Song Zining let out an exclamation at a glance: “Void Crystal!? This big?”
“Void crystal?” Qianye recalled that when he first picked up the object, it indeed generated continuous raw void energy within.
Song Zining took it for a closer inspection. His gaze lingers briefly on the filled gap at the rhombic crystal where something had been embedded earlier. “What’s this? Was something inlaid here?”
Qianye briefly recounted how he had first obtained pieces of small crystal fragments from the Baron Batu vampire spider’s castle, and then retrieved the entire crystal from the Black Forest.
Nodding, Song Zining replied, “I can’t make sure myself. It’s better to call Nangong Xiaoniao; she’s the real expert in these things.”
Song Zining tidied his room slightly, erasing certain traces he couldn’t allow outsiders to observe. Then, he summoned his personal attendants and maids to settle the sleeping young girl before inviting Nangong Xiaoniao over.
Though Song Zining and Qianye declared that Zhu Ji was an orphan saved by Qianye from a destroyed human enclave amid his expedition—looking around at the glances cast by the servants and maids gave Song an unpleasant sensation. Despite this clumsy lie, why couldn’t no one suspect what trouble Qian had actually caused? What was that knowing gaze these people wore, the look saying that it went unsaid and he, the young master of the seven heavens, didn’t need to clarify anything at all?
To which, Qianye watched from one side bursting into laughter.
Not soon after, Nangong Xiaoniao hurriedly arrived. Her face flushed as she encountered Qianye, someone she hadn’t seen since their last parting. Exchanging but a few words, as soon as spotting the crystal laid carefully on the desk, she gasped: “A void crystal! And a peerless specimen too!”
Xiaoniao rushed forth instantly and grabbing the dull, opaque stone began scanning it with keen detail. Finally pulling away somewhat reluctantly after prolonged study, admiration still apparent.
Qinye posed the question at length: “So…what’s its function? What is it actually useful for?”
“This, my friend, is the pinnacle of the energy sources currently available!” she explained.
With a meticulous lecture from Nangong, Qinye grasped that a void crystal resembled an existing conduit connecting the void itself. Given the right energy enchantment, its force flows forever as raw void energy without exhaustion. Alas, this unique matter rarely manifests, seldom in any regular mine or territory—appearing only sporadically in certain extremities, extremely rare and thus, obtainable only by sheer fortune rather than by force and demand.
To the Empire, its most vital use for void crystals lies in propitious crafting for ships, particularly as the energy furnaces in vessels: A tiny crystal the size of a little finger could easily propel and maintain a destroyer-sized cruiser. Qianye, in his acquisition, had landed a crystal that could match the proportions used in the Empire’s “Sky Flare,” the highest-class of capital carriers, whose specifications had once marked the pinnacle of fleet capabilities.
The floating fleet’s supreme star vessels were in terribly limited supply despite technological prowess—fewer than a dozen such ships currently manned. Their scarcity hinged upon one factor beyond monetary constraints. The core bottleneck remained the absence sufficient void crystals, required to manufacture the propulsion cores.
To the Empire, securing a piece of such rare size of this rare void crystal promised one addition, a formidable battleship to their navy. During those days in Heili City, watching swarms of ladies flock around a floating arrival with General Wéi Pòtiān, the sheer scale of the Imperial capital dreadnought’s enormity hit Qianye anew, for that very behemoth didn’t even attain Sky Flare levels. Had such crystals entered trade value, the worth of any complete fleet without one would be trivial at best.
Nangong did confirm what made him feel rich—also, something troubling. For something this rare, was an absolute strategic material: highly contested goods, hardly disposable, and certainly never ordinary possessions lying within anyone’s grasp.
After the exchange, Qianye’s euphoria dimmed with a shadow—awarely of the burdening risk of ownership. His and Zining’s eyes met in mutual, quiet communication. Song took lead in saying, “Leave this piece to me; I’ll think of way.”
What followed became remarkably calm amidst the ongoing bloodshed in the Iron Curtain. War progress reports arrived like metronomes from Ghost Rope, and from Far Command HQ. Their tone, however, spoke of bloodshed intensities too harrowing. In complete contrast, Heilikou emerged like some refuge, undisturbed by war and thriving with bustling life while lights shone in its nightly rhythm.
Qianye, however, still hesitant towards journeying west to Lord Zhao’s domain—never by fear of dangers, but due primarily to that instinctual resistance: confronting the buried truth of past events. Song Zining made no further urging effort but poured himself deeply in combat readiness for the great campaign of the Iron Curtain, mobilizing the “An Huo Fire” to crush the Dark Territories’ strongholds during their strategic window, consolidating prior western expansions Qianye had secured beforehand while pushing territorial borders further.
In an entirely contrasting pace, Zhu Ji’s day broke into meals, sleep, then another round of eating and sleeping again; completely devoid of irregularity. A curious habit, though—a clingy affection—clung Zining in calling out “mommy,” leaving the youth visibly frustrated and embarrassed. In Qianye’s mere nearness alone, however, traces of that child’s usual behavior shifted. It revealed, with startling clarity, an aura of quiet sublimation—an odd mix between reverencial fear and meek surrender.
An afternoon at about three to four o’clock found a ceiling of uniform slate gray above, while orderly life persisted, and in accordance the city flicked on its scattered constellation of lanterns in the dusk.
He strolled its familiar streets, gazing at what now was unmistakably “his” city. Before lay the colossal, double-block construction site; colossal steampipe arteries roared, sending power humming through machinery as tall the skyline, workers teeming like ants on scaffolds and scaffolds above more scaffolds.
The wall’s patchwork repairs; the district’s rebuild had edged to near completion. Anytime now, migrant tides would fill these houses, whether crude or lavish, rendering Heiliki’s battle wounds another history-page soon to be turned—a memory.
Thus was this Eternal Night continent—impoverished, barren land that bore the fiercest form of life tenacity.
While perched upon a criscross web-work of hissing, scalding pipelines overlooking the glowing metropolis, an abrupt tremor within urged a quickening.
Below, amidst a crowded stretch of thoroughfare, someone—male, young and striking—ceased mid-street. Looked up—and met his silent gaze.
For a moment, Qianye momentarily wavered at this long-unseen silhouette against an all too vivid recollection as if yesterday still linger from Tianshu Spring Hunt across continents—and like lifetimes ago.
That figure began ascending as if defying gravity in slow levitation: a crisp silhouette shaped into the very fabric of air, each step crisp and soundless toward him. Light-colored hair flitted across a finely chiseled face kissed by wind, while a familiar, calm smile emerged:
“Night. It’s been a long time.”
Qiyane lingered into the lull of the moment. Silence.
“…Young master Zhao.”
Changes had shaped Zhao Junhong greatly since the Spring Hunt, from swagger to quiet poise. Beneath his plain warrior’s outfit draped with his wind-catching cloak concealed the ornate, silver-fan shaped contraption on back: A fantasy that bore his family lineage. His dignified composure blended easily with common soldiery. Only under closer examination could his elegance set itself apart against ordinary soldiers on foot nearby.
Meanwhile the guest scrutinized Qinye with keen eyes. Smiled again.
“The challenge we once made passed a while back—and looking now…you continue growing ahead. You’re far beyond me now.”
Tensing eased subtly as Qianye murmured a trace of smile: “If Lord Zhao wishes a match, by all means.”
For an ephemeral instant, Zhao’s rich brownish-tinging violet-pale, intense gaze sharpened—tinged with keenness, eagernes—but tempered. He sighed.
“Originally, amid these bloodsoaked days within the Iron Curtain war zone—we could’ve taken the opportunity to battle side by side.” But regretting now: “Serenia impatiently awaits in western lands. The ultimatum she’s declared? ‘You’d better appear quickly or be dragged bodily to Lord Zhao residence.’”
“Has her injury healed?”
“Not exactly. If so…she might already be here.”
The guest softened with the next sentence.
“My younger brother now commands all clans’ forces during these wars back at the valley estate; he requested that I personally make sure you’d cross toward western regions safely.”
Qinye’s quietude deepened. The kind of silence filled rooms, filled voids inside.
“Isn’t it a bit chilled up there?” a voice chimed up below amid gentle footfall and childish giggling. Song below watched both figures with an amused expression. Attached to and clinging on his arm was Ju Ji, a tiny koala-child in her attachment stance with limbs clinging like roots.
During transit back to Anhuo base en route, Qinye eventually learned: Junhong arrived alone this whole time, no entourage nor protection to avoid suspicion.
Their situation back in the bloody wars of the valley left little maneuver. For that reason, Zhao chose stealth for the purposeful absence of noise.
Also worth noting— Lady Serenia had departed weeks earlier, abandoning formal treatment for the edge western airship exchange dock. Inwardly, Qianye recognized now—that she’d halted treatment completely for a long journey’s urgency to meet him, risking direct incursion into lands deep in Eternal Night’s shadow, just to drag him by hand personally back into the Zhao family home, should Qianye dare continue avoiding.
Some truths, some reckoning—could only delay so long.
On returning to the An Huo quarters, Qianye gathered his belongings. There wasn’t quite much needed. And as Junhong remained discreet, remaining for now within the confines of Qianye’s quarters at his request, the days settled into quiet, with brief dialogue. But always, both men found topics carefully skirting an unspoken name.
Qianye resumed maintaining the Dua Bloom. A quiet murmur escaped him.
“What was said earlier…Your brother, the Fourth…claimed he possesses the fragment—a piece from my mother’s heirloom locket?”
“Jun Du told my father about you on returning—now a full battle captain himself. Thus, the invitation back home is also an order—the locket’s secrets as well as other matters awaiting his presentation.”
From the way Jun Hong spoke, ‘my father’ referred specifically to Engraced Grace Marquis Zhao Weihuang…also—by a thread stretched over ages—Qiyen itself.
Silence answered like thunder in their shared air.
Junhong’s voice wavered gentle as an exhale:
“When the scandal erupted between then—when my elder brothers and I already in military institute, you had been at home in Zhaos’ household all alone with Jun Du.”
“He confided in and leaned into no one save you.”
“You two were very close at that stage, if perhaps…the memories dim now in you…”
“He himself didn’t witness that tragedy but was deeply affected for years afterward.”
“Back in that past, things swirled thick and muddy. We’ve struggled all but hopelessly through layers of secrets. Today…few still remain—original actors. Whatever is uncovered…we leave the full telling from now upon a father’s voice. Even then, maybe, what he’ll tell will be incomplete.”
“Why?” Qiyen now finally spoke in one word that hung with centuries behind it.
Zhang paused, and continued:
“For you see—that incident, when it struck the household—my father was still deployed thousands of li across, leading a vital war suppressing rebels. Upon learning news too late, his return arrived only in aftermath.”
Hearing this, strangely…the cold knot inside loosened somewhat from Qinye’s chest. Silence settled again, and after while, in that heavy stillness, finally stirred:
“I’ll leave tomorrow at first light.”
Travel plans were made to leave dawn next day. Anhun kept few within its circle aware of this journey’s details—including of course Nangong Xiaoniao. Along wayward docks, through gust-woven air, she stood until she finally saw Qinye enter his waiting lighter-than-air airship.
Wordless and restless she was, watching him as though words wanted release a thousand times over, but still—trapped in her throat until that final metallic closing of boarding hatch. And then it lifted.
She turned slowly from watching the now distant silhouette, as if chasing something already lost to time—on that youthful face, so delicate with sorrow she hadn’t carried yesterday. A fragile, aching sadness etching across youthful innocence.
Not many hours into sky-bound departure, Song summoned Xiaoniao in his study upon Qinye’s early wake.
“Please take a seat…please.” Soft, almost unguarded tone replaced cold civility with Song now.
“Perhaps it’s better—just that standing suffices me. As always, sir.” Her voice—distant, icy—unmoved.
Unforgiveness lingering—unwilling to forget Song’s earlier counsel urging she sever ties from Night.
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