Lower Thousand Provinces · Canglan Sea Realm.
Northern Region, Wen Dao Palace.
Night lay heavy, candlelight flickering.
Yin Qiyue wore a thin, plain white nightgown and lounged over her vanity.
Her dark hair spilled loose, a few strands hanging over the Tongxuan Mirror as they swayed gently with the absentminded movements of her fingertips.
Five years had passed. The once-green girl had not only survived, but grown ever more alluring. Every frown and smile now carried mature charm; she had become a bewitching, peerlessly beautiful older woman.
"Wen Dao Palace took in three little ones with Heavenly Spirit Roots today..." She propped her chin lazily on one hand, tracing idle circles across the mirror with her fingertip. "Funny thing is, one of them has an exceptionally fine Root Bone, yet was born with blocked meridians. Ten years of cultivation, and he hasn't achieved what others do in three months..."
She suddenly chuckled. A playful glint flickered in her drowsy eyes. "Stranger still, after returning home to visit his family this time, the meager cultivation he'd painstakingly built up vanished without a trace."
"Then his engagement was broken off, and in his humiliation, he actually shouted, 'Don't bully a young man just because he's poor!'"
"Oh! And that old pine in the back hills awakened its spiritual consciousness last night and demanded to become a guardian elder..."
For five years, Yin Qiyue had spent every night chatting to the mirror about little things like these. The glass had remained cold, never once answering her.
But day after day, she kept at it without fail.
Suddenly, ripples spread across the mirror.
"Yin Qiyue."
The cool voice startled her, and her elbow slipped. Her chin smacked hard against the tabletop.
As she sucked in a sharp breath from the pain, she saw the