The bandits had set up camp in a half-collapsed shrine near the edge of the river cliffs. Smoke from a fire pit curled into the sky. Qingsai crept through the underbrush, heart pounding.
He could see them clearly now—five men, two laughing drunkenly, one sharpening a blade. The last two girls, barely conscious, were tied inside a shattered offering hut.
Qingsai's hands trembled.
He had no sword. No training. No plan.
But something in his chest… burned.
> "Protect them."
"You've done this before."
"Flame remembers."
He waited until one of the guards walked toward the trees to relieve himself. Then—he struck. A thrown rock to the head. The man dropped.
Qingsai sprinted forward, ducked behind a cart, and reached the girls. He started cutting their ropes with a broken blade he'd stolen from the unconscious bandit.
But he was seen.
"Oi! Who the hell—!?"
The shout came too late. The girls were free. "Run!" he whispered, shoving them toward the forest.
The bandits drew weapons.
Qingsai stood between them and the fleeing girls, chest heaving, blade shaking in his hand.
"Just leave," he said. "I don't want to fight."
The leader sneered. "You? Fight us?"
They advanced.
Then—it happened.
The world tilted. Time slowed.
Qingsai's breath stopped.
Inside his mind, a door opened. Behind it, flame. Memory. Lives.
> "Do not fear the fire. Become it."
His hand ignited in blue flame.