YH Sees the Goddess of Light Again, Qiu'er Was Not Forced to Become Human

The moment the second level of the altar opened, the broken soul tool component in Huo Yuhao's palm cracked.

It was not damaged.

It was expanding.

Two thin icy wings unfolded from what had once been a flat piece. Dong'er's residual light patterns were embedded along their edges, while a distant golden mark of the Auspicious Beast was pressed into the center. That golden mark was not present here, yet the altar seemed to have forcibly drawn out a sliver of its shadow from an immense distance.

Ye Guyi looked at the fragment and said softly, "It has turned into an array."

Huo Yuhao felt it too. The soul tool fragment was no longer just an inanimate object. Activated by the altar's pull, it began reflecting a hidden stretch of the past. Ma Xiaotao stood behind and to the side, suppressing the backlash from the altar's outer layer with Evil Fire. Her tone was unusually serious.

"Junior Brother, don't look for too long."

Huo Yuhao nodded. He knew he could not look for too long, but the second level of the altar had already drawn Dong'er in and tugged at Wang Qiu'er's thread across an immense distance.

He had to look.

The Eye of Destiny opened, and the world instantly fell silent. Huo Yuhao saw the golden Auspicious Beast deep within the Star Dou Great Forest. At that time, she was not yet Wang Qiu'er. She stood amid ancient trees and shimmering lake water, carrying the innate nobility of the Emperor Auspicious Beast. Every Soul Beast around her revered her and looked up to her, yet none truly asked where she wanted to go.

Then he saw a Spirit Sea.

His own.

So the Three-Eyed Golden Lion had once touched his memories through Fate Guidance. She saw the lights of human academies, the smiles of friends standing side by side, pain, hunger, and hatred—but she also saw the warmth that had not yet been extinguished.

At its deepest point lay a shadow he had hidden away.

—the Goddess of Light.

She was not a distinct person, but more like every imagined form of light, gentleness, and protection in a young boy's heart. She was the vague image of the "sister" Dong'er had once described when she was still Wang Dong. Butterfly-wing-like light, the outline of a young woman, standing in the cleanest place within his Spirit Sea. When the Three-Eyed Golden Lion saw that shadow, she lingered there for a long time.

She had not been pushed into the human world by anyone. She saw the pain and warmth that belonged to humanity within Huo Yuhao's Spirit Sea, and she saw the light in his heart. Thus, for the first time, she conceived a thought that did not belong to the Emperor Auspicious Beast.

She wanted to see it for herself.

She wanted to know what the light hidden in his heart truly was. She wanted to know why humans, so fragile as they were, could remember someone so deeply.

Huo Yuhao's mind shook violently. At last, he understood why Qiu'er had come directly to him. She had not come to fight Dong'er or take anyone's place. She had seen the human world in his Spirit Sea, seen light, and seen a choice she had never possessed.

"What did you see?" Wang Dong'er's voice pulled Huo Yuhao back to reality.

He found himself standing in an illusion where blue-gold and gold intertwined. Wang Dong'er stood beside him, her face pale. At the distant edge, a pink-gold shadow was held by the altar, yet it never truly took form.

Wang Dong'er had seen it too. "That vague shadow again?"

Huo Yuhao did not answer immediately, because the answer was still incomplete. He had only seen part of the reason Qiu'er had become human, seen the moment she willingly walked into the human world, but he had yet to see where that higher light truly came from.

Wang Dong'er saw through his silence. "Yuhao, don't hide things from me anymore."

"I saw that Qiu'er—no, the Three-Eyed Golden Lion—once formed Fate Guidance with my Spirit Sea."

Wang Dong'er stopped breathing.

Huo Yuhao told Dong'er everything his Spirit Eyes had just glimpsed. The illusion was so quiet it made one's heart race. Dong'er also clearly realized that Qiu'er had not simply appeared from nowhere. Her arrival was actually connected to Huo Yuhao's deepest image of the Goddess of Light. And the Goddess of Light was, in truth, Wang Dong'er's likeness.

Yet beneath her distress, somewhere in Wang Dong'er's heart loosened slightly. At least Wang Qiu'er—that forceful, blunt girl who had made her grit her teeth in anger—had only wanted to leave the Star Dou Great Forest for the first time because she had been drawn to the lights of the human world within Huo Yuhao's Spirit Sea.

The second level of the altar suddenly lit up, as though it had seized upon her wavering. An ancient will emerged from deep within the stone steps.

Return to the flow.

Wang Dong'er frowned. The distant golden shadow also trembled.

Huo Yuhao's gaze turned cold.

"Return to what flow?"

The soul tool fragment in his palm unfurled icy-blue patterns, and Ultimate Ice erupted from beneath his feet.

"They never agreed to it!"

The altar's will trembled. Huo Yuhao wanted to seize back Dong'er and Qiu'er's fates. The Eye of Destiny pressed down in reverse, forcibly locking the memory illuminated by the second level of the altar deep within his Spirit Sea.

Outside the illusion, Ye Guyi saw three colors of light shine around Huo Yuhao at once.

Icy blue.

Blue-gold.

And a strand of Star Dou gold so distant it was nearly impossible to grasp. At the deepest point, there was also an extremely faint remnant of pink-gold light. It flashed and vanished, too quickly for anyone to see clearly.

The second level of the altar abruptly went dark. Huo Yuhao dropped to his knees, bracing himself against the stone steps with one hand as cold sweat rolled down his forehead. Wang Dong'er supported him at once, her grip tight.

"Yuhao, she did not come to steal you from me." Wang Dong'er's voice was very soft.

Huo Yuhao looked at her. Wang Dong'er's eyes were slightly red. After a long silence, she said, "I know that now."

She paused, her voice so low it was nearly swallowed by the altar's fading echoes.

"I can let go, Yuhao. I love you very much, but perhaps Qiu'er needs you more than I do."

Huo Yuhao's chest tightened. At the center of the soul tool fragment, that strand of pink-gold remnant light slowly sank beneath its surface, leaving behind only a stroke too faint to make out. It did not form a name, nor did it provide an answer.

But this clue made Huo Yuhao vaguely suspect that, beyond the Fate Guidance between Qiu'er and himself, another powerful and mysterious force had driven Qiu'er to the human world and led her to see the form of the Goddess of Light.

And when the altar pulled that golden shadow again, Wang Qiu'er might not want to return—but she would have to.

Deep within the second level's stone steps, the entrance to the third level lit up briefly.

Huo Yuhao instinctively wanted to continue looking downward, but the instant his Spirit Eyes touched that entrance, a piercing soul tool howl rose from beneath the altar. It was not the altar itself rejecting him. Rather, an external Sun-Moon Conduction Pattern had wrapped itself around the third-level entrance from underground, like a lock fastened over the door in advance.

He Caitou crouched down and pressed his palm against the edge of a crack between the stones. His expression quickly changed. "It is not that the inside cannot be opened. Someone outside has connected a sampler. Every time the third level moves, the soul tool outside collects another reaction."

Ye Guyi said coldly, "In other words, if we continue exploring, we will be feeding them samples and giving them clues."

Evil Fire flickered at Ma Xiaotao's fingertips. "Then burn the thing outside."

Huo Yuhao did not answer immediately. He looked at the trace of orange ink along the edge of the soul tool fragment. Orange had deliberately left it as a hidden marker in a previous letter. Before, he had only thought it was a reminder of the direction. Only now did he understand that she had been telling him why the third level could not be forced open.

Wang Dong'er watched as the Sun-Moon Conduction Pattern gradually pressed the third-level entrance into darkness. Her lips were pale, but she did not stubbornly try to stop him.

"We have to remove the lock outside first."

Huo Yuhao clenched the soul tool fragment and nodded.

Before that, they had to find the hand the Sun Moon Empire had hidden outside the altar.