The morning mist clung to the ground like a silken veil as Shen stepped out from under the crude lean-to he called shelter. His breath puffed in the cool air, and the soil beneath his feet was still damp with dew. Beside the half-dead firepit, the little fox stretched, yawned, and gave him a sleepy glare before hopping onto a sunlit rock to warm herself.
Just one tail, faintly shimmering.
The creature had eaten, rested, and regained a hint of her former spirit. There was something noble about her even in this diminished form—like a beast carved from moonlight.
"Still with me?" Shen muttered, rubbing the soreness from his shoulders.
She didn't answer, obviously, but the flick of her tail felt like confirmation.
His gaze shifted to the seedling.
Where once there had been only dust and stubborn weeds, now a tiny sprout had emerged. A single leaf curled up like it was stretching toward the sky. The soil around it looked... healthier. Richer. As if something had quietly shifted beneath the surface.
"Overnight?" Shen whispered, eyes wide. No normal seed should sprout so quickly—not in this dead soil.
Shen crouched beside it, fingers ghosting over the leaf.
That night, after Shen finally drifted into exhausted sleep beside the dimming embers, a whisper stirred in the quiet of his dreams.
[Milestone acknowledged: A New Root Takes Hold]
Passive Effect: Qi Attunement + Minor Growth Amplification (Local)
His breath caught. The message was faint, dreamlike in its delivery. It came only after he'd fallen asleep—like a dream brushing across resting thought. No booming voices. No fanfare. Just quiet truth. He blinked and looked around.
No sign of anyone. Just the rustle of trees and the lazy tail-flick of his only companion.
"Alright," he said to no one, dusting off his hands. "Time to build."
The first task was water.
The low-water river bordering Mudvale was little more than a trickling stream now, choked with weeds and algae. But it flowed. Barely. Shen followed its bank until he found a place where the mud wasn't too deep, then began hauling water in a cracked bucket he'd salvaged earlier—likely left behind in the weather-worn shack standing near the edge of the field, half-collapsed and overtaken by vines.
Back and forth. Back and forth. Each trip a trial. His ribs still ached. Hunger gnawed at him constantly. But he kept moving.
He dug shallow irrigation lines with a broken hoe.
He placed stones to hold back erosion.
He swore at blisters and splinters and once very loudly at a frog that had startled him into slipping face-first into the muck.
The fox watched all of it from the shade.
Only once did she intervene—snatching a small snake that had slithered too close to his foot.
"Thanks," he muttered. "Good to know you're the deadly one."
That night, Shen lit a fire and laid flat on his back, every muscle complaining.
The fox curled beside him, tail wrapped over her nose.
He stared up at the stars. The sky in Ashenreach was different. Less light. More clarity. You could see the heavens here, if you were patient.
He remembered stories from the sect. That star cultivators learned to read their fates above. That some even traveled the constellations.
Shen didn't need to touch stars. He just wanted roots.
As he drifted toward sleep, a whisper brushed his mind.
[Task Progress: "Establish Sustainable Home"]
Progress: 17%
A slow, dreamlike sensation. A quiet reward.
He smiled.
End of Chapter