As evening fell, Yin Wujou was summoned by his men to deal with a riot involving spirit beasts in the west of the city. Before leaving, he instructed Snow Empress not to wander around. Snow Empress responded, and after his figure disappeared at the end of the stone steps outside the palace gate, she turned around and found Granny Song standing behind her, leaning on her dark cane, looking at her calmly.
"Girl, keep this old woman company and talk to her." After saying this, Granny Song walked straight to the stone pavilion behind the courtyard without waiting for her reply.
The stone pavilion was built on a slightly elevated spot in the backyard of the Wujou Hall. It was open on all sides, offering a view of most of the main city. At this moment, the leaden clouds in the sky pressed even lower, and faint flashes of lightning flickered deep within the clouds in the distance. Snow Empress helped Granny Song sit down on the stone bench, and then sat opposite her.
Granny Song was silent for a moment, her gaze fixed on the black banner fluttering atop the distant city wall. She spoke softly, as if talking to herself, "I raised him myself. His mother died early, and his father was a heartless man who abandoned the vast Demon Domain to go into seclusion for thirty years. When Yin Wujou was six, his father went into seclusion, leaving the position of Domain Lord vacant, and the twenty-eight tribes began vying for power. He was just a child, with only me, an old woman, and a few loyal servants by his side, hiding in a side hall, afraid to utter a sound. While the fighting raged outside, drawing little figures on the wall with charcoal sticks, he would squat under the windowsill."
Snow Empress listened quietly. Granny Song spoke slowly, each word spoken steadily, as if counting a string of beads that had been separated for a long time.
"He killed for the first time when he was ten years old," Granny Song said. "Someone broke into the side hall, trying to capture him to be a puppet. He hid behind the door and stabbed the man in the lower back with a short knife. He was so terrified when the knife went in that he was stunned. When the knife was pulled out, blood splattered all over his face. He stood there frozen for the time it takes for an incense stick to burn. When I found him, he was still standing there, the blood on his face dried, cracked and peeling. When he saw me, he said, 'Granny, so human blood is warm after all.'"
Snow Empress's fingers slowly clenched into a fist inside her sleeve.
"Later, he gradually fought his way back to the Demon Domain. First, he won over the few loyal servants around him, then the rogue cultivators in the city, and then he went to collect the tribes that had rebelled one by one. After ten years of fighting, he brought all twenty-eight tribes back onto the map of the Demon Domain. When he was sixteen, he went to the Ziwei Sect for the first time. After returning, he sat on the roof of the hall in a daze all night. I thought he had suffered some kind of hidden injury, so I went up to check and found him clutching a dried flower petal in his hand."
Granny Song finally turned to look at Snow Empress. Her withered eyes were still as sharp as ever in the dim light, but beneath that sharpness lay a deep and thick layer of warmth.
"After he returned from the Ziwei Sect, he started painting. He painted and burned, burned and painted again, until he had painted more than three hundred pieces before they were barely presentable. But he didn't put them away after he finished them; he just left them on the windowsill and burned them the next day. I asked him if he wanted to ask someone to go to the Ziwei Sect to inquire about the girl's name, but he said no need. She was the Snow Empress; the entire cultivation world knew her, but she didn't know him."
Snow Empress's throat tightened. The wind outside the stone pavilion picked up, making the copper bells on the corners of the pavilion ring wildly.
"Then came the matter of yours in the Absolute Abyss." Granny Song's tone suddenly turned somber. "When he returned, his left arm was gone, half his clothes were soaked in blood, and he walked into the hall with a pale face. He smiled when he saw me. He said, 'Granny, she saved me. She transformed herself into a ball of fire to blow up that array's core.' It took me three months to recover before I learned that the array's core in the Absolute Abyss was formed from Chaotic Demonic Qi. To transform oneself into fire to blow it up would at least destroy one's cultivation, or at worst, annihilate one's soul."
Granny Song paused for a long time after speaking. The wind blew into the stone pavilion, causing the stray hairs at her temples to flutter and fall back down. In the distance, the flags on the city towers fluttered in the wind, and the leaden clouds hung lower, almost pressing down on the spire of the main city tower.
"During the three months he was recuperating, it was difficult for me to even see him. He would lock himself in his room all day, sometimes not coming out for an entire day. Later, when his injuries improved, he started traveling to various parts of the Demon Domain, going to the Crimson Flame Mine to find ore, and to the Soul-Severing Gorge to collect moss. Nobody knew what he was up to. It wasn't until one day when he planted that purple flower that I understood."
Granny Song looked at Snow Empress, her eyes finally welling up with tears. "He told me, 'Grandma, I want to try. What if the flower can live? If it lives, she can come back.' She said she liked purple flowers."
Snow Empress sat on the stone bench, head down, tears falling one by one onto the back of her hand. They were scalding hot, but the wind quickly cooled them. She didn't raise her hand to wipe them away, but just listened to Granny Song continue speaking.
"I said, aren't you stupid? You've ruined yourself like this for someone who might never come back. He said, 'Not maybe.' He said she would come back. She kept her word." Granny Song paused, her voice trembling slightly, a rare occurrence. "Girl, he hasn't cried since he was six. He didn't cry when he stabbed someone, he didn't cry when he was wounded in battle, he didn't cry when he lost an arm. But that day, when he was squatting by the wall burying that dried flower petal, I heard him cry."
The stone pavilion remained silent for a long time. The wind howled in from all sides, chilling Snow Empress to the bone, but she was oblivious. Her head was bowed, tears falling silently, soaking a large patch of her sleeve. After what seemed like an eternity, she spoke in a hoarse voice, "He never mentioned it to me."
"That man, he feels ashamed to even utter a single word about himself." Granny Song stood up, leaning on her cane, and walked to her side. Her withered hand gently patted her head. "But this old woman feels it's not worth it for him. There are some things he won't say, but I have to. You need to know, he searched every inch of the Demon Domain Realm to get you back. That seedling was nurtured in the Flame Heart Soil deep within the Crimson Flame Mine, and the flower buds were watered with crushed fluorescent moss from the cliffs of Soul-Severing Gorge mixed with spiritual water. He was overjoyed every time a Yezi grew, but he dared not tell anyone else, only me."
Snow Empress raised her face, her cheeks streaked with tears, her eyes red and swollen. She opened her mouth as if to say something, but her throat was choked with phlegm, and after a long while, she managed to squeeze out a few words: "Grandma..."
Granny Song waved her hand, "Alright, alright, go wash your face after you've finished crying. When he comes back and sees you like this, he'll think I've bullied you." She turned and walked out of the stone pavilion, then turned back after a few steps, "Girl, he's suffered too much in his life. Before, no one supported him; it was always this old woman who held him up. Now that you're here, he won't have to carry the burden alone anymore."
Granny Song's figure disappeared around the corner of the stone steps. Snow Empress sat alone in the stone pavilion, the wind drying the tear stains on her face into a taut line. She sat for a while, then slowly stood up and walked to the edge of the pavilion, gazing in the direction of the city tower in the distance. Leaden clouds surged, lightning danced in the depths of the clouds, and the streetlights on the main city streets were just coming on, their warm yellow lights forming a patchwork against the gray Heavenly Screen.
She reached into her sleeve and touched the small porcelain bottle, her fingertips tracing its cool surface.