The underground path that Zhao Wei and the Ember remnants followed twisted like a serpent through the heart of the ancient mountain. Jagged roots broke through the ceiling and stone walls, as though the earth itself was struggling to reclaim what had been buried.

  The deeper they moved, the quieter everything became.

  Even Bai, who usually filled the silence with offhanded remarks and nervous ramblings, was silent. He clutched a scroll tightly to his chest, its seal cracked, releasing occasional pulses of dim red light.

  Zhao Wei led the way, her fingers brushing along the etched symbols that lined the passage. These weren’t just wardings. They were records—etched memories of a world before the Spirit Wars. Her lips moved slightly, recalling half-remembered verses, tracing stories with her fingertips.

  A sudden draft chilled the tunnel.

  Feng Ren turned, hand brushing the hilt of his hidden blade. “That wasn’t wind.”

  Zhao Wei paused, her gaze narrowing. “No. It was breath.”

  They stopped at a dead-end wall, veins of spiritstone glowing faintly in its surface. Bai stepped forward, scroll held up like a lantern.

  The wall responded.

  The stone shimmered, symbols blooming like moss across its surface. Then, without a sound, the wall folded inward, opening into a vast chamber bathed in pale blue light. An underground hall, circular and enormous, with its domed ceiling held aloft by curved ribs of white jade.

  In the center stood a dais carved from obsidian. Upon it, a memory vessel hovered, a tear-shaped crystal pulsing with locked time.

  Zhao Wei exhaled. “The Memory Crucible.”

  “It looks like it holds nightmares,” Bai whispered.

  Feng Ren moved to her side. “It probably does.”

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  Zhao Wei stepped forward. The Crucible pulsed once, sensing her presence. Her blood. Her name.

  She reached out and touched it.

  Flames swallowed her.

  She stood in another life.

  The chamber melted away, and Zhao Wei found herself within the memory of the Creed, an older world, where firelight flickered against obsidian floors and hundreds knelt before a cloaked figure upon a black throne.

  But she wasn’t one of them. She floated above, unseen. The Crucible let her witness.

  A name echoed through the hall: "Wei Ning."

  Her former self stood tall, dressed in ceremonial black, her hand gripping a scroll bound with twin serpent seals. She handed it to the figure on the throne.

  “This knowledge was stolen from the Eternal Archive. I recovered it myself.”

  “You disobeyed direct orders,” the throne's occupant said, voice cold and ageless.

  Wei Ning bowed. “And preserved the last truth of the Shadow Spiral. Without it, we would never understand the origin of the binding curse.”

  The crowd stirred.

  Another voice cut through the tension. One she knew too well.

  Li Feng.

  Once her most trusted second. He stepped forward from the shadows.

  “And yet, it cost us the Crimson Spire. Thirty operatives. And your own brother.”

  Wei Ning flinched. Just slightly.

  Zhao Wei felt the weight of that moment settle on her chest.

  A betrayal was already unfolding.

  The memory shifted again.

  Another scene. A war room filled with maps scorched by battle. Wei Ning stood before a smaller group—strategists, traitors, those who wore masks even in private.

  And at the edge of the room, in the flickering torchlight, stood a shadowed figure. Eyes unreadable. Face half-concealed by a silver-touched hood.

  The same figure who had helped her escape the execution. The one she had never dared name.

  He stepped forward in the memory, placing a bloodied seal into Wei Ning’s hand. “If you survive the fall, find the Ember. They will follow.”

  And then he was gone.

  Zhao Wei felt the pull of the Crucible again.

  The chamber returned. Her knees hit the stone, breath ragged. The others rushed to her.

  “What did you see?” Bai asked.

  She looked up.

  “A lie,” she whispered. “The Creed's history is a lie.”

  Feng Ren frowned. “That explains everything and nothing.”

  Zhao Wei stood, steadier now. Her hands curled into fists.

  “They called me traitor. But they knew I had found something they wanted buried. The Shadow Spiral. The origin of the curse.”

  “You think they altered the records?”

  “I know they did. And someone helped me escape. Someone who might still be alive.”

  The chamber trembled. The Crucible cracked.

  Zhao Wei turned as a hidden stairwell opened along the far wall. Wind hissed through it—but not air. Magic. A pulse.

  Something was awakening.

  And they had just taken the first step into its memory.