Kunlun Mountain Part 4 - The Return

Chapter 32 - Change

Orchid Valleys.  

Honghui took a tentative step forward.  His eyes never left her face as she moved closer.  The light in the room was so brilliantly bright, that he wondered if he were perhaps seeing things, but the closer she got the more fearful he became until she was standing directly in front of him.

'"Honghui.  I have returned." The woman said as she stood before him smiling.  A smile so bright, so beautiful, he suddenly stumbled back until he fell onto the dais behind him.  

"I can see you have much to talk about.  Remain here, where he can gather his strength, then when you are ready, call for Lai to assist you back to your chamber." Lanhua said as he quietly left the room, along with the others who had been in there with him.

But he heard none of it.  Honghuis eyes remained fixed on the woman in front of him.  The tears had began to gather and and his body was trembling, but no matter how hard he tried to rationalize her sudden appearance, he couldn't.  Instead he said nothing as she knelt before him.

"Honghui, I know this might seem unreal, but it is truly me.  I have returned thanks to many people and because of certain situations that needed to be achieved before I could be brought back. " She said in the exact same sweet tone of voice that he never forgot.

"But because of the debts we all owed one another and to fate, I have been given the chance to come back to you." she said as she took his hand into her own.  Even the touch of her skin on his was the same.

But he was so confused and disbelieving of what he was seeing, Honghui could not help but wonder if this was some grand joke, a prank or even retribution for what he had done, a mirage to make him insane.  Lanhua had said his mind had split and had lost the ability to differentiate between the two women.  Trembling and ready to push her away, Shao Wan moved closer.

"How?" he asked breathlessly.  His voice was barely audible but she heard him and as she took the other hand into her own, she gently explained to him the tangled web of debts that four people had to pay in order for her to return to him.

She then went onto explain the fated actions they all undertook in order to bring their world full circle,  and the opportunity for them all to live the lives they were destined to.  She also explained to him, how she was able to return.

"Without the heart blood of the original Nine Tailed Fox, and the magic of the Orchid People, I would not be here today."  she said bringing it all to an end for him, while the tears rolled down his face.

"You also need to heal quickly.  We have a world that needs our help.  The return will not be an easy one of you, but I am here now, and together, we will do what we have to do in order to assist those who survived, while gathering our people to begin again" she said in the softest of tones and the reason why Honghui had not been able to differentiate between the two women.

Though they looked different, their beautiful hearts and minds were so alike, that almost from the very beginning, when he met Bai Qian for the first time, he saw so much of Shao Wan in her that over time, he lost the ability to see the differences.  And there were many, they were not the same people, but having been alone in his mourning for so long, he clung to the similarities until the differences were not longer visible or relevant to him.

"She used her own heart blood to bring you back?" he asked stunned, now knowing who had uplifted the tablet from his temple and why.

"Mo Yuan owed you a life debt.  Bai Qian owed Mo Yuan life debts.  She brought me back to repay his debt to you, while also repaying her debt to him.  Honghui, all debts have been paid, we all owe each other nothing.  I paid my life debt that I owed by dying.  You paid your debts to fate by losing me.  Therefore all debts have been cleared."