THE REAL PROTEGE

Ling Li lowered the golden cup with both hands, now half-filled with her own blood, and pressed a silk bandage across her palm with practiced calm.

But inside, her heart thundered.

What she had seen… was not a warning. It was a choice.

There had been three futures. One steeped in betrayal and shadows. One drenched in cold sorrow. And one—faint, flickering — built on a path not yet walked, where forgiveness shaped fate.

And in all three, Chu Yan had stayed on his knees beneath her gate.

She rose slowly, the robe's hem whispering across the mat, and walked to the basin to cleanse her hands. The crimson swirled down the drain like vanishing threads of fear.

The golden light from the setting sun stretched long across the marble floor as the doors of the sacred invocation chamber finally slid open.

For hours, no sound had escaped it—it-no flicker, no ripple. Only silence and tension that coiled tighter with each passing minute.

Now, the silence broke.

By the time Ling Li stepped out of the chamber, she had changed.

Not into silence. Not into fury.

But to resolve.

Serene yet unreadable, her celestial robe replaced by a grey jacket that hugged her frame like armor. Her hair was tied high in a warrior's knot, not a single strand out of place. Her movements were fluid, eyes forward, every step deliberate — like a blade drawn slow and final from its sheath.

In the grand sitting room, Shi Min, El Padre, and El Capitan stood from their seats the moment they heard the inner door shift open.

"Mom—" Shi Min started.

"Ling—" El Padre stepped forward.

"Madam—" El Capitan said, voice low.

But Ling Li didn't stop.

Didn't acknowledge them. Not even a glance.

Ling Li passed by, her gaze fixed beyond them, beyond the confines of the estate, beyond this fractured moment.

Her footsteps echoed through the living room like thunder beneath velvet. Each squeak of her boots against marble sent chills rippling up Shi Min's spine.

Shi Min blinked, momentarily stunned. "She didn't even look at us."

El Padre's brows drew together. "She's made a decision."

El Capitan adjusted the ring on his thumb, eyes narrowed. "The question is, which one?"

Without a word, they moved.

All three men turned and strode after her in synchronized urgency, the polished floor flashing beneath their steps as they followed the commanding figure of a woman who had seen futures and now moved as if destiny were catching up to her heels.

Outside the estate, the air had shifted—the world holding its breath.

And at the gate… still kneeling, blood drying on his knuckles, heart trembling beneath his ribs — Four Eyes.

Would she speak?

Would she pass him by?

Would she save him — or leave him to drown in the silence he had once chosen?

==========

Four Eyes' knees had gone numb, but he didn't shift. He won't. Not if the wind bit deeper. Not when the stars changed places. Not even when the moon drifts high above the sea cliffs.

He knelt there not because he was told to do so.

He knelt because his soul wouldn't allow him to rise.

Then—

A sound.

Soft footsteps across stone. The unmistakable rhythm of Ling Li.

The estate gates opened with a gentle groan.

Ling Li stepped forward.

No guards. No words.

She came alone.

Her hair was tied in a simple twist, her grey cloak cinched tightly at her waist, eyes clear and unreadable under the faint torchlight.

Four Eyes looked up, pain and hope clashing in his expression like two storms fighting for the same sky.

For a breath, neither spoke.

Then, Ling Li drew in air like a blade being unsheathed.

"Why didn't you look at me," she said quietly, "when I needed to see your eyes the most?"

Four Eyes' lips parted, and his voice was hoarse.

"Because I couldn't look at you and lie," he whispered. "And I was afraid… if I looked too long, I wouldn't hear the truth I was trying to find."

"And instead," she said, eyes flashing, "you made me believe everything else was louder than me."

He nodded once, trembling. "That's the failure I carry now."

Silence again.

Ling Li stepped closer. His heart thundered.

"You told Shi Min," she said slowly, "you'd wait for me. No matter how long."

"Yes."

"And if I never forgave you?"

Four Eyes' chin lifted. "Then I would have waited until the bones in my knees turned to dust."

A pause.

Then Ling Li's voice dropped — not softer, but deeper, carved from vulnerability carefully unraveled.

"I saw the truth," Ling Li said. "With my own eyes. And more than that — I saw you. In every version of the future I could choose."

Four Eyes' breath caught.

Ling Li crouched before him now, her face inches from his.

"If I take your hand again," Ling Li said, "there will be no more others. No more questions. Only us. Can you still carry that?"

"I will," Four Eyes whispered. "I already do."

Ling Li stared for one more breathless moment.

And then — slowly, with trembling grace — she reached out and placed her hand in his again.

Not gently. Not hesitantly.

Completely.

And when their fingers touched, a breath passed between them, weightless and seismic all at once.

Not a sound stirred on the grounds of the estate.

Not the whisper of the wind through the cypress trees. Not the murmured hush of the guards at the walls. Not even the low voices of El Padre, El Capitan, and Shi Min, who had halted at a respectful distance, witnessing from the shadows with bated hearts.

Four Eyes let out a ragged breath, as if he had just been released from a ten-thousand-pound weight he didn't even realize had been crushing him. His hands trembled as they closed around hers, reverent, like a man touching sunlight he thought he'd lost forever.

"I'll never let go again," he breathed, voice barely louder than the wind. "Even if the world splits open."

Ling Li searched his face.

There were no more masks there.

No more armor.

Just him — laid bare, bleeding, aching, but still here.

Ling Li's expression softened — not melted, not surrendered, but opened like a steel lotus that had chosen, with precision and grace, to bloom on her own terms.

"Then get up," she said, voice low.

Four Eyes blinked.

Her grip on his hand tightened ever so slightly.

"Get up, Chu Yan," Ling Li repeated — this time with a note of command threaded with something gentler.