The carriage wheels rolled steadily, bumping less as the mountain path widened into flatter roads. The scent of pine and damp earth still clung to the night air, but the horizon was already paling, hinting at dawn.
Inside, silence weighed heavier than the rocking of the cart. Zhao Wuming sat by the window, arms folded, gaze fixed outward at the blur of passing trees. Chen Huo rested at the other end, still pale from the previous night's sickness, lips pressed tight, his eyes never once lifting toward his brother.
Not once did their gazes crossed since morning..
The air between them was sharper than any sword.
Min He and Jiang Rui played Go , placing stones wherever their mood carried them. Sun Yan glanced between them and shook her head, as though the silence itself might break if prodded.
She pulled a thin herb manual from her robe and began to skim, though her eyes hardly moved across the page. sorted herbs, her eyes narrowing at every wilted leaf.
Mei Lanyin sat at the window, brush in hand, whispering lines to herself as the landscape slipped by:
"Stone path breaks,
heart breaks slower.
Senior's laughter gone,
but memory lingers."
Her eyes flicked toward outside, where the road widened into a narrow glade.
"Who would've thought Zhao Wuming actually cared so much?" the girl muttered, her lips curling into a faint smile. "Yesterday he nearly tore apart the carriage when Chen Huo fainted. I thought he didn't even notice him most of the time."
The girl beside him tilted her head. "What?"
"That Zhao Wuming has feelings for Chen Huo's sister,
Min He gave a low chuckle. "He hides it too well. If I hadn't seen his face yesterday, I'd never believe it either. All this time, we thought they were just fellow brothers..."
The girl tilted her head, eyes glinting with mischief. "More like brothers pretending to be strangers. Still, to see Wuming lose his composure like that..." She trailed off, muffling her laugh behind her sleeve.
"I thought I was imagining it yesterday, but now that you mention it... the way he looked when her name came up—it wasn't just a slip."
"Shut it," Zhao Wuming cut in, his voice sharp as a blade. He still didn't turn from the window, but his tone made even the girl sit straighter.
The carriage rocked on. Silence returned, though it was a different silence now
Before dawn, Li Qiong was already awake.
While the campfire still smoldered and dew clung to grass, he stretched, bones crackling in the cold. His breathing deepened, steady as the tide.
This was his own invention—the Immortal Slumber Breathing—a technique built from turtle breathing, but sharper, more advanced, dangerous. Too long an inhale, one could faint; too sudden an exhale, the qi scattered. He walked the line between rise and ruin with every breath.
Then his body moved: a series of fists—straight, hooked, upward, downward—rolling into elbow strikes, palm pushes, and finger-point acupoint jabs. His knees drove forward, long kicks slicing air, blocks sliding close against his ribs.
Micro-evasions followed—small shifts of shoulder, waist, heel. To an onlooker, he seemed to fight a phantom: parrying, dodging, countering blows only he could see. Each sequence repeated, variation after variation, until sweat glistened on his brow.
At last he dropped to the ground—pushups, pullups, sprints between rocks, leaps and landings—body moving like a furnace worked by bellows. The others, stirring awake, could feel it: a heat, like burning wood, radiating from where he trained.
When the sun crested the ridge, he ended with meditation, legs folded, breaths measured. Then a plunge into a mountain stream, water biting his skin, chasing away the furnace fire.
At dusk, when the group stopped to rest, he practiced again. Each exhale like smoke, each inhale like steel.
"Brother Li is frightening," Min He muttered one evening, cheeks red with cold wind. She pointed at his shadow boxing. "It's like he's fighting a invincible foe."
"Or preparing to fight one," Jiang Rui corrected, flipping through another cheap talisman scroll. "I'd rather not spar him even in my dreams."
Mei Lanyin glanced at Li Qiong and quickly switched her gaze. He did not question—only closed the manual in his hands. It was a mortal martial arts book, bought for a few silvers at a roadside stall. Simple forms, diagrams of stances. Nothing divine. Nothing out of ordinary. But in his eyes, even scrap techniques held lessons.
That night, as the oil lamp flickered and the carriage rocked softly in the wind, Chen Huo finally muttered, voice low:
For a while, the weight between sworn brothers lifted.
By the next dawn, their road bent downward. Hills eased, and the horizon spread wide.
The sun began to break across the horizon, gilding the world in pale fire. And there, faint but rising out of the morning mist, stretched the silhouette of the Imperial Capital—towering walls, endless rooftops, and spires that reached into the heavens.
The journey was ending.