The horns rolled through the pass again—three notes, low and deliberate.
They weren't a search signal. They were a claim.
The Bellkeeper didn't need to say it; Qin Mo felt it in his bones. Whoever followed those horns wasn't here to hunt—they were here to take.
They moved fast, dropping from the ridge into a chute of slick stone. Pine roots knuckled through the walls like ribs; frost slicked the shadows. Qin Mo took point, Flame Step in reserve, saving stamina for the moment it mattered.
Behind them, the horns sounded again, closer now, answered by the crackle of torches. The mist glowed faintly in their wake, as if even the fog knew to get out of their way.
"You've made enemies," the Bellkeeper murmured, breath steady despite the run.
"They tried to feed me to their wolves," Qin Mo said. "We're past enemies."
She didn't push. Her eyes kept scanning the flanks, calculating lines of sight, counting places a bowman could hide.
The chute spat them into a lower gully choked with snowmelt and loose shale. Here, the sound of the horns dulled under the rush of water. Qin Mo slowed, letting his hearing stretch. The system's Perception boost sharpened details—the clink of harness, the whisper of a boot sliding on wet rock, the faint, rhythmic whine of something wound under tension.
"Left slope," he said.
They moved as one, slipping into a notch between boulders just as a quarrel hissed past where his head had been. The bolt hit the water and steamed—alchemic charge.
[Environmental note: acid trace detected — armor degradation on contact.]
"Hunters with toys," the Bellkeeper muttered.
Another quarrel came from the right. She pivoted, bellstaff swinging in a blur. The impact rang, knocking the shot wide, the vibration running up her arm like a gong strike.
No more hiding. Qin Mo burst from cover, closing the distance to the left shooter in three Flame Step arcs. The man was good—he dropped the crossbow the instant he saw him and drew a curved blade. Not good enough. Qin Mo's opening cut hammered through guard and collarbone, sending him into the meltwater with a hiss.
The second hunter pulled back, trying to gain elevation. The Bellkeeper's staff caught him mid-stride, sweeping his legs out from under him. Qin Mo finished it in two strokes.
The horns cut off. Silence pressed down, thick as frost.
"They know," the Bellkeeper said quietly. "We're not quarry—they are."
Qin Mo's jaw tightened. "Then they'll send more than scouts."
They didn't linger. The gully bent west, away from the main pass, toward the older forest where the pines grew so close their roots interlocked. The air here tasted different—less copper, more resin and shadow.
Half an hour later, they stopped in a hollow where the roots formed a ceiling. The Bellkeeper lit a shard-lamp, its glow tight and red.
"You've got two choices," she said, watching him over the glow. "We split—double their trail, make them waste time. Or we hold ground and make an example that keeps them from sending a third party."
Qin Mo cleaned the blood from his blade before answering. The decision wasn't about pride—it was about the ledger. The system had added Hunter as a category. Leaving them alive meant that marker would follow him, always waiting to reappear.
"We hold," he said.
The Bellkeeper's smile was small and sharp. "Then we need bait."
They used the hollow's choke point, piling loose rock for cover, dragging one of the hunters' bodies into the open. The Bellkeeper worked quickly, carving a sigil into the earth just behind the corpse. It smelled of iron and pine sap.
When the horns came again, they were faster, closer, urgent now. Shapes moved through the fog—four this time, maybe five. Two with torches, the rest in the shadow of their light.
Qin Mo's grip tightened. The dead king's core was a weight at his ribs, warm even through the cold. Flame Step and Heat/Frost Weave pulsed like a second rhythm in his blood.
The first torch crossed the sigil. The ground hissed. Frost leapt up the wielder's arm; he screamed, dropping the light into the meltwater. Shadows broke forward, blades flashing.
Qin Mo met them head-on. Frost to open, flame to finish. Each swap bit deeper, the system counting every strike in its silent ledger. The Bellkeeper moved like a pendulum behind him, each swing of the staff ringing bone.
Two minutes later, the gully was quiet again, the only sound the rush of meltwater past stone.
[Hostile presence: neutralized.]
[Heat/Frost Weave proficiency +4%.]
[Hunter sub-category reduced: 3/7.]
Qin Mo exhaled once, slow, letting the hum fade from his limbs. "They'll keep coming until—"
"—until the hand's cut off," the Bellkeeper finished. She toed one of the bodies over, frowning at the seal stitched into the leather. "You're not just on a ledger, Qin Mo. You're on a list."
Somewhere deeper in the pines, a bell rang—a single note, low and long.
Her expression changed. "And that's my list."