The morning at the inn was thick with a silence louder than the previous night's chaos. They finished their meal without a word, the clink of porcelain and wood the only conversation. As Li Wei stood to settle the bill, Xuán Chè finally broke.
"You really bet on my safety?"
The three siblings glanced at each other. Yisha shrugged. Qianyi took a delicate sip of tea. Li Wei adjusted his sleeves. It was a synchronized display of utter nonchalance.
"I could have been… my innocence was nearly ruined!" Xuán Chè pressed, his voice a mixture of outrage and bewildered hurt.
Qianyi set her cup down, a subtle, knowing smirk on her lips. In her usual, soft, melodic voice, she delivered the line with perfect comedic timing: "But did you die?"
Yisha snorted into her rice bowl. Even Li Wei's stern mouth twitched. Xuán Chè could only stare, the absurdity of their logic finally overwhelming his indignation. He was learning. In this family, survival was the baseline; everything else was just commentary.
While mounting their horses in the courtyard, Màn'er stood there, her eyes red-rimmed and downcast.
"I… I am sorry," she whispered, her voice raw. "It was a terrible thing I did. Can you ever forgive me?"
Xuán Chè looked at her, his expression not angry, but weary. "I forgive you," he said, his tone polite but chillingly final. "But you must forget this obsession. Move on. And never again try to manipulate people. It only leads to ruin for everyone."
He turned his horse and nudged it forward, not looking back. The chapter of the Welcome Inn was firmly closed.
For days, they rode, the landscape slowly shifting from lush bamboo forests to a drier, more rugged terrain. They camped under the stars, the routine of the road settling around them.
On the fourth day, they crested a hill and saw a sight that made them rein in their horses.
A ragged line of people slogged along the road towards them. Mostly women, children, and the elderly, their faces gaunt with hunger and etched with a deep, hollow fear.
They moved with the slow desperation of those who had lost everything. They were not travelers; they were refugees, escaping their town.
As the foursome watched the ragged procession, a shared, silent wave of pity passed between them. These were not warriors or adventurers, but the fragile, chewed-up remnants of a peaceful life, spat out by some unseen horror.
"Those poor souls," Li Wei said, his voice low, almost to himself.
The others glanced at him in quiet agreement, but it was Xuán Chè whose look emitted a spark of surprise. He was seeing a new layer to the formidable Frost Fox—genuine, unfeigned empathy.
"What happened to them?" Qianyi wondered aloud.
Without another word, Li Wei dismounted. He knew a warrior on horseback could be intimidating. He needed to be approachable. The others followed his lead.
Leading his horse by the reins, he walked toward the weary group, his posture non-threatening. He approached an elderly man who seemed to be one of the few pillars of strength left among them.
"Bù hǎo yìsi," Li Wei began, his tone respectful and calm. "Could you tell me what happened? What are you fleeing from?"
The old man looked up, his eyes haunted. He gestured weakly back the way they had come. "Demons... or ghosts. We don't know. It comes at night. It doesn't just kill... it consumes. The land itself is dying where it walks. Our crops withered in a single night. Our livestock... drained to husks. We're all that's left of Ping'an."
A young woman, clutching a sleeping child, added, her voice trembling, "It's not natural. The shadows themselves move. Someone... or something...cursed our home."
Qianyi carefully stepped forward, offering a gentle and friendly smile. "How long ago did this happen? When did you first notice something was wrong?"
The old man, resting on his walking stick, looked up in contemplation. "About a week ago."
"No, it was before that," an older lady added. "About a month ago is when strange things started happening. Something would rattle my pigs every night. And then I noticed my crops were dying. The soil was changing. My pigs stopped eating."
Xuán Chè's empathy turned into concerned realization, and it was written all over his face.
"The town where I grew up went through something similar. The animals began to starve themselves. The land died. Sifu and I went to the next town and then the next. He said he had to go back to finalize some personal matters, and he never returned. I went back to our old town, but it was gone. Destroyed. I didn't know what happened. I didn't know this had happened."
Li Wei's gaze, shifted from the refugees to Xuán Chè. The mission had just become deeply personal. "This 'Sifu' of yours," Li Wei asked, his voice low and intent. "What was he finalizing? What did he know?"
"He didn't say," Xuán Chè confided. "But he was agitated. He told me that if I noticed anything strange before he returned to head east. He was the one who told me about Wàng Yōu Zhèn. He said it was a town paved in opportunity and he'd take me there some day."
"He told you about Wàng Yōu Zhèn," Yisha inquired.
"Yeah. And the day he left he told me to leave a message here for him and at each town I go to and to keep going until I make it to Wàng Yōu Zhèn. Said it's the safest place anywhere."
The siblings looked at each other. Could his Sifu know Xuán Líng?
The siblings looked at each other. No words were spoken aloud, but a silent, rapid-fire conversation flashed between them:
Li Wei raised an eyebrow: He was sent to us. Deliberately.
Qianyi slightly nodded: His Sifu didn't just know of the town. He knew it was a sanctuary.
Yisha stared intensely: Could his Sifu know Mother?
The coincidences were piling up too high: a lost scion of a fallen empire, carrying a jade pendant with a ward that conceals his identity, personally guided toward their home by a mysterious mentor who foresaw a spreading blight.
This was no longer a simple rescue mission or a chance encounter. They were walking a path that had been laid out for them long before they ever set foot on it.
"How far is Ping'an from here," Qianyi asked the old man.
"It's about two days' walk. But you're on horseback so it'll be quicker for you."
"Listen," Li Wei said, almost commanding. "Head southeast from here. Do not stay in the next town. Rest, but don't stay. I don't know how long it will take you, but this road will take you to Wàng Yōu Zhèn. Plenty of land nearby to start a village. I'll have someone waiting for you at the to help you get settled."
It was more than a suggestion; it was a lifeline. The weary refugees, seeing the unwavering certainty in his eyes, bowed deeply, their voices overlapping in a chorus of tearful gratitude.
"Xièxie, dàrén! Xièxie dàrén!" Thank you, lord! Thank you!
"Bǎozhòng!" Xuán Chè called out to the departing refugees as he and the others mounted their horses, a sincere wish for their difficult journey ahead.
The old man leading the refugees turned and bowed his head once more. "Bǎozhòng—You all take care as well!"
They continued the road toward Ping'an mulling over the many coincidences. Li Wei, though concerned about the many coincidences and the blight, was more curious about Xuán Chè's sifu.
"Tell me about your sifu. Where did he find you? What was he like?"
"He said found me outside of a town not far from Ān Zhèn, where we lived. He was looking for a place to take refuge from the storm and found us in the house. My mother was already dead, but she was still holding me, trying to shield me."
He paused, the image hanging heavily in the air.
"Sifu was…kind, but distant. He seemed sad, like a weight he could never put down. He was incredibly knowledgeable about history, herbs, and old legends, but he never spoke of his own past. He would sometimes get a faraway look in his eyes, as if he was listening for something—or waiting for someone. The only thing he ever said was that he had failed her a long time ago and he'd make it right someday."
Li Wei's gaze met Qianyi's. The unspoken question was now a deafening roar: Who was this man?
"You said he told you to leave letters for him at each town you went to. Did you do it? Leave letters for him," Yisha asked.
"Of course!"
"Did you remember if you passed through Ping'an." Yisha and Xuán Chè's eyes met, and he immediately understood her thought process.
"I think so," he said, his voice rising with excitement. "Yes, I'm sure of it! We can check the inn when we get there!"
A fierce, triumphant grin spread across Yisha's face.
"Tài hǎo le! Excellent!"
They arrived just outside of Píng'ān in the midafternoon of the following day. A sickly, dark red overcast hung over the town, leaching the color from the world and casting everything in a bloody, twilight gloom.
"There is...no sun," Yisha whispered, her power over light feeling stifled and distant under the oppressive shroud.
Instead of guiding their horses inside, they secured them to a cluster of petrified, leafless trees just beyond the town's border, a desperate hope to spare the animals from the creeping blight.
They walked the rest of the way on foot. Qianyi stopped, kneeling to touch the ground. The soil was a brittle, gray powder. The trees were skeletal; the grass was ash.
"There is no life in anything," she gasped, recoiling her hand as if burned by the sheer absence of vitality.
They passed through the crumbled town gate. The silence was absolute. No people. No animals. No birds. No insects. Just the hollow howl of a wind that carried no scent. They crossed a stone bridge arching over a riverbed that held nothing but fine, dead sand.
After reaching the other side, Xuán Chè pointed to a building to their left. "The inn."
They approached, their footsteps echoing in the unnatural quiet. Peering through doorless entrance, they saw them: human husks, slumped over tables and chairs, their forms desiccated as if all moisture and life had been violently sucked away.
And that's when they heard it.
From the depths of the town, a loud screech ripped through the silence. It was unlike any animal they had ever heard. It was a sound of rending metal, tearing souls, and pure, malice. Though it sounded a bit far, it was still loud enough to cause searing head pain. But the sound grew closer, and a wave of physical agony attacked them. They covered their ears, stumbling, as the pain intensified, threatening to shatter their skulls.
"Down!" Li Wei roared over the torment.
He conjured a dagger of ice and slashed his own finger without hesitation. Crouching, he used his own blood to swiftly draw a complex, circular sigil on the dusty floorboards. As he finished, the air within the inn's common room solidified into a visible, frosty mist, forming a dome around them that deadened the horrific screech to a manageable, dull throb.
The relief was instant but temporary. Li Wei's face was pale from the effort and blood loss. "We can't stay here long," he commanded, his voice strained. "The barrier won't hold. Look for the letter! Look for anything! NOW!"