The forest did not give Huo Zhen back.
The fog thinned, then thickened again in slow, deliberate breaths, as if the Pavilion itself were deciding how much mercy to grant. Where Huo Zhen had vanished, there was no broken earth, no scorched bark, no sign of struggle...only a hollow gap in the air that refused to be explained.
Mu Qing stood rigid, his face drained of color. "He can't just… disappear."
"He can," Yun Ke said quietly, though his eyes never stopped moving. "This is a trial. Trials remove what they deem unstable."
Lei Fan's jaw clenched hard enough to show strain beneath his skin. Lightning did not flicker from him...he kept it leashed...but Jin Yue could sense the pressure behind that restraint, like a storm trapped in a sealed jar.
"We go after him," Lei Fan said.
"And trigger the formation to swallow two more?" Yun Ke countered. "We don't even know what 'after' means here."
