In the gloomy dungeon, a man with disheveled hair hung bound by his limbs against the wall. His body was covered in blood, making it impossible to distinguish between wounds and trails of blood that had trickled down.
Outside the cell stood several graceful women. Their leader wore a veil that covered her entire face, yet one could still sense her gaze fixed intently on the man in the cell. She focused on his labored breathing, each breath longer than the last, growing increasingly feeble. The woman’s hand tightened. “Go in. Take his blood.” Her voice was surprisingly coarse and raspy, like that of a ninety-year-old woman.
“Sect Leader…” one of the women behind her hesitated. “We’ve already taken blood today. The next extraction should wait until noon tomorrow…”
Before she could finish, there was a sharp crack as the woman called Sect Leader turned and struck the attendant across the face.
“Can’t you see he’ll be dead by tonight?” The eyes behind the veil coldly stared at the attendant who had fallen to the ground. “Wait until noon tomorrow? Do you want all my efforts to be wasted?”
Soon, the attendant began to wail, clutching her face. Her cries grew louder as she rolled on the ground in agony. When her movements finally ceased, everyone could see that where the Sect Leader had struck her, half her face had rotted away, revealing the horrifying sight of exposed bone beneath the bloody flesh.
She let out two more anguished cries before the hand covering her face fell away. She lay on the ground, eyes wide open, lifeless.
“Does anyone else have something to say?”
The remaining women fell silent as death. They quietly cleansed their hands, opened the cell door, and entered.
One woman opened a golden box containing a silkworm-like creature that writhed within. Another wiped away the blood near the man’s heart, while a third took out a golden knife and made a small incision on his chest. Fresh blood flowed out. The creature in the box immediately began to thrash about wildly, as if strongly attracted to the blood.
The attendant placed the box against the man’s chest. The creature instantly crawled to his wound and began drinking his blood in great gulps, its jade-white body gradually turning blood-red.
When its color had changed sufficiently, the attendant tried to brush the creature back into the box. After a couple of attempts, her face suddenly turned pale.
“Sect Leader.”
Outside the cell, the woman’s voice deepened: “What is it?”
“The… the Jade Silkworm’s head has crawled into the wound. It won’t come out…”
The veiled woman flew into the cell with a few steps. In the brief moment it took her to enter, the attendant had already cried out repeatedly: “It’s gone in! The Jade Silkworm has gone in!”
By the time she reached them, there was no trace of the Jade Silkworm on the man’s chest.
The cell fell silent. Suddenly, an attendant at the side noticed movement in her peripheral vision – the finger of the man who had been bound motionless for ninety-nine days twitched slightly. While she was still stunned, someone else exclaimed: “His wound…”
His wound was… slowly healing…
The Sect Leader observed the man, reaching out to touch his chest, then let out a suppressed laugh: “Success! My human vessel has finally succeeded!”
As she laughed, in that instant, the man suddenly clenched his fist. With two thunderous crashes, the iron chains binding his wrists shattered, the force embedding the broken chains into the wall behind him.
The man’s eyes snapped open, blood-red like those of a wild beast. Despite his refined features, his appearance was deeply unsettling.
The woman laughed loudly: “Good child, good child! Today, you become the guardian treasure of my Lingchang Sect! With you, my return to the Southern Borderlands is within reach!” Before she could finish speaking, the man’s hand shot out and seized her throat.
His grip tightened, and the woman’s face instantly turned purple.
“Let… child… let go… I am your master.”
The man paid no attention to her words. With a swing of his arm, he threw her against the wall like a rag doll, creating a large crater on impact.
He let out a roar like a beast howling in the night, and in an instant, the dungeon was splattered with blood.
Time passed, and as dawn approached, he stumbled out of the dungeon, moving wretchedly through the forest. Looking up in the distance, he saw the desolate towers of the Great Jin Dynasty’s frontier city.
His breath came out in harsh gasps, the night’s cold instantly turning them into soft white mists that he dispersed as he moved through them.
Stumbling forward, he walked blindly. The light of the waning moon filtered through the withered branches, illuminating his blood-covered body. On his bare chest, a bright red mark like flames climbed upward, extending to his neck, and cheek, and finally stopping at the corner of his left eye.
In his heart, there was pain so intense it felt like it could tear his soul apart.
He gritted his teeth, his expression tortured.
Leaving the forest where there were no more trees to support him, his foot slipped, and he rolled down the slope.
The frontier dawn was bitterly cold. He lay alone on the wasteland with closed eyes, frost forming on the dead grass. He felt his muscles begin to tremble, bit by bit, inch by inch, experiencing pain as if his bones were being crushed.
His body felt as if it were being compressed by rocks, his bones making crackling sounds. His tall frame slowly shrank until… he had completely transformed into a child.
The morning light crossed the distant mountains, falling diagonally across the desolate northern frontier.
Suddenly, the sound of approaching horses came from afar, hooves striking the earth with the scent of iron and blood, quickly arriving. He kept his eyes closed, not in pretense, but because he truly lacked the strength to open them.
“General…” a rough male voice called out, “Look, there seems to be a child over there.”
Hooves approached softly and stopped beside him. Someone dismounted, and driven by instinct, he wanted to determine if the newcomer was a threat. Gathering all his strength to open his eyes, he saw in the backlight the silhouette of a woman in close-fitting red armor trimmed with silver.
A female… general?
After this one glance, he had no more strength and his eyes closed again.
Behind the woman were two men in iron armor. Vice Commander Luo Teng, seeing the child, was surprised: “My word! This child is covered in blood! Quite frightening!”
The other vice commander, Qin Lan, remained calmer: “General, this child has a mark on his chest.”
“A flame pattern, quite beautifully done.” Accompanying this slightly husky female voice, cool fingertips gently touched the pattern on his chest.
Where her fingertip traced, it caused a shiver. In his chest, it was as if a recently dormant beast had been awakened by her touch, writhing in his heart. Suddenly, he felt an intense heat throughout his body, his mouth parched. His nose began to detect a different scent in the air.
The scent of blood.
It came from within these three people, flowing from their hearts, circulating through their bodies, keeping them alive.
His sense of smell grew increasingly acute, and blood held an indescribable allure for him.
Especially this woman’s blood, which had an ineffable fragrance…
His body grew restless, but the three before him remained unaware.
“The child is quite adorable,” the female general patted his face. “Let’s take him with us.”
“General…” Qin Lan said resignedly, “This child’s origins are unknown…”
Luo Teng seemed more easygoing: “I’ve heard the Western Xiong have customs of human sacrifice. The weather in the frontier is particularly cold and dry this year. Perhaps this child was their sacrifice for praying to survive the winter?”
“How would a sacrifice end up abandoned here, in tattered clothes and covered in blood…”
Hearing the word ‘blood,’ his inner turmoil intensified, his throat moving, his mouth as dry as fire.
“He seems thirsty. Bring some water first,” the female general called out. Then came the sound of a water skin being uncorked. But rather than pouring water directly into his mouth as her voice suggested, she carefully moistened her finger and gently dampened his lips with her wet fingertip.
Water has no taste, yet from her fingertip, it mysteriously acquired a fatally enticing fragrance.
It carried her scent and the smell of blood.
When her finger first left his lips, he felt like a hungry wolf robbed of meat, the savage emotions in his heart almost uncontrollable. So when her finger touched his lips a second time, he almost involuntarily opened his mouth and viciously bit down on her finger.
The flesh of her index finger broke, his teeth sinking into her flesh as the taste of blood filled his mouth.
The female general winced in pain, drawing in a sharp breath, instinctively trying to pull her finger back. But he wouldn’t let go, his throat working as he almost frantically swallowed the blood seeping from her fingertip.
The taste of blood filled his mouth, warming his stomach as if a fire had been lit, then that blazing sensation rushed straight to his heart, burning so hot it made his heart ache, causing it to beat wildly.
“General!” The two men, seeing this, rushed forward. One tried to force open his jaw, but he refused to let go.
The other cursed loudly: “Ungrateful little bastard! I’ll tear your jaw off! Qin Lan, let go, let me handle this!” His rough hand gripped the boy’s jaw, but the woman called out sharply: “Luo Teng!”
Luo Teng’s movement stopped at her command, but he didn’t release his grip, instead saying angrily: “General! This little beast bit you!”
“Do I not know he bit me?” she rebuked him, pushing away his hand with some disgust. Compared to the man’s, her fingers were much more slender, yet with just two fingers pressing on his jaw joint, he felt his cheeks go numb, no longer able to keep his jaw clenched.
“If I let you handle it, you’d crush his skull,” she reproached, then withdrew her finger.
But the blood that had flowed out had already merged with his body.
Though this small amount of blood was far from enough to satisfy him, the turmoil within his body seemed to have been calmed by even this tiny quantity.
“General,” the man called Qin Lan spoke with concern, “your hand…”
“A child’s strength, just a flesh wound,” Though he had bitten her, she didn’t let him go, instead hoisting him onto her shoulder. “Let’s go, back to camp.”
Luo Teng anxiously shouted: “General, you’re taking this little wolf cub back with us?”
Li Shuang placed him on her horse: “He’s just a child.” She mounted behind him, holding his seemingly unconscious and powerless form in her arms, speaking casually, “Wasn’t I also like a wild wolf when Father found and took me in?”
At these words, no one raised further objections.