near the inner channels or mainly along the outer circulation. Gu Mojin passed her the physician's notes. The description was incomplete, but the pattern resembled the cases she had seen from two border settlements. In each, the victims suffered a strange reversal of qi and a lingering coldness around the dantian. Some recovered after days of careful treatment. Others were never found in time.
"This is the same pattern," Su Nanxin said quietly. "Or close enough that I do not want to call it coincidence. The reports from the border villages arrived weeks apart, and no one had enough evidence to connect them. Now someone has tried to silence a physician who recognized the symptoms. That means the person responsible knows what they are doing."
Gu Mojin's fingers tightened around the edge of the table. "Could it be a forbidden cultivation manual?"
