Wedding Invitation
At the extreme end of the East China Sea, thousands of feet below, the movement of the sun and the moon has long been cut off.
The crystal palaces stretched out, radiant and vibrant, but now sank into a dead blue. The light of the night pearls was obscured by the thick, silent dust of the deep sea, barely outlining the palace's sinister and eerie outline, like the skeleton of a giant beast lurking in the eternal darkness. No fish swam, no shrimp or crab soldiers patrolled, and even the water seemed frozen, with a sticky, suffocating quality.
Only in the depths of the Dragon Head Hall, a faint strange light stubbornly penetrates the solidified darkness.
Ao Guang reclined on the cold, dark jade throne, his eyes closed. The aura that permeated him blended seamlessly with the stillness of the ocean, yet a deeper, bone-deep weariness emanated from him. His black, dragon-patterned royal robe, which should have lent him a majestic presence, now seemed like a heavy shadow, ready to drag him into an eternal slumber.
Only he himself knew that his consciousness was not dormant, but had slipped into another state.
There was no darkness, no silence. It was a shallow, crystal-clear bay, where sunlight penetrated unimpeded, casting shimmering golden hues on the white, fine-sand seabed. Schools of colorful fish darted around, and corals clump together, shimmering with magnificent light.
He saw her.
Yinglong. She was dressed in a fiery red, not her wedding gown, but her usual battle armor, somehow stained with that dazzling color. Her long hair, unbound and carelessly draped over her shoulders, brushed against his outstretched fingertips, carrying the warmth of sunlight and the slightly salty scent of seawater. She was smiling, her eyebrows curved, the most vivid and unclouded image in my memory, more dazzling than all the dazzling lights and shadows around her combined.
The shadowy figures around them were the dragons of the four seas, the spirits of the aquatic world, and a boisterous, genuine celebration. The sound of drums and music drifted across the waves, a little hazy but full of vitality.
He held her hand and walked step by step towards the altar carved from a single piece of ten-thousand-year-old warm jade deep in the bay. It was the site of the dragon clan's most ancient and sacred rituals, symbolizing a lifespan equal to heaven and earth, and prosperity shared by the four seas.
"Yinglong..." He called her softly, his voice filled with hoarseness and longing that had accumulated for thousands of years, which he himself had not noticed.
She tilted her head, her smile deepened, and was about to respond—
"His Majesty."
A voice, cold, flat, without any ripples, like a piece of ice thrown into a quiet lake of dreams, suddenly smashing all the light, shadow, color, and temperature into pieces.
Ao Guang suddenly opened his eyes.
The fleeting moment in his eyes was a tender affection that had not yet faded, which was then covered by the darkness and coldness that had settled in the deep sea for a thousand years, and finally solidified into eternal ice on the throne.
He raised his eyes and looked under the throne.
There crouched a figure: the old turtle Prime Minister of the East China Sea. His head buried deep in the water, his loose court robes motionless in the still water, like a reef long dead.
"Tell me." Ao Guang spoke in a low voice, with a hint of hesitation from not speaking for a long time.
The old turtle prime minister lowered his head even lower, almost touching the cold jade tiles on the seabed. "The Heavenly Palace... has sent a wedding invitation. Three days later, a banquet will be held in the Yaochi Jade Pool to celebrate... the wedding of the God of War Yinglong and the Crown Prince of the Heavenly Emperor."
No response.
A deathly silence fell within the Dragon Head Hall. The solidified darkness seemed to possess weight, pressing down heavily upon the old turtle prime minister's carapace and upon the silent figure on the throne.
After a long moment, Ao Guang slowly, extremely slowly, straightened his body. The Jade Throne creaked with a grating sound, like bones rubbing against each other, due to his subtle movement.
He raised his hand, not quickly, and even with a strange stiffness, and took the wedding invitation that was floating in front of him.
The post was of bright, dazzling gold, woven with Nine Heavens Cloud Brocade, and dotted with star sand on the edges. It was extremely luxurious, exuding an ostentatious aura belonging to the Nine Heavens that was incompatible with this deep-sea dragon palace.
Ao Guang's fingers traced the gilded characters. The two characters "Yinglong" burned into his eyes like two red-hot daggers.
He didn't read the content.
I just stared at those two words for a long time.
Then, he applied a little force with his fingers.
"laugh--"
There was a soft sound, almost inaudible. Across the magnificent wedding invitation, starting from the name "Yinglong," a charred crack spread silently, as if burned by an invisible flame. The edges curled and carbonized, and the golden light quickly dimmed and extinguished.
There was no rage, no trembling of aura. Not even the deadly blue surrounding him was disturbed in the slightest.
Only the wedding invitation turned into fine, black ashes between his fingers, floating down and mixing with the eternal dust on the seabed, never to be found again.
Ao Guang raised his gaze from the empty fingertips, passed the crawling old minister, and looked at the boundless, all-consuming darkness outside the palace.
He suddenly laughed softly.
The laughter was very soft, echoing in the empty and silent hall, but it was more heart-wrenching than any roar.
"Oh……"
The old turtle prime minister's body trembled almost imperceptibly, and he buried his head deeper, almost embedding it in the gap between the floor tiles.
Ao Guang stood up.
The hem of the black royal robe brushed against the cold throne, stirring up a faint breeze. He descended the jade steps one step at a time, his footsteps landing on the silent seabed, yet it felt as if he were stepping on piles of bones, emitting a formless, dull echo.
He reached the temple door and stopped. Outside was an eternal, hopeless darkness.
"A thousand years..."
He spoke to the endless darkness in a voice almost whispered by himself.
"She promised..."
The sound dissipated in the solidified water without causing any ripples.
He raised his hand and pressed it lightly against his heart. There, through the fabric and the royal robe, a lingering trace of the ethereal warmth of the Sunshine Bay a thousand years ago seemed to linger. This contrast with the icy cold that now permeated his body formed a sharp, maddening contrast.
The touch of my fingertips was icy cold, colder than the black ice at the bottom of the sea.
He stood there, like a statue that had completely lost its life, blending into the background of the Dragon Palace and the deep sea. Only in those bottomless dragon eyes was there a silent storm that was enough to annihilate everything.
Time at the bottom of the sea came to a standstill once again. It was as if the announcement, the wedding invitation, and the wisp of ashes were all just an insignificant illusion.
Only the illusory, long-cooled warmth in his heart and the lingering, glaring red in front of his eyes proved that something had once truly existed.
And, it is announcing its end in an even more cruel way.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
