I felt a wave of nausea rise in my throat at the realization. People, families, children... treated like cattle. I could barely process the full weight of it, but the truth of Xue Lian's words settled over me like a heavy cloak. The famine had already turned this place into a living nightmare and the gruesome part was that this was just day zero of it!
At the tick of sunset, this place should have turn into an apocalypse of human eating cannibals. My face scowled and I turned over to the little girl still with her sister's ashes. "Is Yoyao a victim of cannibals?"
Xue Lian trailed my gaze and found me watching the little girl club to her sister's ashes. "Yoyao is one out of many victims. She contracted smallpox which eventually led to her being targeted as the weakest commoner and then being sold to Zhao Sao for a quarter load of bread and two dried fishes. Yoyao couldn't make it through the fire and died on the way."
"What a dad tragedy. No wonder the old lady hates people from the imperials. What sort of heartlessness is this?"
"Quiet down. After all you are one of them. There's no difference between you and them until you attain the devilish and mighty power that they garner to have."
The truth was ugly, and yet here I was, in the thick of it, trying to understand a world I had once only observed from afar. Now, I was part of the problem, and it made my stomach churn.
I looked down at the little girl again, her tiny hands cradling the urn of her sister's ashes. I couldn't even begin to fathom the grief she must have been carrying. I clenched my fists, anger bubbling beneath my skin, but Xue Lian's cold words reminded me that I wasn't the hero here, I was just another person with a chance to escape.
"Tell me, Xue Lian," I said, my voice shaking slightly but steadying with determination, "how do we stop this? How do we make it right?"
She raised an eyebrow, a flicker of amusement or something darker flashing in her eyes. "Make it right?" she repeated, her voice laced with a bitter edge. "You can't make right what's already been broken beyond repair. All you can do is survive, and that means becoming as ruthless as they are."
I looked away, feeling the weight of her words pressing down on me like the oppressive air around us. The wind outside had shifted, carrying the cold bite of the coming night. It was a stark reminder of what was to come—a night where people would do whatever it took to survive, even if it meant turning on each other.
"You said we have to leave before the sun sets, right?" I asked, trying to refocus.
Xue Lian nodded without looking at me. "Once the sun is gone, the city becomes a different place. More dangerous. We'll stay under the radar until then."
"What happens to them? Do we take them under our shelter or?" I couldn't bring myself to ask but Xue Lian's face went cold.
"There is no mercy. You have to learn that." Xue Lian whispered, getting up from the ground. She pushed her hand into her sleeves and brought out a dice. "Who wants to play a game?"
My instinct changed instantly with the ugly grin on Xue Lian's face. She didn't look so nice like she had been before. She settled to the ground, rolling the dice twice in her hand. "Winner gets to keep all. Loser gets to be the meal of the next day!"
My heart skipped a beat. Why did it feel Xue Lian had a sudden change of aura?
"The game," she continued, her voice now colder, "is called 骰子赌命 (Shǎo zǐ dǔ mìng), or 'The Dice of Fate.' It's an ancient game, one that goes back to times when the empire was still in its prime, long before famine and ruin tore the kingdom apart. The dice were once used to determine fates in battle—who would live, who would die. Now, it decides who eats and who is eaten."
I felt a chill run down my spine as she explained the rules in a matter-of-fact tone. The dice were rolled twice, and if they landed on you, you had to come up with four words in a set amount of time. If you failed, if you couldn't make the words before the sand ran out, the penalty was death. A bullet to the head."
She stopped, making a stainless steel hour glass to appear in the air. "This game is based on an ancient Chinese practice, where dice were historically used to decide military fates, especially in desperate times. It draws from the ancient custom of "casting lots" (抽签), which is often referenced in Chinese historical texts as a method of making decisions during battles or in cases where the outcome was beyond human control. The game was sometimes employed to settle disputes or to gamble with one's life in extreme situations, especially in the poorer regions where survival was tied to luck and fate rather than skill or strength. The clock of an hourglass marks the passage of time, reminding participants that death is never far from their heels. "
"How does it benefit us!" The old lady yelled, dragging the little girl to her side.
"The winner gets to take hundred shellings of gold." Xue Lian nodded her head, snapping her fingers and a brown bag filled with gold fell to the center of the room. Xue Lian's gaze moved across the room, locking eyes with each of us. "The game is simple. The dice will choose, and those chosen will have to act quickly. Four words, in a set time. Fail to speak them, and you forfeit your life. You succeed, and you take the gold—more than enough to secure your place, at least for a while."
I glanced at the others. The old lady's grip on the little girl tightened, but there was no sign of mercy in her eyes. She was calculating, weighing her options. Would she dare play? Was it even worth it?
The little girl clutched her sister's ashes tighter, her face pale, her body trembling. I couldn't shake the thought of how much she had already suffered—and now, she was being drawn into this twisted game of chance.
"You go first!" The old lady clapped her hands in happiness, whispering into the girl's ears. "Once one is down, the other won't be so hard to take down too. Watch and learn from mummy."
I could hear their evil thoughts and it was concerning. Xue Lian was right, famine brought out the greed in people. I then locked eyes with Xue Lian who didn't seem bothered even though she had heard their words.
"Here's how it works," Xue Lian said, her voice laced with an eerie calm. "Once the dice are rolled, the person it lands on must come up with four words, four characters that form a proper idiom. It must be a phrase or saying used in the Empire, but the twist is... it cannot be just any idiom. You must make it relevant to your situation. To what you have learned in these streets. To what you know about survival."
The first roll landed on me.
"Two minutes. Make it count."
In that moment, a thought struck me, and I whispered it under my breath: "困兽之斗" (kùn shòu zhī dòu), meaning "a cornered beast's struggle."
The idiom was perfect—it captured the hopelessness of the world around us, the people who had nowhere to turn, the desperation that clawed at each person's heart.
But then I remembered the rules. I had to explain the idiom. Two minutes to justify why I had chosen those characters.
I looked up at Xue Lian, who was watching me intently. "It's... it's about survival," I said quickly. "When a beast is cornered, it fights with everything it has, even if it knows it's doomed. That's what this place is. A cornered beast... struggling against a world that wants to devour it. Everyone here is just trying to survive, even if it means losing their humanity in the process."
Xue Lian nodded slowly, her gaze unreadable. The hourglass was nearly at its end, and I could feel my heart pounding in my chest, my every word hanging in the air. If I failed, it would be the last thing I said.
She looked down at the hourglass, watching the final grains of sand trickle down. Then, she glanced at me again, her eyes sharp.
"Correct," she said, her voice laced with approval. But there was no warmth in her words. "You live for another round."
Should I be happy or should I be sad that Xue Lian will definitely not let those two live?
"Our turn! My turn!" She yelled with all excitement, rushing to grab the dice and roll. Xue Lian caught hold of her palms and said."
"No cheating! I will roll the dice."
A small groan erupted from the lady but she soon stopped noticing how firm Xue Lian was with her words.
"I play this game in the casino. I'm sure to win. I always win and when I do, you two will drop the gold and I will have you two flesh eaten by I and my daughter!"