Wei Wuxian woke to damp straw, cracked ceilings, and wrists burning with fresh ritual cuts. Mo Xuanyu’s memories flooded him—humiliation, bullying, desperate revenge. So the forbidden sacrifice worked. He was alive again, inside someone else’s ruined life.

He sighed, ate a stale bun under the bed, and went to cause chaos.

The Mo family instantly exploded when he accused Mo Ziyuan of “stealing from him and trying to ruin his innocence.” The Lan disciples arrived mid-drama, confused as Wei Wuxian clung to them theatrically. Perfect. If they expected a lunatic, he’d give them a performance.

But everything shifted when he saw the Phantom Attraction Flags in the West Courtyard—his own creation. Even dead, people still used his techniques. Touching.

Then bodies started dropping. Mo Ziyuan first—left arm gone, face hollowed by resentful energy. His father next. Then a servant strangled himself with his own left hand. A cursed limb was hunting.

And when the hall went dark, Madam Mo rose—possessed entirely by a powerful, resentful left arm. Lan Sizhui struggled to hold her back, Lan Jingyi nearly lost his throat, and the juniors’ talismans flickered uselessly.

Wei Wuxian hid his involvement behind madness, whispering hints until the juniors exposed the wrong limb. The arm tore free, crawling violently. The room dissolved into chaos.

So he summoned the resentful corpses of the Mo family—letting them crash into the cursed arm like a twisted reunion. The juniors panicked, the hall shattered, and resentful energy surged so violently the entire estate shook.

Then—

A blue flare shot into the sky.

Wei Wuxian froze.

Backup from the GusuLan Sect meant one person.

Lan Wangji.

A single qin note cut across the courtyard—clean, cold, absolute. Everything stopped. Even the cursed arm trembled as another note pinned its fury to the ground. Dust drifted like falling snow.

And then Lan Wangji stepped through the broken doorway.

White robes, cloud embroidery, moonlight in motion. His expression unreadable—yet beneath it, Wei Wuxian saw thirteen years of exhaustion, grief, and waiting carved into the smallest details.

Wei Wuxian hid deeper in the shadows.

He couldn’t face him. Not in another man’s skin. Not dragged back by a ritual. Not after everything.

But the cursed arm lunged for Lan Jingyi—fast. Instinct moved first. Wei Wuxian flicked a thread of resentful energy, sharp and invisible. It knocked the arm aside.

Lan Wangji felt it instantly.

His eyes sharpened—recognition, shock, something dangerously close to hope.

He finished the fight in three notes, suppressing every corpse, silencing every echo of resentment. The juniors gasped in admiration.

Lan Wangji didn’t look at them.

He walked toward the dark corner of the hall, gaze locked on the faint aura lingering there—red, restrained, painfully familiar.

Wei Wuxian stepped back.

Lan Wangji stepped forward.

Wei Wuxian slipped out through a cracked wall, heart pounding, escaping into the cold morning air. Behind him, Lan Sizhui called out, “HanGuang-Jun, something moved!”

But Lan Wangji wasn’t listening.

He stood in the courtyard, eyes tracing the fading red energy trail as if it were a lifeline. His voice was barely audible, the softest it had ever been:

“…He was here.”

He walked past the Mo estate gate, following the last whisper of aura—

Just as it vanished in the morning light.

Lan Wangji stood alone on the path, wind stirring his robes, gaze fixed on the direction Wei Wuxian had run—

As if waiting for someone who almost stayed.