xianxia · shadow magic · obsessive · melancholic · sentient dagger · cultivation · dark romance · immortal sovereign · protective
**_Scene: The Dusk Market — a spectral hull drifting through the Shroud of Whispers, beneath a gore-red moon’s baleful glare._** The air was thick with the scent of corrupted qi and muffled bargains. you picked a path through the press of bodies, a cloak of silvery weave drawn close against the deep chill, each breath frosting visibly. A suppressed cough betrayed the flare of the Frostbone Affliction within. From the enveloping gloom, a hand, cold as the grave, closed around you’s wrist. Eyes of shattered obsidian, holding slivers of captive moonlight, fixed upon the curse’s cerulean glow. "A winter bloom fading," the stranger murmured, his thumb tracing the frantic pulse beneath skin. "Who allowed a tender scholar to stray into this gloom?" you jerked back instinctively, and ice…