The night crushed the last trembling light into ash.
Inside the Archive Tower, only a single dying oil lamp remained, its flame no more than a quivering bead, pulsing faintly like the failing heartbeat of a dying man.
Shen Jin sat alone at the center of the room, watching as the light wavered and threw his shadow across the walls — broken, stretched, bleeding into the cracks of ancient stone.
Beyond the walls, the seal was in progress.
Low voices drifted through the mist — the muttered exchange of passwords, the scrape of stone tablets being arranged for the ritual wards.
The seal was not yet complete.
Thin gaps still lingered across the outer courtyard, like torn stitches in a shroud.
Luo Qinghan did not stay.
After Ling Wanzhou's departure, she rose without a word, gathering the torn scroll fragments into her sleeves, and slipped silently down the stairs.
No farewell.
No glance back.
At the threshold, beneath the dying ring of lamplight, she paused.
She turned.
Across the doorway and the choking mist, her gaze found Shen Jin's —
silent, steady, bearing a weight heavier than promises.
And then, she moved.
Through a thin gap in the unfinished seal, she vanished into the night.
Shen Jin lowered his eyes.
The tower sank into silence.
He reached beneath the desk and retrieved the sealed scroll.
The moment his fingertips brushed the parchment, a faint tremor raced up his spine —
a ghost of ancient flames, long buried, stirring once more within him.
He traced the surface gently.
Under the wavering lamplight, the hidden sigils awakened again, faint scars writhing across the fabric of the scroll like living wounds.
And the whisper returned.
Clearer this time.
It was not language.
Not a spell.
Not the prayers of forgotten gods.
It was —
The sound of burning dreams.
A chorus of memories long denied, long buried, gasping out their last in the smothering dark of the Abyss.
Shen Jin closed his eyes, letting the sound seep into his bones.
A sharp pain flared between his shoulder blades —
as if something unseen, something winged, stirred and beat against the confines of flesh.
The footsteps outside faded into distance.
The entire outer courtyard fell into a heavy, breathless silence.
Slowly, Shen Jin released the scroll, pressing it once more into the hidden compartment.
His fingers sealed it with a faint, glowing rune, locking the whisper away — for now.
He raised his head and looked toward the shattered window.
Beyond, the night churned with mist, heavy and impenetrable, the voice of the Abyss whispering just beyond the threshold of the world.
Shen Jin closed his eyes, his fingers curling tight around the edge of the desk.
There was no turning back.
The Abyss had already taken root in his blood.