A roar exploded behind Wei and Chun.
It was not a horse.
The sound did not resemble a true neigh. It was closer to something dead, clumsily imitating a memory of a beast's cry. There was no rise or fall of breath, no push of air—only the dry vibration between throat bone and spine, forced into shape again and again, then collapsing at once.
The sound was hollow and broken,
as if it rolled out from inside an empty skull.
Chun had no time to react.
Her wrist tightened suddenly. A brutal force dragged her forward.
It was Wei.
He pulled her into his arms. Her feet kicked wildly, her nails scraped at nothing. A broken whimper spilled from her throat—
not quite crying, more like the sound of someone being choked, torn apart, unable to form a whole voice.
"Move," Wei hissed into her ear, his voice raw, as if scorched by fire.
"If you want to live, move."
Her body went soft. She could barely stand. He half carried her, half dragged her, hauling her out of the collapsed house.
They ran over shattered tiles and burned beams. Small cracking sounds snapped underfoot.
A narrow path. A few houses. Then a fork.
Two dirt roads split left and right under the night sky.
The left road was wider. The houses along it were mostly intact, walls still standing. Faint lamplight lingered under the eaves. At the far end, the dark outline of a forest loomed.
Footprints littered the ground—but there was no fresh blood.
Just then—
From the shadowed alley on the left,
a shape darted out.
Fast.
Too fast.
Like a villager running close to the walls.
In the blink of an eye, it vanished back into the dark.
The right path was narrower, more suffocating.
Several houses were still burning. Flames licked at the roofs, beams crackled and snapped. Fences had warped into blackened shapes. Sparks drifted down from straw roofs, flashing once on broken wood before dying out.
In places, entire roofs had collapsed. Rubble squeezed the passage down to a gap barely wide enough for an arm.
Behind them, the sound of hooves drew closer.
Not a frantic chase.
A slow, steady approach.
Each step landed in the same rhythm.
Now was not the time to freeze.
Chun clenched her teeth, wiped her nose and tears with her sleeve, and forced herself to look ahead.
She pointed to the left road. Her voice trembled, but she pushed it out anyway.
"That way leads down the mountain… out of the village."
She paused. Something stuck in her throat before she forced out another sentence.
"Let's escape first."
She turned to Wei, her eyes full of unease.
She knew his home lay in the other direction. She didn't know if he would abandon it as easily as she would.
Wei didn't answer.
He stood still, shoulders tight.
His gaze shifted between the two roads—but he wasn't weighing which was safer.
The moment Chun pointed left,
a thin swelling pressure bloomed behind Wei's right eye.
It wasn't pain.
It felt like something was being dragged out of place.
The left road suddenly became unnaturally clear.
The lines of the eaves. The cracks in the walls. The footprints on the ground. Everything was sharp—too sharp. As if someone had traced it deliberately.
Stable. Reasonable. Clean.
That clarity made his heart sink.
The burning alley on the right, by contrast, lost its edges. Despite the flames, he couldn't see its end. All that remained was a blurred, continuous sense of pull, as if something deep in his vision was quietly drawing him that way.
Not a command.
Not a warning.
Just this—
If he didn't follow that direction, his chest tightened.
"Hurry!" Chun tugged at his hand.
"What are you hesitating for?"
The right side was fire.
No matter how she thought about it, the left made sense.
The next second, Wei grabbed her hand.
No explanation.
Without looking left again, he turned sharply and dragged her into the burning darkness of the alley.
"What are you doing?!"
Chun stumbled, her voice shaking."Someone must be setting fires up ahead!"
"My dad said—if you can't choose, go left!"
"But you're going right!"
She tried to stop, but flames were already rolling along both sides of the alley. Heat slammed into them in waves. The air stank of charred wood and ash.
Wei pressed his lips together.
He didn't answer.
His breathing had gone uneven.
The pulling sensation was still there—stronger now, rougher, like someone had grabbed behind his eye and was yanking his vision forward.
He didn't slow down. He dragged Chun with him, deeper into the alley.
Their footsteps vanished beneath the crackle of fire.
The passage stretched on.
Every breath burned with heat and ash, clawing at the throat. Both of them held it in, refusing to cough.
Wei glanced back.
Firelight flickered at the alley's mouth—but no shadow followed.
The pressure he had expected never came.
Behind them, the sound of hooves stopped.
Not abruptly—
but as if something invisible had blocked them at the entrance.
Silence took its place.
A silence so deep it made the ears ache.
The skeletal warhorse stood there, unmoving.
It did not retreat. It did not advance.
Its bone hooves rested neatly on the ground, as if placed along some unseen line.
In the firelight, its head tilted slightly.
Its hollow eye sockets stared straight into the depths of the alley.
Only then did Wei slow down.
The pulling"line" snapped.
A belated pain stabbed behind his eye, like something had been torn away by force.
The pressure at his back vanished.
He couldn't explain it to Chun.
At the edge of life and death, he couldn't even tell himself
whether that had been guidance—
or a mistake made by his own body.
Life could hide inside death.
And life itself might be the deadliest place of all.
In the darkness, the skeletal warhorse scraped the ground with one hoof.
Once.
Again.
The third time was so light it was almost swallowed by the fire.
Then it stood still.
It did not pursue.
As if it had already seen enough.
"It won't enter the fire," Wei said quietly, more as a confirmation than a statement.
"At least… not right now."
Only then did Chun realize she had been holding her breath. She let it out, shaking.
Her legs were weak, but Wei still held her steady.
They didn't stop.
Behind them, the fire kept burning.
At the alley's entrance, the skeletal warhorse remained, its shadow stretched long by the flames—but it never crossed that invisible line.
They had followed that line.
Whether it was a way out—
No one could say.