The town they ended up in had no name that mattered.
It lay at the ragged edge of Fog Valley's influence, where the swamp stench thinned and the horizon opened into low, broken hills. Caravan roads crossed here like old scars. Wagons rattled in and out under sun-bleached banners, bringing salt bricks and spirit grain, iron spearheads and odds and ends scavenged from the Southern Wilderness' dead tribes.
The people here had seen many things. Slave caravans. Shaman warriors. Wandering martial artists whose temper was sharper than their blades.
But when Ren's aura brushed over the town walls, every spine inside the crude wooden palisade went rigid.
It was only a touch—no more than a ripple of pressure, a weightless glance of his Dao. Yet to ordinary mortals, it felt like something vast and ancient had opened its eyes and looked down for a heartbeat.
Men unloading sacks froze.
A boy dropped a basket of medicinal roots.
A pair of mercenaries halfway through an argument went silent at the same time, hands hovering near hilts before they even realized they'd moved.
Then, just as quickly, the pressure vanished.
The town exhaled.
On the wall, the guards exchanged looks. No one said a word. This was the Southern Wilderness. Sometimes, things passed by that you really did not want to draw the attention of.
Down at the gate, the captain bowed as low as his old waist allowed when Ren, Na Yi, and Na Shui walked through.
"Honored… guests," he managed.
Ren smiled as if nothing was strange.
He wore travel-worn black, nothing overtly luxurious—no huge clan crest, no ostentatious jade crown—yet the eyes of the guards slid away from his face as though afraid they would see something there they were not meant to see.
"Afternoon," he said casually. "We just need a place to sleep that doesn't smell like rot."
The captain swallowed and nodded repeatedly. "Yes. Yes, of course."
...
The inn here was better.
Actual stone foundations. Walls that didn't lean when the wind blew. Paper windows patched neatly instead of with whatever rags were on hand. The air carried the smells of oil and spice instead of blood and mold. From the open kitchen door came the hiss of something frying and the reassuring crackle of a proper fire.
Most importantly, there were no human bones in the corners.
Ren paid for the best suite with a casual handful of gold taels.
To the innkeeper, it was enough to buy half his establishment twice over.
The man's hands shook as he accepted the payment. He bowed again and again, his back nearly folding in half.
"Honored sir, if there is anything—anything at all—you require…"
"Clean sheets," Ren said, amused. "Hot water. Decent food."
...
The suite on the second floor was simple but clean.
Solid beams, swept floorboards. A low table with an oil lamp. Two beds wide enough for two people each, with thick quilts that smelled faintly of sun instead of damp. A narrow window looked out over the town's central street, where merchants were still packing up their stalls.
Ren closed the door behind them.
The moment the latch clicked, the fragile composure Na Yi and Na Shui had been holding onto since the swamp simply… crumbled.
They didn't fling themselves dramatically onto the beds. They didn't wail.
They just sat down on the floor, backs to the far wall, knees drawn up, swords laid carefully within arm's reach by habit. Na Yi's fingers were white where they gripped her sheath. Na Shui's shoulders had gone tight, as if she were bracing for a blow that never came.
For a while, the only sounds were the muted noise from the street below and the faint creak of wood as the inn breathed.
Then Na Shui spoke.
"…I still hear them," she said, voice raw.
Ren didn't move from where he stood near the window.
"I know," he answered quietly.
Na Shui stared down at her hands.
"The day the Fire Worm banners appeared," she went on, words tumbling out now that the first had been forced through her clenched throat, "the sky was red. Not like sunset. Like blood. They beat the drums and sang. We thought… we thought maybe they would just pass by."
Her laugh cracked like dry bark.
"They didn't."
Na Yi closed her eyes.
Na Shui's voice scraped on, hoarse and uneven. She talked about hiding under broken beams with Na Yi's hand crushing hers, splinters digging into her arms as she tried not to scream when another body was dragged past. About the smell of smoke and fat, about the sound of bones breaking, about the way Chi Guda had laughed.
About their mother's last cry.
About their father falling in front of the shattered stone idol of the Sorcerer, staff broken, blood soaking the altar.
Na Yi listened with her jaw clenched, then picked up the thread when Na Shui's words ran out.
She spoke of cold years after that—of slave markets under scorching suns and freezing rains; of the way men's eyes crawled over their witch tattoos; of the bargains she'd made with strangers to keep Na Shui alive just one more day. She spoke of the Faith of the Sorcerer, carried under her skin even when she had nothing else left—of the way each humiliating bow, each forced smile, had been fed to the altar in her heart as fuel for a single, unending vow: revenge.
They didn't censor anything.
They didn't need to.
Ren listened.
He didn't interrupt. He didn't tell them it was all right—because it wasn't. He didn't offer clumsy consolation about time healing wounds or fate having some grand design.
Sometimes his hand would move.
When Na Shui's voice grew so hoarse it was just air, he passed her a cup of water. When the night wind slipped under the window frame and made them shiver, he pulled an extra blanket from the bed and draped it over their shoulders. When Na Yi's composure cracked for a heartbeat and her hand trembled too hard to hold the cup, his fingers brushed hers just long enough to steady them.
Small things.
When Na Shui's voice finally broke altogether and she buried her face against her knees, shoulders shaking, Ren reached over without a word and pulled her sideways until her head rested against his thigh.
She stiffened.
Then, slowly, she sagged, fingers knotting in his robe.
Na Yi watched, throat tight.
Ren opened his other arm slightly.
"If you keep sitting over there," he said quietly, "you're going to make the wall feel more loved than you are."
Her lips trembled despite herself.
She moved.
She ended up with her shoulder against his chest, her head near his collarbone, the steady beat of his heart under her ear. His arm settled around her shoulders in a way that felt… inevitable. Natural, not forced, like a place she'd been meant to lean all along but had never dared.
They cried again.
Not like earlier in the camp—no ragged screams torn out against a backdrop of blood. This was quieter. Deeper. The kind of tears that came when a weight long carried finally loosened enough to be truly felt.
Ren held them.
He didn't offer grand vows out loud there and then; his Dao Heart made them silently instead. He had seen worlds crumble, sects annihilated, emperors fall. He knew this flavor of grief.
He also knew that, for them, this had to be the last time that grief belonged to helpless prey.
He held them until Na Shui's grip on his sleeve loosened.
Until Na Yi's fingers, which had clenched in his shirt at some point, slowly relaxed.
Only when their breathing smoothed, long and even, did he adjust his posture, easing them into a more comfortable position without waking them.
He shifted his back against the wall, let his legs stretch out, and tucked both sisters in closer. One on each side: Na Shui curled half across his lap, cheek pillowed on his thigh; Na Yi nestled against his side, her head on his shoulder, their hands still tangled in his clothes like they feared he might vanish if they let go.
His cloak, smelling faintly of pine smoke and travel, lay over them like a blanket.
"Sleep," he murmured, voice no more than a breath against their hair. "I'll stay."
They did.
...
Morning light filtered through the paper window, soft and clean.
Na Yi woke first.
For a moment, she didn't remember where she was.
She just felt warmth.
Warmth at her back, under her cheek, wrapped around her shoulders. Her nose was filled with the faint scent of smoke and something cool and sharp beneath it—like pine on the wind in early winter. Her body was heavier than usual, not with exhaustion, but with something she had almost forgotten existed: rest.
Then memory clicked into place.
She opened her eyes.
Ren was leaning against the wall near the window, legs stretched out, as if he'd simply taken root there in the night. Na Shui lay sprawled half across his lap, breathing quietly, her cheek still on his thigh. Na Yi herself was tucked against his side, head resting on his shoulder.
His cloak had slipped a little in the night; he'd pulled it up again, covering both of them.
He was awake.
He looked down as he felt her stir. His smile came easily, warm as the morning sun sliding over the rooftops.
"Morning," he said.
Na Yi's throat tightened.
This time, she didn't hide it.
"…Morning," she answered softly.
Na Shui surfaced from sleep like someone swimming up from deep water. She blinked, rubbed her eyes with balled fists, then froze when she realized exactly what her pillow was.
"Ren…?" she murmured.
"Still me," he said. "Still here."
She stared up at him for a heartbeat.
Then, much to her own horror, her eyes filled.
"Y-you… stayed," she said, as if he might not have noticed.
Ren's brows rose slightly, as though the idea he wouldn't had never occurred to him.
"Of course I stayed," he said, sounding mildly offended by the implication. "You think I'd drop you in some new town and wander off right after you killed your demon?"
He tilted his head, lips quirking.
"That'd be pretty lousy boyfriend material."
Na Shui's brain stalled.
"B-boy…?" she squeaked.
Na Yi's heart skipped.
Ren's smile crooked, eyes amused.
"Too early to call it that?" he mused aloud. "Maybe."
He straightened slightly, rolling his shoulders, the easy motion making it seem as if sitting upright all night with two people draped over him had been nothing at all.
"How's the heart?" he asked more quietly.
Na Yi took stock.
There was an ache, yes—something hollow and unfamiliar where pure hatred had once been packed so tightly it had felt like a second spine. It hurt. But it was a clean pain, like a bone that had been set straight after too long being crooked.
"It… hurts," she admitted. "But not in the same way."
Na Shui nodded vigorously, wiping at her eyes with the heel of her palm, angry at her own tears. "It's like… a heavy stone is gone," she said haltingly. "And now everything else is… loud."
Ren's eyes softened.
"That's normal," he said. "You carried that stone for years. Your shoulders don't know what to do without it yet."
He clapped his hands together once, lightly, the sharp sound cutting through the last tangle of sleep and sorrow.
"Which is why," he said, "we're going to spend today teaching them something else to carry."
Na Shui tilted her head, puzzled.
"…Like what?" she asked.
He grinned.
"Smiles."
....
He kept his word.
They did not train that day.
They did not dissect cultivation methods or argue about circulation paths. They did not plan tribal-level strategies around fire altars and supply lines.
They went for a walk.
Ren took them through the town's market streets, where life rolled on heedless of distant swamps and cannibal tribes. Vendors shouted over one another, hawking dried beast meat, spirit grain, cheap talismans carved with crooked characters, bone charms, and pottery. Children darted between stalls, laughing. A mangy dog dozed under a cart. The air was thick with the smell of spice, grilled skewers, and dust.
Na Shui and Na Yi had seen markets before—but always from the position of those watched, those weighed, those whose wrists might be suddenly grabbed.
This time, eyes glanced over them and moved on.
It took them a while to believe it.
Na Shui flinched the first time someone shouted nearby. Muscles tense, she nearly reached for her sword before she caught herself.
Ren's hand brushed lightly against her own. A ripple of his true essence wrapped around both sisters like an invisible cloak, gently dulling the edge of the world's noise.
"Easy," he said, quiet enough that only they could hear. "No one here can touch you unless I let them. And I don't feel like letting anyone."
Na Shui's shoulders eased.
Na Yi's gaze swept the street, sharp and assessing. Each time her eyes landed on a potential threat—a burly mercenary with too much scar tissue and too little restraint, a shaman with suspicious tattoos—she found those people unconsciously taking a step back, brows furrowing, as if they had walked too close to a cliff's edge without realizing it.
Ren didn't even look at them.
He just walked, hands in his sleeves, expression relaxed.
The first time he stopped was at a stall selling hair ornaments.
They were simple pieces: wooden pins and combs carved into flowers and feathers, a few with inlaid bone that had aspirations of being jade. Underneath the dust, Na Shui saw the faint echo of festivals from a life before fire and screams.
Her hand hovered over a pin carved in the shape of a flower. The petals had been shaped with surprising care, each line neat even if the material was cheap.
Before her fingers could touch it, she snatched her hand back, guilt flashing across her face. Wanting something as frivolous as a hair ornament felt… wrong.
Ren's hand didn't hesitate.
He picked up the pin.
"How much?" he asked the stall owner.
The man looked him up and down—then quickly down and away, as if meeting his eyes had burned.
He named a price that made Na Shui's breath catch.
Ren paid without haggling.
"W-wait, you don't need to—!" Na Shui stammered, flustered.
He ignored her protests.
"Come here," he said.
He stepped close enough that she could feel the warmth of him, the wild but controlled strength coiled just under his skin. His fingers moved through her hair with careful precision, lifting the dark strands, twisting them up, securing the wooden flower in place.
"There," he said, stepping back to look.
Morning light caught on the simple ornament, turning it into something quietly lovely.
"Now everyone can see what I already did."
Na Shui made another overloaded, strangled noise and immediately tried to hide her face again.
Na Yi watched, lips pressing together around a smile she couldn't quite suppress. Her chest felt… complicated. Warm and sore and strangely light.
Later, at a weapon stall, Na Yi picked up a spare knife.
The blade was nothing special—mass-produced for hunters and caravan guards—but its balance was decent, the steel free of obvious flaws. She tested it with a few quick movements, wrist flicking just so. The knife hummed through the air, leaving a faint whisper where it cut.
Na Yi made a quiet, approving sound before she realized she'd done it.
Ren noticed.
He didn't say anything.
He simply paid for it. Then he paid for a better one the merchant had hidden at the back, and a small whetstone with a fine, even grain.
Na Yi lifted a brow at the growing pile.
"You intend to equip an army?" she asked dryly.
"If you're going to keep stabbing the world," he said, straight-faced, "you might as well do it with something worthy of you."
She shook her head, but the knife stayed at her belt.
They ate street food, sitting on low stools and the edge of barrels like any other travelers.
Na Shui tried something skewered and coated in a bright red sauce. Her eyes widened as the spice hit her tongue.
This time, when tears sprang to her eyes, it was from heat and unexpected joy.
"It's so good," she mumbled around a mouthful, cheeks puffed, refusing to spit it out even as she fanned her mouth.
Na Yi sniffed at her own portion with suspicion.
"It's too oily," she declared.
Ren hummed, biting into his.
"Is it?" he asked.
She sniffed again.
Then took a bite.
By the time she finished, there was no trace of the skewers left but the sticks.
They watched a small troupe perform a crude play in the town square—a rough story about a brave warrior, a foolish shaman, and a witch who pretended to be helpless until the last moment.
The actor playing the shaman overacted so hard that his skull staff nearly flew out of his hands every other line. The warrior flexed too much. The witch's lines were awful, but there was something fierce in the way the girl delivering them squared her shoulders.
Na Shui snorted and muttered under her breath every time the "foolish shaman" tried to summon spirit fire and only produced smoke.
Na Yi's comments were sharper, aimed at the structure of the story itself, at how easily people accepted tales where the witch was a prize instead of a person.
Ren laughed with them, not at them, adding the occasional remark that somehow made the bad play bearable.
Every time a shadow crossed their faces—when a smell from a cooking stall was too close to the reek of the swamp, when a loud shout echoed like a cannibal's roar—Ren was simply there. A hand brushing theirs. A low joke. A casual "Hey, look at that," as he pointed out some ridiculous sight—a dog chasing its own tail, a merchant arguing with a goose.
He didn't push them to forget.
He just stayed, steady as a mountain, until the shadows passed.
By the time the sun began to sink, turning the town's dust into gold, their smiles came a little easier.
...
Evening wrapped the town like warm water.
From the common room below came the muffled buzz of conversation and clatter of bowls. In their suite, lamp-light painted the walls in soft amber. Outside the window, the sky was a deepening blue, streaked with the last red of dusk. Somewhere far off, a dog barked.
Na Yi and Na Shui sat side by side on one of the beds, shoulders touching, their swords resting against the wall within easy reach. Their new clothes, bought in a fit of practicality that afternoon, had already creased from a long day, but neither seemed to care.
Ren stood by the window for a moment, watching the last light fade over the low hills.
His reflection in the glass looked relaxed. But as he turned back to them, something beneath that easy expression sharpened.
"Na Yi," he said.
"Ren?" she answered, straightening instinctively.
"Na Shui."
"H-hm?" Na Shui blinked.
He crossed the room with unhurried steps and stopped just in front of them.
Up close, they could see the tiny lines at the corners of his eyes—the faint traces of worry and laughter both. The impression he gave was that of a young man in his prime, yet there was an oldness in his gaze, a heaviness that didn't come from years alone.
He looked at them steadily.
"No contracts," he said quietly. "No slave seals. You already chose to walk my road in the swamp. You trusted me with your lives in the pagoda. You followed me to burn your demon to ash."
Na Shui's hands clenched in her lap.
Na Yi held his gaze without looking away.
"In return," he went on, voice gentling, "I promised you revenge, strength, a road that doesn't end in some Fire Worm cooking pot."
The corners of his mouth twitched in a humorless echo of a smile.
"But there's something else I want."
Na Shui made a faint choking sound in her throat.
Na Yi's pulse picked up.
"…Our witch techniques?" Na Yi asked, keeping her tone dry to hide the way her heart had started beating harder.
He smiled faintly.
"I'm already learning the skeleton of those," he said. "I don't need to steal the flesh."
"Then our faith?" Na Yi pressed. "You intend to become a god of the Na Tribe?"
"I'm not a god," he said. "And I have no interest in kneeling on an altar while people throw incense at me."
His gaze slid over them, warm and clear.
"Our bodies, then—" Na Yi began, pushing.
He let the words hang for a heartbeat, watching Na Shui's ears turn steadily redder, then chuckled under his breath.
"Those are included in what I'm about to say," he admitted, candid as ever. "But they're not all of it."
He sat down on the edge of the bed, close enough that they only had to lean a little to touch, but he didn't assume that right. His hands rested loosely on his knees.
"What I want," he said plainly, "is you. Not as tools. Not as tokens of some Divine Kingdom I patched up. As my women. As people whose paths I'll keep building as long as I'm breathing."
Na Shui's breath hitched.
"Y-you… want…" she stammered.
Na Yi's cheeks flushed, but her eyes were very clear.
"You say that so casually," she murmured.
He shrugged, utterly without shame.
"My Dao Heart doesn't like lying to people I care about," he said. "I could dance around it. Flirt for months. Pretend I'm just being friendly. But you're witches of the Sorcerer. You've walked through life and death. You don't need games."
He leaned back a little, giving them space even as his words drew them in.
"I'm not a simple man," he continued. "I have other women. Other… entanglements. I won't pretend I'm some pure-hearted youth who'll hold your hand and only yours."
Na Shui swallowed hard.
Na Yi's fingers twisted in the quilt.
"But," he added, and the word landed like a stone in a basin, "when I say 'mine,' it's not a collar. It's a promise. I don't scatter that word for fun. If you take my hand as my women, I'll carve out the heavens for you until the sky changes color. I'll stand between you and anything that tries to drag you back down. And I'll expect you to walk beside me, not behind."
His voice dropped.
"I like you," he said simply. "Both of you. Your stubbornness, your anger, your faith, the way you get back up no matter how many times the swamp knocks you down. I want to see how far you can go if someone stops trying to eat you and starts giving you the tools to eat the world instead."
Silence fell.
Na Shui's heart hammered so hard it hurt.
"Elder Sister…" she whispered.
Na Yi closed her eyes.
Behind her lids flashed blood and fire. Her father falling before the Sorcerer's broken altar. Her mother's last look. The lamps in the slave caravans. The cold nights curling around Na Shui so the girl would not freeze.
Ren's hand extended in the swamp.
His back in the pagoda, cutting through levels that had devoured generations of witches. The way he had looked at Chi Guda, not as an unreachable monster, but as a problem to be solved—and then solved it.
His warmth as she'd cried over that butcher's corpse.
When she opened her eyes, they were wet, but steady.
"Ren," she said slowly. "You are arrogant."
"Frequently," he agreed without missing a beat.
"You are dangerous."
"I try."
"You walk roads we cannot yet see."
"That's kind of the point."
Her lips trembled.
"But you have never lied to us," she said. "Not once."
He met her gaze head-on.
"I don't intend to start," he said.
Na Yi's hand lifted.
It shook once.
Then it settled on his.
Her grip was firm.
"Then," she said quietly, "we will walk this road as your women. As Na Tribe's witches." Her lips curved in a faint, fierce smile. "Let us see what kind of sky you can really reach."
Na Shui sucked in a breath.
Her own hand slapped down on top of theirs a heartbeat later, fingers curling tight enough to hurt.
"Me too," she blurted. "I… I already decided back in the swamp. You kept us alive, you made us strong, you let us kill that bastard with our own hands. If that isn't worth gambling my heart on, I don't know what is."
Ren's smile changed.
It warmed from the inside out, like embers catching and flaring into quiet flame.
His fingers turned, wrapping around theirs.
"Good," he said softly.
Then, because he was very much himself, he tugged.
Na Yi stumbled forward with a startled breath.
Na Shui yelped.
He caught them both easily, one arm slipping around Na Yi's waist, the other settling over Na Shui's shoulders, pulling them into his chest. The movement was smooth, unhurried—the kind that said he had imagined doing this but had not allowed himself the indulgence until now.
Na Yi's breath brushed against his neck.
Na Shui's face pressed into his shoulder, hot through his robe.
For an instant, all three of them froze.
Then Na Yi tilted her head up.
Her eyes met his at close range.
"Do not regret this," she whispered.
He chuckled low in his throat.
"Not in my nature," he said.
He bent his head.
Their lips met.
It wasn't a chaste brush, as if he were afraid she'd vanish; nor was it a devouring claim that tried to replace the world in one breath.
It was deep and unhurried.
A kiss that said he had time. That he intended to be here tomorrow, and the day after, and all the countless days when this would no longer feel like a miracle but like something woven into the fabric of their lives. Na Yi's fingers clenched in his shirt, then slowly relaxed as she leaned in, letting herself fall without calculating where she would land.
When he finally drew back, her cheeks were flushed, eyes slightly unfocused, her usual sharp tongue occupied with remembering how to speak.
Na Shui stared, stunned.
Ren turned his head toward her.
"Your turn," he murmured, teasing.
Na Shui made a sound that was half squeak, half strangled groan.
"I—I—!"
He didn't push.
He just waited.
His eyes were warm, patient, utterly unmocking.
After a heartbeat that felt like falling from the top of the Sorcerer Pagoda, Na Shui screwed her eyes shut, surged up onto her knees, grabbed his collar with both hands, and pressed her lips to his in a clumsy, earnest kiss.
He almost laughed into her mouth at the sheer force of her courage—but he didn't.
He kissed her back instead, gentling the angle, giving her something to follow. Letting her taste not only heat, but steadiness. An unspoken promise that he would not treat this as a joke, that her offering was received with the weight it deserved.
When they parted, she immediately hid her face in his chest, ears blazing crimson.
"You're impossible," she muttered, voice muffled.
"I've heard that before," he said, amused.
He held them both for a while, content.
One hand stroked Na Shui's hair where the wooden flower pin rested, thumb brushing the cheap wood as if it were rare jade. The other traced slow, soothing circles at the small of Na Yi's back, grounding her each time her thoughts tried to scatter.
In that small, warm room above an ordinary inn in a nameless town, with the world outside unaware, the tapestry of his Dao gained two more threads.
...
Later, when they could sit upright without immediately melting, Ren let the next weight drop.
"Now that we've settled that," he said, tone light but eyes intent, "let's talk about your tribe."
Na Yi's expression sobered.
Na Shui sniffed, wiping the last streaks of dampness from her face, but her gaze sharpened as well.
Ren leaned back slightly, hooking an arm around each of them as if that recent decision was already a fact the world would just have to get used to.
"Right now, in the Southern Wilderness," he said, "Na Tribe is a story people tell."
He looked past them for a moment, seeing far beyond the inn's walls.
"A cautionary tale," he went on. "Sorcerer believers eaten by cannibals. A ruined temple. A destroyed Sorcerer Pagoda whose key was lost. Two surviving witches that everyone assumes died along the way."
His smile turned sharp.
"I don't like that ending."
He looked back at them.
"In the future," he said softly, "when people hear 'Na Tribe,' I want their first thought to be, 'Those witches who carved their way from the swamp to the sky.' I want your name spoken in the same breath as the great sects' geniuses. I want young martial artists arguing in the night about which Na witch's Dao fits them better, trying not to wet themselves if you walk by while they're doing it."
Na Shui's eyes widened, pupils sparkling.
Na Yi's lips parted, her breath catching.
"That is…" she began.
"Too much?" he asked, genuinely curious.
"Terrifying," she finished.
Na Shui's hands clenched in excitement. "Amazing," she said at the same time.
Ren laughed.
"There we go," he said. "That expression right there. Get used to it. Because I wasn't joking."
He lifted one hand, fingers tracing idle patterns in the air that only they could feel—roads unfolding, pressures shifting, the faint echo of a rune-wheel of Fire Martial Intent turning high above them, compressing all flames within its domain.
"We'll rebuild your Holy Land properly," he said. "Tune the Sorcerer Pagoda so it doesn't just chew up promising witches and spit out corpses. Create a new generation of Na witches who can step into the wider world without being devoured."
His eyes cooled.
"And before we do any of that," he added, voice dropping to a low, dangerous hum, "we erase Fire Worm. Completely."
Na Yi's gaze sharpened like a blade drawn from its sheath.
"Chi Guda is dead," she said evenly. "But their tribe still stands."
"Not for long," Ren said.
He leaned back, his aura sinking for a moment into the deeps.
"There's a Shaman sitting on their flame," he went on. "Chi Yue. He's the kind of man who thinks a stolen earthcore flame and a pile of bones give him the right to look down on the world."
Ren's lips curled.
"We're going to take his fire. Crush his pride. Turn his tribe into a line in history that ends with a period, not an ellipsis."
Na Shui's fingers dug into his sleeve.
"Crush… Chi Yue," she repeated, savoring the words like a spice on her tongue.
Images rose in her mind unbidden: that man's indifferent face as he approved a list of names for sacrifice, the way Fire Worm warriors had whispered "Shaman Leader" with reverence.
To see that same name broken in her mouth was… satisfying.
Ren's smile turned slow and cruel.
"After that," he said, his tone sliding back toward easy warmth, "we can talk about traveling north, meeting other sects, stealing their geniuses for your tribe. Maybe making some old masters cough up their treasured manuals when they realize Na witches aren't backwater relics anymore."
Na Yi exhaled, a faint thread of laughter in it.
"You speak such nonsense," she said quietly.
"Thank you," he replied, utterly sincere.
She almost choked again.
Na Shui leaned against him, her smile bright and fierce, nothing of the haunted slave girl left in the line of her back.
"Then… let's do it," she said. "Let's make Na Tribe a name the world can't ignore."
Ren looked at them.
At the witch whose calm eyes now burned with purpose. At the younger sister whose honest heart had chosen him without hesitation. At the two threads of fate that had braided themselves into his road almost without him noticing.
His Dao Heart settled a little more.
"Good," he said.
He squeezed their shoulders, fingers warm and firm.
"First the swamp," he murmured. "Then the world."