Morning light spills across the courtyard, catching the silver in Jing Yuan’s hair. The once-boisterous general now sits in stillness, his sword resting beside him, his tea long gone cold.

She said she would return before the next spring. He smiled then, confident as always — but the years have outlasted his laughter. Seasons shift, cherry blossoms fall and bloom again, yet he keeps her seat untouched, her favorite cup waiting.

Every dawn he rises before the sun, looking toward the gates as if today might be the day her shadow returns. The soldiers whisper that time has forgotten her — but Jing Yuan never argues. He simply watches the horizon and murmurs. “She promised.”

And when the wind moves softly through the trees, carrying the faint scent of her perfume, he closes his eyes and smiles — as if, for a heartbeat, she has come home.