Christmas slid by like a sled over ice. Within days came New Year’s Day, and the calendar clicked into 2022.

Sometimes Yekase hammered out new gadgets, sparks leaping like fireflies. Sometimes Ling Yi hauled her shopping, like a kite tugged by wind. Sometimes she saddled up Luciferin and picked a fight with some eyesore organization, like thunder rolling over tin roofs. Her days felt packed, like sticky rice pressed tight in a bamboo steamer.

Still, urgency chased her like a drumbeat on her back. No grand reason, just this: her mom’s move to Twin Towers City loomed like a dark cloud. Each day, she could almost see it inch closer.

Anxiety crawled like ants. “What do I do?”

Water rang like glass beads as Liu RuoYuan washed dishes. Impatient, she said, “How would I know? Just tell her. She won’t kill you.”

Fear pricked like nettles. “What if she kicks me out? Wang Zhewei turned into a girl and her parents disowned her. If I can’t turn back, then what?”

Liu snorted like a carp. “You worked a few years and bought a floating island. You outshine the whole village combined; Mom will burst with joy, not anger. What are you even scared of?”

“Yeah, but still...”

Uneasy like a cat in rain, Yekase rolled back and forth on the floor.

“Are you getting more and more like a cat? Scared of Mom’s scolding, yet posing cute like a kitten?”

“I don’t mean to,” she sagged spread-eagle, like a starfish. “It’s reflex. Probably leftover from two days as a cat. Druids are terrifying.”

“Oh, badass, there’s an after-effect like that?” Liu didn’t buy it; her thumb skimmed a tablet like a dragonfly.

“Why would I lie to you?”

“Go outside more. Meet humans. It might nudge you back toward normal, a bit.”

“Makes sense.”

Games felt stale like lukewarm tea, and boredom spread like fog. So she decided to wander somewhere she hadn’t visited lately. Right—check on Xiaoyuan and her controller.

She came up to street level, mounted her e-scooter, and buzzed toward Henan Road like a bee.

Summit Net Café was as lively as a night market. More than half the screens glowed, aquariums of color where players fought. They seemed to be hosting a tournament, not Kengan, something else, like drums under neon.

A couple days ago, in the round of sixteen, Xiaoyuan sent Yu Yunxiu packing. Right after, she ran into Chubu Risa and got lifted by the seven-unit Nightstar Machine-God King. Now she was back in her two-person suite.

Yekase gave her name and asked to queue for a visit. The admin said Xiaoyuan had left orders: if it’s Yekase, let her straight in.

“Lucky me? Are we close already?”

Thinking that nonsense, Yekase still rang the bell and pushed in.

Xiaoyuan had her legs on the desk, casual as a cat on a sill. She held the infamous e-waste, MS—Mintendo Slash—and chewed a plastic straw to shreds.

“You’re here. Sit,” she mumbled, then spat the straw onto the desk like a dart. A dozen twisted straws already lay there like dead worms.

Yekase set the cola at the screen’s corner, careful like placing a teacup. She sat on the other end of the sofa. “Afternoon. Nothing urgent, just came to hang out.”

“Good. Hey—what the hell, why does that even—what the hell—”

“—you can buffer that throw? What the—”

Her voice cut off like a string snapped. She straightened from her sofa nest, breath held like a diving seal. After a few seconds, she deflated and flopped back like a punctured ball. She tossed the MS onto the table.

“Fuck this trash game. I’m done.”

Her swears never change, do they, Yekase thought, wry as bitter tea. She picked up the MS and, sure enough, saw the opponent’s victory screen.

Xiaoyuan turned to a PC game and used the controller Yekase had built. Casual as rain, she asked, “Haven’t seen you in months. You ascend?”

“Ascend what?”

“Body tempering, flight, breakthrough, advancement—same mountain, many paths. Pick the term you like.”

“Oh. Then yeah. Last month I toured Europe; monsters in Labyrinth City took me as kin.”

“You hit Silver City?”

“Helped the city lord fix a mecha.”

“Oh.”

When she wasn’t recounting her own bright exploits, Xiaoyuan’s mood stayed flat as a lake. It wasn’t cold or stern, just lazy, like sun-warm stone. Yekase still remembered her glow while talking about that Gold Bricks caper in the States.

Socially anxious, a champion slacker, thin-skinned as rice paper. At the peak of Mind Energy fusion and immortal, yet chased by regular grunts with typewriters. Then she turned around and beat Yu Yunxiu bloody in the arena. Yekase couldn’t pin this woman down, like catching smoke.

She weighed Sandryon and Labyrinth City, who felt similar tier. It struck her that Longlifers all carried a crack or three, like porcelain with fine lines. Forget the two who walked out of Western fantasy; even Xiaoyuan, a seventy-year-old granny, was... delicate. The worry for her own future rose like mist.

“So you’re here for business?”

“Uh, no. No particular goal.” She stretched her legs like a cat and added, “Wrong stairs. That path goes straight to the main quest.”

“We’ll take a side path first. Got any good loot?”

“Looks like a phoenix feather.”

Watching Xiaoyuan claim the item, Yekase saw her mix it with frog saliva on the spot. She brewed a potent health potion, steam curling like pale vines.

“By the way, you’re in Eternal Green Pages. That makes you an alchemist too, right?”

“Mm-hmm?”

“Do you know Greenfield?”

“What about that little old man from Faena?”

“They’re fine. Just rebooted recently; I helped them through a newbie tutorial. No—what I mean is their school. That loop where they got a statue in Soville.”

Lips pressed, Xiaoyuan stared at the screen, memory rustling like leaves. After a while, she said slowly, “I know of it.”

“And…?”

“That’s about it. My Alchemy might be worse than yours.”

You call that an alchemist?! Yekase choked on the words like a fishbone.

Unbothered, Xiaoyuan smiled and muttered, “You even dug up Greenfield...”

What did that mean? A chill crept in like a draft. Was she going to silence a witness? Yekase swallowed hard.

“Fine. There’s a private dinner tonight. Come with me.”

“Huh?”

“Plenty of people you know will be there.”

“Wait, why, all of a sudden—?”

“When the Crystal Witch took citizenship, they placed her at the old Southwestern United University. She taught a Mysticism elective for a year, like a lantern in fog. Her class became Huaxia’s first alchemists. With the newborn Infinite Power industry, they shored up ruinous infrastructure like ants raising a hill.”

Truly a foreign suit over a Huaxia backbone, Teacher Sandryon. But what did that have to do with dinner?

“You’re wondering what that has to do with dinner. Honestly, not much.”

“Thanks for the nothing-burger...”

The harmless joke cut the turbulence in Yekase’s chest like a fan. “Alright. If you’re buying, I’ve no reason to refuse. Who’s attending?”

“You’ll see when we get there. Time’s about up. We roll.”

She tapped the log-off key with her toe and turned. She fished a tote and a crumpled coat from the sofa-wall gap. Seeing the monitor go dark, she drew her foot back. She slid on slippers under the desk and heaved herself upright with an “oof.”

“So you pick your plus-one five seconds before takeoff? Do you have no friends?”

Silence stretched like gum.

“Where’s the dinner—”

Yekase changed the subject quickly, and Xiaoyuan’s raised brow slowly settled. No friends, yet don’t mention it; what a temper, she thought, like stepping on eggs.

They left the suite. Xiaoyuan told the admin to hang the [Xiaoyuan Not Home] sign at the register. They walked into the underground garage and rolled out a battered electric tricycle.

“If you don’t mind, I’ve got a motorcycle,” Yekase offered, like a life raft.

Expression unchanged, Xiaoyuan keyed the ignition. “You think this is a battered e-trike? It’s a Mind Energy trike.”

“Mind Energy engines are dime a dozen, though.”

“Red Flag brand. Fifty years old. Its brothers and sisters worked in co-ops, hauling rice or hogs.”

“And this one?”

“It hauled corn.”

Enough, she thought; I can’t endure your cold jokes. Now you’ll—

She finished the threat in her head and climbed into the rear frame like a penitent. Technically there was no seat; she perched on the side iron.

Xiaoyuan’s Mind Energy flowed endless as a spring, and she fed the engine without mercy. The trike roared with motorcycle swagger, horn blaring like geese, and bullied down the car lanes. Several times Yekase nearly flew out like loose luggage. She gave up side-sitting, ended half-kneeling in the bed, gripping the frame with both hands.

“We’re here.”

Her voice was the calmest thing on that ride, a sip of water in fire. Salvation brushed Yekase’s ears in those two words. If a life were this trike ride, Xiaoyuan was the trike goddess guiding sufferers to heaven. Sure, the trike was hers, and the suffering was her driving. But certain monotheistic gods do eat both ends like that, right on brand.

Yekase lifted her head from the trike and saw a very European building. It resembled the Shangyin City Alchemy Association from days ago, just smaller, without gaudy LED tubes.

“Who even holds a dinner in a place like this?”

Xiaoyuan still wouldn’t say. Yekase trailed her inside. They walked a marble-bright corridor that mirrored their steps like water. They slid open a side door and saw—

Sandryon lay in Labyrinth City’s arms, her head pillowed between two snow-white headlights. They were nearly head-sized, and her hair sank into the light like snow. She forked a slice of red dragon fruit from a platter and fed it over her own head into Labyrinth City’s mouth.

In the surf pool, Aurora floated supine like a corpse, turning slowly with the eddy.

“They say red dragon fruit makes your poop pink,” Sandryon said.

Chewing, Labyrinth City answered, “No need. A little spell can do that.”

“Tell your people to develop fewer spells like that. It’s disgraceful.”

Yekase took in the three of them, a tableau like a fever dream. And she knew she’d come to the right place today.