Jiang Zhu and I were locked in a bitter feud for ten years. She used someone else to murder my parents, and I used forbidden magic to leave her permanently disabled. Everyone believed the grudge between us would keep us entangled until death. But on the day of the mountain-collapse sacrifice, evil spirits ran amok, and Jiang Zhu shoved me out of harm’s way like a madwoman, only to be dragged into the endless abyss herself. “Don’t get the wrong idea. I just didn’t want to owe you...” “Shen Mo, if there’s another life, let’s never meet again...” When I opened my eyes, I had returned to the day of the sacrificial lot drawing. I went straight to the clan leader and volunteered. “A Yi is frail and might offend the Ghost Queen. Let me go instead.” Jiang Zhu, consider this repayment, life for life. This time, I’ll enter the underworld of my own accord and trade my life for your peaceful old age among the living.
