The air smelled of frost and charcoal.
Shi Yaozu stood at the edge of the uppermost terrace, boots planted in dirt that still held the faintest heat—not from the sun, but from something deeper. Something older. Something left behind by her.
She had walked this field hours ago. He could tell. The ground had been disturbed in precise ways—never chaotic. Never careless. Metal hummed just beneath the soil, waiting like wolves beneath a thin sheet of snow.
He turned to the squad behind him—six men, hand-picked, silent. Not for loyalty. For obedience.
"We burn what she marked," Yaozu said. "Nothing else."
One soldier hesitated. "Sir… the fields… are you sure?"
