowers to know exactly what the shape of their petals looked like. Purple stripes adorned each petal, just like their ancestors that I created. Yet, unlike those blooms, the base of these petals was silver mixed with voidlight blue.

"They…they're…"

Something needed to be said. I had so many words and thoughts in my mind that I thought I might burst, but no words made it past my lips. They died on my tongue, unable to encapsulate the meaning I attributed to them.

"I take it this wasn't what you were expecting," Lin said, reaching down to pick a flower from the ground. "I don't think I've ever seen them this color. The blue looks great on them."

I whipped around, only to see him smirking. He knew exactly what color that was, and why they'd developed that way. Silver moonlight and the black of the void mixed together to make voidlight, which shone with a pale and baleful blue, like ice on a cold winter's night.

"They…they weren't like this before. I burned them." I protested.

"And from the ashes, they bloomed once more. They adapted to their tragedy and grew from it."

I looked down, feeling a sad smile pulling at my face. "Is it the natural state of wood cultivation to be filled with such wisdom?"

"When dealing with silly moon artists, yes." He shoved my shoulder playfully. "Just imagine if I'd lived back then. I'd have kept you on the straight and narrow, without a doubt."

That was just too much. Laughter bubbled up inside me, and the rest of my emotions just snapped. I was tired of being scared. I was tired of the guilt and the pain. Lin's simple joke, and the image of an alternate reality it invoked purged all the darkness in my heart. If only for that single moment in time, the Labyrinth's whispers were silent, and my heart was light.

"Me, too! Me, too!" Xinya exclaimed, dropping her lantern and wrapping her arms around my waist. "I woulda fought all those Ascendents who threatened Lanyue!"

"Even the wicked Ghost King of Daying?" I asked, tickling her chin. She giggled right alongside me.

Xinya stuck out her tongue. "I live in a city of yokai, my best friend is a dragon, and I played with shades more than I did the other kids in Saikan. I'm not afraid of any Ghost King."

Even Lin broke down in laughter at the idea of Xinya facing down a terrible undead Ascendent. Part of me knew it was ridiculous, but another part felt her enthusiasm and knew that, had she lived at the same time and had the power of even a lesser Ascendent, she'd have beaten him handily.

We laughed and joked in the lily beds until Xinya was covered in flower petals and Chiho was finished entwining the thin stems into her braids. When it trilled its completion, it zoomed to the ground, snatched up one more bloom, and tucked it neatly into the ribbon that held my hair back from my face. Even Lin had one, although his was tucked into the sash at his waist rather than his hair. It just felt right.

But, our merriment wouldn't last forever. A pulse of void qi washed over the bed like a shockwave that bent over the flowers as it passed. It was cold, and familiar.

"Yoru? That pulse…that was on the water below," Xinya murmured.

"It's Shouweiye."

"What is Shouweiye?" asked Lin.

"A void moth that has gorged itself on qi for centuries," I explained. "We don't want to meet it here. Come on, my palace was more enclosed than Chouko's. We'll be safe in my chambers."

Neither younger artist questioned me. Instead, Xinya's hand slipped into mine, and we began to run. Across the lily beds, the gates loomed. I slammed a shoulder into them rather than losing momentum by opening them normally. They gave way, and we raced out into the common gardens between the two Tsuyuki palaces.

A shriek of rage and hunger shattered the calm around us. I had no doubt that Shouweiye had seen us, or, more specifically, seen the lights we carried. Like any good moth, it still navigated by tracking lights rather than by normal hunting senses alone. Between Xinya's lantern, my chains, Lin's adaptation, and the Heaven's Lilies we'd picked up, we were beacons for the hunting moth.

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Another shockwave emanated from my left, and I looked towards the lake. In that direction, only a few buildings were large enough to hold such a massive creature on its roof. Jinshi's palace was one, but the protections he likely left would have made the place uncomfortable for a monster of Shouweiye's size. What was far more likely was that it was nesting on the roof of a building situated on the island at the center of the water. That was where the Master Defense Array for Half-Moon Manor was located, as well as the systems that controlled the Armillary system for the city below.

"Intruders…They come for my qi…they come for the gate!" the void sang with a voice that could only belong to Shouweiye itself. It was wrapped in a chorus of destruction that gave me a minor headache.

What gate? I wondered. No gates other than those built into the architecture were kept within Half-Moon Manor, meaning whatever it was, it was new. New was dangerous. Is that what's causing the increased void qi around?

The line of thought would have to wait. Shouweiye's enormous wings beat the air. It was aloft, and, given how quickly it moved the last two times I'd encountered the beast, it would be on us any second. We were exposed, even in the doorway of Chouko's palace. It could easily snap us right off the ground or score our bodies with its enormous talon-like legs.

"Run," I instructed. No one hesitated, but Xinya's legs simply couldn't move as fast as either Lin or I could.

We were only half-way across the distance between Chouko's palace and my own when Shouweiye reached us. Dark red eyes and long feelers loomed out of the dark as its enormous wings pounded the air. I held onto Xinya's shoulder before she was blown down by the gale force hurricane being thrown up by the monster's wings.

"Lesser void spirit…come to take my gate from me?" Shouweiye hissed, its voice echoing through the void. "It's mine."

"My eyesight in the dark isn't great, but I'm assuming that's as big as I think it is?" Lin said, drawing his sword.

"If you think it's the size of both stories of Half-Moon Harbor, then yes," I confirmed. "But the Tide Serpent was definitely bigger."

"We had two more silver artists when we fought the Tide Serpent."

"We were both Iron back then."

He shook his head. "Then let's hope that size matters. Two Silvers and a Bronze does not match the strength of Two Silvers and Two Irons."

"Since when have you known me to care about cultivation rank?" I countered.

There was an irritation in the back of my mind. Shouweiye was interrupting a moment. This was the first day in years that I felt truly joyful, and it had swooped in to steal all of that. My niece clung to me with all the strength she could muster, not just because she was small and could be blown away, but also because she was afraid. That put a damper on my day that I just couldn't ignore.

Eclipse leapt from its sheath in the same motion that I drew my bow and an arrow from my quiver. Shouweiye was massive, but that meant nothing to me. I'd fought bigger opponents before.

The void moth descended. Void smoke curled off its wings in a shadowy wake of qi. I pushed Xinya behind Lin and me, and the two of us prepared our techniques in unison. A shining arrow with threads of voidlight wrapping around the shaft flew through the air, surrounded by a hail of qi-infused seeds.

The arrow lodged itself in the joint where one of Shouweiye's legs met the rest of its body along with several dozen seeds. The moth shrieked in rage, beating its wings to halt its approach.

"What?! Pain?! I have no pain with the gate?! Lesser spirit fights back? It shall be destroyed!" Shouweiye screamed through the void. I braced myself for an attack like the one that nearly killed Lihua, but none came. The moth didn't swoop down again. Instead, its feelers began to glow with a dark light. A moment later, it vanished entirely.

"Where did it go?" Lin asked, whipping his head around to find the monster.

"Run, while it's away!" I instructed the other two. We were too exposed, too far out of position to truly fight the beast. In the darkness, it was difficult to even see the creature, and it could approach from too many angles that we couldn't defend.

As if to prove my point, Flash Forward warned me of its next strike. I lunged forward, grabbing Xinya by the collar and yanking her back as Shouweiye seemed to materialize straight from the nothingness of the void. It crouched on all six legs, glowering at the three of us as we skidded to a halt.

"And how are we going to get to the palace, now?" Lin asked, but I was already shifting direction. My former home was not the only one we could retreat to.

"Try and pin it down!" I shouted to Lin. He nodded and tossed a handful of seeds at the monster's feet. They sprouted into vines and blossoms, some of which I recognized as being from Chouko's garden. The sneaky wood artist had pocketed some while we passed through, but I couldn't bring myself to resent him for it. It wasn't like they were doing anything else there, and only the revitalizing strength of wood qi would nurture the life within anyway.

Eclipse skimmed the grass by my feet, and I stepped onto the blade. With my current luck, I didn't dare fly too high. Even if the defenses that usually protected against flying intruders weren't stopping Shouweiye, it would be just my luck for them to restore themselves just in time to strike me clean out of the air. However, the extra speed of the blade, coupled with the speed boost I received from my own spacial warping techniques turned me into a shining star as I whipped across the open field.

Three more arrows found new homes in Shouweiye's thorax. I might not have had a good angle on its back, but the arrows still sank into its exoskeleton, causing sickly black and yellow ichor to seep from the beast's body.

Shouweiye flung its feelers through the air, and I spied potent void qi across their entire surface. I ducked beneath the blow, spinning around and drawing three more arrows back on my string before firing them forward.

Whipping back around, I flew close to the ground. Lin was backing away, keeping his focus on the vines that clung to Shouweiye's limbs, keeping it steady as we made our escape. I latched onto his raised hand, pulling him with me as I sped towards the first of the covered bridges that crossed over the lake. Xinya was already running ahead, and we caught up to her just as we reached the bridge, where I let Lin down and hopped off my blade.

"I have got to get me a sword that can do that," he muttered.

"I thought you hated using Razor Wind?" I asked. He'd demonstrated great control over the Sword Saint's legendary blade, but he had given it up at the earliest opportunity.

"I did, but I can't deny that a sword like that is useful," he grumbled.

Shouweiye shrieked as it lost its prey. Behind us, I heard the sound of ripping dirt and earth as it uprooted the vines holding it in place. I could feel the pulsing of its wings overhead, but with the cover of the bridge, we were a lot more difficult to track.

However, with every step, the potency of the void in the air seemed to increase exponentially. Xinya began to cough, and rather than let her pace lag, I scooped her into my arms. She buried her face in my shoulder.

"My skin is itchy and my head hurts," she complained.

"I know."

"And my nose is bleeding."

It was worrisome. Even my skin was tingling with the void, but we couldn't stop. We zigzagged across the lake, running straight past the building where the defense array dwelled. Glancing at the building as we passed, I was certain that Shouweiye lived there. There was simply no other explanation for the scratch marks on the walls and broken tiles that lay in piles on the ground. It was probably living on the roof.

Soon, the shore was back in view. The void's influence in the air had decreased slightly. Shouweiye's screeches were behind us, probably still circling the other side of the lake.

Without a second glance, I raced across the grass and threw open the doors to the Wind Palace before running straight for the main building and Jinshi's personal quarters. Only once we were safe with the doors bolted did I set Xinya down.

"We're going to have to deal with that thing eventually," Lin said. I waved him off. There were more important things than the giant moth monster trying to kill us.

"Hey Xinya, guess what?" I began, kneeling next to her. I wiped the blood from her nose, and she looked at me expectantly. I watched her carefully, entirely too eager to see the excitement as it dawned on her face. "This is the Wind Palace. You're standing in the Sword Saint's own reception hall."

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