“To climb into hell is easier than to descend into memory. The Lantern Citadel guards both.”

  I. The Path Lit by BloodNight had yet to fall, but darkness was already settling over the nds near Qilong Ridge, a mountainous expanse veiled in eternal mists and forbidden arts. Aduin's cloak was torn at the hem, soaked in spiritual dew that burned the skin of lesser cultivators. His right arm hung loose, still bearing the scars of the spirit-locks from Zhou Yanshi’s trap.

  He hadn’t rested in three days.

  “The next moon,” he muttered, staring at the locator bead pulsing weakly in his palm, “or she’s gone.”

  The bead guided him northeast, past the Cicada Grove, through the Silver Moth Hollow, and now toward the foot of Lantern Citadel—a cursed fortress sealed off from the rest of the cultivation world after the Massacre of Mo-Yuan two centuries ago.

  Rumors said the dead still whispered in its stone walls.

  Rumors said no one left alive.

  He didn’t care. She was inside.“Yu Xiaoqin… I’m coming.”

  II. The Lanterns Never DieThe citadel towered like a sb of dead sky, its silhouette jagged and mad. Its gates—twin sbs of obsidian—were carved with the faces of those who had once ruled from within, now twisted in agony. Rows of spirit nterns, fueled by ancient blood, flickered dimly along the walls, giving the pce its cursed name.

  As Aduin approached, a wind unlike any other pushed against him—not physical, but psychic. The memories of the sin screamed at his soul.

  He bit into his thumb and spped his blood against the ground.

  “Soul-Fog Dispersion Art: Third Veil,” he chanted.

  A red mist exploded around him and began peeling back the spiritual defenses.

  The gates creaked open—not by his hand, but by invitation.

  Aduin stepped inside.

  III. Labyrinth of the ForsakenInside the Lantern Citadel, walls moved like breathing beasts. Halls shifted. Doors disappeared. What was once straight became circur, and what was down became up.

  This was not just a prison—it was a trial array, fueled by the spiritual torment of every soul who had ever died here.

  Every step forward cost essence.

  Every breath summoned pain.

  But Aduin moved forward.

  The locator bead pulsed faster now, vibrating with urgency.

  He passed murals that bled. Statues that whispered.

  Then, a presence emerged.

  Three of them.

  “Another fool dares disturb our slumber.”

  From the shadows stepped three figures in ragged cultivator robes—Warden-Monks of the old Lantern Sect, sealed in the Citadel for their sins against the eastern provinces.

  Their eyes glowed hollow.

  Their teeth were cracked jade.

  And they had no hearts left.

  “Leave,” one hissed, drawing a crescent-shaped bde. “Or be left.”

  Aduin raised his hand, pulling from his side the Rot-Bone Dagger—short, jagged, and humming with every scream he had fed into it since the River of Bones.

  “Try me.”

  IV. A Duel Not Fought with MercyThe corridor erupted in chaos.

  The Warden-Monks moved like shadows, bending light, summoning the broken souls bound to the Citadel. Aduin's dagger carved through bone and spirit alike, but with every strike, his own essence frayed.

  Blood dripped from his mouth. His ears rang with curses of the dead.

  Still, he pressed forward.

  He sealed the first monk’s heart with a Soul-Splinter Seal.

  He shattered the second’s mind with the Frost-Eyed Lotus Curse.

  But the third—

  The third lunged and carved through his shoulder, nearly severing the arm.

  “You’ll die here,” the monk sneered.

  “Then I’ll haunt you forever,” Aduin replied, spitting blood in his face.

  With a final explosion of internal force, Aduin unleashed the Tenth Chant of the Rot Sutra, a forbidden burst that aged the monk’s body by a hundred years in a second.

  The Warden screamed, shriveled, and vanished in ash.

  Aduin colpsed to one knee, panting.

  “Not yet,” he growled. “I’m not done.”

  V. The Lantern CoreAfter what felt like hours, he reached the inner sanctum—a massive chamber lit by nine stone nterns, each burning with the soul-fire of a fallen cultivator.

  And at the center, suspended in a cocoon of jade threads and blood-mist—

  Yu Xiaoqin.

  Her face was pale, her lips blue, her aura flickering like a dying fire.

  Aduin staggered forward.

  “Xiaoqin…”

  But as he reached out to break the cocoon, a voice behind him spoke—

  not Zhou’s.

  Not a man’s.

  “So you came, little rot-bearer.”

  From the far side of the sanctum stepped a woman in crimson robes embroidered with the symbol of a closed eye—the mark of the Lantern Sect's final Matron, Jiang Qimei, a woman thought to have perished when the citadel fell.

  But here she was.

  Whole.

  Alive.

  And smiling.

  “She’s been waiting for you.”

  Aduin’s body went cold.

  “You... you’re supposed to be dead.”

  “Death is a pce. I made it my home.”

  Epilogue: Chains of the LivingJiang Qimei lifted a palm, and the cocoon around Xiaoqin pulsed.

  “You’ve done well to get this far. Now… give me the rot inside you. The Ninth Fme. Give it willingly, and I’ll let her go.”

  Aduin’s hands trembled.

  He knew what she was asking.

  The Rot Sutra wasn’t a cultivation art.

  It was a seal.

  He was the st vessel.

  To give it up would be to return to the weak, forgotten shell he once was.

  But—

  He looked at Xiaoqin.

  And took a step forward.

  “I’ll give you nothing.”

  Qimei smiled wider.

  “Then watch her die.”

  The chamber filled with burning light.

  Chains wrapped around Xiaoqin’s throat.

  And before Aduin could scream—

  She opened her eyes.

  And whispered: “Run.”----

  [TO BE CONTINUED...]