Noticing Dixue’s gaze, a girl stepped out of the trees like a shy deer slipping from shade into sun.

“Sister Dixue, why are you here…?”

She looked sweet, harmless as a lamb—light chestnut hair like tea in sunlight, a figure about the same as Breeze’s, standing slender as a young willow, a bud about to bloom.

But Dixue’s voice sharpened like frost against glass.

“Shao Rong! You’d even murder your own sister…?”

“Sister Dixue, what are you saying? I—I’m just gathering resources!”

“Gathering resources? You’re treating lives like weeds in a field.”

“Huh!? LittleSnow, is this girl the Fourth Princess?”

Yue Liuyi lifted her face, stunned. From any angle, the girl looked guileless; even her gestures held a timid flutter, nothing like the venomous princess they’d imagined.

“Mm! Little Yue, stay sharp. This one’s a master of masks and honeyed lies—don’t let that soft face lull you.”

Dixue stepped in front of Yue Liuyi like a snow-bright shield. Since the princess appeared, the crossbowmen had gone quiet, the wind listening for knives.

“Ah! Why speak of me like that, Sister Dixue? My tricks and disguises—didn’t I learn those from you?”

Shao Rong shook her head quickly, fear painted on like powder.

“Hmph… I never harmed people the way you do.”

“Sister! Why did you attack me? And… why did you do that to Sister Qinhui?”

Ji Wan snapped from her daze, orange eyes fixed on Shao Rong like twin embers.

“Huh? Isn’t that little Wan? Why are you here?”

Only now noticing Ji Wan, Shao Rong covered her mouth and hopped back, feigning surprise like a sparrow spooked by a branch.

“Huh…? Sister didn’t even notice me?”

“Mm! I never meant to hurt you, little Wan. I even sent squads to find you. Looks like orders got muddled, and we’ve had a little misunderstanding.”

“A mis—misunderstanding?”

“Yes. Come to me, little Wan. I’ll clear it all up…”

Ji Wan drifted a step forward, heart tugged like a leaf in current—

“Ji Wan, don’t go. She’ll hurt you.”

“Eh!?”

“That strike just now—she set it up long before.”

“Ugh!”

Only then did the orange-haired girl recall that punch, a blow with no mercy, like a hammer falling in a temple.

“Sister, you intend to attack me…?”

“Ah… so you saw through it?”

Shao Rong sighed, shedding the trembling facade. A “sweet” smile unfolded, honey over steel.

“Your fox tail finally shows.”

“Heh-heh. But the time… I’ve stalled enough. Compared to two years ago, Sister Dixue, you really have grown foolish.”

“Stalling…?”

“You’re already surrounded.”

Shao Rong clapped, delighted, and metal answered her like thunder in a canyon.

“What…?”

Yue Liuyi glanced back, stunned. Their retreat had been swallowed by a ring of copper golems, twin blades in each hand. Their bodies wore special copper skins, gleaming like sunlit coins; seventy or eighty stood in a tight forest of metal.

“Ehee! Sister Dixue—how’s this? I know you’ve got a World Tree Maiden who can petrify, but it’s useless here. Every golem carries anti-magic shields. Their rounded bodies make arrows and bullets glance off.”

“What!? We—we walked right into it! This is bad! Looks like… I can only cover Little Yue’s escape.”

Dixue clutched Yue Liuyi, despair on her face like rain over snow.

“You…”

“Help! Help!”

It should’ve been a grim moment, yet seeing Dixue’s theatrics… the regal Shao Rong suddenly slipped, losing composure like silk snagged on thorns.

The chestnut-haired girl raised a jade hairpin and shouted at Dixue, voice cutting like a cold blade.

“Dixue! You still bluff? These are built to crush you. They’re ricochet-proof and hit like a storm. This many will cut you all down!”

“So scary? Little Yue! It’s awful! I can’t cover your retreat!”

Dixue hugged Yue Liuyi like a parting at a ferry, so dramatic it made LittleSnow look almost mischievous. Yue Liuyi saw through it at once, calm as moonlight.

(She’s working a trick…)

“Lady Shao Rong! Look out!”

The Grand Arhat lunged in, forearm catching a black edge meant for Shao Rong—Xiang Xiaoyan’s cool silhouette flared behind Ji Wan like a flame in ink.

“Black Rose!? When—?”

“Hahaha! Shao Rong! I’ve wanted to cut you down for so long! Do you know how long I’ve waited for this day!?”

Xiang Xiaoyan smiled wickedly and swung her night-black blade.

Her black hair swayed as she turned, scattering like crow-feathers in wind. Blade and hair wove into a thousand dark strands; dressed head to toe in shadow, she was a flower blooming in the night—deadly and beautiful.

She looked like a jet-black Valkyrie, bringing a hunter’s kill-stroke down on the Fourth Princess.

“Mengyi, protect me—now!”

“Oh!”

Master Mengyi closed in on Xiaoyan. He fought barehanded, but the Grand Arhat’s body was metal-hard, fearless before steel.

His heavy punches hammered forward. Xiang Xiaoyan didn’t dare meet them with her blade; she slipped and wove away, silver like rain under lanterns.

“Annoying! Get out, you baldy!”

Xiaoyan seethed. The Grand Arhat’s power was an iron tide; she had to leave Shao Rong for now and tie up with him, shadows sparring with bronze.

“Damn, you almost got me hurt. Golems—go!”

Shao Rong flicked her hand, and copper golems surged in like a wave of shields.

Bright blades flashed in sun. Metal clanged like bells. The golems closed to strike the girls—

And then—

At a girl’s command, the vines scattered on the ground woke and writhed, serpents of root glowing red as if steeped in blood.

“What is that…?”

“It’s zombie blood, but it works.”

San Hua Zhi’s figure stepped from the dense woods, a kimonoed silhouette with a huge wine jar on her back. At her gesture, a red mist poured from the jar, thick as incense smoke, soaking the vines.

The vines ceased to be vines. Like the first time San Hua Zhi fought Dixue, every coil turned razor-sharp. Smooth copper meant nothing; the blood-fed vines wrapped tight and held fast, binding the golems till they couldn’t budge.

“Squeak-squeak-squeak!”

“Roooar~”

Little Monkey and Little Red Dragon arrived with the treefolk—countless Deadwood Wardens rose from the soil, arms like old roots, and smashed the bound golems against each other with heavy, wooden fury.

“Troops from the Forest Fortress? H—how could they reinforce this fast? This is near the Gold Fortress!”

Shao Rong clenched her sleeve, face cooling like water on slate. She hadn’t expected to collide with the Forest Fortress’s main force. What should’ve been a crushing ambush had become a pitched battle on open ground.

“Because we were stalling too.”

Dixue smiled and shook her head at Shao Rong, lazy as a cat in sunlight.

“Stalling… don’t tell me—you were bait from the start?”

At this distance, rescue should’ve been impossible. Unless their main force had already been lurking here…

Realization cut cold. The Fourth Princess’s heart iced over.

“Heh-heh, you finally caught up. Sieges are such a headache. It’s cleaner to wipe your main force out right here. Then the Gold Fortress falls into our hands.”

Dixue’s words shocked enemies and allies alike, fear and awe rippling like wind over grass.

“Huh!? LittleSnow, that was the plan?”

“Sister Dixue! Why didn’t you tell Zaocun earlier? I nearly died of fright!”

“I—we were… collecting resources, weren’t we…?”

“Heh-heh. I didn’t want to tip our hand. That little fox is too sly—if she didn’t see us truly under attack, she wouldn’t commit everything.”

Dixue lifted her chest proudly, happy in the warm shine of her friends’ admiration.

“D—damn you! I won’t let you have your way. Heavy crossbowmen, full volley! Guslei, open that!”

The crossbowmen knew the brink when they saw it. They fired at full force—royal guards as deadly as elite elven archers. Even with Cherry Blossom Butterfly Speech blurring sight, they found targets by sound and killed Deadwood Wardens cleanly.

Two bolts, and a warden fell like a rotted trunk.

“Huh? Guslei—Qinhui’s traitors are here too? Heh, perfect. One net.”

Dixue smiled. The crossbowmen were precise—but she was more precise. The silver-white girl drew and loosed; every arrow dropped a heavy crossbowman, denying counterfire like a winter gust.

On the other flank, things were rougher. Master Mengyi was a hall-ranked Arhat, terrifying up close; in straight brawls, warriors counter assassins like iron counters silk.

“Trash Dixue, are you done? Come help!”

Xiang Xiaoyan was furious, pressed hard and bristling. She’d never been this cornered, black hair tossing like storm-scattered ravens.

“How do you call someone trash while asking for help?”

“If I weren’t your ambush, you’d be dead already! Trash! Trash! Big trash!”

“Uu! I planned this perfectly—don’t call me trash!”

“I will! Trash! Liuyi’s trash too!”

“Uu! You dare call Little Yue trash? I’m mad now!”

“Dixue trash! Liuyi trash! You’re both big trash!”

Whenever Xiaoyan’s hair turned black, her brain seemed to shed a few petals—and somehow that dullness halo always dragged Dixue into its orbit.

The silver-haired girl still shot to ease Xiaoyan’s pressure, but the two bickered like children under fireworks.

“Good timing!”

Shao Rong seized the moment and signaled Guslei to open their last card—

A pitch-black coffin, swaddled in chain after chain, heavy as night and cold as a river stone.

It was the Fourth Princess’s final trump. She hadn’t wanted to use it… but the tide had rolled to the cliff’s edge.

She couldn’t lose. She absolutely couldn’t let Dixue and Ji Wan leave.

“…”

The chains came away. A girl with chalk-pale skin and bone-white hair emerged from the coffin like winter pulled from earth.

Her eyes were red—the red of blood itself. It was as if the color of capillaries bled through her irises; no spark of life lit those pupils, only the gloom of a frozen dawn.

Yue Liuyi noticed that even while they lifted her from the coffin, the girl’s body stayed stiff as a statue, all stone, no softness, as if carved rather than born.

From the curve of her mouth to the glassy pupils to the cold bridge of her nose, she was a still lake—no ripple of feeling.

Even cradled by Shao Rong, she didn’t turn her gaze; her eyes were a dead moon that refused to drift.

“Is she even human...?” The words fell like dry leaves in late wind.

A chill stirred in Yue Liuyi; this girl dragged her mind back to Breeze, like a winter reed bending to old frost.

Back in the Lost City, Breeze carried the same winter‑quiet weight, a hush like snow on ruins.

Shock pricked Yue Liuyi; what truly startled her was Breeze’s reaction, a sudden spark in still water.

“This is...” Breeze’s voice snagged like silk on thorns.

Seeing the white‑haired girl, Breeze’s eyes widened like lanterns; her ice‑still face finally cracked, emotion thawing through like early spring.

“Go to hell, all of you!” His words spat sparks like flint. “A World Tree Maiden—big deal! You think only you have one? I’ve got mine too!”

Shao Rong hugged the white‑haired girl like a puppet; his hands twisted toward her throat, a wolf’s snap at a brittle twig.