"Some truths are buried not in darkness, but in light—where no one dares to look."
The sky above them bled crimson.
Not a metaphor, not some poetic illusion—but an actual hue of blood-red seeping across the vast firmament, as if the heavens themselves were weeping.
Lin Ruoqing staggered back as the world around her shifted violently. Her hand gripped the edge of a fractured obsidian stone as the ground beneath her cracked, pulsing with veins of glowing red energy.
"What... is this place?" she gasped.
Beside her, Murdoch Nightshade—no longer the masked gentleman from her human world, but a creature carved from night and fire—stood motionless, his eyes scanning the wasteland with cold precision. In this light, his silver hair glowed like moonlight on a blade, his pupils slit like a beast's, and from his back unfurled the shadows of wings that weren't there before.
"This is the Shadow Realm," he said quietly. "The exile of my kind. And now... your only sanctuary."
Ruoqing turned toward him, the edge of fear bristling in her voice. "You dragged me into a vampire hellhole to protect me?!"
His eyes flickered. "To save you."
"From what?"
"From the ceremony. From the Council. From the prophecy they twisted into a noose."
That name again—the Ceremony.
She had heard whispers of it in the corners of her dreams. A veil. A dress. Candles. Blood.
But it hadn't been her dream. It had been someone else's.
Her? Another her?
A sudden jolt of memory crashed through her like a lightning bolt. A cathedral. A golden-haired man smiling. A blade. Screams.
She stumbled, clutching her chest, the pressure near her heart unbearable.
Murdoch caught her before she collapsed. His hands were surprisingly warm, almost too warm for someone whose kind were said to be cold-blooded.
"You saw it," he said, his voice darkening. "You're remembering."
"I don't understand..." she whispered.
"You were someone else," he said. "Once. And they want to make you her again—so they can sacrifice you properly this time."
Before she could respond, a low vibration ran through the cracked soil beneath their feet. Murdoch's expression shifted.
"They found us."
"Who?"
"The Blood Hunters. The Council's assassins. Not vampires. Not humans. Something... in-between."
Ruoqing's heart lurched. "And they want to kill me?"
"No," he said. "They want to use you. Killing you is just the backup plan."
Without waiting for further protest, he pulled her behind a jagged wall of black stone.
In the distance, six figures emerged from the bloody mist.
They moved like ghosts—drifting, yet grounded. Each cloaked in silver robes that shimmered with ancient runes, their faces hidden beneath pale masks carved with three vertical eyes. They carried no visible weapons, yet the air bent around them with invisible blades.
Murdoch's body shifted. Shadows danced along his arms, forming claw-like gauntlets of obsidian.
"You stay here," he growled. "I'll draw them away."
"No," Ruoqing said firmly. "You're not doing this alone."
His head turned sharply. "I swore to protect you."
"Then don't leave me behind."
For the first time, his expression cracked.
A smile.
Small, but real.
"Stubborn," he murmured.
"You love that," she shot back.
He did.
But before he could reply, the hunters struck.
The fight was a blur of black and silver.
Murdoch exploded into motion, a shadow across the cracked landscape. His claws met the first hunter's invisible blade mid-air, the impact sending a shockwave that split the nearest spire in half.
Ruoqing ducked behind the rocks, her heart hammering, eyes wide as the battle unfolded like a dark ballet. She watched as Murdoch danced between attackers, too fast to follow, his movements elegant and lethal.
But they were many.
And he was only one.
She scrambled backward—until her hand brushed something cold and solid.
A weapon. A dagger. Strange, ancient. Black stone with veins of red.
The moment she touched it, her vision exploded.
Flashes of memory not her own. Hands stained in blood. A girl in white. A groom without a face. Screams. Fire. Ash.
Ruoqing clutched the dagger and stood.
She stepped into the battlefield.
One of the hunters turned, fast as a whip. But before it could strike, she moved.
And something—something old, something buried inside her—rose.
The dagger arced. It sliced clean through the hunter's mask.
Light erupted.
The creature dropped, convulsing, then stilled.
Murdoch stared.
The others hesitated.
"She remembers," one of them hissed. "She is awakening."
"No," Murdoch growled, stepping in front of her. "She is free."
He raised his claws again.
But the hunters faded into mist, retreating into the cracks of the earth.
Ruoqing dropped the dagger, her breath ragged.
Murdoch caught her before she fell. Again.
"You were incredible," he whispered.
"What... was that?" she panted.
"A fragment of your old self," he said. "The priestess. The first bride. The one they want to resurrect."
"But I don't want to be her."
"Then we fight. We make a new fate."
She looked up at him, eyes fierce through the tears.
"Together."
He nodded. "Together."
But far away, in another time—in the future or the past, no one knew—another version of Lin RuoQing stood at the altar.
She wore white. Her hands trembled.
The groom—a golden-haired man—lifted her veil.
Behind his smile, his eyes gleamed red.
And in the shadows, Murdoch screamed.