The Lost Memory

The cave fell silent.

The crackling of the campfire suddenly became unusually distinct.

Ying'er stood frozen for a long time before finally asking in a hoarse voice, “...Does my husband truly know nothing? He doesn’t realize he is actually—”

“He doesn’t know,” Wu Lingfeng said, her gaze never leaving Ye Xuan. “Or rather, he believes wholeheartedly in the memories implanted in him, because he has no reason to doubt them. In those memories, he is that orphan, that boy who grew up in poverty.”

She closed her eyes briefly, then opened them again, an indescribable emotion flickering deep within. “But his body remembers. Even if his soul is clouded, even if his memories have been hollowed out, the deepest things within the body cannot be deceived.”

“So today, just seeing those two characters... reduced him to this state.”

Ying'er’s tears spilled forth again. She clamped her hand over her mouth, shoulders trembling as she wept silently.

Wu Lingfeng said nothing more.

She once again fixed her gaze on Ye Xuan’s face, on his tightly furrowed brows, on the almost imperceptible, long-dried trail of blood at the corner of his eye.

“But... why was this done?” Ying'er choked out. “Why did they do this to my husband?”

Wu Lingfeng had no answer to that question.

“That is something you will have to ask him yourself,” she said, her voice soft and low. “Only when he awakens will this mystery be unraveled.”

She reached out, placing her hand gently on Ye Xuan’s forehead, feeling the faint, fragile warmth that still lingered there.

“If... he can still wake up.”

She spoke those words so softly they were almost spoken only in her heart, but Ying'er heard them nonetheless. She stifled her sobs, burying her entire face into her knees, daring not to make a sound.

The cave held only the faint crackle of the fire and the occasional heavy, agonized sigh from Ye Xuan, echoing over and over in the stillness.

The next morning.

The first rays of sunlight climbed over the mountain ridge, slanting into the cave and casting a slender golden beam across the ground. It came to rest quietly at the edge of the stone platform.

Ying'er had fallen asleep beside the platform, clutching the sleeve of Ye Xuan’s robe. Tear streaks still marked her face, and her sleep was shallow and uneasy. Her lips twitched faintly, as though even in her dreams she found no rest.

Wu Lingfeng remained where she had been sitting, her back straight, her eyes unclosed.

She had not slept the entire night.

The backlash pain from the Dragon Transformation Art still pulsed relentlessly with each heartbeat, surging up in waves. She simply buried the pain in the deepest recesses of her mind, without so much as a furrow of her brow.

On the stone platform, Ye Xuan stirred.

First his fingers, then his arm, then his shoulders—slowly, bit by bit, he surfaced from that deathlike coma, floating upward.

“Ah...”

A vague, low moan escaped from his throat.

His eyelashes quivered faintly. Then, at last, his eyes slowly opened.

What kind of eyes were they?

Bloodshot, utterly exhausted. Fine red veins crisscrossed the whites, and the light in his pupils was scattered, unfocused, hollow like two bottomless, abandoned wells.

Yet deep within, something lurked. Something that could only arise from learning an unbearable truth. Despair, twisted anguish—a weight so crushing it was barely containable.

“Husband! You’re awake!”

Ying'er woke at the slightest movement, jerking her head up. Her voice was thick with tears, mingled with joy.

She lunged forward to grasp his hand. “You’re awake! You scared me to death! How do you feel? Are you hurt? Let me get you some water—”

Ye Xuan did not respond.

He simply stared blankly at the stone ceiling, saying nothing, as though he hadn’t heard a word—as though he had forgotten how to look away from that fixed point.

Ying'er froze in place. Slowly, she withdrew her hand, a deeper, unnameable unease creeping into her heart.

Wu Lingfeng stepped forward and offered him a bowl of lukewarm water she had prepared earlier. Her voice was softer than usual by half a tone, but she kept it steady. “Have some water.”

Ye Xuan’s gaze dropped to the bowl.

He paused for the briefest moment.

Then, in a sudden motion, he swept his hand across, sending both water and porcelain bowl crashing to the ground. The bowl shattered into four or five pieces on the stone floor, shards flying everywhere while water spread into a dark stain.

In that instant, the cave fell utterly silent.

Ying'er flinched backward, eyes wide, caught between stunned confusion and silent grievance. Yet she forced herself still, not daring to make a sound.

Wu Lingfeng stood there, looking at the broken porcelain on the floor. Her brow twitched once, but she said nothing.

Ye Xuan lowered his head, staring at his own hands.

They were long, pale, slender hands—clean-knuckled, faintly cool. At this moment, they lay calmly on his lap, looking perfectly ordinary. Yet, to him, they seemed to reveal something deeply foreign.

He stared at those hands for a long time.

Then, he let out a laugh.

“Ha ha…”

The laughter was low and light, sounding like something leaking out from the deepest cracks—beneath a casual, careless surface lay a bone-chilling desolation.

Then the laughter grew louder. More out of control. From a bitter chuckle into a near-hysterical cackle that filled the entire cave, crashing and echoing off the stone walls. It carried within it a kind of wild, thorough mocking of self, sending chills down the spine of anyone who heard it.

“How could I have forgotten.”

His laughter was laced with a hint of hoarseness. “How could I ever have forgotten something so important?”

He lifted his head and stared sharply at Wu Lingfeng and Ying'er.

“Do you know what the most laughable part is?”

His voice was gratingly hoarse, yet exceptionally clear. Every word was bitten off, stable and precise.

“I have the memories of countless past lives,” he began slowly. “In every single one, I know exactly who I am, where I stand, what I have endured, and how I died.”

A pause.

“But.”

Ye Xuan raised his hands and grabbed at his own hair, his fingers pressing so hard that his knuckles turned white, threatening to tear out whole strands. The bloodshot veins in his eyes flared, throbbing more intensely with his agitation.

“In this life alone, I cannot recall—before I entered the Azure Cloud Sect—who I was!”

His voice trembled with pent-up rage, the rising of a flood long held back at the breaking point.

“I thought I remembered! All along, I thought I remembered! I was Ye Xuan from the mountain village. My father and mother died. I farmed the land. I starved. Then I was discovered and taken away by an elder from the sect. That whole memory was firmly planted in my mind—I never once doubted it!”

He stopped to draw a ragged breath. The light in his eyes grew dimmer but deeper.

“But last night... that seal began to loosen.”

“I tried to recall my father’s face.”

“Nothing.”

“I tried to recall my mother’s voice.”

“Still nothing.”

“I tried to recall a single person from the village. Any tree. Any path. Any stone…”

Ye Xuan’s voice grew lower and lower, until it almost faded into nothingness.

“All blank.”

“I can’t even remember how to hold a hoe.”

"I grew up farming the land, yet I can't even recall how to hold a hoe."

He lowered his head, letting out a hollow laugh—something within it seemed to shatter: "Isn't that ridiculous?"