"Ji Chen" stopped walking. The hem of his blue robe hung motionless.
He looked at Zhou Xuan and frowned, his eyes filled with heartache.
"Master." His voice was as cool and respectful as ever, but it trembled at the end. "Your left shoulder... the Dao wound from the battle in the Mysterious Crystal World never healed. Now you've suffered another injury. Your bones are exposed."
Zhou Xuan stood with his saber in hand. Gray-gold light flowed slowly over the bare bones of his left side. Death qi wreathed the right half of his body, its gray-black markings contracting and expanding with his breathing.
He said nothing.
"Ji Chen" took three steps forward.
"That day in the Return-to-Void Demon Sea, you used your three-colored origin source to keep me alive and bore the backlash of divine punishment yourself. You held my hand and said, 'If the sky falls, I'll hold it up.'" He gazed into Zhou Xuan's eyes, speaking faster and faster. "You did it. Central Province survived, and the four worlds surrendered. But now the Divine Lord is using me as bait to force you in here. He never intended to let either of us go."
Everything he said came from memories of their time alone together. How the Heavenly Strategy World had perished, how they had fought for their lives in the Return-to-Void Demon Sea-even his tone and pauses were identical. He had stolen Ji Chen's memories and learned even his instinctive emotions.
Zhou Xuan remained silent. His gray-gold eyes revealed nothing.
His gaze shifted, sweeping across the starry sky.
The stars were arranged in orderly rows. Starlight wove a net that fell across the white jade ground. Every ray refracted at the same angle. The law power here was strong and pure, and vitality flourished.
But there was