The ‘hun’ engraved into the air by the young girl was nothing extraordinary, nor was it written in an archaic or unknown language from ancient or futuristic times.
It was a ‘hun‘ of standardized, modern Simplified Script – the system of writing that An Fei had utilized for the majority, if not all of her life.
It was simple, with clean strokes that left no room for disambiguation.
Each stroke was illuminated by a different color of light, the radiance emmitted from the collection of slashes triggering gentle reverberations throughout the air. When contrasted against the overpowering hue of scarlet, the ‘hun‘ characterproduced a harmonious yet chaotic mixture.
It blended in perfectly with the background of scarlet wrath, yet An Fei could clearly spot distinct traces of purity, righteousness, and steadfast warmth.
The young girl raised her hand to match that of the floating character, and parted her lips to jeer in a lilting voice.
“Could it be that you are unable to draw even such a simple character?” the young girl sneered.
“You call yourself An Fei, yet you can’t even write a simple character in the air – one that you’ve written for numerous years? Where has your courage ran off towards?”
With a stiff frown wearing down on her lips, An Fei’s throat gently pulsated in anger and indignation towards the young girl’s words.
Curling the fingers of her right hand into a tight fist, she raised her arm into the air, as if to bring down a judgement filled with righteous fury.
And she brought it down towards the young girl’s countenance, initiating the first stroke for the ‘hun’ character. Her arm served as the brush, her fist merging with the brush hairs to shred the surroudings to form her character.
At least, that was what An Fei had hoped.
“…huh?”
Her arm remained locked in place at its overhead position, the fingers still clenched into the tight fist demanding to be planted into a person’s arrogant countenance. Regardless of her struggles, her arm seemed unable to be let down.
She couldn’t remove the unknown and invisible barrier with her physical strength, nor could she call upon the coil of spiritual essence locked deeply within her body.
Her arm was frozen into place.
Her body retained its natural movement, save for her arm. She could move her legs, twist her body and kick with her feet, yet her right arm served as an invisible and immovable anchor locking her into position.
“What’s going on?”
An Fei’s pupils contracted in shock. Her eyes flickered towards the young girl’s countenance, of which she discovered a mocking curve displayed in its full bloom.
The ‘hun’ engraved into the air by the young girl was nothing extraordinary, nor was it written in an archaic or unknown language from ancient or futuristic times. It was a ‘hun’ of standardized, modern Simplified Script – the system of writing that An Fei had utilized for the majority, if not all of her life.
It was simple, with clean strokes that left no room for disambiguation.
Each stroke was illuminated by a different color of light, the radiance emmitted from the collection of slashes triggering gentle reverberations throughout the air. When contrasted against the overpowering hue of scarlet, the ‘hun’ characterproduced a harmonious yet chaotic mixture.
It blended in perfectly with the background of scarlet wrath, yet An Fei could clearly spot distinct traces of purity, righteousness, and steadfast warmth.
The young girl raised her hand to match that of the floating character, and parted her lips to jeer in a lilting voice.
“Could it be that you are unable to draw even such a simple character?” the young girl sneered.
“You call yourself An Fei, yet you can’t even write a simple character in the air – one that you’ve written for numerous years? Where has your courage ran off towards?”
With a stiff frown wearing down on her lips, An Fei’s throat gently pulsated in anger and indignation towards the young girl’s words. Curling the fingers of her right hand into a tight fist, she raised her arm into the air, as if to bring down a judgement filled with righteous fury.
And she brought it down towards the young girl’s countenance, initiating the first stroke for the ‘hun’ character. Her arm served as the brush, her fist merging with the brush hairs to shred the surroudings to form her character.
At least, that was what An Fei had hoped.
“…huh?”
Her arm remained locked in place at its overhead position, the fingers still clenched into the tight fist demanding to be planted into a person’s arrogant countenance. Regardless of her struggles, her arm seemed unable to be let down.
She couldn’t remove the unknown and invisible barrier with her physical strength, nor could she call upon the coil of spiritual essence locked deeply within her body.
Her arm was frozen into place.
Her body retained its natural movement, save for her arm. She could move her legs, twist her body and kick with her feet, yet her right arm served as an invisible and immovable anchor locking her into position.
“What’s going on?”
An Fei’s pupils contracted in shock. Her eyes flickered towards the young girl’s countenance, of which she discovered a mocking curve displayed in its full bloom.
Clap!
As if to humiliate her further, the young girl’s hands slapped palms together in a slow, rhythmic clap. Each strike reverberated within An Fei’s heart, as though singing a mighty chorus of her ultimate defeat and loss.
“What a great surprise. You claimed to be the true An Fei, but you can’t even write the character for your own soul,” the young girl mocked with a gentle voice.
“How hyprocritical is that? Believing to be the true owner of your body, but only to realize that you aren’t even in possession of the body’s soul.”
“What have you done?” An Fei shouted in anger, struggling to remove her arm from its invisible bind.
“I can’t write the character for my own soul? You’ve tampered with the rules of this strange place, who is to say that you also have prohibited me from writing a character? Release me!”
“I’ve tampered with the rules of this… strange place?” the young girl’s scarlet irises flickered with derision and pity.
“I’ve also placed a prohibition onto your movements, as to prevent you from refuting my point? How laughable – you don’t even know where you are! Did you know, that we are currently residing within the depths of your own soul!?”
The words slammed deeply into An Fei’s heart, and she was left breathless for a brief moment. When she finally recovered, An Fei scanned around the surroundings with her eyes.
A few breaths afterwards of deep thought, she spoke.
“You claimed that I am merely an aggregate body of aggression and hate, and that this place is my own soul. Prove it – I simply can’t believe such an atrocious claim.”
Huh?
The young girl’s lips trembled as laughter bubbled within her throat. Her eyes crinkled into delicate smiles as she stared directly towards An Fei’s unconvinced expression, before doubling into an unstoppable cascade of laughter.
The peals of laughter were delicate and heartwarming, yet they slashed light wounds onto An Fei’s shoulders.
“…hehe, you don’t even know that much?” the young girl finally regained her breath.
“You resided within a great opportunity for an entire year – no, even more – and you couldn’t even comprehend that much? I say, what expectations had Grandfather on you?”
“Grandfather?” An Fei echoed, her irises narrowing with suspicion.
“What does Grandfather have to do with this?”
“What does Grandfather have to do with this!? What doesn’t Grandfather have to do with this!?”
The young girl abruptly screamed in frustration. She thrust her right arm forwards level to her chest, the fingers splayed wide open.
“[Come! The Sanctuary desires the offering!]”
Immediately after the final word left the young girl’s lips, the monochromic world of scarlet hue morphed into an aria bestowed by the heavens.
With a sinking feeling arising within her heart, An Fei could only watch as two black books manifested between the young girl and her.
One was covered by strips of tattered leather, and lacked a title. The other was of a coarse yet fine fabric, and was embossed with goldleaf lettering.
“How…”
She knew those books, and also knew them to be the actual books themselves instead of a gullible fabrication.
An Fei bit her lips, observing the world of scarlet morph from a world of monochrome desolation to one of ambient creation and destruction, as though a butterfly had emerged from its cocoon.
From overhead, the scarlet skies broke apart to reveal the respective plumes of violet, indigo, yellow, and green. Each plume was adorned with the sentiments of purity, innocence, dignity, and virtue, causing a harmonious symphony with the dull overlay of wrathful scarlet light.
The scarlet ground underneath their feet disintegrated to reveal a massive, gaping void that threatened to swallow all existence into its endless depths.
At the horizon, the plumes of light were compressed and annihilated into nihility by the suction of the void, and the void was consecrated to reveal elements of creation by the plumes of light.
The sides of the world broke to display bastions of golden light, as though they were the endlessly revered sanctuary that held creation and destruction at bay.
The sensations crawling across her skin were neither cold nor hot, yet both blisteringly cold and scorchingly hot. As she strained her eyes to reduce the stinging pain across her senses, An Fei gasped as she stared directly towards the two books.
The scattered elements of the void seeped from the pristine pages of the tattered book left behind by An Xiang Yang. The plumes of light that dominated the skies with their heavenly, purifying chorus, extended from the pages of the <Eternal Sanctum>.
And the golden sanctuary extended from the young girl’s body – more precisely, her heart. The young girl’s body exuded a blinding yet soothing glare of pure light, causing her to blend into the surroundings with ease.
…as though she were the mural that captured the mutual annihilation and assimilation of creation and destruction.
But An Fei had nothing.
The elements of the void ceased their attraction on her skin, and the plumes of colorful light failed to bestow their glorifying radiance onto her soul. The golden sanctuary removed its presence from her perception, avoiding her glances and silent calls.
Even the scarlet light wished to distance itself from her body, leaving An Fei standing alone in the midst of a cosmic phenomenon.
“Pitiful, isn’t it?”
Belonging neither to the void of destruction and nihility, nor the heavens of creation and eternity.
The young girl’s soft voice echoed throughout the boundary, no longer filled with taunting mockery. Instead, An Fei felt a wave of sympathy wash over her entire body, as if she had heard the blessing of an angelic being.
But the sympathy cut with the edge of the sharpest blade in the infinite universe.
It cut into her core being even more than her twin butterfly swords could possibly accomplish. She could not raise any defenses against such torment, nor was she allowed to endure.
“Forty-Seventh Archive of Time, third aisle, fifth book from the third shelf down,” the young girl spoke for the last time.
“If you still cannot come to terms, then read it. Poor, pitiful being.”
With the passing of her words, the young girl disappeared, the two books disappeared, and the boundary world of monochrome scarlet vanished. The scenes of heavenly destruction and creation dissipated into a gentle nihility, and the sanctuary of golden light disappeared as though it had never existed.
But An Fei didn’t return to the streets of Goeun, nor did she disappear alongside of the rest of the world. She stared into two fiery orbs larger than the sun could ever possibly be, the golden balls of light scorching her soul with the blessing and curse of the heavens themselves.
She stared into the eyes of a dragon.
A dragon with scarlet scales, and a wrath that was firmly enshrined within the Gate of Death.
