Chapter 1: The Unforgotten Dawn
The mist in the Dabie Mountains did not burn away with the dawn; it clung. It was a shroud of fine, grey silk, muffling the world, deadening sound, and leaving diamonds of cold moisture on every leaf and stone. It was a silence that felt like respect. Or accusation.
Through this spectral haze, eleven figures moved in a slow, solemn procession. They walked the overgrown path that only they remembered, their footsteps the only sound in the muffled world. They were ghosts visiting a graveyard of ghosts.
At their head was Kèlú. He was a stark silhouette against the soft grey, his black clothing absorbing the weak light. His posture was ramrod straight, a soldier's march, but his eyes, those flat, tombstone eyes, scanned the familiar terrain with a predator's hyper-vigilance, seeing not beauty, but sightlines, ambush points, and exits. The cheerful boy who had once run these paths was a phantom. The man in his place was carved from the same granite as the mountains themselves.
Behind him trailed the other ten. They were the remnants, the spared. Not all were warriors. There was Old Man Luo, the sect's former cook, his once-jovial face now etched with permanent sorrow. There was Lin, a senior sister whose spear arm had been permanently crippled that night, leaving her with a slight, painful limp. There were two younger disciples, now teenagers, who had hidden in the cisterns, their eyes forever wide with a trauma they could not articulate. They had all been forever bent by the storm that had annihilated their world.
Their destination was a clearing that should not have existed, a secret, hallowed place known only to the Silent Moon Sect. Now, it was a garden of stone.
Twenty-three graves. Each one hand-cut from the mountain's rock. Each one etched with a name, a date, and a simple, traditional epitaph. The work was uneven—some inscriptions were masterfully precise, the work of a steady, grieving hand practiced in calligraphy. Others were rougher, the characters dug deep into the stone with raw, desperate strength, the strokes shaking with tears and rage. Kèlú had carved most of them. The survivors had done the rest.
They stood in a semi-circle before the stones, a silent, living monument to the dead. The air was thick with unspoken words, with shared memory, with a pain so profound it had become a part of them, like a second skeleton. For a long time, there was only the sound of the wind sighing through the pines and the soft drip of condensation.
Old Man Luo stepped forward. In his hands, he held not incense, but a simple clay pot. From it, he began to pour clear, potent baijiu onto the earth before the largest grave.
"Master Feng," his voice was a rasp, tearing the silence. "We bring you the warmth you enjoyed. We remember your wisdom. We… we endure."
One by one, the others came forward. They placed small offerings: a wildflower picked from the path, a perfectly round river stone, a folded paper crane. They whispered names. They touched the cold stone as if they could absorb some lingering warmth from those who slept beneath.
Kèlú did not move. He was a statue of grief and resolve. His eyes swept over the names, not needing to read them. They were etched into his soul more deeply than into the granite.Master. Bo Brother. Protector. Mei Ling, Aunt. Storyteller. One by one,he acknowledged them all, a general reviewing the ranks of his fallen army.
The ceremony, such as it was, concluded. There were no more words. Grief had long since exhausted language. With final, bowed heads and hands clasped in a final salute of respect, the ten survivors began to drift away, back down the path, leaving the weight of the mountain to its keeper. They knew he needed to be alone. They knew his rituals were his own.
Only when the last sound of their footsteps had faded into the mist did Kèlú allow his iron composure to fracture. A single, minute crack.
He moved now, not with the stiff precision of a soldier, but with the slow, heavy tread of a man carrying a world on his shoulders. He walked past the rows, his fingers briefly brushing the top of Master Feng's gravestone, a touch of apology and promise. He passed Bo's grave, a nod of shared, unfulfilled duty.
He stopped before the smallest, neatest stone at the end of the row. It was made of a smoother, darker rock, and the characters were carved with an artist's delicate precision. He had spent a month on this stone alone, ensuring every curve, every line, was perfect for her.
Xia. Her Sunset Came Too Soon. Loved Eternally.
The cruel, emotionless contract killer, the man who could stare into the eyes of a dying man and feel nothing, knelt in the damp earth. His shoulders, usually a taut line of ready violence, slumped. He reached out a hand, the same hand that hours before had disassembled a lethal weapon with cold efficiency, and laid it gently on the cold stone. The touch was unbearably tender.
"Xia," he whispered. The name was a prayer on the mountain air, a sound so foreign from his mouth it seemed to startle the mist.
His eyes, those flat, dark pools, shimmered. A single tear escaped, tracing a clean path through the veneer of hardened detachment he showed the world. It dripped onto the moss at the base of her grave.
"The mist is thick today," he began, his voice low, a raw murmur meant only for her. "You would have loved it. You always said it made the world feel like a painting… like we were living inside a dream."
He was silent for a moment, gathering words he had stored for months. "I was in Marrakesh.It's a city of dust and noise and colors so bright they hurt your eyes. You would have hated the chaos… but you would have loved the spices. The smell of cinnamon and cumin everywhere. I… I thought of you in the market. I saw a scarf, blue like the sky over the training grounds at midday. I almost…" He trailed off, the sentence too painful to finish. I almost bought it for you.
He swallowed hard, the motion painful in his throat. "I'm still looking.I'm following the money, the weapons, the whispers. It's like grabbing at smoke. They call themselves the Jade Circle. The name fits. Cold. Hard. Valuable only to those who covet power." His voice hardened, the killer surfacing through the grief. "I will find them, Xia. I will find the man who gave the order. The one called Azure Dragon."
He leaned forward, his forehead now resting against the unforgiving stone, as if he could press his thoughts, his memories, through the rock to her. "I am not the man you knew.That man died with you. He was better. He was whole. What's left… what's left is a tool. A sharp, cold tool made for one purpose." His whisper became even softer, choked. "I am so sorry I was not here. I am so sorry I could not… I should have…"
The words failed him. The guilt was a black hole inside him, consuming all light, all sound. He knelt there for a long time, silent, communing with a memory, drawing a strength from her that he could find nowhere else.
Finally, he drew a slow, shuddering breath. The moment of vulnerability was over, sealed away once more behind walls of ice and resolve. He stood up, his face once again a mask of impassive stone. Only the faint, damp track on his cheek betrayed the emotion that had been there.
He placed a single, perfect white orchid he had carried tucked inside his jacket on her grave. He did not know where the gesture came from; it was a impulse from the ghost of Lì Wei.
With a final, long look, he turned. He paid his respects to Master Feng one last time, a deep, formal bow that held the weight of a son's duty to his father.
"I will restore our honor, Master," he vowed, the words a blade in the silence. "Or I will join you in the earth."
Then he walked away, not looking back. The mist swallowed him whole.
—
The survivors were waiting for him at the edge of the tree line, where the mountain path began its steep descent into the world. A beat-up van, their only link to the modern world, sat idling, its exhaust fumes mixing with the mist.
They looked at him as he emerged from the gloom. They always did. They searched his face for some sign of the boy they remembered, some crack in the formidable fortress he had become. They saw only the commander, the avenger. The man who bore the burden so they did not have to. The younger ones looked at him with a mixture of fear and awe.
Kèlú's gaze swept over them, a quick, efficient assessment. Safe. Unharmed. Anxious. "Report,"he said. The word was not a request. It was an expectation. It was the reason they met here, every year. Beyond remembrance, it was a council of war.
There was an awkward, heavy silence. Lin looked at Old Man Luo. The teenagers studied their shoes. The hope they had momentarily felt at the graveside had evaporated, replaced by the familiar, weary reality of their three-year failure.
Kèlú's eyes narrowed imperceptibly. The silence was the report. It was the same report it had been for months. Nothing. Nowhere.
Just as the pressure of his gaze was becoming unbearable, a man named Jian, once a junior scribe now their primary forger and intelligence runner, cleared his throat. He was a nervous man, and facing Kèlú's intensity made his hands shake.
"We… we have checked all the usual channels," Jian stammered. "The Triads in Macau have heard the name, but only as a myth. The Yakuza in Tokyo demand exorbitant sums for information they do not have. The… the Russians in Vladivostok laughed. They said chasing the Jade Circle is like chasing your own shadow."
Kèlú said nothing. The silence stretched, more punishing than any outburst.
Jian flinched, then seemed to gather every ounce of courage in his body. He took a half-step forward. "But…there is one thing. A whisper. It's thin. Very thin. It could be nothing. Probably is nothing."
"Speak," Kèlú commanded, his voice low and dangerous.
"A contact in Odessa. A low-level smuggler we've used before. He was drunk, bragging about clients he's ferried across the Black Sea. He mentioned a man. A Russian, but not from Russia. Not anymore." Jian spoke faster now, the words tumbling out. "He said this man was 'connected to the green ghosts.' He used that phrase. 'Green ghosts.' My contact thought he meant some environmental group. But I… I thought of jade."
Kèlú's entire focus narrowed onto Jian like a scope finding its target. The air around him seemed to grow colder. "A name. A location."
Jian swallowed. "The Russian's name is Aleksandr Volkov. But he goes by 'The Wolf' now. He's not small-time. My contact said he's risen fast. Too fast. He's based in Italy now. Venice, of all places. Poses as a wealthy art collector, a patron of the canals. But the underworld knows. He runs a significant piece of the Balkan smuggling routes. Drugs, arms, people. He's protected. He's… he's dangerous."
He finished, his chest heaving as if he'd just run a mile.
Kèlú processed the information with a terrifying speed. A Russian with ties to "green ghosts" who had rapidly ascended to a position of power in a European hub for smuggling. It fit. The Jade Circle would need such men—plausibly deniable, ruthless, efficient channels for moving people and goods.
It was a thread. The first real thread in months.
He looked from Jian's anxious face to the hopeful, terrified eyes of the other survivors. This was why they endured. For a moment like this.
His decision was made in the space between two heartbeats.
Without another word, he turned and began walking down the mountain path, away from the graves, away from the past. The survivors watched him go, understanding dawning on them.
Just before he disappeared around a bend, Kèlú stopped. He didn't turn back, but his voice, cold, clear, and absolute, cut through the mist and floated back to them.
"Tell the broker I accept the contract in Venice."