Memories Return

Hao Nhien did not speak immediately.

He only looked at Lang Tuyet, then back at the figure in red war armor shown from behind in the painting.

Her words still lingered in the silent room.

“This man… I’ve seen him before.”

After a long while, Hao Nhien finally asked:

“Where?”

Lang Tuyet did not answer at once.

She remained very close to the painting, one hand still hovering near the edge of the frame.

“I’m not sure.”

Her voice was lower than usual.

Hao Nhien frowned slightly.

Lang Tuyet closed her eyes.

“I’ve never met him in real life.”

She paused.

“But I’ve seen this back in my dreams.”

Hao Nhien did not interrupt.

Lang Tuyet slowly continued:

“The dream began a very long time ago, and it appeared more than once. Every time I woke up, most of the images faded almost immediately. Only a few scattered fragments remained.”

Her hand tightened slightly.

“Sometimes there was a battlefield.”

“Sometimes there was only a very strong wind.”

“I would be standing somewhere very high, with clouds beneath me, and ahead there was always a man in war armor with his back turned toward me.”

Hao Nhien looked at the figure in the painting.

Lang Tuyet opened her eyes.

“I never saw his face.”

“But the way he drew the bow, this silhouette from behind, even the feeling of standing behind him…”

Her voice slowed.

“I remember it.”

Hao Nhien was silent for several breaths before asking:

“Was there anything else in the dream?”

Lang Tuyet frowned slightly.

“There was the name of a place I had never heard of.”

Hao Nhien’s attention immediately sharpened.

Lang Tuyet thought for a long time, as though wanting to make certain what she was about to say was not something she had just imagined.

“Firmament.”

Hao Nhien went still.

The letter in this very room had mentioned it before, and Anh Nhien was now somewhere within that place.

Yet what sent a chill down his spine was something else entirely.

Hao Nhien looked directly at Lang Tuyet.

“I never told you about Firmament.”

Lang Tuyet looked back at him.

“I know.”

The answer made the room seem even quieter.

She slowly continued:

“That is exactly why I don’t understand how I once heard that name in those dreams.”

Hao Nhien said nothing more.

The figure in the painting.

The recurring dreams.

The Heavenly Spirit Merchant Association.

Firmament.

Any one of those things alone might have been dismissed as coincidence, but once they all began appearing around the same person, he could no longer ignore them.

Lang Tuyet looked away from the painting and around the room.

Her gaze slowly passed over the wooden desk, the bookcases, the stone shelves, and the corners of the walls.

After a while, her lips moved slightly.

“The Saintess’s room…”

Hao Nhien immediately turned toward her.

“Sister Lang, what did you just say?”

Lang Tuyet froze.

She seemed to have only just realized that she had spoken aloud.

“The Saintess’s room.”

Hao Nhien stepped closer.

“You know this room belonged to her?”

Lang Tuyet shook her head.

“I don’t know why I said that.”

Hao Nhien watched her for a long time.

The title “Saintess” itself was not entirely unfamiliar to Lang Tuyet. During their earlier negotiations at Thien Bao Pavilion, he had mentioned the Saintess connected to these ruins.

But he had never told her that this room belonged to the Saintess.

Much less described its interior.

Lang Tuyet slowly walked toward the ancient wooden desk in the center of the room.

She pulled out the chair and sat down.

The motion was so natural that Hao Nhien instinctively narrowed his eyes.

She did not inspect the chair’s position or search for mechanisms nearby. She simply sat down as though her body had long been familiar with the distance between the chair and the desk.

Lang Tuyet placed both hands on the tabletop.

Her fingertips unconsciously tapped three times, then stopped.

Her gaze shifted toward the right edge of the desk.

Her hand lowered, following a hair-thin groove that would have been almost impossible to notice without knowing it was there.

Click.

A small hidden drawer sprang open.

Both Hao Nhien and Lang Tuyet froze.

It was empty.

Lang Tuyet stared at the drawer, her brows drawing together slightly, one hand still resting on its handle.

Hao Nhien immediately remembered the letter.

During his previous visit, he had taken the yellow-paper envelope from this very drawer.

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He reached into his storage ring.

The envelope appeared in his hand.

Lang Tuyet looked over.

Hao Nhien stepped forward and placed it into the drawer.

“It was originally here.”

Lang Tuyet looked up.

“You took it?”

“Mm.”

“Last time, I didn’t know whether I would ever have another chance to return here, so I brought it with me.”

Lang Tuyet studied him for a moment, then nodded and picked up the letter.

She opened it.

Light from the stone lamps spread evenly across the page.

She read very slowly, her expression changing with each line.

Then her gaze stopped at one place.

For a long time.

Lang Tuyet gently touched two words on the page with one finger.

“Firmament.”

She raised her head and looked at Hao Nhien.

“That’s it.”

Hao Nhien nodded.

“This is where I first learned that name.”

Lang Tuyet continued looking at him.

Hao Nhien was silent for a moment before saying:

“To me, Firmament means even more than that.”

Her gaze shifted slightly.

He looked at the letter in her hands.

“The soul of someone I must find is there.”

Lang Tuyet asked very softly:

“Who?”

Hao Nhien fell silent for a beat.

The image of Anh Nhien appeared in his mind.

“Anh Nhien.”

He looked directly at Lang Tuyet.

“My wife.”

Lang Tuyet said nothing.

The faint smile that usually rested at the corner of her lips disappeared completely.

Hao Nhien continued:

“I know very little about her current situation, and I still haven’t found a true path leading to Firmament. So any clue connected to that place is something I cannot ignore.”

Lang Tuyet lowered her eyes toward the letter.

Only after a long while did she softly say:

“That is why you had to come back.”

“Mm.”

She did not ask anything more about Anh Nhien.

She simply placed the letter back into the hidden drawer.

Her other hand rested on the tabletop.

“The Saintess.”

She repeated the title softly, then looked around the room.

“I still don’t remember.”

Hao Nhien watched her.

Lang Tuyet slowly said:

“But my body seems to know what to do.”

Her gaze fell to her own hand.

“This place…”

She paused.

“…seems to be recognizing me.”

Hao Nhien did not answer.

That sentence alone was enough to make the doubts in his heart grow heavier.

After a moment, he reached into his storage ring again.

An ancient arrow appeared.

Lang Tuyet immediately looked over.

Hao Nhien walked toward the painting and inserted the arrow into the groove he had discovered during his previous visit.

He pressed down.

Click.

The frame trembled slightly and slowly slid aside.

A hidden chamber appeared behind it.

The stone shelves inside were still empty.

Lang Tuyet stepped forward and looked inside.

“You took the things that were here?”

“Mm.”

Hao Nhien answered naturally.

“Last time, I had no idea whether anyone still managed this place. Leaving them buried underground served no purpose.”

Lang Tuyet nodded.

She did not ask what he had taken.

Instead, she stepped inside and slowly examined each stone shelf, storage alcove, and line of runes carved into the walls.

Eventually, her gaze returned to the ancient arrow still embedded in the mechanism.

Lang Tuyet walked over.

Her hand settled around the shaft.

She stared at it for a long time before gently twisting.

To the left.

Crack.

A low sound came from somewhere deeper inside.

Hao Nhien immediately turned.

At the far end of the chamber, what had appeared to be a solid wall began to move.

A dark seam appeared, then slowly widened, revealing an entirely different entrance.

Hao Nhien stood still, staring at the shifting wall in obvious surprise.

During his previous visit, he had entered this very chamber, opened the hidden section behind the painting, and inspected nearly everything visible.

Yet he had completely failed to notice that another mechanism was concealed here.

His gaze moved from the newly opened passage to the arrow in Lang Tuyet’s hand, then settled on her.

“Sister Lang.”

“Mm?”

“You knew it had to be turned?”

Lang Tuyet lowered her eyes toward the hand still resting on the arrow.

Confusion briefly crossed her face.

After a while, she tightened her grip slightly and said:

“I don’t remember ever learning how to do this, but my hand knew what to do.”

Hao Nhien watched her for several breaths, then asked nothing more.

The two stepped through the newly opened doorway and entered the deeper hidden chamber.

The room was not large.

At its center stood only a round jade pedestal at about waist height.

Above it, a small milky-white jade orb slowly rotated, casting a soft glow like morning mist across the surrounding space.

Two other objects rested beneath it.

An ancient ring bearing the symbol of a hammer crossed over a coin.

Beside it lay a red command token edged in gold, its runes flickering on and off.

The moment Lang Tuyet saw the white jade orb, she stopped.

Hao Nhien immediately noticed.

Her reaction this time was different from when she had seen the Heavenly Spirit Merchant Association plaque, and different again from when she read the letter.

Her breathing deepened.

Even the aura within her body began to fluctuate very slightly.

“Sister Lang.”

Hao Nhien warned:

“Be careful.”

“Mm.”

She answered softly and continued toward the jade pedestal.

Lang Tuyet reached out and touched the milky-white orb.

The instant her fingertip made contact, white light spread outward.

Her entire body tensed.

Her pupils contracted, and she trembled once before becoming completely still.

“Sister Lang!”

Hao Nhien immediately stepped forward, spiritual power already surging through his meridians.

But when his hand was less than half a foot from her shoulder, a weak voice suddenly sounded directly within his sea of consciousness.

“Don’t…”

Hao Nhien stopped.

It was Lang Tuyet.

“I’m still fine. Something… is coming back.”

Hao Nhien frowned but did not touch her.

His spiritual sense immediately spread out, carefully covering her entire body.

Her soul remained stable.

Her meridians showed no sign of damage.

The aura within her body still belonged entirely to her.

But the light from the orb was traveling through her arm, sinking deeper into her body little by little.

The longer Hao Nhien observed, the less this resembled an ordinary inheritance.

That power was not merely replenishing spiritual energy.

It seemed to be awakening something that had already existed within Lang Tuyet from the beginning.

All he could do was remain beside her and wait.

Time passed slowly.

After roughly the time it took an incense stick to burn, the light surrounding the orb began to fade.

At last, the jade orb trembled and transformed into a stream of white light that entered directly through Lang Tuyet’s brow.

Hao Nhien’s hand immediately tightened.

Lang Tuyet remained standing where she was.

Several breaths later, she opened her eyes.

A layer of white light briefly flashed within them before vanishing.

“Sister Lang?”

Lang Tuyet had not yet answered when the aura around her suddenly changed.

An invisible layer of concealment seemed to peel away from her body, revealing her true spiritual power rising level by level.

Hao Nhien’s expression immediately changed.

Late Foundation Establishment.

The aura continued climbing and very quickly reached peak Foundation Establishment.

He stared at her.

“Sister Lang, you’ve been hiding your cultivation all this time?”

Lang Tuyet had no time to answer.

The power that had just awakened was still driving the accumulation within her body, causing the final barrier between Foundation Establishment and Golden Core to begin trembling.

Hao Nhien immediately understood.

The jade orb had not directly granted her a new realm.

Lang Tuyet had already been standing at peak Foundation Establishment and had simply concealed it extremely well.

The power merging into her now was only reawakening something that originally belonged to her and pushing accumulation that had already reached its limit through that final step.

Golden Core.

The moment that thought appeared, a hair-thin black crack opened in the air above the jade pedestal.

It existed for only an instant before vanishing, but both Hao Nhien and Lang Tuyet saw it.

Hao Nhien looked up, and scenes from the past immediately surfaced in his mind.

Thunder Burst had once torn open space in the Western Wastes, while the power of a Beast King approaching the Beast Emperor level had also made the space around the battlefield unstable.

He still did not know whether what covered the Western Wastes was a seal, a rule, or some other ancient force.

But the reaction just now was enough to prove that breaking through to Golden Core here could touch a boundary neither of them understood.

“Sister Lang, suppress it.”

Lang Tuyet gritted her teeth lightly and shook her head.

“I can’t hold it anymore. The power has already gone beyond what I can suppress.”

A second black crack immediately appeared.

It was longer than the first, and the space around the jade pedestal distorted slightly.

Lang Tuyet understood the danger as well.

“We have to leave the Western Wastes immediately.”

She reached out and took the ancient ring from the pedestal.

The moment it touched her skin, the ring automatically shrank and fitted itself perfectly around her finger.

Lang Tuyet paused for only an instant before immediately grabbing the red command token edged in gold.

As soon as the token entered her hand, her fingers almost instinctively traced three runes across its surface.

Red light flared at once.

Hao Nhien saw it clearly.

Lang Tuyet rapidly formed a seal.

“This is a teleportation talisman.”

“Where does it lead?”

Lang Tuyet closed her eyes and sensed it for a brief moment.

“I don’t know the exact location.”

Another fluctuation passed through the space above them.

This time it was strong enough for both of them to clearly sense a reaction from the sealing force surrounding the area.

Hao Nhien immediately said:

“Use it.”

Lang Tuyet no longer hesitated.

She activated the token.

Red-gold light instantly spread into a vortex around the two of them, bringing with it increasingly violent spatial fluctuations.

Just as the teleportation formation began to take shape, Hao Nhien suddenly turned his head.

The ancient arrow was still embedded in the mechanism outside.

He immediately understood that he could not leave it behind.

It was not simply an ancient artifact.

These ruins were still the only place where he had found clear clues connected to Firmament and Anh Nhien.

If he lost the arrow, he might also lose the ability to open deeper secrets when he returned in the future.

“Give me three breaths.”

Lang Tuyet immediately turned toward him.

“Hao Nhien!”

Spirit Wings had already opened behind him.

A low boom sounded.

Hao Nhien vanished from the hidden chamber.

He shot through the outer room, reached the painting, seized the arrow, and reversed the mechanism.

The sound of moving stone echoed through the chamber.

The deeper hidden doorway began to close, and the stone wall slowly shifted back into place.

Hao Nhien pulled out the arrow.

The painting slid down as well.

Just as the mechanisms were nearly sealed completely, red-gold light surged up behind him.

“Hao Nhien!”

A hand seized his wrist.

Lang Tuyet.

The teleportation vortex had already pulled her close to the outer doorway.

Hao Nhien had only just turned when white and red-gold light erupted at the same time.

The space around them contracted and distorted in an instant.

Their figures vanished completely.

The room immediately fell empty.

The stone lamps continued to burn, their pale golden light spreading across the wooden shelves, the ancient desk, and the painting that had returned to its original position.

Within that quiet glow, the man in red war armor still faced away from the viewer, as though nothing that had just happened had changed him in the slightest.

The hidden chambers were sealed once more, while the jade orb, the ancient ring, and the command token had disappeared with the two of them.

Only the Saintess’s room remained deep beneath the earth, quietly illuminated within the ancient ruins.

As though this place had never truly fallen asleep.

As though it had only been waiting for someone to return.