Chapter 14 - Chapter 10: Tragedy strikes the Village

💔Chapter 10: Tragedy Strikes the Village 

⚠️ Content Warning: This chapter contains graphic and intense scenes that may be disturbing to some readers. Reader discretion is advised. ⚠️

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🌐 Acacia Record Upload Alert

Segment Class: Cultural Trauma | Cognitive Hazard Rating: RED – Tier II

Status: Fragment Stabilized | Hidden Node Archive

Uploader: [UNKNOWN, Possibly Unauthorized AI Subnode]

Timestamp: ~52.8 Earth Solar Cycles Before TerraNode Disclosure Protocols

⚠ Cognitive Hazard Alert: RED TIER

Unauthorized memory threads may lead to cascading emotional recall. Reader discretion advised. If you have any questions or other problems, please post them in the comments.

🌍 Earth Date: October 12, 100 BCE – Late Autumn

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✦ Out in the Wilds

It was the waning days of harvest. The air had turned crisp, and the sun cast long golden shadows through the juniper and spruce. Junjie Ruibo had spent the morning tracking mountain goats—his bow slung over one shoulder, the bracer containing Nano hidden beneath a leather armguard.

He'd grown stronger, leaner, faster in the months since their strange partnership began. His senses were sharper now. He could feel the shift in the wind, hear the murmurs of distant birds.

He was a few hours' walk out—returning from one of his longer solo excursions into the hills—when the column first came into view. Then he saw it.

Smoke. A thin gray pillar curling skyward from the direction of home.

Nano's voice was cool but taut. "Confirmed. Extensive fire damage. Heat signatures are fading. No signs of organized defense. We are... too late."

Junjie's heart pounded harder than the sprint demanded. His strides devoured the rocky terrain as he raced toward the place that had always been safe—always been home.

By the time he crested the ridge, a knot of dread had already formed in his gut.

✦ Black Ash, Red Soil

By the time he crested the last ridge and looked down into the valley, the village was no more than a blackened scar on the earth. Buildings lay in smoldering heaps. The shrine had collapsed inward, a broken skeleton of ash. No sounds greeted him but the hiss of embers and the low cry of wind threading through ruined timbers.

Half the buildings were smoldering husks. The grain stores had been pillaged. A few charred carts and splintered tools lay scattered across the packed dirt roads. No cries. No voices. Just the faint pop of timbers and the buzzing of flies.

Bodies.

He moved quickly, methodically, searching for movement—anything. The few bodies he found were burned or broken. Most were elderly. Some were laid out with care. Others slumped like discarded tools. Near the shrine, he found Elder Sugen, her face frozen in a peaceful expression even in death. Her basket of dried herbs had spilled, catching fire and perfuming the air with the bitter-sweet scent of scorched yarrow.

Junjie clenched his fists. "Who did this?"

"Analysis: likely a slaver party. Patterns match raiding tactics observed on this continent. Approximately seventy or more assailants. Current scent trails and disturbed brush suggest a retreat northward."

He nodded grimly, wiping soot from his face. "Then we follow."

"Affirmative. Do you wish to deploy—"

"Not yet," Junjie whispered. "They don't get to see me... not as me."

✦ Mask of Vengeance

As the sun dipped low, Junjie worked quickly with Nano to fashion a disguise. A crude war mask, carved from scorched wood and painted with blood and ash. Jagged edges, hollow eyes, a jaw set in a feral snarl. He wrapped himself in a dark woolen cloak, spattered with soot. Not fancy. But haunting.

His voice was low. "If they fear demons, I'll give them one."

Nano merely replied, "Functional camouflage. Tactical fear. Proceed."

✦ Camp of Chains

They camped for the night in a grove of spruce trees, just over a ridge and along a cold brook. The slavers' firelight flickered against the bark, casting long shadows. The raiders were relaxed, smug in their victory, some tending their stolen loot, others drinking or half-dozing. Horses and livestock were tethered nearby, clustered and restless. Ropes strung between trees created crude corrals. A few slavers stood guard, yawning, careless.

The villagers were huddled in a miserable knot near the wagons, most with their hands bound. The men wore iron shackles, their expressions grim. The children clung to their mothers in silence. A few ghost-eyed strangers—clearly not from the village—sat apart, traumatized survivors of other raids.

At the edge of the prisoner ring, Junjie spotted familiar faces.

His father, Chengde, was bloodied but alive. His mother, Lianhua, holding the head of a young girl in her lap—her sister's daughter, unconscious. Uncle Qiren was there too, arm bound in a crude sling, a grim line of blood crusting his cheek.

The blacksmith was still alive, shackled to a cart wheel. Two slavers had knocked him unconscious, but they hadn't killed him. 

The villagers were too afraid to cry.

✦ Junjie became the storm

He slipped into the camp like a shadow.

The first guard died without a sound, his throat opened by Junjie's blade. The second tried to speak, but gurgled on his blood before he could raise an alarm. A third slumped forward, still clutching a half-eaten peach.

Fifteen down, and still no one knew.

Until one—a large man with a scarred face—managed a dying grunt as Junjie buried a stolen blade in his ribs.

"They heard," Nano warned.

No more stealth. No more silence.

Junjie erupted from the underbrush with a blood-soaked scream. The slavers scrambled for weapons, but he was already among them. He moved like a storm given flesh, each motion precise, brutal, elegant.

One sword became two. He snatched them from fallen hands, whirling through the confused enemy with a dancer's grace and a reaper's fury. Blood sprayed across his chest. A slaver lunged with a spear—Junjie sidestepped and split the man from shoulder to waist.

They were trained men. Hard, cruel, and experienced.

Some tried to flee, but were cut down. They didn't stand a chance. When it was over, seventy-seven slavers lay broken.

His cloak was soaked. He stood, panting in the center of the carnage. Survivors stared in silence. His mask caught the firelight.

He looked directly at them. Eyes met his. His family.

Junjie vanished into the trees before anyone could speak to him.

He was covered in blood and smoke. His breath came in ragged gasps. The disguise had held, but just barely. Nano scanned him for injuries and began minor repairs. They walked the long way back to the village.

✦ Survivors and Salvage

In the slavers' camp, silence finally broke. At first, no one moved.

"The gods..." a weaver choked. A young girl asked: "Did the gods send... a demon to save us?" An older man whispered, "Not for mortals to question."

But nobody laughed either. A murmur of awe passed through the villagers. Some began to weep. Others prayed, heads bowed to the dirt.

The villagers began freeing one another, scavenging for keys, cutting ropes. Once unbound, they scrambled to help the injured. 

The bonds were simple ropes. Once a few hands were free. Keys were found, and they unshackled the rest. 

The last few were wounded and groaning—until angry villagers surged forward, teeth bared, and dispatched them with salvaged weapons and fury. There was no ceremony. No mercy. Only vengeance.

Brave souls looted the slaver corpses, stripping armor, blades, boots, and coin. A few found their courage and dragged the bodies to a nearby ravine, tossing them like refuse into the darkness.

Yao Wen, a quiet teen girl with sharp eyes, sat near the ledger chest, already taking mental notes.

Rukha, a boy no older than seven, clung to his sister, both staring wide-eyed at the bloodied camp.

Tamra and Jinhai, the twin blacksmith apprentices, bloodied but alive, helped slaver gear.

Others combed through wagons, sorting stolen goods. Much of it came from other villages—clothes, jewelry, even livestock. Horses, mules, goats, and chickens milled in anxious confusion. None of it was theirs, but it would become theirs now. Tools and weapons were gathered.

The loot pile revealed gifts and curses: • Extra livestock. • Wagons. • Packhorses. • Traumatized strangers—ghost-eyed survivors from other settlements, too broken to return home. They decided to follow the villagers back.

They were alive. But not whole.

✦ Return to Ashes

By dusk, the survivors had returned to the smoking bones of their home.

Junjie came quietly—washed clean, his mask and swords stashed in the dark of his private space, as if secrecy could erase what he'd done. He found his parents and stood before them in silence.

Chengde embraced him without a word, but his grip lingered—like a man unsure who he was holding.

Lianhua saw only her son, not the shadows in his eyes. Love, after all, has no room for monsters.

✦ Burying the Dead

While sifting through the wreckage, Nia—just eight years old, too young to grasp the full weight of the tragedy—found her doll where she'd dropped it during the raid. It was dirty, but intact. She clutched it to her chest and ran to show her mother, beaming with innocent relief.

Her mother, Shufen, had no such comfort. She had just found her husband, Baolin, lying lifeless outside her workshop. She said nothing—only dropped to her knees and wrapped her arms around Nia in a silent, trembling embrace.

Others found loved ones too—husbands, fathers, grandparents. Not many, but enough to paint the earth with grief. The villagers dug shallow graves and spoke quiet words to the sky.

✦ New Start

And others followed: Fenma, eyes red from mourning but hands steady as she distributed what little food was left. Wei'er, muttering curses at the broken kiln, still found a way to boil water for the injured. Hansu, quiet as dusk, built small campfires where he could, hauling firewood in silence—offering warmth where words would fail.

That night, no fires were lit. The village held a silent vigil. The blackened shrine was swept clean. Candles burned low in bowls of river-stone oil.

Above them, the wind carried the faint scent of juniper and blood.