...
Half a heartbeat after their talisman-breaker strike, the jade cube's light flared, and the hall dissolved. Tian Shen and Feng Yin plummeted through soft darkness.
When they landed, it was on an impossibly smooth floor of pale quartz. All around them stretched a limitless, faintly glowing void—an orb of white light so pregnant with quiet that even their breathing sounded loud.
They rose together. The door behind them had vanished. No sound. No scent. No wind. Only their shared pulse of life.
Tian Shen Thought.
'Where... is this? How many times have many trapped chambers in legends, only to escape by skin or by sword? This feels different. Like the world itself dissolved around us.'
Feng Yin's jade-bright eyes met his. Even in this emptiness, he could feel her heartbeat—a soft metronome in the blank.
"Are you... okay?" she whispered.
Her voice echoed once, then folded back to them.
