I gain ten years' worth of cultivation every day, and even geniuses will only see my doorstep!

Qin Yuan straightened up. He pushed Lin Qing'er's hand away and stood up. His legs stopped trembling, his hands stopped trembling, and his eyes focused. He looked at her face. This time, there was a reflection in his eyes. Her face was complete in the reflection. Eyebrows, eyes, nose, lips, chin, ears, stray hairs at the temples—all the features pieced together were not features, but a face. Not a face, but her.

"I remember now."

"What did you remember?"

I remembered you. Everything.

The leader of the Forgotten Sect stood at a distance, the tear stains on her mask faintly visible in the gray mist. She did not leave, nor did she continue her attack. She stood there, like a felled tree, its roots still attached to the soil, but its trunk already fallen.

"You'll regret this," she said. Then she turned and the followers followed her, getting up one by one and disappearing into the gray fog.

Qin Yuan looked down and saw a small red dot on Lin Qing'er's temple, like a needle prick or a mosquito bite. He reached out and touched it; her skin was warm, and the red dot was almost gone.

"What did you use to exchange it?"

Lin Qing'er took the bottle from his hand, tightened the cap, and put it in her pocket. "It's not important."

Back at the back mountain of Xuan Yuan Sect, everything was the same as before. The old plum tree had lost all its blossoms, and no leaves had yet grown; its bare branches swayed gently in the wind, like an old man's fingers. The stream flowed on, its sound the same as years ago, decades ago, and centuries ago. On the bank, a thick layer of moss had grown on the bluestone, its color dark and glossy.

Qin Yuan's sword was still hanging on the wall inside the room, its scabbard covered in a layer of dust. He didn't wipe it off.

Lin Qing'er sat on the bluestone, looking at the old plum tree. Her eyes were looking, but her focus wasn't on the tree. Her eyes were empty, like a window with the curtains drawn, so you couldn't see inside.

Qin Yuan came out of the house carrying two bowls of porridge. The porridge was hot, and the bowls were scalding hot; his fingers gripped the rim of the bowls, and his fingertips turned red from the heat. He placed one bowl in her hand, and she took it but didn't drink it. The bowl slowly tilted in her hand, and the porridge almost spilled. She righted it, but still didn't drink it.

"What are you thinking about?"

"It's nothing. It just feels like something's missing."

Qin Yuan put the porridge aside and squatted down in front of her. His knees touched the bluestone, and his trousers were stained with the green, wet sap of moss.

"You used your memories so that I could remember you."

Lin Qing'er didn't speak. She placed the bowl of porridge on her lap, holding it with both hands. Steam rose from the bottom of the bowl through her fingers, blurring her face.

What is that memory?

"unimportant."

"It's very important. It's important to me."

Lin Qing'er remained silent for a long time. The steam from the porridge dissipated, the bowl cooled, and the temperature in her hands also dropped.

"An old plum blossom petal fell onto the back of my hand. You didn't pick it off for me. I didn't pick it off myself either. Then the petal was blown away by the wind. That's it."

Qin Yuan didn't remember that afternoon. When that memory was taken away, he was repairing the causal chain, and his consciousness wasn't in his own body. He didn't know what color the petals were when they landed on the back of her hand, whether it was a sunny or cloudy day, whether there was a sound when the wind blew, or whether his breathing changed when she leaned on his shoulder.

But he knew that memory was very important to her. Because she used that memory to make him remember her.

He went deep into the chaos to find the collector of memories. The palace was still there, the cube was still spinning, and the old man was still examining those glowing memories with a magnifying glass.

But a crack appeared at the palace entrance. Not a spatial rift, but a gap between two worlds. The edges of the crack were smooth, like cloth cut with a knife, without any rough edges. On the other side of the crack, the ground was white, the sky was black, trees grew above the clouds, and the clouds sank beneath one's feet. A mirror world.

The mirror image of Lin Qing'er stood on the other side of the crack. She wore cyan clothes, the same as Lin Qing'er's usual attire. Her face was identical to Lin Qing'er's. But her eyes were different—not that there was no light in them, but rather that the light shone only on herself, not on others. In her hand, she held a cube, within which a silver light was sealed.

Lin Qing'er's memories.

"I've retrieved what she changed for you. You're welcome."

Qin Yuan stood on this side of the crack, looking at the mirror image of Lin Qing'er. "Why did you help me?"

Lin Qing'er in the mirror world pondered for a moment. Her brow furrowed slightly, not out of anger, but in thought. She rarely thought, because the mirror world required no thought. There were only rules, no choices. But now she was thinking, because she had made a choice.

"Because you made me understand what 'choice' is. She chose you, and you chose her. I've never chosen anyone, nor have I ever been chosen by anyone. So I want to try. To try choosing someone and see what happens."

She handed the cube through the crack. Qin Yuan reached out to take it.

The Forgotten Cult emerged from the gray mist. This time, not a dozen, but dozens. Gray robes, blank masks—they surged towards the rift like a tide. They weren't after Qin Yuan, but after the Mirror Image Lin Qing'er. They knew who possessed the cube.

For the first time, Lin Qing'er in Mirror World took the initiative to protect others. She wasn't good at guarding. Her rule was abandonment. But abandonment could also be used for protection—she "abandoned" all the attacks from the Forgotten Sect into the deeper reaches of the Mirror World. Not blocking, not deflecting, but sending those attacks to a place where they didn't exist. The palm wind disappeared, the spiritual energy wave disappeared, the finger strikes disappeared. The followers lost their target, their bodies lurched forward, they lost their balance, and they fell at the edge of the crack.

Qin Yuan took the cube and opened it. Lin Qing'er's memory transformed into a beam of azure light, passing through the crack and flying towards the back mountain of the Xuan Yuan Sect. The azure light moved slowly but steadily. When it passed through the depths of chaos, the chaotic energy parted to make way, like a crowd making way for a carriage. When it passed through the myriad realms, the timeline did not interfere with it, the causal chain did not intercept it, and the web of fate did not entangle it. It was a memory, only wanting to go home.

Far away at the Xuan Yuan Sect, Lin Qing'er sat on a bluestone, the bare branches of the old plum tree swaying before her. Suddenly, something entered her temple. It wasn't pain, nor itching, but a feeling of "completeness." Like the last piece of a puzzle being placed, like the last button of a garment being fastened. She remembered the old plum petals from that day. White, five petals, one with a slightly yellowed edge. They landed on the back of her right hand, right at the base of her index and middle fingers. She didn't remove them because Qin Yuan was asleep, leaning against her left shoulder. She was afraid that moving would wake him. The petals were blown away by the wind, and she didn't catch them. But she remembered that the moment the wind blew, Qin Yuan's breathing didn't change. He remained asleep. He slept very soundly.