"What... what did you see?" Lin Xiao asked, his voice trembling.
His sister opened her mouth to speak, her lips forming silent words, but no sound came out. Her eyes filled with panic as she tried to explain, but it was as if the words were trapped, refusing to leave her throat.
She looked at Lin Xiao with a mix of fear and desperation, her hands trembling as she clutched his arm.
"Please, tell me," Lin Xiao urged, his heart pounding. He turned to his mother, who was equally pale, her gaze locked on him with an intensity that made his stomach twist.
She too tried to speak, her lips moving soundlessly, but just like his sister, she couldn't form the words. Her eyes were pleading, but whatever they had seen, whatever they knew, it was as if an invisible force was preventing them from revealing it.
Lin Xiao's mind raced. What could have possibly terrified them so much? Why were they looking at him as if he were the cause of their fear? The golden river had done something to them—shown them something—but what?
As his mother and sister continued to struggle, Lin Xiao felt a growing sense of dread. The silence was deafening, the unspoken truth hanging between them like a dark cloud. Whatever they had seen, it was tied to him, and it was something they were too afraid to even try to voice.
In that moment, Lin Xiao realized that the river had not only shown them something, but it had also left an indelible mark on them—a mark that linked him to something terrifying, something he couldn't yet understand.
Lin Xiao stood there, watching his mother and sister struggle in silence. Their faces were pale, their eyes full of terror, and no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't seem to utter a single word about what they had seen.
It was gnawing at him, the mystery behind their fear. His heart raced as questions filled his mind, but one thought stood out clearly — his Memory Manipulation skill.
He took a deep breath, steadying himself. It wasn't something he had used on them before. He wasn't even sure if he should, but the fear in their eyes, the way they recoiled from him as if they had seen something horrible, forced his hand. He had to know what had terrified them so deeply.
With a gentle but purposeful step, Lin Xiao placed his hands more firmly on their shoulders, as if to comfort them. "It's okay," he whispered softly, masking his true intention. He closed his eyes, focusing inward, drawing on the power of Memory Manipulation.
Within his mind, the world seemed to slow down. The familiar sensation of tapping into the domain of memories enveloped him. Slowly, he allowed his consciousness to extend outward, careful to make no sudden moves.
He visualized delicate threads, invisible to the eye, stretching from his mind into theirs. He knew he had to be discreet. If they sensed what he was doing, they might panic even more.
He started with his sister. The link formed easily, and Lin Xiao could feel the surface of her thoughts — confusion, fear, desperation.
He took a breath and gently, almost imperceptibly, pushed deeper, guiding his awareness toward the recent memories. They were hazy, and disjointed, as if they were still too overwhelming for her mind to fully process.
As he delved deeper, he saw glimpses of the golden river. It was flowing, and powerful, but what came next was even more terrifying. Her vision had changed, morphing into something incomprehensible — fractured images of him, Lin Xiao, standing in the center of an ominous scene.
Shadows swirled around him, and his face was obscured, twisted into something unrecognizable. He was different, and powerful, and the fear in her heart was palpable. It was as if she had seen a version of him that was beyond human, something dark and god-like.
Lin Xiao winced, quickly retracting from the memory before it overwhelmed him. He turned his focus toward his mother's mind, guiding himself just as gently as before. The connection was slightly weaker, but he pressed on.
Lin Xiao shifted his focus toward his mother's mind, feeling the subtle difference in their mental connection. It was weaker than his sister's, perhaps because of her age or her deeper emotional bonds. But he persisted, gently pushing forward into her memories.
The beginning was eerily familiar. He saw the golden river again, vast and powerful, its light stretching across the cosmos. And then, there he was — himself, standing amidst the swirling shadows.
But something was different this time. The shadows clung to him, but they didn't feel malevolent like they had in his sister's vision. His expression was clearer here, and what he saw sent a chill down his spine.
He was panting, struggling. His face was lined with exhaustion, his eyes wide with fear and desperation, as if he were fighting an overwhelming force.
His body was tense, like he was barely holding himself together, and his surroundings were crumbling as if the world itself was falling apart around him.
The shadows weren't consuming him, but instead seemed to be pushing him down, weighing on him, forcing him to struggle to stay upright.
Lin Xiao's heart sank. His mother's vision wasn't of him as some evil figure, like his sister had seen. It was something entirely different.
She had seen him in danger — desperate, overwhelmed, and on the verge of collapse. He could feel the weight of her fear, but it wasn't fear of him. It was fear for him.
Realization dawned on him. His sister had seen a version of him that terrified her — a powerful, dark figure that struck fear into her heart, a version of him that felt alien and dangerous.
That's why she recoiled, why she couldn't even look at him. To her, he had become something monstrous, something she couldn't understand or trust.
But his mother? She had seen him vulnerable, struggling against insurmountable odds. Her fear came from a place of love, from a place of care. She wasn't afraid of him. She was afraid of losing him.
The contrast between the two visions hit him hard. His sister feared the potential of what he could become, and his mother feared the possibility of his downfall. Both were terrified, but for entirely different reasons.
Lin Xiao pulled himself back from the connection, his head spinning. The gravity of what they had seen weighed heavily on him. He hadn't just glimpsed their fear; he had witnessed two vastly different futures.
One where he was a force of destruction and another where he was caught in a desperate struggle for survival.
But what was the truth? What had the Golden River really shown them? And more importantly, was there a way to prevent either of these visions from coming true?