On the day of Great Cold, heaven and earth were white, with goose feather snowflakes falling densely.

In the thirty-fifth year of Yongchang, Sunan welcomed a heavy snowfall that hadn’t been seen in ten years.

The heavy snow quickly covered the large and small streets throughout Sunan City. Jagged tree branches cast eerie shadows in the cold night moonlight, every household tightly shut their doors, and occasionally the fragrant aroma of laba porridge drifted through the lit window cracks of houses on both sides of the street.

In the mass grave behind the execution ground, ice and snow washed away the sticky stench of blood from the site. Corpses lay piled one upon another, their original faces unrecognizable due to being frozen by ice and snow, gleaming with a crystalline blue-white sheen under the moonlight.

In this silent snowfall, dark figures moved among them, like mice active in the night, their movements swift yet cautious.

Twelve-year-old Lu Tong walked through the graveyard behind the execution ground.

A few days ago, Yunniang had been developing a new poison and sent her down the mountain to find fresh human liver.

She had descended from Luomei Peak and stayed in Sunan City for three days, waiting until today when the execution of death row prisoners ended, the crowd of onlookers dispersed, the executioner returned home, and the officials threw the prisoners’ corpses into the mass grave, before emerging from the broken temple where she had been sheltering.

The snow fell silently and densely. Snowflakes landed on the girl’s tightly wrapped face veil, the veil became dampened by a layer of moisture, and when blown by the cold night north wind, it felt bone-piercingly cold.

Lu Tong seemed oblivious to this, only keeping her head down, carefully selecting from the pile of corpses by moonlight.

After the execution of death row prisoners in Sunan City, those with family members would pay silver to take the bodies back. Those without family members had their corpses casually piled in the graveyard behind the execution ground and hastily buried.

The mass grave never lacked corpses – some fresh, others long rotted. Those horrifying wounds were frozen solid by wind and snow, frozen in their bloody state. Lu Tong carefully walked among the pile of corpses when suddenly she tripped over something round beneath her feet and nearly fell. She steadied herself and looked closely.

It was a head that had been cleanly severed from the neck down, with disheveled long hair like black grass, skin pale as wax, and only a pair of round, staring eyes that couldn’t hide their malevolence.

It must be the head of a death row prisoner beheaded today.

Lu Tong’s body trembled slightly.

She hurriedly lowered her head, pressed her palms together, and bowed quietly to the head before her, then stepped around the head and continued forward.

Even though she had often seen corpses of all kinds, each time Lu Tong encountered them, she still couldn’t achieve complete composure.

Yunniang always needed to make new poisons, and new poisons required various materials.

Some were herbs, dew, and animal parts.

Others were human hearts, human livers, human bodies.

Of course, living human bodies were best, but Yunniang couldn’t directly kill people just to make poison, so she could only settle for the next best thing and seek the freshest corpses.

Sometimes, Yunniang would find poor families who had recently lost someone, negotiate a price with the family members, and buy the corpse.

Sometimes, Yunniang would inquire about patients who didn’t have long to live, agree on payment, and wait nearby for the person to die so she could immediately take away the freshest medicinal ingredient.

Lu Tong had witnessed this once – a poor family’s young daughter was gravely ill and beyond treatment. Yunniang negotiated a price with the father and waited right by the little girl for her to pass away. Like a vulture guarding someone taking their last breath, it was terrifying to behold.

But such families weren’t common, so more often, Yunniang would send Lu Tong to mass graves to find fresh corpses. The mass grave on Luomei Peak wasn’t fresh enough; to find those who had died recently, she had to come to the mass grave behind the execution ground in Sunan City.

These death row prisoners without family members had committed heinous crimes in life, and no one cared about their remains after death, making them the safest option. The officials wouldn’t specifically bother with them either. Even if discovered, passing along a bit of silver would settle the matter.

Lu Tong wasn’t visiting the execution ground to find corpses for the first time. At first she was always very frightened, but as time passed, she could be somewhat calmer. Sometimes she even felt that compared to waiting by a sickbed for someone to die, dealing with dead people at such execution grounds was actually more reassuring.

After all, sometimes living people were far more frightening than dead ones.

Heavy snow drifted down from the vast sky – this was the coldest time of the year. Sunan City hadn’t seen snow in ten years, and even the small rivers in the city had frozen over.

Lu Tong tightened the thin winter clothes on her body.

If this were previous years in Changwu County, at this season, Great Cold welcoming the new year, preparations should be made for the New Year.

Eating glutinous rice, drinking freely, making offerings, sweeping dust, pasting windows, preparing preserved foods, arranging marriages, seizing opportunities, bathing, posting New Year decorations – mother’s steamed glutinous rice was both salty and fragrant, and she and Lu Qian would always fight over the stove candy and oil cakes for the Kitchen God offering.

Only this year’s Great Cold had no glutinous rice or stove candy, nor parents and siblings, only overcast skies with heavy snow and frozen clouds hanging low to earth.

Lu Tong stopped in her tracks.

At the outermost edge of the graveyard lay several corpses in neat rows.

Perhaps because today’s heavy snow was too cold and darkness fell early, the people at the execution ground hadn’t even covered these fresh corpses with burial shrouds, allowing white snow to pile layer upon layer over them, freezing these human forms into frost-white, hard ice sculptures.

The girl crouched down, rubbed her hands together, and by the dim moonlight, skillfully felt around these corpses with both hands.

After feeling around for a while, Lu Tong found a corpse that was fairly satisfactory.

It was a headless corpse with a robust build. Touching it, it seemed to be a middle-aged man. Among all the corpses, this one appeared more muscular and should be able to meet Yunniang’s requirements.

Lu Tong brushed off the ice and snow from the corpse, opened her medical box, took out a jar and small knife from inside, forcefully cut open the corpse’s chest cavity, suppressed her discomfort, and groped inside to find what she needed.

Heavy snow howled down upon people, and in the empty execution ground, only the wind wailed mournfully. The girl’s figure in this cold desolation was as frail as a small foraging beast, agile yet alert.

Lu Tong placed the last piece of bloody matter into the jar filled with ice and snow, covered the jar properly, stored it in the medical box, then grabbed a handful of snow water from the ground to wash the blood from her hands.

The snow water soaked through her fingertips, piercingly cold, like the human heart she had just dug out.

When people died, they lost all warmth. No matter how scalding hot the blood had been, after life completely drained away, it became a pool of cold, deep spring water.

She repositioned the corpse properly, then searched around for a long time before finally finding the corpse’s head. It was a gaunt middle-aged man with fierce, gloomy features and round, staring eyes.

Lu Tong vaguely heard the common people watching the execution mention that this person had robbed passersby, killed them, and dumped their bodies, which was why he was convicted and imprisoned.

She placed the head on top of the corpse, stepped back two paces, knelt on the ground, and kowtowed several times to the dead body.

“Uncle, I only took some things from your body and have already found your head for you, so we’re even.”

Lu Tong spoke devoutly: “I didn’t kill you. You were executed because you killed people. Every grievance has its source and every debt its debtor – I didn’t harm you, so if you have resentment in your heart, don’t come after me.”

“When Qingming Festival comes next year, I’ll burn some paper money for you. Please don’t blame me, please don’t blame me.”

She had heard before that death row prisoners who were executed had been vicious criminals in life and would become vengeful ghosts after death. Lu Tong felt that digging out corpses’ hearts and livers was ultimately something that damaged virtue, so in her guilt, she could only try to ease the remorse in her heart this way.

She had just finished speaking and hadn’t yet risen when she suddenly heard a soft “tsk” of laughter beside her.

“Who?!”

The next moment, something ice-cold and sharp pressed against her neck and shoulder. Someone was close behind her, their voice coming from beside her ear – clear and bright, yet still carrying some indistinct hoarseness.

“Where did this little thief come from, daring to steal from the dead?”

Lu Tong’s entire body went ice-cold, and in an instant, her scalp tingled.

She had stayed in the execution ground for so long yet hadn’t noticed when this person had arrived. When had he come, and how much had he seen of her digging through corpses and extracting hearts?

Steadying herself, Lu Tong tried to maintain composure as she spoke: “Who are you?”

As soon as the words left her mouth, she suddenly smelled a thick stench of blood.

This blood stench was different from the putrid, nauseating smell of blood on the dead bodies earlier – it was fresh and heavy, coming from the person behind her. He was restraining Lu Tong from behind, a cold blade tip at her throat. Lu Tong couldn’t turn around or see the other person’s appearance clearly.

The person fell silent for a moment, then lifted the blade tip slightly upward. Lu Tong felt the pressure on her neck increase, accompanied by the other person’s laughing voice.

“I’m lost. It’s cold here. Take me somewhere I can rest. Otherwise,” he lowered his voice slightly, “I’ll kill you.”

Lu Tong froze in place.

This person seemed injured and was hiding here – he might be some kind of desperate criminal. His knife was still at her throat; arguing with him now would be too dangerous.

After a long standoff, she compromised.

Lu Tong slowly said: “I know there’s a broken temple nearby where you can shelter from the cold… I’ll take you there.”

The other person laughed briefly, perhaps pleased by her compliance, then an arm wrapped around from behind Lu Tong and rested on her shoulder.

From a distance, it looked like a drunk person embracing her.

If one could ignore the dagger hidden in his palm and aimed at her throat.

Lu Tong allowed this person to hold her as they walked unsteadily out of the execution ground.

The other person leaned half his body against her. Lu Tong had no choice but to bear part of his weight. He was tall, so as Lu Tong supported him, she could smell the even thicker blood stench coming from his body.

He was injured – Lu Tong was certain of this.

But she didn’t dare try to escape at this moment. The knife pressed against her throat was too sharp, and this person’s body was too tense, like a beast ready to strike, capable of biting through prey’s throat at any time.

She didn’t dare take the risk.

After walking for about half an incense stick’s time, a crumbling broken temple appeared in the distance through the wind and snow.

The temple gate was half-open with no lights, only a bit of residual night light illuminating the crude, broken crossbeams.

Lu Tong felt the blade at her throat press closer and quickly spoke up: “There’s no one here.”

There’s no one here.

Beggars and wandering monks in Sunan City often stayed in broken temples, but no one bothered with the temples near the execution ground. People often said this area was close to the execution ground, where the wronged souls of executed prisoners lingered and sometimes became vengeful ghosts that frequently wandered nearby. Even the clay Buddha originally enshrined in the temple had been damaged by rain on some rainy day. After that, no one dared spend the night here.

Lu Tong often spent nights here because it was close to the execution ground, convenient for her nighttime corpse-hunting. Moreover, staying together with those beggars and wandering monks wasn’t necessarily safer than spending the night alone near the execution ground.

After all, dead people wouldn’t harm others, but living people might.

Lu Tong led the person to the front of the broken temple and reached out to push the door outward.

“Creak—”

The temple door was fully opened.

The person stood in the doorway, lowered the knife in his hand, and asked: “Do you have fire?”

Lu Tong answered quietly: “Yes.”

After speaking, she walked to the very center of the temple hall, crouched down under the clay Buddha’s offering table, felt around for a long time, and pulled out an oil lamp and fire striker to light it.

These were things she had hidden here before.

As soon as the oil lamp was lit, the surroundings brightened.

Before the offering table stood a clay Buddha sculpture as tall as a person, but a previous heavy rain had caused the temple to leak, and continuous downpours had washed away half the colored painting on the Buddha, making even its features indistinguishable.

The wooden plate was completely empty without a single piece of offering fruit. This place had been untouched for so long that layer upon layer of fine spider webs had formed in the corners, with dust everywhere. Broken wooden boards were stacked in the corner, probably from crossbeams that had collapsed before.

Under the offering table, several tattered old prayer mats were put together, roughly forming the shape of a bed – this was the “couch” Lu Tong had made, where she would lie down to rest at night.

The person’s gaze briefly swept over the prayer mats and straw mats, then asked thoughtfully: “You live here?”

Lu Tong turned around abruptly.

At the execution ground it had been overcast, and she had her back to this person, unable to see his appearance clearly. But now with the clear lamplight in the temple, she could see the other person’s appearance.

He was a tall man wearing pitch-black archery clothes with a black cloth covering his face, concealing his features. Only a pair of extremely dark and bright eyes were visible, shimmering with a cold gleam in the firelight.

His voice was very young – though somewhat hoarse, it couldn’t hide the clear brightness characteristic of youth. Lu Tong guessed he was only sixteen or seventeen years old, perhaps even younger.

Seeing Lu Tong look over, he re-sheathed the short knife in his hand and casually walked to the center of the temple hall, beginning to survey the surroundings.

He wasn’t blocking the doorway anymore. Lu Tong’s heart stirred, and she slowly moved toward the door.

Just as she was about to approach the broken door, the young man’s cold voice came from behind: “Where are you going?”

Lu Tong’s steps halted.

She stiffly turned around, looking at the other person’s back as she slowly spoke: “I’ve already brought you here, there’s no one who will come here…”

He interrupted Lu Tong’s words: “Are you planning to report to the authorities?”

Lu Tong was stunned.

Without waiting for Lu Tong to answer, the person in front turned around, looked at her, and said methodically: “If you report to the authorities, I’ll say we’re accomplices.”

“You!”

He glanced at the medical box on Lu Tong: “Also, how would you explain stealing corpses?”

Actually, the corpse-stealing matter wouldn’t be hard to explain – those officials wouldn’t really do anything to her – but if she got inexplicably entangled with the person before her…

Who knew what his background was.

Lu Tong calmed herself and said softly: “I won’t report to the authorities, don’t worry. Today I’ll pretend I never saw you.”

He looked at Lu Tong with some surprise, then glanced at the window, and suddenly sneered: “It’s so cold outside, where would you go? This is your territory – there’s no reason for a guest to drive the host away.”

He lightly flicked his knife sheath with his fingertip, his voice seeming to carry amusement.

“Sit down. Let’s stay together.”

Lu Tong stared intently at his knife sheath.

The other person appeared relaxed, his tone could even be called friendly, but his subtle threats made one feel vaguely unsettled.

She lowered her eyes halfway, her gaze quickly glancing toward the door.

This place was around the execution ground – aside from this broken temple, there were no residential buildings. If she rushed out the door, there would be no shelter outside, only vast snow. Though he was injured, he currently seemed to have stable breathing. For a man to catch up with a little girl would always be easy.

He could very easily kill her and bury her in the snow without anyone knowing.

The black-clothed person looked at her again and said: “The snow outside is heavy. Close the door.”

This person didn’t intend to let her go.

When strength was so unequal, head-on confrontation was never a good approach. Lu Tong secretly gripped the strap of her medical box tightly and reluctantly walked to the door, pushing the door that was about to fall apart closed.

The wind and snow were immediately blocked by more than half.

He sat down on the prayer mat, back straight, his gaze pausing when it swept over the pile of broken wooden boards in the corner, then he ordered Lu Tong: “Little thief, there’s wood in the room. Go make a fire.”

Lu Tong secretly gritted her teeth.

If this person wanted to kill or cut her up, he should just give her a quick end, but instead he was dawdling like this.

Lu Tong suspected he was too severely injured and didn’t have much strength to do things, so he was ordering her around like a servant.

But she didn’t have the courage to fight this person. Setting aside the knife in his hand, between a young girl and a young man, there was always a disparity in physical strength.

If only she could possess exquisite poison arts like Yunniang – at least she could use some poison powder to blind this person’s eyes, which would be better than being at someone’s mercy like this.

Lu Tong silently walked to the corner of the temple, selected several slightly shorter pieces of broken wood and carried them to beside the offering table, then used the oil lamp’s flame to gradually light them.

These pieces of wood were from fallen window frames and crossbeams. After a long time, they had become slightly damp. Lu Tong struggled for quite a while before finally getting some heat.

She gathered several short pieces of wood together, and a small fire pile rose up. The snowy night no longer seemed so cold and dreary.

She wiped the sweat from her forehead. When she looked up, she met his gaze looking over.

This person’s eyes were very bright, like clear gems in the weak candlelight, but his gaze seemed to be watching prey, very aggressive.

Lu Tong was momentarily stunned.

Though this person wore a black face covering and had suspicious traces, his bearing and manner were extraordinary. He showed no hint of the cowering, wretched appearance of a fugitive, but was instead composed and at ease with outstanding demeanor. If Lu Tong hadn’t been coerced here by him, judging by appearance alone, one might think this person was some mysterious young hero whose identity couldn’t be revealed to outsiders.

Truly outstanding.

However, with his face covered, it was hard to say – perhaps beneath the face covering was a pockmarked face. Lu Tong thought maliciously.

The black-clothed person naturally didn’t know Lu Tong was secretly criticizing him. After glancing at Lu Tong, he looked away.

At the feet of the clay Buddha with its blurred face, the offering table was completely empty, with only a rusted copper lamp placed on it. The oil lamp burned brightly, and in this snowy night the candlelight became the only warm color. Small lamp flowers bloomed from the wick, falling on the offering table to form vague floral patterns.

“Lamp flowers blooming…” The black-clothed person slightly raised his eyebrows. “It seems our luck is good.”

Lu Tong didn’t understand what he meant and only followed his gaze. The lamp flowers bursting around the oil lamp fell on the dust-covered offering table, creating fine, delicate oil traces.

As if seeing her confusion, the black-clothed person tilted his head: “Don’t you know?”

He smiled: “Long ago Lu Jia said, ‘When lamp flowers burst, all things bring joy.’ There was an ancient method of divining by lamp flowers – when lamp flowers continuously burst forth, it portends great happiness.” He paused, then spoke without much sincerity: “Congratulations.”

Lu Tong frowned.

She had never heard of any lamp flower divination technique and suspected this person was making things up to deceive her. Moreover, she spent every day on Luomei Peak testing medicines – what good fortune could there be? If she were truly lucky, she wouldn’t have encountered this person and been coerced into her current situation.