Su Yan leaped from the window and landed on something soft.
A muffled grunt came from below. Guo Xiaodie rolled over, still deep in slumber, her clothes rumpled but intact.
Su Yan blinked. "Why is she sleeping here?"
He shook his head and followed the petite girl into the moonlit grove. She moved like a leaf on wind, silent and bright.
"The girl was drugged," she said over her shoulder. "Someone carried her into your bed and took her clothes. I watched from the treeline. When you threw her out the window instead of... well, I knew you wouldn't sleep. So I came."
Su Yan scratched his head. "The houses here are few. I thought she was just cold."
The girl laughed, clear as a bell. "You're strange. If I were you, I wouldn't have dressed her before tossing her out."
"What else would I do? And it's cold. She could catch a chill."
From the shadows, Li Yingzhu crept toward the window, expecting to catch Su Yan in a compromising position. Instead she found Guo Xiaodie sleeping in the dirt, fully clothed. She scooped the girl up and vanished into the night.
Su Yan followed the stranger to the crown of the great phoenix tree. She tapped the bark—three long, two short—and the trunk split open into a corridor of woven light. At the end stood a palace of colored feathers and woven gold.
She pushed open a lattice window. Dawn bled across the eastern sky.
"You saved my life," she said. "I owe you everything."
She studied his face, noting his sun-darkened skin. "Perhaps in my next life, as an ox or horse, I can repay you properly."
Su Yan waved her off. "It was nothing."
He still didn't understand how he'd saved her. The heavenly god and demon had attacked together, then fled just as suddenly.
"I meant to recover longer," she said, "but when I saw you last night, I changed my mind. Young Master Su, do you know a demon has possessed you?"
Su Yan laughed. "That demon was destroyed by Lord Zhou and the Emperor. How could it—"
Pain lanced through his brow. His shadow erupted into black tendrils that crawled up the palace walls.
A voice boomed from his forehead. "Phoenix girl! I meant to kill you, but this brat is the one who ruined me! He trapped me with two peak experts and shattered my thousand-year cultivation!"
The girl spread rainbow wings behind her. "We are natural enemies. And you've possessed my benefactor. Why would I spare you?"
She circled. The demon forced Su Yan's body to mirror her movements, keeping her in front.
"Harm me and he dies too!" the demon shrieked.
She hesitated. The demon saw its chance and drove deeper into Su Yan's brow.
"No!" She shot forward, wings folding into a spear of light.
But she was too late. The demon plunged toward Su Yan's soul.
Then it screamed.
Light exploded from Su Yan's forehead—a searing, world-ending radiance that engulfed the demon and rushed toward Avia.
She transformed. Colorful wings spread wide as she poured every feather, every spark of divine fire, into a desperate shield.
The shockwave tore through Mount Jiuyi. The phoenix tree blazed with dawn-colored light that painted half the sky.
Far away, Zhou Qiyun looked up, jaw tight. "Another expert? This tribulation keeps getting crowded."
Su Yan woke by the window. The sun hung huge and red on the horizon. A seven-colored phoenix hovered before it, wings trembling.
He touched his brow. A spot of black blood came away.
"The demon's gone?" He grinned. "You really are something, Phoenix Immortal. I didn't feel a thing."
She folded her wings and landed outside, studying him with frightened eyes.
"You remember nothing?"
"I blacked out. When I woke, the demon was ash."
She smiled weakly, blood on her lip. The blast had hurt her more than she let on.
"Your seal is different from mine," she said back inside. "Try to remember your childhood. I'll see what kind of seal this is."
Su Yan closed his eyes. "I lived in Sujiaping. My father was Xu Yanping. My mother was Cai Zhenzhen. Our house was the third one west of the village entrance..."
Behind Avia, seven-colored light wove itself into a mirror. It showed a village, a third house, a farmer with a hoe, a young Su Yan, a woman washing clothes by a well.
The farmer and woman looked up at the mirror. Their faces were blank—smooth as eggs.
"Details!" Avia urged. "Remember details! Who lived east of your house?"
Su Yan concentrated. The faces in the mirror shifted. Nose here. Eyes there. Mouth sliding sideways. Each time he remembered, the faces reset.
The mirror-people stared out at Avia, growing larger, pressing against the glass.
Avia's blood ran cold. She'd used every detail he could summon to brute-force the seal's true form, but the seal only grew stronger.
"Cut!" She spread her wings and shattered the mirror with a burst of sacred fire. She plummeted, bleeding, her mind reeling.
What kind of seal was this? What was he?