“As expected… so this is it.” The System had braced for this shape of fate, yet the cruelty hit like venom sliding under ice.

She stared at two bodies, each gut punched open, scarlet holes gleaming while intestines dangled like torn ropes in a rainstorm.

Around them, the trash heaps looked like carrion altars, slick with blood pools and scattered organs, shadows crawling like rats under broken tin.

Fear rose from her toes like winter floodwater and punched straight into her skull, a cold hammer ringing in her ears.

She didn’t linger. Dread was a snapped bowstring; her feet answered first, leaving this nest of trouble once the needed truth was in hand.

Two guards dead inside Chronos City was no small ripple; under Moragus’s gaze, a misstep was a tiger’s den, and blame poured like bitter brew.

If she got branded just for rubbernecking, there’d be no place to cry, only iron bars and stone-cold night for company.

“The longer I stay inside my host’s mind,” she thought, “the story’s gears spin faster, like a river in flood.” Bad omen, dark clouds.

She reached the central square of the housing block, handed the northern general store its order, settled wages, then rushed for the east gate paperwork like a brushfire.

But plans withered in the wind; change was a dust storm that chewed them to rags.

By the time she reached the slum’s east gate with papers in hand, heavy troops sealed it tight, steel teeth biting shut.

Done for. The word dropped like a stone into a well, ripples chasing her ribs.

Her host had no shield at this hour. If a killer crossed paths, death would fall like an axe, no room to parry.

She burned to force her way in, but guards stacked like iron trees at the gate. After circling like a stray dog, she resorted to gossip.

“Hey, brother, sorry—why seal the slum gate all of a sudden?” she asked, voice light, heart tight as wire.

“Huh? You don’t even know?” The man’s look was odd, then eased into the casual chew of a bystander. “You must’ve missed it. Big scene.”

“Big how?” The System blinked. She’d been gone less than two hours. What storm could rise so fast?

“Someone from out of town,” he whispered, lips smacking like seeds in a husk, “robbed a palace treasure in front of Lord Moragus.”

“What? Robbed him to his face?” The words stumbled out, like pebbles slipping down a ravine. “He’s a final-boss type here. That’s suicide.”

“Exactly. Young blood with hot heads—thinking life’s long, offering their necks to a blade,” the man said, pleased with her shock like a spark catching straw.

“But how does swiping Moragus’s treasure shut the slum gates?” The System caught the seam, eyes narrowing like a knife-edge.

“Ah, that,” he said, pointing. “The guy ran that way. To stop him slipping out, the gates got sealed like jars in a cellar.”

“Can you believe it? Big as life, he leapt—whoosh—like a streak of lightning. Like Superman.”

“Yeah, sure. ‘Superman’,” the System muttered, sarcasm a dry leaf in her mouth.

“And funny thing,” the man added, brow wrinkling, “he claimed he was a former retainer of the Queen of Time. Asked folks to help.”

“What? He said he served the Queen of Time?” The System almost yelped, shock bursting like a firecracker, swallowed by the noisy street’s drum.

“Y-yeah… is that bad?” He flinched at Ningyi’s exaggerated reaction. “You know who this Queen of Time is?”

Silence fell in her chest like snow. This talk had to end; the air was a net, and she felt hooks.

If true, he knew the sealed legends Moragus buried. At least it meant he belonged to her era, a lantern in this fog.

Good sign. Maybe she could pry open the world’s backstory, find old stars in a new night.

And if he truly was the Queen of Time’s retainer, the stolen prize might be her prophecy, a thread leading through the labyrinth.

Decision struck like a bell. She thanked the man at the east gate, then slipped back to the northern market’s slum entrance, a shadow hugging walls.

The uproar elsewhere kept eyes busy; this passage was a blind stream under moonlight, unnoticed and open.

She slid in low, spine flat to brick, a cat in tall grass. The slum had flipped like a table since morning.

Shacks once sagging like patched sails now lay broken, walls pushed down by boots and anger. Blood streaked the alleys like rusted rain.

Familiar corners groaned with refugees, bodies curled, wounds flowering purple and red, voices leaking pain like slow smoke.

Those soldiers never saw human faces here, only scatter to be swept, dust to be trampled. The truth tasted like grit.

Her host, compared to them, felt too kind, a spring in a drought, soft where iron ruled.

At least Nana Toki never killed the innocent. That promise was a lantern she guarded close.

“I hope the hero from the Queen of Time’s prophecy arrives soon,” she prayed, “to cap this endless storm.” Her breath carried it like a reed in wind.

Guided by memory’s threads, she found their little hut, still standing like a stubborn stump in floodwater.

Empty, though. The room held only quiet, a hollow gourd rolling in her chest.

“Nana and Qi aren’t back yet?” It fit the routine—this hour was for treasure-hunting. Yet worry swarmed like gnats under her skin.

Chronos City’s guards didn’t bargain with kindness. A scrape could turn to cudgel blows, then to a red end under boots.

Bzz—! The sound knifed the air, sharp and sudden, an audio thunderbolt. The blast wind slapped the hut, beams squealing like bent reeds.

“What now?” The System felt her skull splitting, events falling like hailstones, sharp and relentless.

She ran, no patience, only direction. The source lay ahead, a drumbeat in the maze of alleys.

A wide square opened, once a playground for slum children, now ringed by silver-armored soldiers, steel a cold forest around prey.

“That’s him!” she breathed, weaving to the fringe like smoke. The noble youth from earlier stood ringed, a lone flame in a circle of ice.

Hours ago he’d moved with silk-smooth ease. Now his fine clothes hung in rags, skin scored with cuts like clawmarks in clay.

Behind him, she saw Nana Toki, and Qi crumpled on the ground, wounds blooming, breath ragged like torn paper.

Oh hell. The curse cracked in her throat like dry wood. She hadn’t planned for this collision, threads knotting into one noose.

If they couldn’t run today, the dirt would hold them all. The thought tasted like iron, heavy and bitter.

From the wall of bodies, a man stepped forward, tall as a spear, silver armor flashing like winter sun, a long lance in his grip.

His brows were sword-straight, his stance proud as a hawk on a cliff. Handsome, yet his eyes held contempt, a chill wind over frost.

“Shi Qianshi,” he said, voice a drum on stone, “I never thought I’d see you again, after all these years.” His gaze was a blade.

“Shi Guang… it’s you!” Shi Qianshi gasped from the ground, breath rough as gravel. Shock flickered, then clarity sharpened like a tempered edge.

His aura steadied; his voice shook like a river under ice. “Why… why are you on the side that invaded our homeland?”