Liang Feng set the pace once they cleared the sect gates.

  He moved at a steady run that was faster than walking but slower than a full sprint, a pace that cultivators at their level could maintain for hours without burning through their qi reserves. The mountain path wound down through the trees and the morning mist hung low between the trunks, and the five of them moved in a loose line with Liang Feng at the front and Chen Bao at the rear.

  They passed the fork that led to Dusthaven and kept going, cutting through the forest east of the city rather than taking the main road. The trees were thicker here and the undergrowth was dense, but the path Liang Feng chose was clear enough, an old hunting trail that wound between the ridges and avoided the open ground near the city.

  Yan Qiu ran in the middle of the group, between Zhou Tai and Shu Yingyue. His body moved easily at this pace and his breathing stayed even, the Dust Treading Step keeping his footwork light and efficient over the uneven ground. He noticed Shu Yingyue glancing at him once or twice during the first stretch, her eyes dropping to his feet and back up, and he wondered if she was watching his technique or still deciding whether he belonged here.

  The forest thinned as they moved north and the terrain opened up into rolling hills covered in dry grass and scattered rocks. The further they went the more familiar the shape of the hills became. Yan Qiu had walked roads like these as a child, following his father to the fields in the early morning when the grass was still wet.

  The unnamed village. He already knew which one it was. The direction was right, the timing matched his mother’s letter, and there was only one village up here that had been hit by beasts recently. Blackroot. Elder Han had not said the name, but Yan Qiu did not need him to.

  He had never heard of Stonehollow, but it was close enough to Blackroot that the same beasts could have spread there. If he looked west from the right hilltop, he might be able to see the tree line where the forest met the fields his father used to work.

  He kept running and did not say anything about it.

  They stopped twice to rest and drink water, and both times Liang Feng kept the breaks short. By late afternoon the hills had flattened out and the grass was taller, swaying in a wind that came from the northeast and carried the smell of dry earth and old leaves. The sun was dropping toward the ridgeline when Liang Feng raised a hand and the group slowed to a walk.

  “We will camp here,” he said, pointing to a shallow depression between two hills where a ring of boulders broke the wind. “We should reach the first village by midday tomorrow.”

  They set up quickly. Zhou Tai and Chen Bao had done this before and moved without needing to talk about it. Zhou Tai cleared a fire pit while Chen Bao disappeared into the tall grass with his knife and came back a short while later carrying two rabbits by the ears. He had caught them so fast that Yan Qiu had barely finished laying out his bedroll.

  The fire was small and the smoke was thin. Zhou Tai skinned the rabbits and spitted them over the coals, and the smell of roasting meat filled the hollow as the sky turned orange and then dark.

  Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!

  “Eat,” Zhou Tai said, handing Yan Qiu a portion. “You are going to want the energy tomorrow.”

  They sat around the fire and ate. Liang Feng was off to one side with the map spread across his knees, studying it by firelight. Shu Yingyue sat near him and cleaned her swords with a cloth, working the blade in long even strokes. The rest of them ate and talked.

  Zhou Tai was the first to break the quiet. He looked at Yan Qiu across the fire and said, “So you are the one who put Fang Rui in the infirmary.”

  Yan Qiu looked up. “You know him?”

  “Everyone knows him. He has been bothering new disciples since before our batch arrived.” Zhou Tai tore off another piece of rabbit and chewed. “I am not saying he did not deserve it, but four against one and you came out on top? That is not normal for someone who had been here a few days.”

  “He got lucky,” Shu Yingyue said without looking up from her swords. “Or Elder Han would not have sent him.”

  “It was not luck,” Liang Feng said from where he sat with the map. He did not look up either. “Elder Han’s report was detailed. Read it before you judge.”

  Shu Yingyue glanced at him and said nothing, but when she looked at Yan Qiu again there was less edge in it than before. The conversation loosened after that. Zhou Tai told a story about a mission where he and Chen Bao had tracked a spirit boar for three days only to find it had already been killed by a falling tree, and Chen Bao shook his head through the whole thing like he had heard it a hundred times but still could not believe it had happened.

  “We still got the contribution points,” Zhou Tai said. “The task was to confirm the beast was dead. It was dead.”

  “You carried a rotting boar carcass back to the sect for fifty contribution points,” Chen Bao said.

  “Fifty points is fifty points.”

  The talk drifted to contribution points after that, and how much everything cost once you advanced past Breath Weaving. Zhou Tai leaned back against a boulder and started counting on his fingers.

  “Spirit stones, technique manuals, meditation cave sessions,” he said. “At Breath Weaving the monthly allowance and a few missions will cover what you need. Once you hit Channel Refining, the allowance covers maybe a third. You have to earn the rest or you will fall behind.”

  “The meditation caves are the worst part,” Chen Bao said. He had finished eating and was sitting with his knife across his lap, turning it slowly in his hands. “A single session costs more than a C-rank mission pays, and you are going to need dozens of sessions to make real progress at that stage.”

  “So how do people manage it?” Yan Qiu asked.

  “Higher-rank missions,” Zhou Tai said. “B-rank and above. That is where the real points come in. Some disciples pool resources with their factions too, share cave slots, trade favors.” He pointed a rabbit bone at Yan Qiu. “Start saving now. Every point you earn at Breath Weaving is a point you will not have to scramble for later.” Shu Yingyue looked up from her swords. “What stage are you?” she asked Yan Qiu.

  “Third stage Breath Weaving.”

  She studied him for a moment. “How long have you been at the sect?”

  “A few weeks,” Yan Qiu said. “Not counting seclusion.”

  Her eyebrows went up slightly, and she glanced at Liang Feng, who gave no indication he was listening. She looked back at Yan Qiu.

  “Your footwork is good,” she said. “I was watching you on the trail. You move lighter than most Breath Weaving cultivators I have seen.”

  “I have been practicing the Dust Treading Step a lot,” Yan Qiu said.

  She gave a small nod and went back to cleaning her swords.

  The fire burned low. Liang Feng folded the map and told them to sleep in shifts, two at a time, and assigned the order. Yan Qiu drew the second shift with Chen Bao.

  He lay on his bedroll and looked up at the sky. The stars were thick and bright out here, away from the sect and the city, and the wind moved through the grass with a low steady sound. By midday they would reach the villages, and he would see what the beasts had done and how close it all was to the place where he grew up.

  He slept, and for once, he did not dream.