After he cried out, the Ascendents turned their gaze to the heavens. There, they saw the full moon sliced with a great chasm. Stones from the attack burned and fell to earth. Moments later, the Sword Saint appeared. Immune to the Darkened Moon’s incredible luck, he slew the monster, piercing him straight between the shoulder blades. With those two blows, the Sword Saint saved our world from complete devastation. -From the Historical Research of Min Tiansai

  Xinya didn’t have any tears left. Everything had fallen apart, and all she had left was shock as the building collapsed on the last person left who stood any sort of chance at defeating the Darkened Moon. Satoro would probably live, but given the strength of that beam and the blows he’d taken on Eclipse’s edge, he likely didn’t have much strength left to move the rubble. He’d be trapped there for at least a few minutes, and a few minutes was almost certainly more than they had left.

  But, what was she to do? She’d worked tirelessly to Advance to the point that she could keep up with Uncle Yoru and Uncle Lin, all while running the inn as the void ate away at her insides. It had been hard. There had been so many nights where she got scarce minutes of sleep between balancing Lin’s ledgers and rising to take the moon moths to the Starlight Path. But, at the end of it all, despite the massive weight she’d pulled onto her shoulders and carried with pride, she was still only eleven. What could an eleven-year-old do against one of the darkest legends in history?

  The Darkened Moon’s laugh echoed around the silence of the battlefield. From the alleys and buildings, members of the Shattered Moon sect eyed their fallen branch leader with equal measures of awe and horror. Their god may have stood before them, but that god was vengeful, and not one of them dared to single themselves out as the next target of his madness. Shoulder to shoulder with them, members of the Fourteenth Alliance waited. Every one of them was no doubt thinking the same thing: would the savior who united them prove to be their doom?

  “Ha! I’ve been waiting to punt him through a wall for thirty-two thousand years,” the Darkened Moon cried with that scratchy, echoey voice that was nothing like the voice of the true Yoru. “It’s not quite the same as it would be if we were both at our prime, but oh well. A win’s a win, I suppose. He should be grateful that history can still remember him. I’d have erased him if I could.”

  Xinya tugged on Lin’s sleeve from where he stood next to her. He looked down, his face pale. One of the lenses of his glasses was cracked, and she could feel his hands trembling, even as he knelt next to her. Her uncle was trying to keep his feelings in check for her sake.

  “What do we do, Uncle?” she asked.

  “I…um,” he visibly grasped for words, but nothing came to him. “I’m sorry, Xinya. I don’t know.”

  Xinya stood, and before Lin could stop her, she stepped out into the open. She had no plan, not yet. But time was of the essence. With every moment that passed, the Darkened Moon was getting stronger. The longer they waited, the less likely they would be to defeat him. Rescuing Yoru from…whatever apparition this was…was hardly even a possibility, given that they had no clue what exactly they were dealing with.

  “Xinya,” Shi Reili’s voice reached Xinya’s mind moments before the voidspawn woman began coughing violently. She materialized at Xinya’s side, keeping pace. The Void Herald looked haggard, and there were wrinkles around her eyes that weren’t there before Xinya had advanced to Silver. Shi Reili was taking the brunt of the girl’s condition upon herself, and it was destroying her. “Listen to me, Xinya. Only you can defeat him as he is now.”

  “How?” Xinya asked. If anyone knew how to beat the Darkened Moon, it was the Void Herald…and possibly the Sword Saint, but between the two, only her ancestor was here.

  “Speak to his heart.” Shi Reili stepped forward, each step deliberate until she knelt next to her descendent, placing her hand on her cheek. “You are my descendent, Chouko’s descendent. You are of his blood and of his qi. You carry within you the void’s aspect of communication, the conquest of separation. You can reach him.”

  Xinya felt her eyes sting, but she had no tears left to shed. “But…I don’t know how. He’s the one who was studying the voices, not me.”

  “His heart is open,” Reili explained. “Speak from your own, and he will hear you.”

  The whole plan seemed ridiculous to Xinya. Somehow, walking up to a vengeful god didn’t seem like the worst plan she ever had, given that Yoru was somewhere buried inside that god’s mind, but it still had risk. If she made it out of this without being erased from existence, she’d consider it a small miracle.

  “Uncle Lin,” she began, trying to keep her voice steady. He’d followed her out into the open, ever her stoic defender. He and Yoru had both stayed strong for her benefit, now it was time for her to return the favor. “I have an idea.”

  “Where does it sit in comparison to your other ideas?” he asked softly.

  “Less dangerous than sneaking into Half-Moon Manor,” she paused and frowned, “probably, anyway.”

  “Where do you need me?”

  “You may need to fight him to give our Yoru a chance, be ready for that,” she instructed. Lin nodded and split off, probably to begin preparing while Xinya distracted the Darkened Moon. She took a deep breath to settle her nerves. Then, she raised her voice. “Hey! Mister! I need to talk to you!”

  The Darkened Moon’s gaze immediately snapped to her, his head twisting at an angle that she didn’t think Yoru’s neck could normally turn to. “What’s this?” he said. “Is a child really all the Ascendents could muster to stand against me?”

  “Why would I stand against my Uncle?” she announced, her voice a lot steadier than she felt.

  “Uncle?” he narrowed his eyes. “My siblings don’t have any children, you insolent whelp.”

  Further proof that this Yoru doesn’t know us, Xinya thought. She stood taller.

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  “I am the disciple and adopted niece of Tsuyuki Yoru,” she said, coming to a stop ten yards from the madman. It was the closest she dared to go. “He adopted me after my father died almost two years ago. He taught me to cultivate the power of the moon. He protected me when even my own blood sought to kill me.”

  “You presume much, brat,” he growled. “That I would take such a weak and worthless thing like you? I should destroy you where you stand!” His qi began to surge, but Xinya didn’t flinch.

  “Would you really destroy Chouko’s blood? Or Reili’s?”

  The Darkened Moon hesitated, but soon, it became clear that he didn’t believe the little girl. “You dare speak the Hated One’s name?! If you’re truly her blood, then I will take pleasure in erasing you from history!”

  Silver qi filled Xinya’s vision. Whatever mistake she made, she didn’t have time to consider it. Instead, lightning fueled her muscles. She barely managed to avoid the first blast.

  “You’re quick for an insect,” the Darkened Moon mused. “What a flighty little gnat you are.”

  Before Xinya could muster a retaliation, she was forced to duck under a silver blade that erupted at an angle from the ground. Two thrown disks cut into her shoulder in quick succession.

  He was just so fast. She’d sparred with Yoru before, but he always slowed his actions to make it a fair fight. Even with her lightning speed, she was barely able to keep from being beheaded by the entity possessing her uncle.

  She danced out of the way of another pair of lunar disks. Lightning sparked from her fingertips as she hurled a bolt of heavenly lightning at the Darkened Moon. It hit him in the shoulder, but he just smiled as his form melted into qi. It was an illusion.

  From the corner of her eye, she saw the light. There was no time to dodge, this time. It was over.

  I’m sorry, Yoru. She thought frantically. I couldn’t reach you, after all.

  Lin watched as the little girl walked towards the madman who wore Yoru’s face. He couldn’t believe his eyes. What had possessed the little girl to walk out there and try talking down one of the most unstable characters in all of history? Didn’t she know that they didn’t give the title of Demon to just anyone? Only the worst of the worst earned that title, and the man before her was the version of Yoru who’d done the deed.

  At the very least, he had to admire her bravery and devotion. There was no one in this world that little girl loved more than Yoru. Everything she did, every advancement she made, every burden she shouldered, she did so she could impress him. She adored him, and he showered her in the affection she craved. There was nothing that either of them would not do for the other.

  Lin admired that more than anything. He wished he could have that kind of bond with someone. Only he and Hanako had come close, but the gap between their cultivation had been too great of an obstacle for that kind of bond. He saw that now. Hanako had motivated him, pushed him, and been the rock he needed. He loved her beyond words, but in the end, he would have held up the world for her, but she wasn’t capable of doing the same for him.

  Yet…

  Lin recalled the day Hanako died, how Yoru had stayed with him in the burning fire, even after being ordered to leave. The pain that tore through him from Lin’s own unknowing hand was unimaginable, yet Yoru never wavered. He didn’t leave. Even as his form turned ghostly, and his body and core shredded themselves apart, he didn’t leave until Lin dragged him from the burning house.

  Then he kissed me, he thought, remembering the soft, cool touch of the voidspawn’s lips against his own under the gazebo. He’d never given himself the opportunity to even consider a world where the brotherhood between them could be anything more. Yet, he suddenly realized that he could no longer imagine what his life would be like without Yoru in it. Whether that actually meant pursuing the moon artist in that way wasn’t something he quite knew if he wanted yet or not, but it didn’t matter.

  Yoru had held up Lin’s world for him as it was crashing down around him, supported him when no one else would. Now, Yoru was in trouble, but what could he do to help? The sword at his side thrummed with power, jade vines and blue flowers glowing softly along the sheath, as if encouraging him to take action.

  The wood artist searched his memory, trying to recall every bit of information he had on Yoru and the Darkened Moon. Time was short. He knew that Xinya couldn’t hold the madman’s attention for long.

  As soon as the idea came to him, he was on his feet and moving. He ducked, skirting the edge of the square until he was just behind the statue of Iru’e Jinshi. A jade pin was still plunged into the statue’s heart, unmoving. Rather than risking climbing the statue, he pulled a seed from his core and tossed it onto the statue. Roots took hold immediately as vines wrapped around the Sword Saint’s chest. Those roots dug into the statue, widening the cracks until Chiho’s jade length was pulled free, lowered into Lin’s hand, and replaced with a brilliant blue rose that bloomed towards the voidlight of the Armillary.

  “Chiho,” Lin hissed frantically. Xinya was speaking with the Darkened Moon. It wouldn’t be long before his patience ran dry. “Chiho! I need you!”

  The pin trilled sadly. It wasn’t damaged by the Darkened Moon’s attack, but being hurled aside by its best friend was more than the little pin could handle. It practically trembled in Lin’s hand, and his heart ached for the little thing.

  “We can still bring him back, Chiho. I’m sure of it,” he assured it, stroking the twisted jade stem of the pin. It stirred slightly, and Lin could feel the crane’s attention on him. “I need your qi. You were made by the Sword Saint, right? That means your qi is his qi. He was the only one who could surprise the Darkened Moon, according to the stories. I need that power if we’re going to knock back the madman and get our Yoru back.”

  Chiho hummed, clearly thinking over the idea. As it did, Lin prepared himself. His Silver technique was volatile, but it allowed him to not only adapt to the changes in qi around him, but to take some of it into himself to use it for his purposes. It was so potent that even Yoru and Satoro praised him, something that neither one did often.

  Carefully, he opened his core as it rested behind his navel. Like a flower blossoming towards the sun, it opened itself to outside forces.

  The Jade Crane trilled only once in agreement before unleashing wind qi on Lin. He choked. The pin’s qi was far more potent than anything he’d experienced, even the time he’d taken Yoru’s own qi in directly to avoid the negative effects of the Armillary. Some days, it was easy to forget that Chiho was created by an Ascendent who poured his very essence into the pin as a gift for the love of his life.

  Suddenly, Lin’s vision sharpened as it never had before. With surprise, he removed the cracked glasses from his nose. For once in his life, he could actually see the world with clarity…or at least more than he was used to. The light of the armillary was still fuzzy around the edges, but he could actually make out the scales of the dragon that entwined around it.

  “You dare to speak the Hated One’s name?!” shrieked the Darkened Moon, and Lin could see the trails of qi gathering around him.

  “Thank you, Chiho,” he said, bowing quickly to the Ascendent-grade accessory. Chiho trilled before fitting itself into Lin’s hair. He felt honored. Chiho had never chosen to remain with him before, usually preferring Xinya if Yoru’s hair was unavailable.

  Lin drew Moon Rose from its sheath. Green and Pink sparks surged across the blade, which didn’t surprise him that much. After all, Moon Rose had been created by the Sword Saint. It was only natural that it react to his qi, and Lin’s core was suffused with it entirely. The blossoming flower was bright with wind qi.

  Lightning crashed, slamming into the Darkened Moon, but from his angle, Lin could see that the mad cultivator was actually a dozen yards from the one Xinya blasted. He moved fast, lunging from behind the Sword Saint’s statue just as he saw the Darkened Moon stretch out a dark, clawed hand. He threw himself between the girl and the blast, wind lending incredible speed to his step. She’d put up a good fight, but now it was his turn to fight the fallen god.