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墨書 Inktalez
As I caught Chen Xing's falling body, the entire Underground Palace was collapsing beneath our feet. His heart, transformed into jade, shattered into a star shape, with each fragment reflecting the scene behind the Bronze Giant Gate—a girl who looked just like me was raising a bloodied Golden Hairpin, and a Phoenix Pattern surged from her wrist, licking the Black Dragon Totem on the dragon chair with fiery tongues.
The stench of Cold Palace Well Moss suddenly exploded in my throat. When I opened my eyes again, the Star Map on the dome was slowly rotating above me. Chen Xing's Copper Coin Sword was embedded three inches into my left shoulder, its tassel stained with shards of peacock blue glaze unique to the Xuande period.
The Veteran Coroner's Wine Gourd rolled to the southeast corner of the altar, and the liquid seeping from its gourd formed the constellation of "Mars Guards the Heart" on the ground. "The Earth Veins are resetting the timeline."
I pressed down on my throbbing temples as the Phoenix Pattern spread from my neck to behind my ears, burning as if someone were carving letters into my skull with a hot iron. The Twenty-Eight Constellation Finger pulled from the Cold Palace Well Bottom was radiating heat, with the Root Mansion's position protruding with fine scales—exactly like the new patterns on Chen Xing's Ceremonial Sword.
The princess's skirt brushed against my hand with an icy touch. Her phantom knelt at the center of the altar, her fingers digging deep into the mouth of the Azure Wind Antelope. The wails of Three Thousand Artisans surged up from below, crystallizing into frost flowers on the surface of Azure Brick.
I watched another version of myself raise the Golden Hairpin, its tip hovering three inches above a swaddled infant, where a dragon-shaped black shadow swam within the Blood Mist rising from her chest. "It wasn't the princess who carved out hearts back then," Chen Xing's bloodied finger suddenly pressed against my nape. "Look at Altar Four Symbols Position."
Thick Black Liquid seeped from cracks in Tortoise Shell Divination, gathering along the trajectory of Twenty-Eight Mansions towards Xuanwu Position. In what should have held offerings, an Azure Bronze Bean shockingly contained a pulsating Jade Heart.
The moment my shadow overlapped with that of the princess, characters representing Emperor Xian Zong's birth date emerged on the surface of the Jade Heart. The Earth Veins trembled more violently than before.
Suddenly, all around the altar, Jade Figurines turned their heads in unison; Southern Red Agate embedded in their eye sockets began to ooze crimson liquid. Chen Xing swung his Copper Coin Sword and shattered the skull of a nearby Jade Figurine; amidst the splattered Shattered Jade lay half of a torn Ministry of Revenue Document: "…Zhenming Seventeenth Year, July Seventh, Three Thousand Artisans sealed in Underground Palace to subdue Yinghuo."
My Phoenix Pattern suddenly grew three inches longer around my wrist. Gold Thread burrowed through my veins into my knuckles; at the moment it touched the princess's phantom, countless fragments of memory surged back through my meridians into my skull. I saw fifteen-year-old Princess Yong Ning curled up in a side hall of Cold Palace, using her Golden Hairpin to carve Big Dipper onto Azure Brick.
The black slime oozing from the cracks in the bricks crawled up her ankle, forming reverse scales at her heart.
"So you are also a sacrifice."
As I unconsciously murmured these words, the Bronze Human Face Lamps at the four corners of the altar suddenly extinguished simultaneously.
In the darkness, icy fingers pressed against my nape, and the princess's voice echoed, mingling with the Earth Veins, drilling into my eardrums: "Those who see the pupa will ultimately become butterflies."
The talisman ignited by Chen Xing illuminated the space within three zhang.
The Jade Heart, which should have been in the Xuanwu Position, was now floating before the princess's phantom. The souls of the Three Thousand Artisans transformed into Firefly Glow, swirling around that enigmatic heart.
I felt a blood-stained handkerchief in my sleeve pocket—suddenly appearing in my embrace as I crossed the Time-Space Rift—the word "Pardon" was seeping dark golden blood.
"The auspicious time has come."
The White Jade Chime Stones at the waist of the Veteran Coroner suddenly chimed, their sound waves tearing open a rift in the void.
Countless Black Tentacles surged from the rift, wrapping around Chen Xing's left arm as he was undergoing Jade Transformation.
Instinctively, I threw out the handkerchief to block them, and the blood-stained silk actually burned with scorch marks upon contact with the tentacles.
The emperor's laughter echoed from deep within the Earth Veins.
The Sovereign, twenty years younger, stepped out of the rift on a trail of Stardust. In his hand, the Imperial Jade Seal was missing its dragon knob, and black slime dripped from its broken edge.
As my Blood Pearl splashed onto the surface of the jade seal, the missing dragon knob suddenly emerged from the word "Pardon" on the handkerchief, held in its mouth was half a Twin Blood Jade.
"Ye Qing is indeed the perfect Perfect Vessel."
The moment the jade seal struck the center of the altar, the entire Underground Palace began to plummet rapidly.
The princess's phantom suddenly materialized; her scarlet-tipped nails pierced my forehead, and the Blood Pearl she extracted coalesced into a phoenix shape in midair.
The Scale Pattern on Chen Xing's Ceremonial Sword began to move; a dark golden Vertical Pupil opened at the hilt.
When the Vertical Pupil gazed at the Bronze Giant Gate, I witnessed a terrifying sight—the Dynasty Emperors were slowly turning their necks like those depicted in murals of the Founding Emperor.
The gap in his Dragon Head Guillotine perfectly matched the curve of the princess's Golden Hairpin.
"Every drop of imperial blood is a key." Chen Xing suddenly bit his tongue, and seventeen Lock Holes emerged from the Blood Mist he sprayed, "And you are the final Lock Core."
A Dragon's Roar resonated from within the Geological Rift.
As I thrust the Golden Hairpin towards the Jade Heart, time and space once again distorted.
The vortex of the Cold Palace Ancient Well pulled us into the stormy night of the third year of Xuan De, where the screams of the Three Thousand Artisans pierced through the air, stinging our eardrums.
The princess's wedding gown lay spread out on the altar as she held my hand and pressed the Golden Hairpin against my heart. "Remember, pain is the spell that breaks the cycle of reincarnation."
As blood splattered onto the Vertical Pupil of the Chen Xing sword, an unexpected change occurred. The artisans who should have perished suddenly turned as one, their eyes reflecting my past life in the Pupil of Jade Transformation—a female emperor adorned with a crown, setting herself ablaze on the sacrificial platform, her wrist adorned with a Phoenix Pattern transforming into a fire dragon that engulfed the entire palace.
The emperor's figure emerged from the flames, holding the Double Fish Jade Pendant, its yin-yang eye representing both my and the princess's hearts. "So that's how it is," I murmured, wiping away the blood trickling from my mouth. I pressed my Twenty-Eight Constellation Finger into the crack of the altar. "What is called Twin Blood Jade is merely fragments of imperial ambition."
Suddenly, the Jade Heart at Xuanwu Position exploded. Amidst the splintering Shattered Jade, I saw the emperor standing in a Modern Laboratory, using a blood-stained kerchief to wipe the Imperial Jade Seal.
At that moment when "Pardon" met the jade seal, age spots on his hand visibly faded at an astonishing rate. As the last trace of blood vanished, a piercing scream erupted from the dragon-head knob of the jade seal—Princess Yong Ning's voice.
Chen Xing suddenly pulled me toward the area of greatest turbulence. Just before the Time-Space Rift closed, I heard two versions of myself from different timelines speaking in unison: "The true sacrifice is the maggots that grow in every heart that believes in immortality."
As darkness swallowed my consciousness, I felt a blood-stained kerchief in my arms. The temperature of that blood was cooling, reminiscent of the warmth that splattered on my eyelashes when the princess had her heart cut out.
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