In central Sanda, a dim, unremarkable carriage held a motley of passengers, like mismatched chess pieces under a swaying lamp.

It wasn’t just gender or race. Humans, the Nacha Tribe, and an Elf sat together, like reeds crowding one riverbank.

Their ages stretched wide, from a human youth bright as spring grass to a Nacha elder weathered like autumn bark.

Their moods scattered like leaves in wind. The youngest human hummed a carefree tune, his crossed leg bobbing with the carriage’s sway.

The eldest Nacha elder hunched in the corner, wringing his wrinkled hands like cold birds, unease rustling through him.

“You… where are you taking me? Let me out, now! Panie! Panie, where are you?” His voice splintered like dry wood.

He yelled, eyes bulging like copper bells, yet fear pinned him in place like frost on grass.

He refused to blink, jumpy as a cat in thunder. Blood threaded his yellowed sclera like cracked river ice.

The human youth sighed, the sound soft as steam, then lowered his leg, letting calm settle like dust.

“Hey, old man, not this again. We’ve told you a dozen times. You just point the way and name a face.”

“No, no, no. You’re in it with that unfilial girl! You want to harm me, don’t you?” His words flew like stones.

The youth exhaled long, a tired wind through reeds. Others only shook their heads or rolled their eyes like dim stars.

“Kabos, shut it. It’s pointless,” said Hos, his gaze turning away like a cloud drifting past a peak.

Kabos sighed, the breath sinking like dusk. The same talk had played on loop like a creaking mill wheel.

At first, everyone tried to soothe him, voices gentle as rain. Minutes later, he forgot, minds fraying like old rope.

Kabos lay back again, giving up his small, worn kindness like a lantern snuffed in a storm.

Then the Elf—who hadn’t joined these past two days—spoke, her voice still as a moonlit pond.

“Pengpeng—she’s not ‘unfilial’,” Mira said, each word a clean blade of ice.

“Gaaah?” He squealed, the cry sharp as a startled bird.

He’d dodged the Elf’s eyes since the day she nearly strangled his pet, that shadow clinging like soot.

When the Stimulant Elixir’s edge faded, his courage drained like tidewater, leaving mud-flat fear behind.

She spoke, and he pressed to the wall, trembling like a leaf, afraid the next breath would be his last.

“You—don’t come closer!” His hands rose like a feeble fence, panic fluttering in them like moths.

Mira didn’t move. Her gaze rested on him like winter moonlight until his head bowed and his mind cracked like thin ice.

“Am I going to die here?” he muttered, voice wandering like fog.

“You won’t die,” she said, calm as a mountain stream, eyes steady like stars. “I promised Pengpeng to keep you safe.”

“Safe until you return to her side, whole,” she added, the promise firm as a tied knot.

“Pro…tect?” His hands loosened a little, like frost melting from a fence post.

“Before we left, she knelt and begged us to guard you,” Mira said, her tone lifting like a hawk on thermals.

“For that, she’d do anything, say yes to anything,” she went on, the words ringing like iron.

“But you turned from the Moon Goddess Isylia’s teaching, like a walker straying at night.”

“You chased a moment’s thrill and drank that forbidden brew, like fire to dry straw,” she said, heat in her voice.

“It’s not her who should pay that price. Yet she knelt, setting aside pride for you, like silk laid on stone.”

“Do you understand? She isn’t the ‘unfilial daughter’ you spit at, but a lantern held against your storm.”

“She… for me…?” His gaze went hollow, like a house emptied of candles.

Mira finally looked away, her breath easing like evening. “I hope you see you owe her an apology.”

The carriage fell quiet, silence pooling like deep water. Faces shifted, surprise pricking like dew.

They all knew Mira almost never lectured. Varie’s lips curled wickedly, a spark like foxfire.

Tela elbowed her, a sharp tap like a pebble on glass, then pointed at the elder, sunk in thought like a rooted stump.

Varie swallowed the joke, the tease fading like mist, and left the air unbroken.

Calm settled again, soft as snowfall. Unlike before, the elder kept his head down, thinking like a millstone turning slow.

When they reached the destination—his old home—the elder lifted his eyes, clear now like rinsed stone.

“If I can go back and see her again, I’ll apologize,” Kabos said, voice steady as a set jaw.

“Thank you for waking this old fool,” he added, bowing his head like bending grain. “Elf lady.”

Varie choked on a laugh, the sound muffled like a hand over a bell. Mira ignored it, her gaze gentler, like dawn.

“You’ll see her again,” she said, a promise bright as a lantern. “I guarantee it.”

“I hope so,” he murmured, hope thin as spring green. “Either way, what’s next is my duty as a man of the Nacha Tribe.”

He offered a Nacha farewell, his hand to his chest like a shield. They answered in kind, fists to hearts like stars to night.

May the Moon Goddess’ favor fall on you, the gesture said, blessing soft as silver rain.

The journey had been far from pleasant, rough as ruts in clay. Yet they found a shared ground like stone set in mortar.

The elder smiled, a small sun in winter, and walked toward his old home like a man returning to a hearth.

That was where the Medicine Peddler last appeared, dropping elixirs like seeds at a door.

The plan was simple, clear as chalk marks. Every six months, the Medicine Peddler came, punctual as a turning season.

He handed over months’ worth of Stimulant Elixir in one bundle, like a sheaf of bitter herbs.

By the last date, the window was near again, ticking close like a cicada’s pulse.

Pengpeng’s foster father once resisted taking her in, worried he’d miss that delivery window, like a fisherman watching tides.

Fate turned, a wheel in dust. Kabos stood in his old home again and would meet the Medicine Peddler once more.

This time, the target wasn’t the Stimulant Elixir, but the Medicine Peddler himself, a shadow they meant to net.

Varie and Mira would lie in wait near the house, hidden like cats in grass, eyes on every path.

They’d watch any approach, sift for suspicion like gold from silt, and seize the one spreading illicit elixirs.