Across the desolate plain, rifts stretched endlessly, and mountains rose high.
Dust and wind swept over the parched earth.
Atop a massive boulder, two utterly mismatched visitors sat at its highest point, gazing out at the scenery of this foreign land.
"A while ago, Changyi secretly came to play with me, but she didn't get to see you."
Behind her, Xi He quietly stuffed osmanthus cakes into her mouth, her cheeks puffed out as she spoke indistinctly. "When she went back, she found everyone down below saying that a dog had eaten the sun. It made her so mad that she stamped her feet and refused to go outside for ages."
"Mortals are narrow-minded, and their memories do not last. They'll forget after a while."
Tongji did not turn around, pretending not to notice her stealing snacks. "At worst, I'll just kill those noisy fools."
"Don't!"
Xi He waved her hands anxiously, forgetting to hide the crumbs falling from her mouth. "She'll definitely cry."
"Why hasn't she come by these past few years?" Tongji asked.
Xi He fell silent.
For a long time.
"Her condition lately... hasn't been very good."
"...Mm."
Amid the same silence, Tongji murmured softly, "Has her time come too?"
The Phoenix had only left not long ago.
At some point, she had stopped appearing altogether.
It was not until they found the God's Wedge she had left behind upon the Jianmu Tree that everyone understood. Perhaps that stubborn woman had long since lost herself amid the endless variables she had foreseen.
Yet among those infinite variables, not one led to the future she desired.
Infinity was the Phoenix's authority.
But infinite despair was likewise the price of that authority.
And Changyi was different from the Phoenix. She had been incomplete from birth, due to the interference