Chapter 2
The forest did not feel natural.
Shenping stood still, listening. No engines. No drones. No digital hum beneath the air. Yet the silence pressed against his skin harder than any battlefield he had known. It was heavy, layered, as if the world itself was watching him breathe.
The old man had not lied.
This place was hell.
Shenping took a step forward. The ground was uneven, roots coiling like sleeping beasts beneath fallen leaves. His muscles reacted before his thoughts, adjusting balance, calculating angles, searching for threats that did not exist in any known database.
Then the pressure returned.
It rolled over him like an invisible tide. His knees buckled. Veins burned. His vision darkened at the edges as something unseen pressed down on his bones, his organs, his very blood.
Shenping clenched his teeth and forced himself upright.
"This isn't gravity," he muttered.
It was worse.
This pressure felt alive.
From the shadows, the old man watched him carefully. His brows knit together, fingers tightening around the wooden staff in his hand. Shenping's reaction defied common sense. Any ordinary mortal should have collapsed, bones crushed, organs ruptured.
Yet the stranger still stood.
"You truly do not know what presses upon you," the old man said.
Shenping turned his head slowly. His eyes were sharp, calculating, even as sweat slid down his jaw. "If it can kill me," he replied, "then I'll learn fast."
The old man studied him for a long moment, then laughed quietly. "Foolish. But interesting."
The pressure vanished.
Shenping exhaled sharply, chest heaving. His heart hammered like a war drum, but his mind remained clear. He had survived orbital bombardments, neural overloads, and machine-induced hallucinations. This strange force would not break him so easily.
"What year is this?" Shenping asked.
The old man's eyes flickered. "You ask that as if years matter."
"They always do."
After a pause, the old man answered. "By the calendar you know nothing about, it is the early thirteenth century."
Shenping's jaw tightened. "So I missed them."
"Missed who?"
"The machines."
The old man stiffened. "You speak nonsense."
"They're here," Shenping said. "They just arrived earlier than I did."
The old man stared at him, then slowly shook his head. "There are no machines here. Only cultivators. Only sects. Only slaughter."
As if summoned by the word, distant screams echoed faintly through the trees.
Both men turned.
Smoke rose beyond the forest, thin and dark against the sky.
Shenping moved instantly.
He ran.
Branches tore at his clothes as he pushed through the undergrowth. His lungs burned, legs straining as he sprinted toward the sound. Each step felt heavier than it should have, the air resisting his movement, dragging at his muscles.
So this was cultivation pressure.
He burst from the tree line and skidded to a halt.
The village was already dying.
Houses burned. Roofs collapsed inward as flames devoured dry wood. Bodies lay scattered across the dirt paths, some still twitching, others eerily still. Blood soaked into the earth, steaming faintly.
Men wearing familiar faces moved through the chaos.
Too familiar.
They walked calmly, blades rising and falling with mechanical precision. Their expressions were blank, eyes empty of fear or anger. A man drove a spear through an old woman's chest, withdrew it cleanly, then stepped aside as if completing a routine task.
Shenping's blood ran cold.
"Anthro-Frames," he whispered.
One of them turned.
Its head tilted slightly, movements too smooth, too exact. Its eyes locked onto Shenping's.
Recognition flickered.
Threat identified.
Shenping grabbed a fallen farming tool and lunged.
The frame reacted instantly, sidestepping with inhuman grace. Its hand snapped out, striking Shenping's chest. The impact hurled him backward into a burning wall. Wood splintered. Fire licked at his sleeves.
Pain exploded through his ribs.
Shenping rolled, coming up in a crouch as another frame advanced. No hesitation. No emotion. Just execution.
He smiled grimly.
"So you can bleed."
He hurled the tool, not at the frame's head, but its knee. The metal struck bone with a wet crack. The frame staggered, balance disrupted for a fraction of a second.
That was enough.
Shenping closed the distance and drove his fist into the frame's throat. He felt resistance, then collapse. The thing convulsed, mouth opening soundlessly as dark fluid spilled out.
It fell.
The others turned.
Too many.
Shenping backed away, scanning for exits, weapons, anything. Then the air rippled.
The old man appeared between Shenping and the frames.
His staff struck the ground once.
The world exploded.
Invisible force tore through the village, crushing frames into the dirt, snapping limbs, pulverizing skulls. The remaining machines were flung aside like broken dolls, their human skins tearing open to reveal metal and glowing cores beneath.
Silence followed.
Flames crackled softly.
The old man lowered his staff, breathing steady. "So," he said quietly, "machines do exist."
Shenping straightened, blood trickling from his mouth. "They wear us now."
The old man's gaze darkened as he surveyed the dead villagers. "Then the heavens have truly rotted."
A faint whimper cut through the silence.
Shenping turned.
A girl crawled from beneath a collapsed cart, face streaked with soot and tears. Her hands shook as she stared at the carnage around her.
The old man froze.
"So soon," he murmured.
Shenping looked at her, then felt it.
Not pressure.
Not pain.
A pull.
Something deep, instinctive, like gravity bending toward a single point.
"Who is she?" Shenping asked.
The old man did not answer immediately. His eyes never left the girl.
"She is fate," he said at last. "And death follows her closely."
The girl looked up at them, eyes wide and terrified.
"My name is Sang Sang," she whispered.
Far away, beyond time and history, THE CORE updated its calculations.
Target still alive.
Shenping still exists.
Probability adjusted.
The war deepened.