Okay so quick background: I received this bonsai as a gift October 2020 from 1800flowers. It came in a ceramic bowl with some sort of wiring that does not allow me to lift and see the roots. It arrived with beautiful shiny dark green leaves. No white flowers ever bloomed. About two weeks after having it (kept it by a window with indirect sunlight, kept soil moist), the leaves dried up so bad. I mean they were CRISPY. I then noticed spider mite webs so I hosed it down real good, and it lost most of its leaves. Soon winter came and the leaves never went back to normal so I took them all off figuring the tree was going into dormancy. I watered a few times during winter (put bowl in a sink with water). Now its April and there has been zero growth. I brought it back outside once temperatures were steady over 40 degrees. A few days ago I pinched back all the branches cause I figured it would promote new growth, and also added fertilizer pellets to aid in this. I checked on it today (after 2 days of straight raining) and the tips of the branches are black! I’m afraid I’ve killed this poor thing and idk how, all I’ve done is try it love it! I feel I’ve been doomed since it dried up last October. Please, any help/advise would be greatly appreciated! Ive included some pics for reference. (Ps, I scraped a tiny part of the trunk and there is still some green in there so I think there may be hope, although the black part has no green in it).

Hello and welcome
Your tree is not dying, it is dead, and that is because you kept it inside. There is no such thing as an indoor tree.
Another thing: never give a struggling tree fertiliser.

Thank you for the welcome and I was so afraid someone would say that. Is there no way to save it? Even if the trunk has green inside it? I’ve kept an azalea bonsai indoors and it thrived beautifully all of last year (even though this spring it is yet to bloom....). Also thank you for mentioning the fertilizer, I will make note of that in the future. I appreciate your response.

The scratchtest is something of an urban myth.. ( like indoor trees, humidity trays and daily misting)
There always is an ever so small chance there is some life left somewhere,place it outside, and hope ( but don't hope too much)
Your azalea... same thing,inside it will go downhill sooner (probably) or later,so place it outside where it belongs and keep it there.

Okay, I will continue to keep them outside (they’ve been out there almost three weeks now). Thank you for your help. Hopefully I can update you saying they lived.

Update: I managed to the cut the wire and free the gardenia. The roots were a coiled mess and I’m assuming that’s why they started coming upward to the top. I’ve trimmed the roots the way a bonsai expert did on YouTube, cleaned the pebbles from the air layer, placed the mesh over the container holes (I found them high up in the middle of the roots and soil), put some fresh soil around and repotted. Watered afterwards. Hopefully this does something positive. I also noticed what looks to be salt all throughout the soil? Not sure what that is.

..... and now you have destroyed that last little chance for survival. Repotting and pruning roots stresses a tree, and that something this one can’t have now. You should have asked before acted.

You had said it was already dead so i figured I don’t have much to lose. Maybe with a little hope and positivity something good will happen. Trees are resilient after all. Thanks for your help.

Nope, the root prunning will not help the tree survive. That is something that should only be done on strong healthy trees and put a lot of stress to the tree.

.... I guess I messed this up. I’m still a beginner with bonsai trees. Hopefully I can do better by my azalea. Thank you LucR and Tropfrog