The days slid quietly toward Qingming, weighed down by unspoken hostility and endless labor.
No open accusations were made.
No punishments announced.
But everyone could feel it.
A pressure, invisible yet constant, pressing down from above.
With the imperial rites approaching, the Imperial Kitchen was drowning in orders. Tribute pastries had to be flawless—auspicious patterns carved cleanly, textures precise, flavors restrained yet dignified. Even a hairline crack could be taken as ill omen.
Because Qing Tian's hands were steady and her technique unusually precise for someone of her station, she was kept behind almost every night.
She did not complain.
She worked.
Her palms were raw from kneading. Her shoulders burned from lifting steamers. The sweet scent of rice flour clung to her hair long after midnight, mixing with smoke and exhaustion.
Tonight was no different.
She was placing the final batch of lucky-patterned rice cakes into the bamboo steamer, adjusting each piece so the carved symbols—clouds, cranes, longevity knots—would rise cleanly when steamed.
Only when she straightened did she realize something was wrong.
The Imperial Kitchen was almost empty.
Too empty.
The great hearths had dimmed to embers. The usual clatter of bowls and low muttering of night workers was gone. Only one oil lamp burned in the corner.
And beneath its trembling light sat a lone figure.
Chef Zhang.
He was hunched on a low wooden stool, his broad shoulders drawn inward as though protecting something fragile. In his hands was a knife.
Not his usual one.
This blade was old—ancient, even. Dark as iron soaked in night, its surface dulled not by neglect but by time itself. The handle had been polished smooth by decades of use, shaped perfectly to a palm that had once wielded it without hesitation.
Again and again, he wiped it.
Slowly. Methodically.
The lamplight slid across the metal, then across his face.
What it revealed made Qing Tian stop breathing.
His expression was solemn—almost haunted. His eyes were fixed on the blade, yet unfocused, as if seeing something far beyond the kitchen walls.
He wasn't cleaning a knife.
He was polishing a memory.
Qing Tian hesitated only a moment.
She quietly poured a bowl of almond tea from the leftovers she had prepared for herself earlier—warm, lightly sweet, with just enough bitterness to settle the chest. She carried it over, careful not to disturb the fragile silence.
"Chef Zhang," she said softly, setting the bowl beside him.
"Please rest a little. Have some tea."
His hand paused mid-motion.
The cloth stilled.
But he did not reach for the bowl.
His gaze drifted instead to the flickering flame of the oil lamp, as though staring through it—through smoke and years—into a distant past.
The kitchen was silent.
Only the faint crackle of dying firewood, and the faraway beat of the night watch echoing beyond the palace walls.
The silence pressed down like a weight.
Lately, Master Zhang had grown quieter than ever.
He had always been a man of few words, but when teaching, his guidance had once been patient, precise, almost gentle. Now, sometimes when Qing Tian asked a question, he would stare at the spices in her hands—or the blade she was using—as if pierced by something unseen.
The pain in his eyes wasn't only from a ruined sense of taste.
It was deeper.
Like a soul torn apart and stitched back together—only to bleed again when touched.
"Chef Zhang…" Qing Tian began, then stopped.
She did not know how to ask.
She did not know if she should.
Then he spoke.
His voice was dry and hoarse, like dead leaves scraping against stone.
"Girl… do you know how this tongue of mine was destroyed?"
Qing Tian's heart slammed violently against her ribs.
She had always known he could not taste properly. Everyone did. But she had assumed illness. Age. Accident.
Hearing him speak of it like this made her throat tighten.
Slowly, she shook her head.
"It wasn't an accident."
A twisted smile tugged at his lips—worse than a sob.
"It was done by someone… for a recipe."
Qing Tian's breath caught.
"A recipe?"
"Yes."
His eyes darkened, reflecting no light at all.
"A single dish."
He lowered his gaze to the black-iron blade, his fingers sliding along its cold spine, slow and reverent, as though touching frozen time itself.
"Snowcloud Soup."
The name alone sounded exquisite.
Too exquisite.
The knife gleamed faintly under the lamp.
And in a voice so calm it was terrifying, Chef Zhang began to speak of a past buried for over twenty years.
Each word felt like it was being chipped from beneath a frozen lake—
Cold.
Sharp.
And soaked in blood.