The border between Chūn and Dzue had never been so clear.

On the one side, verdant hills, plush underfoot.

On the other, barren, scorched dirt.

A distinctive, unnatural line.

It was as if the Demon Realm had been transplanted into the Mortal Realm. He stepped into the dust and felt his skin begin to dry almost instantly. A hundred steps and his mouth was dry, two hundred and his eyes felt gritty and struggled to blink.

This couldn’t be anything other than a curse, surely. And this energy, this horribly familiar energy.

She’s dead.

He couldn’t even enter Ming Yuet. From the top of Dzak Hau, he looked down on the crumbled city, tongue so dry it was cracking in his mouth. Somewhere below him, Wong Tang slumbered. Did she know? Did the Heavenly Realm know?

Were Gong Ming Dzue and Gong Lau Yan just… gone?

Was… no-one going to do anything?

Was it just him, alone?

He closed his eyes.

Breathe. Breathe through the pain. You’re still here. This will pass.

You’ll see him again, soon.

*

‘Soon’ is relative.

Yuen Muk stared at the ash on his hands.

He had come to Chūn, over a decade ago now, settling down into the Still Heart temple that had been set up there. He was made the administrator of the place, slowly recovering his heart and his health until one day, the little Second Princess, Chūn Zéyi, marched into the temple grounds with an escort of guards and asked him if there was anything she could do.

Yuen Muk had looked at this small child with heavy-lidded grey eyes, soft eyebrows, and a permanent gentle pout, and thought she looked like Dzue Dziu Ming, but he was dead, along with his fragile Chūn bride, without any children, and this girl was the daughter of Chūn Shēnzhi and his newly instated royal wife.

There was no denying the Water energy that whispered and rippled below the surface of her skin. He smilingly handed her the book that Dzap Ming had written for her years ago.

"Would you like to learn how to help and protect people?" he asked, and she had answered in the affirmative without hesitation.

Chūn Zéyi grew into an accomplished and much-loved woman, never marrying, dedicating herself to serving the people. Yuen Muk's only regret was that, without the direct tutorage of Dzap Ming, her cultivation path was stuck at the cusp of the Third Dantian.

And then, the floods.

For months, for more than a year, rain fell of Chūn, flooding the country, rotting buildings, sweep away people.

A curse, they whispered. The demons are at it again.

Chūn Zéyi agreed to marry the crown prince of Zháng, with its high mountains and cliffs, to secure asylum for the people of Chūn.

This isn't right, Yuen Muk thought.

Chūn Zéyi was murdered on the day she was to leave for Zháng.

They say the demon who was responsible for the curse, screaming and spitting lies, arrived at the palace and killed her where she stood, before her horrified family.

Yuen Muk was not able to find out the truth. He returned from a fruitless trip to the palace, where everyone refused to speak to him, to find that the Still Heart Temple had been burnt to the ground.

Charred bodies lay in the broken rubble. His heart pounded.

Who had the power to burn a temple with a strong Water attribute?

No. She's dead, Yuen Muk.

Frantically, he gathered the ashes with his bare hands, scooping them into pouches. There were so many. Why were there so many? Hadn't anyone escaped?

When he finally trudged across the remains of the front gates, his eyes fell on some unfamiliar items.

Chains. Metal bars.

Someone had blocked the entrance, and the gentle monks and nuns of the temple had not been able to escape.

His body weighed down by the ashes of his Junior Siblings, he headed west in Zháng. There was no word of Zéyi here, only that the Crown Prince was disappointed to find she had been killed, and was looking for answers.

None came.

Is this what the Ng Dzeung had left for?

Dzue was dry and desolate, Chūn drowning under too much water. People kept dying. Everything was going wrong.

Was it time to leave? He meditated and walked and barely ate. Only one thought kept him going – the last disciple. Where was the last disciple?

The granite mountains of Zháng were like a fortress. Yuen Muk slowly built a new temple amongst their security, and placed his dead Junior Siblings into a crematory.

He did not know who was who. We was certain some boxes contained more than one person.
It was spring two years later when he felt that his new temple, and its new disciples, were safe enough for him to leave the temple for the first time since arriving in Zháng.

The first town he entered was a poor thing, once a prosperous farming town but now badly managed, the soil stripped of nutrient. Yuen Muk put his hand to the earth and was grateful to feel that there was still, just, some life left in it. Not like the soil in the demon realm, all those years ago.

A small hand tugged his sleeve. He turned to find a scrawny child, dressed mostly in rags, looking dolefully at him.

"H-Hello," the child said politely, and made a clumsy bow. Then they smiled. They had dark eyes like the night sky and, oddly, pale golden, almost silvery hair that shone despite the dirt that caked it. Vaguely, Yuen Muk wondered if Naksatar had returned after vanishing decades ago. Maybe he should go and ask.

Yuen Muk pulled a bun from his pouch and gave it to the urchin, who bowed politely again.
"Thank you."

Despite their obvious hunger, they ate the bun quietly.

Yuen Muk flagged a passing villager. "Where are this child's parents?"

She shrugged. "Haven't seen them in months. The mother wasn’t a local. Oh, she was from Zháng, obviously. Look at that child’s hair. Who else but a Zháng person could have hair that colour around here?" She looked at the child. "We've been giving that kid food every now and then, but most of us haven't even got enough for ourselves. Are you looking for disciples, Sir Cultivator? That child is polite and obedient, wouldn't be the worst choice."

Yuen Muk looked back at the child. They had finished the bun and was trying to surreptitiously lick sauce from their filthy fingers.

A little breeze stirred their silver-gold hair and made little eddies in the dust at their feet.

There was not a breath of wind to be felt elsewhere.

"This..."

"Weird, isn't it? Sometimes the breeze seems to follow them around. And... occasionally we've found that kid eating fruit out of season. A few other villagers almost beat them up when they couldn't say where the fruit had come from."

Yuen Muk nodded his thanks and let the woman go on her way. He turned back to the child.
"Little one, I'm a cultivator. It means I follow a path of martial arts, of healing, a way of life that makes me strong and allows me to help people. Would you like to join my school? There are other disciples there already who I am sure you will get along with. Most importantly, there will be food and a nice bed. Would you like to try it and see?"

The child nodded guilelessly. Yuen Muk drew a book from his robes, and handed it to the child. "Hold this for me?"

The child took the book obediently.

"What's your name?"

A shake of the head, almost apologetic. "What's your name, Sir Cultivator?"

"I'm known as Yuen Muk. And my school... it's Yuen Mei." He hadn’t used his Dzue name in a long time. These days, he was Yuan Mu.

"Nice to meet you, Sir Yuen." The child bowed a third time.

Do they think that Yuen is my family name? Yuen Muk wondered, amused. He looked at the child's shining hair.

"Sou Yuet. Yuen Sou Yuet¹鳶素月 (Yuen Sou Yuet) – 'Hawk/Kite', 'A bright and clear moon'.. I think that's a good name for you."

Sou Yuet's dark eyes glimmered wordlessly. Yuen Muk indicated with his head in the direction of the temple. "Let's go."

They were pottering up the road back to Yuen Mei when Yuen Muk remembered he had another bun. "Ah, Sou Yuet..."

He realised that the child had the book open. They obviously couldn't read, but they were easily tracing the flowing patterns of the diagrams in the book, showing the forms and movements of the Gales of Battle Practice. A little lightness came to Yuen Muk's heart.

So you were here, huh? He handed the bun to Sou Yuet.  "Sou Yuet, I'll have to teach you to read. I think you'll like that book."

Yuk Ying, maybe I will see you soon after all.