The air reeked of iron and smoke. Everywhere Yue Rin looked, there were broken bodies and scattered gear, soaked dark and slick against the dirt.
Agonizing screams tore through the air, and the mountainside looked like hell spilled open. A cultivator was torn in two by a giant bear, jagged rocks jutting from its back like a living ridge. Another was swallowed whole by a snake. Yue Rin could even see him struggling inside its stretched belly before he went still.
The killing intent in the air crushed down on her chest. Her legs went boneless, and she dropped to the ground, palms scraping stone.
"I can't feel my legs… I can't…"
"Senior! Senior, save me!"
"Don't push, you idiot!"
She was on a different part of the mountain, and Han Suyien wasn't by her side.
Yue Rin tried to push herself up. Tried to crawl. Her body barely obeyed. Then the bear's eyes locked onto her.
It lumbered closer, drool swinging in thick strings from its mouth, mixed with blood that wasn't its own. The stench hit her like a fist, sour and hot. Between its teeth, she saw scraps of cloth and something pale that might've been bone.
Yue Rin stared as it approached. Her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. When it opened its mouth, she gagged and heaved.
"Help… help me…"
Her plea vanished under the uproar. No one even looked her way. They barely had time to save themselves.
The bear lunged.
Its jaws snapped shut.
On nothing.
It blinked, confused, head swinging as it searched. Yue Rin was gone.
More flashes of light burst nearby as new cultivators stumbled into the open. It forgot her instantly and threw itself into the fresh prey, almost irritated by how loud they screamed.
* * * *
Cui Zheng caught Yue Rin under one arm as his flying sword shot upward, wind snapping her sleeves. She trembled hard enough that her teeth clicked. When he swept his senses over her, he felt no Qi at all.
Cold wind slapped Yue Rin's face until her senses crawled back into place. She realized she was in the air, held like baggage, the ground dropping away beneath them.
Her head jerked toward the person carrying her, expecting a certain person.
Instead, an older man stood on a flying sword, his expression composed and distant. The brief pity in his gaze made Yue Rin's skin prickle, and her guard rose.
"You must be Yue Rin."
"How… How do you know my name?"
"Don't misunderstand. I'm Cui Zheng, manager of the Rogue Alliance Pavilion. A-Ling asked me to find you."
"A-Ling?" The name loosened her wariness a little.
A sudden scream rose from below. Yue Rin looked down and saw cultivators being smashed by a huge ape and she recognized it immediately.
"Elder Cui Zheng, what is happening?"
"The mountain has turned into a killing ground, and Dawning Vale isn't any better."
"Dawning Vale is in danger?" Yue Rin repeated, and the words barely left her mouth before a deep explosion rolled through the air.
It came from the valley.
Her stomach dropped. Even from here, she could see the kingdom burning. Smoke climbed into the winter sky. Whole blocks buckled and collapsed as figures flashed above the capital, trading strikes that tore through rooftops like paper. Every missed blow turned into another wave of ruin.
Yue Rin's fingers dug into her sleeve. "We need to go save A-Ling!"
Cui Zheng just shook his head. "A-Ling and her mother had already reached Lianhua Kingdom. They're safe. That's where we're going too."
He angled his sword east and Yue Rin fell silent.
She wanted to ask him to turn back. To search for Han Suyien. For Qin Xueyi. For the others. But her mouth wouldn't shape the words. Han Suyien had talismans and hidden tricks. Qin Xueyi probably also had similar things. And the three male cultivators… she'd already repaid what she could by pushing Han Suyien to take them along.
Besides, something told Yue Rin this man would ignore her request even if she said it out loud.
They flew closer to the to mountain base until Yue Rin could make out the north gate. The streets below boiled with bodies. People climbed over each other, shoving and clawing toward the gate like drowning men fighting for air. Someone fell, and the crowd stamped right over them.
A single red shoe lay in the mud, trampled flat, its owner nowhere in sight. A woman screamed for her child until her voice broke. A cart overturned, spilling sacks into the street, and hands snatched at it like starving animals.
Above them, another burst of power cracked the air. Stone rained down. Dust swallowed whole alleys.
Some people gave up. They dropped to their knees in the street, faces blank, as if waiting for the sky to finish them.
Yue Rin saw herself in them. That hollow helplessness. The way dread narrowed the world down to one thought: please, someone save me.
She swallowed hard and scanned the streets. "Where are the city guards? Shouldn't they be restoring order at a moment like this?"
Cui Zheng let out a cold snort. "The royal family fled long ago with them. Even using them to 'clear' anyone standing in front of their carriages."
Heat rushed up Yue Rin's neck. Her eyes stung, and her hands curled into fists, nails biting into her palms. The royals had run, and now they were letting the city burn while cultivators fought overhead like the lives below were nothing but ants.
But she was powerless. Mortal. Even if she screamed until her throat tore, she couldn't stop any of it.
So she forced herself to look away from the streets and collapsing buildings. Her stomach twisted, not from fear this time, but from the helpless fury of it.
Then something clicked in her mind.
She was weak, yes.
But wasn't there someone strong right beside her?
Yue Rin drew a breath and turned to Cui Zheng, carefully smoothing her voice, making it as polite as she can manage. "Esteemed Elder, may I ask you for a favor?"
"No." Cui Zheng answered instantly.
Yue Rin stiffened, then tried again, softer, the desperation in her voice cutting at her pride. "If you help me with just this one thing… A-Ling will owe you a favor!"
That finally made him glance at her.
His expression didn't change much, but his silence did.
"What is it?" His tone made it sound like he was bracing for something unreasonable.
Yue Rin apologized to A-Ling in her heart and promised to make it up for her later. "It's this..."
After she explained her request, Cui Zheng stared at her for a long breath before he rubbed his chin. "So that's what you're asking, A-Ling's judgment truly isn't poor."
With that, he shifted his sword and angled it down toward the capital, diving into the smoke and screaming streets below.