The wind had grown softer these past few days.When Lin Feng meditated, it no longer howled through the broken temple rafters but circled him gently, as though the air itself had learned restraint.
He didn't notice it at first — the way the world now bent ever so slightly toward his stillness.Only when he sat beneath the old plum tree one morning, eyes closed, did he realize that the falling petals were avoiding him, spiraling around his form before touching the ground.
He opened his eyes slowly.
"You're not a coincidence, are you…"
The parchment pulsed faintly in answer, as though listening.
He exhaled, trying to calm the ripple of unease within. Each night since his awakening, his dreams had become stranger — not chaotic, but impossibly vivid.
A hall of glass stars.A voice like wind over frozen lakes.And always, the same gentle whisper threading through them:
"Awaken gently, child of the storm."
That voice…It felt neither divine nor human.It was something in between — a tone that carried centuries of quiet watching.
He pressed his palm to his chest, almost embarrassed by the warmth blooming there. "Who are you?"
The air stilled, then moved again, brushing against his cheek like a sigh.
He didn't realize he was smiling — faintly, uncertainly.
Above the Ninth Heaven
The clouds of the Celestial Realm shifted restlessly, streaks of silver threading through their expanse.
Arannis stood upon the outer balcony of the Celestial Citadel, overlooking the mortal planes far below. She had spent the last three nights unable to sleep — her dreams echoing with the faint rhythm of a mortal heartbeat.
When the morning bells rang, she felt the disturbance before the summons came.
"Envoy Arannis," said a voice behind her.
She turned. A tall figure in obsidian armor approached — Lord Vaenor, commander of the Envoy Order. His gaze was sharp, his tone sharper.
"You've been tampering with sealed records."
Her expression didn't change. "I sought clarification."
"Clarification is not your duty. The Registrar has noticed your absence from the Courts. He demands your explanation — and your compliance."
She bowed, composed. "Then I will answer."
But as she followed him through the vast corridors of luminous jade, she felt it again — that whisper across her mind, faint but unmistakable.
"Do not let them see the truth."
Her steps faltered. The voice wasn't her imagination. It was his.
For an instant, the veil between Heaven and Earth trembled — and two souls, separated by realms, brushed lightly against one another.
Lin Feng froze mid-breath in the mortal realm, feeling his pulse skip. Somewhere beyond the sky, someone had just… heard him.
He looked up instinctively, eyes tracing the endless blue.
Arannis did the same, standing before the golden doors of the Heavenly Court.
For that single heartbeat, the heavens were no longer silent.
Far Below
The parchment stirred in Lin Feng's lap, its glow deepening. The runes shifted into a single, delicate pattern — a sigil shaped like a feather falling through a storm.
He traced it with his fingers, unaware that at the same moment, Arannis's own celestial seal — the one etched into her palm as an Envoy — flared in identical light.
They didn't know it yet, but the thread between them had awakened.