The wind in the western desert did not sound like the wind in Chang'an. It was a high, thin whistle that carried the scent of "parched mineral and ancient rot." Prince Zhao rode at the front of his fifty-man unit, his hand steady on the reins of his black stallion. They were three days into the Gobi, following the path Omar the merchant had described. The sun was a white disk in a dusty sky, but the horizon was beginning to turn a strange, shimmering color. It looked like a wall of liquid silver moving across the sand.
"Halt!" Zhao commanded. His voice carried the "invincible" authority of a general. "Shields up! This is not a common sandstorm."
As the storm hit, Zhao realized that the "silver" was not sand. It was millions of tiny, crystalline spores that reflected the sunlight. They moved with a "supernatural power," swirling around the soldiers and seeking any patch of exposed skin. The air became a "life-and-death crisis" as the silver dust began to drink the moisture from the horses' breath. Zhao pulled his cloak tight, his obsidian eyes narrowing. He could feel the "Qi deviation" in his blood reacting to the silver storm. It was as if the spores were calling to the "beast" inside him, trying to force a "rough and unnatural" transformation.
"Keep your mouths covered!" Zhao shouted through the roar of the wind. "These are the desert spores Li Mei warned us about. They are alive!"
Meanwhile, back in the Imperial Medical Bureau, Li Mei was conducting her own "heart-pounding mystery" investigation. She held the purple silk ribbon she had found under the merchant's pillow. Her "Golden Finger" of scent was her primary tool. She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, "analyzing" the layers of fragrance on the silk.
There was the lavender and arsenic of the Empress Dowager, but beneath those, she detected a "distinctive" third scent. It was the smell of Xuan ink mixed with crushed pine-soot and a specific type of anti-mold herb used only by the Chief Clerk of the Medical Bureau.
"The traitor is not in the palace cells," Mei whispered to the empty room. "The traitor is in this very building."
Mei walked toward the archives where the Chief Clerk, a man named Master Han, managed the imperial medical records. Han was a recurring character known for his "timidity and precision." He was the last person anyone would suspect of "kingdom building" for a fallen Empress. Mei's nostrils flared as she approached his desk. The scent of the pine-soot ink was overwhelming, perfectly matching the ribbon.
"Master Han," Mei said, her voice filled with "rationality and responsibility." "I found something of yours in the quarantine camp. A purple ribbon."
Han's hand froze over the scroll he was writing. He did not look up, but Mei smelled a sudden spike of "cold copper"—the scent of fear. He was an "infuriating" antagonist who had hidden in plain sight, using his position to feed information to the Empress's remaining "military units."
"The Lady Alchemist has a very dangerous nose," Han rasped. He finally looked up, and Mei saw that his eyes were clouded with the same gray dust as the merchants. "But the 'Puppet Master' told me you would find me eventually. She said the 'Scent-Tracking Alchemist' is the only true threat to the new order."
Han reached into his desk and pulled out a small clay sphere. Before Mei could reach for her silver needles, he smashed the sphere on the floor. A cloud of concentrated "silver spores" erupted in the room, a "time-limited crisis" designed to kill her instantly.
"If the Prince dies in the desert, and you die in this office, the Tang will finally fall," Han laughed, his voice turning into a dry rattle as the spores consumed him as well.
Mei held her breath, her hand flying to the jade wolf-head pendant Zhao had given her. The jade began to glow with a soft, protective light, acting as a "cheat" to repel the gray dust. She realized the "background" of this plot was deeper than she thought; the spores were not just a sickness, they were a "supernatural force" being used as a tactical weapon.
The chapter ended with Zhao battling a silver-furred wraith that emerged from the sandstorm, while Mei stood trapped in a cloud of lethal dust, her looming crisis just beginning.