Boooom!!

  An ungodly noise echoed through the mountainous forest, reverberating off the cliffs and weaving through the trees. A moment ter, a massive three-meter-thick tree groaned and colpsed, its trunk bsted apart by a Honda Civic-sized hole.

  “Haha! I love this thing!” Jin Shu shouted, though his ears were still ringing from the deafeni of the sniper rifle. He grinned but let out a resigned sigh. “I just wish the Silence Rune had worked… Then again, the noise might be useful for surprising and disorienting enemies.”

  “You may o inscribe the bullets with the Silence Rune for it to be effective," Nano chimed in.

  “Yeah, I figured as much,” Jin Shu muttered. “Still, that’s going to take a lot of work…”

  He heaved anh as the rifle in his hands began to glow softly, vanishing in an instant. In its pce appeared a pink-and-bck Glock 19, which he turned over in his hands thoughtfully.

  His shoulders sagged as he remembered the circumstances of its creation. While crafting the pistol, Yin’er had hurt herself, and he’d left the on in the fe to go help her. By the time he returned, one side of the gun had been scorched bck. With the st of his rose gold, he’d made adjustments, carving his mother’s name—Sun Mei'er—into the bed side and inying it with the preetal. He hadn’t had enough material to refe it entirely, so he’d dohe best he could.

  As his mind wandered, Yin’er darted through the foliage of distant trees before nding lightly on his shoulder. “Daddy, no more loud noises?” she asked, her toinged with a not so subtle hint of boredom.

  Jin Shu snapped out of his thoughts at the sound of her voice. “No, there’s going to be one mo back, I don’t want you hurting your ears, okay?”

  “Boo! Stinky Daddy!” she cried out, puffing up her cheeks in moger. Still, she flew off, flitting through the trees. On her way, she spotted a horned squirrel and immediately started a scuffle with it.

  Jin Shu chuckled as he watched her chase the poor creature through the underbrush. “Don’t go too far,” he called out, creeping into his voibsp;

  She gnced back at him but gave no response, her agreeing nor refusing to stay close. He shook his head, a wry smile f on his lips. He wasn’t too worried, though—he could sense her location through the bond they shared.

  For now, he let her be. Shifting his focus back to the task at hand, Jin Shu gnced down at the pistol in his hand. He had e here to test the ons he’d fed weeks ago.

  He raised the gun, his mother’s future gift, and prepared to test it. Aiming down the sights, he took a deep breath, letting the rustling of the wind through the trees guide him. The cool breeze brushed against his skin, the earthly sts from the forest rexing his body as he he dire the winds carried them, adjusting his aim accly.

  Exhaling slowly, he squeezed the trigger.

  Bang!

  The pistol recoiled in his grip as the bullet shot forward. A soft thunk followed, marking its impact against a nearby tree trunk. Uhe sniper rifle, there was h-shaking boom or oversized hole. Those effects were the result of the runes he’d painstakingly inscribed into the rger on.

  For now, his mun had no runes. He was waiting until he could master more advanced inscriptions. ons could only support so many runes before the strain caused them to break, and this pistol o st. He wa to be perfect—he’d already botched the f process once. He couldn’t afford to make another mistake with the runes.

  Just as he prepared to test the ons further, a pierg scream carried on the wind reached his ears. Dread gripped his heart, and his first thought was Yin’er. But as he focused on their e, relief swept over him. She was safe and in the opposite dire of the scream.

  Still, he tugged at their bond to call her back. He couldn’t sehoughts, but he could push emotions and subtly manipute the thread that lihem.

  Moments ter, Yin’er appeared, darting through the trees. She came flying toward him, a squirming squirrel cmped tightly in her jaw.

  “Whaf’s wwong?” she mumbled through the struggling animal.

  Jin Shu stifled a ugh. “Let the squirrel go first.”

  Her furry face sched up iance, but after a moment of ption, she spat the squirrel out. The poor creature scrambled off, chittering angrily as it disappeared into the foliage.

  “What?” she huffed, irritation clear ione as her little whiskers twitched in annoyanbsp;

  Jin Shu almost ughed again but mao keep his posure. “There was screaming—something bad might’ve happened nearby.” His tone grew serious as he expihe situation.

  Aah!!

  Another scream pierced the air, this one much closer.

  “Wait… I think I reize that voice…” Jin Shu murmured, his brow furrowing. He couldn’t pce it yet, but something about the scream felt familiar.

  “Based on speech reition, that is the voice of your mother’s disciple, Fan Biyu,” Nano informed him.

  “What? Are you sure?”

  “99% certain.”

  “Shit! Let’s go!” Jin Shu barked, taking off in the dire of the scream.

  Yin’er fluttered after him, her small wings beating frantically. If it really was Fan Biyu, that meant his mother couldn’t be far. And judging by the desperation in her voice, Fan Biyu was in serious trouble.

  As Jin Shu sprihrough the forest, weaviween trees and vaulting over rocks and tangled roots, memories of the st time he’d run through these woods surfaced. “It ’t be a Wiiger,” he thought. Surely, a beast like that wouldn’t push Fan Biyu to scream so desperately.

  He refused to believe it. He’d seeraining with his mother. He’d even sparred with her once. Fan Biyu’s cultivation was leagues above his, and her bat teiques were, at the very least, on par with his own.

  The memory of their sparring session fshed through his mind—her hands igniting with a vivid red fire as she struck his chest with a bzing palm. If she hadn’t held back at the st moment, he might still be rec from the injuries. Just the thought of it sent a shiver rag down his spine.

  Shaking the memory from his head, he pressed onward. The forest suddenly thinned, giving way to a clearing. There, three men stood over the prone form of a young woman. Her face was obscured, but Jin Shu’s gut twisted. Fan Biyu.

  He crouched at the edge of the clearing, his breathing steadying as he focused on the men’s versation.

  “Hehehe! We’ve finally caught you, pretty little dy. You really gave us a run for our money, didn’t you?” she man on the right, his voice dripping with malibsp;

  “You didn’t actually think you could get away, did you?” mocked the one on the left, grinning cruelly.

  The man in the middle leaned forward, his voice low and twisted with glee. “Now that we’ve caught you, we return in time to enjoy both master and disciple. Ahahaha!”

  Boom!!

  A deafening crack shattered the tension as the middle man’s head erupted in a spray of blood and brain matter. His body crumpled to the ground, lifeless.

  Jin Shu lowered the sniper rifle, as the bullet tiraveling, shattering a few trees in the distance, his breathing still calm as the remaining two men froze, drenched in the gore of their panion. His mind had been posed, focused on assessing the situation. But when they mentioned his mother, he snapped. Killing the man had brought him a flicker of calm, but he wasn’t done. If he’d started killing, he might as well finish the job—after getting some answers.

  In a blink, the sniper rifle vanished, repced by an M17 pistol in his hand.

  The two surviving men, still stunned, hadn’t eveered what had happened before Jin Shu fired.

  Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

  Four sh out in rapid succession. The bullets tore into the men’s knees with precision, shattering bone and cartige. They colpsed to the ground with strangled screams, writhing in pain as they clutched at their ruined legs.

  Jin Shu stepped into the clearing, the faint smell of gunpowder mingling with the metallig of blood in the air. His voice was cold as ice. “Time to talk.” He spat the words out through his grit teeth.