Qin Ming's heart surged. The "wild path" they'd told him would never work — had it finally opened?
He came back from the wasteland with fire in his blood. The winter air felt warm. He kicked the stone mill in his yard and it jumped off the ground.
He leaped — huge air — and scooped snow off the roof edge.
When he exhaled, a white jet shot out like a spear trailing fog, cracking the air.
He moved through forms, churning the yard snow into the sky until it was snowing again in his own courtyard. One arm swept sideways and every flake in front of him shattered.
His body ran hot. Silver threads wove through his pores, pulling out sweat — purifying. A faint glow covered him.
Rare. Even during New Life, this was rare.
He trained hard. When exhaustion finally came, he stopped.
New Life was a process. He could feel it — the change moving through him. Soon.
He sat in the yard and let the snow fall on him. No cold touched him now. This was nothing like the aftermath of his sickness, when he'd huddled under thick quilts on a heated bed and still frozen.
He closed his eyes. In his mind, he ran through the high-difficulty forms, training the consciousness itself.
The silver ripples came back. His breathing shifted — complex, patternless.
Mind leads intent. Intent moves breath. The glow on his skin brightened.
The yard went still. Snow covered him like a second skin.
He emptied his mind. No thought, no wanting.
When the silver light finally faded, he opened his eyes. He could feel it — vigorous new force, breeding deep in his body.
He lifted the two-hundred-jin millstone, held it, set it down gently.
"Two days," he told himself. "Maybe less."
Then hunger hit like a hammer.
He boiled mushroom soup. Walnuts, almonds, chestnuts for the main meal. Dried red dates and hawthorn for side dishes. He ate until the food was gone.
He rested. Then trained again. Moving like a released bow, cracking like thunder, snow swirling. Vitality building.
He ate when hungry, slept when tired, trained when recovered. From Shallow Night into Deep Night, his body pulsed with life.
Before bed, he washed in ice-water. No cold. His body was lean, muscle hard, lines clean. Wet black hair dripped in the sunstone light. His skin gleamed. He looked like a weapon.
He slept deep and dreamless. New Life consumed him even in sleep.
---
Morning. He ate seven meals.
The secondary development demanded fuel. But even good food got tedious by the seventh serving, and his stores were thinning.
"Am I a bottomless pit?" He stared at the nearly empty sack. "Three days. That's all it lasted."
He couldn't stop the exercises. Still as a mountain, striking like a hawk. Silver light growing.
He walked to the millstone and tried to lift both stones — top and bottom together. He heaved. They left the ground.
Lu Ze walked through the gate and froze.
"Xiao Qin...?"
His jaw hung loose. Yesterday he'd pitied Qin Ming for wasting the golden window. Today the boy was lifting a combined millstone.
Liang Wanqing came through from the next yard and went blank.
"Same as Er Bingzi," Lu Ze said. "New Life, and he can lift four hundred jin already."
"Golden-age New Life," Liang Wanqing breathed. "First in Twin Tree Village. In... how many years?"
"Uncle's the best!" Wen Rui bounced, eyes bright.
"The change isn't finished," Qin Ming said. "Still going."
Liang Wanqing stared. "In this region, golden-age New Life tops out at five hundred jin after stabilization. Xiao Qin — you wouldn't be hitting that..."
"The bright city," Lu Ze said. "They say there are boys there who can lift six hundred."
---
Noise from the street. Liang Wanqing went to check and came back, face drawn.
"Granny Zhou is dying."
Qin Ming had seen her two days ago — thin, bloodless, shaking at her gate. She'd looked wrong.
"What happened?"
"She's been eating almost nothing. Her body was weak to begin with."
They went to the Zhou house. Her son, Zhou Changyu, had gone out hunting weeks ago and come back empty-handed with a shattered arm. This winter, every family was short. With the breadwinner broken, Granny Zhou had been quietly saving her own rations — giving most to her son and grandchildren, eating just enough to stay alive.
She'd told no one. Today they found her stores — a few ground yams, hard flatbread, hidden in a bamboo basket under the snow. The nuts Qin Ming had given her sat untouched in a corner.
She'd starved herself to feed her family.
Zhou Changyu, thirty and thick-shouldered, knelt by her body, weeping, slapping his own face, calling himself worthless. His wife knelt beside him, wailing.
Qin Ming stood there a long time. Two days ago, she'd pushed dried yam strips into his hand — her secret rations. For him.
He went home, filled a sack with five pounds of nuts, and brought it back.
"Brother Qin—" Zhou Changyu tried to refuse.
Qin Ming put it in his hands and left.
Late into the night, the weeping from the Zhou house carried through the dark.
Qin Ming sat alone in his black yard. Others had family to mourn with. He had fading faces he couldn't hold in memory — half-glimpsed figures from a childhood he couldn't quite reach. He was afraid of the day they vanished entirely.
He looked up at a sky that showed him nothing. Loneliness pressed down like a stone.
---
Then the air changed.
Something vast and oppressive swept over him. Every muscle in his body locked.
In the impenetrable blackness above, two golden lanterns appeared. Bright. Alien. Terrifying.
Wind exploded from nothing. Snow ripped off the ground. The roof of his house shook like it would tear free.
The golden lanterns crossed the sky — eyes. Something enormous, wings spread wide enough to blot whatever was above, was passing over Twin Tree Village. The wind was its wake.
Then it was gone. The storm died as fast as it had come.
Villagers spilled into the street. The old ones recognized the phenomenon — a high-tier creature in transit. It would not stop. They told the young not to fear.
Qin Ming sat back down and stared at the dark sky for a long time.
The Endless Night covered everything, cut every road to the wider world. He wanted to see what was out there.
He stood up and trained — the old forms, the ones he remembered best from childhood.
His body pulsed with new force. Faint light-mist rose from his skin.
Hunger came again — sharper than before. He ate every nut he had left. It wasn't enough. When he thought of the red squirrel or Yang Yongqing's black goat, his mouth watered.
His body was sending a message. It needed meat.
"I'm going back into the mountain at Shallow Night."
He'd given the Zhou family five pounds. His own stores were thin. And the New Life wasn't finished.