Hearing the faint urgency in Jiangche’s call for help, Lang Jiuchuan’s expression grew cold and still. She said to him through her spirit consciousness: “If you can fight, then fight. Don’t force a direct confrontation. Preserve yourself first. If it’s beyond you, come back.”

Jiangche: …

Understood — she’s telling him to hold on for now. But what was this business about ‘if it’s beyond you?’ He was very capable, thank you very much.

“Who has the lightest footwork among you? Carry me up to the Mountain God temple immediately.” Lang Jiuchuan turned to the guards.

Luo Tian stepped forward at once. “Miss, I do. I can handle ten opponents at once.”

Lang Jiuchuan pressed her hand down, and Luo Tian crouched obligingly. She settled onto his back with barely perceptible weight. He rose and thought privately — good heavens, this is no different from carrying his little one back home. Light as air, hardly anything to her at all.

“Move forward.” Lang Jiuchuan gave his shoulder a light pat.

Shen Qinghe watched her set off without the faintest concern for propriety between men and women, and made a mental note to have a quiet word with the guards later — to keep their mouths shut about this, or they would damage the young lady’s reputation by talking.

Seeing Lang Jiuchuan moving ahead, Shen Qinghe wasted no time. He selected his most trusted personal guard and followed swiftly after.

The sun was tilting westward. The moment the afternoon watch arrived, what had looked like paradise on earth began to grow dark and cold. It was as if the sun had forsaken this valley entirely — no light fell within it anymore. In its place, a dense, turbid stream of foul energy surged to cover the mountain valley like a suffocating shroud.

The wind keened and wailed, as though a multitude of aggrieved souls were weeping — a mournful, piercing sound.

The Mountain God temple of Female Village lay halfway up the slope, at a wide meadow of singular beauty. At the center of the meadow stood a stone incense burner as tall as a small child, bristling with spent incense sticks.

The temple itself was set within the mountain behind the meadow — a cave large enough for two men to stand in without crouching. Above the mouth of the cave, the words “Mountain God Temple” had been carved into the rock face with red lacquer. On either side of the entrance hung strips of fresh red silk, along with two red lanterns bearing the character for “happiness” — an incongruous, eerie assemblage that felt neither sacred nor human.

Lang Jiuchuan regarded the dim, amber flicker of candlelight from within the cave with cold composure.

A fierce gust rushed from within the cave, carrying with it a howling, oppressive force that made every person want to turn back.

“So this is the Mountain God temple?” Luo Tian shuddered from head to toe. “It doesn’t look remotely sacred. Just deeply unsettling.”

He was no stranger to temples — even a crumbling mountaintop shrine would have a different air about it from this. This did not look like a temple at all. It looked like a ghost’s lair.

Was this the aesthetic of Female Village? Truly something else.

Lang Jiuchuan gave a cold smile. Of course it felt unsettling — the energy coiling within the cave was nothing but dark, sinister force. How could it not make people’s hearts tremble?

A violent gust tore through the air. Luo Tian raised his sleeve to shield his face, while still managing to step in front of Lang Jiuchuan to block the wind.

Lang Jiuchuan held her ground without moving and let the gust enter her spirit consciousness.

It was Jiangche.

“Stop standing there — if you don’t act soon, these people are going to die in that illusion to atone for their sins. Hurry up and let me draw on your vital energy. My spiritual form is about to scatter.”

Lang Jiuchuan took in the complexity of his aura and furrowed her brow. “What have you been swallowing again?”

Jiangche drew on her vital energy and smoothed himself over from end to end before answering. “There’s a gorge behind this place, and the bottom is entirely white bones — a site of festering resentment and killing energy. If you threw swords and blades down there, they would surely be refined into terrible weapons of slaughter.”

Lang Jiuchuan listened and looked at the mountain face before her. “You are saying that behind the Mountain God temple there is a cliff gorge.”

“Right. I’d guess that the young men taken as husbands by the Mountain God all ended up at the bottom of that cliff eventually.”

“And the living? Any sign of the missing who are still alive?”

“A place like that — even if there were living people, they’d be barely drawing breath. There’s no surviving it.” Jiangche said: “In this deep winter, not even a bird down there, let alone a living person. Also — whatever is inside this Mountain God temple is deeply sinister. That force is partly corrupt and partly sacred, something between the two extremes. Just be careful when you go in.”

“Couldn’t handle it yourself?”

Jiangche stiffened. “I was preserving my full strength to fight alongside you in a combined effort. Do you not understand strategy?”

“If even you couldn’t handle it, then it does have some real ability.” A glimmer of excitement lit in Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes. She rather wanted to see what kind of thing could be both sacred and corrupt.

Jiangche looked at her expression and rolled his eyes. Right — he had forgotten. This one was unhinged. She was born without fear. He had worried for nothing.

Shen Qinghe had arrived and steadied his slightly disordered breathing. “This is the Mountain God temple, then. Be careful inside — it is a mountain cave, extremely cold.”

He thought for a moment, and began reaching for the outer robe across his shoulders. “You should put another layer on…”

“No need. The cold inside is not only because it’s a cave. Another robe won’t solve it.” Lang Jiuchuan stopped him.

She went in first. Those behind her quickly followed. Once everyone had entered the cave, Elder Ke materialized from somewhere unnoticed, the corner of his mouth curved at an angle. He drew the bone flute from his hand and began to play.

A black serpent, no thicker than a thread of silk, slithered from the bone flute, dropped to the ground, and wound its way snaking into the temple.

The moment Lang Jiuchuan and the others entered the temple, the scene transformed entirely. The dark, dim cave gave way to a valley of stunning beauty — maple trees in blazing red as far as the eye could see, and every color of wildflower blooming across the hillsides. Within the valley, wooden houses sat with smoke wisping from their chimneys, and children ran and called to one another through the village. A scene of peace and wholeness.

But that tranquil picture was shattered, all at once, by a single woman.

She was the most beautiful woman in the village — and the one most despised by every other woman. She was a widow, and a widow whose beauty was her ruin. Trouble gathers at a widow’s gate — that saying holds true wherever it is spoken. All the more so when that widow is beautiful; how could the men of the mountain help but be drawn to her?

And so it was that in the season when the maple leaves burned reddest, that widow — whose name was as beautiful as she was — was forced down in the deep heart of the valley, on a meadow where wildflowers bloomed bright and tangled. Her body, pale as jade, was covered by the falling maple leaves spiraling down around her, yet they could not conceal the bruising that covered her from head to foot.

Where there is one, there will be a second. The widow became a curse — desired by men, despised by women. She grew haggard with each passing day, but she dared not die. Her child’s wings had not yet grown strong enough.

Yet she had to die.

Her existence had turned the once-peaceful village into a place of poison and smoke. Couples who had lived in harmony now quarreled day and night. Healthy livestock died for no reason. Abundant crops withered to nothing. Everyone hated her — hated her for disturbing the village’s peace, for bringing ruin to its fortunes.

The ritual diviner declared that her dissolute nature had offended the Mountain God, and the God’s punishment had descended, leaving the village without peace. A sacrifice was required, to beg the God’s forgiveness.

The widow’s son fell to his knees and pleaded, time and again. But the fury of many cannot be quelled, and when mother and son attempted to flee, they were caught and dragged back. That same day, the widow was bound to the altar and offered to the God as his bride.

Her son witnessed it all and said nothing. The villagers all said it had been his mother’s fault, and that in becoming the God’s new bride, she was making atonement for her sins — that this was a good thing.

He did not argue.

From that day, Red Maple Village was rid of its most beautiful widow. Peace, it seemed, was restored. And her name was…

Red Lotus.

Red Lotus’s tragedy — a blood debt is born.

Let all weep blood for her. Let all atone to her. Let all beg her forgiveness.

Hiss.

Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes snapped open, her gaze sharp and frigid. The Panguan brush flew from her hand and struck the black serpent that had already begun to climb over her foot.