By the next day, the town clinic swelled like a hive, air sour as medicine, faces gray as ash and bodies slumped like wilted reeds. No one died from last night’s food, but they all looked half-dead. At least Ouyang’s claim held true—they’d remember that taste for the rest of their lives, like a scar carved into tongue and mind.
When suspicion hovered over Ouyang like a storm cloud, he tugged Xian out by the sleeve, like pulling a hidden card from a sleeve of silk.
“If you don’t believe me, ask your sister. I was playing with her last night,” he said, voice casual as a breeze. “Where’s the motive to commit a crime?”
Xi’s gaze slid to Xian. The little girl hugged a huge plush doll, its fabric like a moonlit mountain masking her face. She answered in a small, leaf-brittle voice, “Big brother stayed and played with me…”
Doubt still coiled in Xi’s chest like a snake in tall grass. But he had an alibi, and she had no blade to cut through it. What Xi didn’t see: under the plush veil, Xian’s twin pupils were black as inkstones, and a crooked smile rippled over her lips like oil on water.
Ouyang rinsed off suspicion like dust in rain. Leticia, though, bore the brunt like a lone pine in winter wind. For some reason, she gathered all blame into her arms, like collecting thorns with bare hands. In truth, a word about that night would have pointed Xi straight to Ouyang, and dragging him out to face her would have cleared the fog.
What baffled Ouyang like mist around a lantern was that Leticia admitted it was all her doing.
More baffling still, the crowd swallowed that leaky story like pigeons pecking at scattered grain. They didn’t torment Leticia much; they only drove her out, stripping her of her job with the Glachidor Clan, like pulling a shawl off a shivering back.
“Feels strange, doesn’t it?” Xi said later, in a wide courtyard where shadows fell like bamboo bars.
Seeing confusion cloud Ouyang’s face, she covered her mouth and laughed, a quick chime like glass in wind, as if his troubles were stars she enjoyed counting. The smile fell away. Her tone turned grave, like a bell at dusk.
“In Ancient Memory Town, the Dika family doesn’t have a good name,” she said, eyes drifting to the distance like kites losing string. “It’s not about character. It’s about a legend.” She sighed, breath thin as mist. “They say that family carries demon blood. Sometimes they lose control and do strange things. Leticia’s father, ten years ago, killed her mother at home with a pair of scissors.”
Her voice dimmed, like a candle in a draft. “Afterward he was devastated. He said a demon’s whisper brushed his ear, and then his body moved like a puppet. He went mad. And the old folks say her grandfather once lit a lot of houses on fire, night blazing like a second sunrise.”
“You wonder why the town didn’t drive them out,” she continued, words steady as stones in a stream. “Two hundred years ago, the townsfolk did band together with torches raised like a forest of spears.”
“But a Pope of the Light Church happened to pass through. He said, demon blood runs in their veins, and this town has a peculiar power that suppresses it. Drive them out, and demons might ride them into our world like wolves through an open gate.”
“So the Dikas stayed. They caused trouble like thorns snagging cloth, but no one actually died, so people tolerated them. Besides, in recent years the family has withered—dead or missing—like a tree losing branches to winter.”
“When it got to Leticia, only three of them were left. Now her mother’s dead by her father’s hand. Her father went mad and vanished like smoke. For more than a decade, Leticia behaved like any ordinary child, so our household let her help with small tasks. But in the end, she still couldn’t escape the demon’s curse.”
Ouyang blinked, thoughts clicking like beads.
Demons? Those recluses of the Abyss, buried like stones at the ocean floor. In his mind, they were so low-key they’d almost blurred from history’s ink. Records said that in the Third Era, the seven Demon Lords clashed with the seven Watchers. The demons lost. Six Lords fell. Only one remained—Demon Lord Safix, the lone helm of the Abyss.
That war drove the demons into shadow like wolves slinking to their dens. But now, it felt like their footprints were fresh again in damp soil.
He still didn’t understand why the girl shouldered everything alone. Was it some quiet wish to break herself like a teacup dropped on purpose?
Guilt pricked him, a thorn under the nail. She was alone, a stray candle in wind, lucky to find work—and he’d snuffed it out. From now on, the town would give her winter eyes, cold and hard.
No parents, no kin, no income—how would she live, leaf-thin against a coming frost?
“A deep sense of guilt,” Ouyang muttered, guilt pooling like ink. He looked like he was reflecting, clouds gathering over a pond. “But then again, she’s alone. If she took her own life and rejoined her family, wouldn’t that be better?” The words fell like stones, ripples dark and cruel.
He kept spiraling, thoughts chasing their tails like dogs in dust.
That was when Xi snapped him out of it, her question like a pebble skipping across a river.
“You call yourself a Demon King. You should know demons. Is there a way to purge the demon blood in Leticia? It feels like fate is too unfair to her.”
Worry bled through her voice like rain through paper. She truly feared for Leticia.
“Seriously? Don’t kid me.” Ouyang gave her a glare sharp as a knife edge. “You want a Demon King to sabotage a demon’s scheme? You sure you’re not that naïve?” He sniffed. “Besides, my strength…”
He stopped mid-sentence, as if a bird had flown into his thought. After a beat, his face turned solemn, like a judge behind a heavy desk. “It’s doable. Mere demons? Back then we hammered them to the Abyss’s bottom, made them turtle up. We can do it again.”
He thumped his chest, confidence flaring like a torch. To him, it looked as easy as eating and drinking.
“Only thing is, I’m too weak now,” he added, tone cooling like iron in water. “If you help unseal a few layers, I might handle it. As I am, I can’t.”
He’d wanted to pull a stunt on the airship, to force Xi to break seals so he could “save” it. That plan sank like a stone, and his grand unsealing scheme got shelved like a dusty scroll.
Now the opportunity lay bright as a ripe fruit. It all hinged on Xi’s resolve.
As expected, the word “seals” made Xi bristle, hackles up like a cat. She hadn’t forgotten what he’d done—the walls of Terracafe still wept in memory. And that night, he almost “destroyed” the world. She’d fainted, yes, but fear leaves a scent that doesn’t wash off.
“Take your time,” Ouyang said, voice mild as tea. “By the way, every seal you undo shaves your life like a blade taking curls off wood. When the last one’s gone, you’ll die. Truly die. You’ll vanish from everyone’s memory and from the river of time. It’ll be as if you never existed, like a footprint licked clean by the tide.”
“I wouldn’t be dumb enough to undo the last seal,” she snapped, eyes flashing like steel.
“Who knows.” He smiled and walked out of the courtyard, pace unhurried as drifting clouds. He knew this couldn’t be rushed. But the ending, he could already taste it, like rain before it falls.
Outside the gate, cherry-pink petals wheeled in the air like slow snow. Everything looked sweet and unreal, a picture painted with soft light. He followed a cobblestone path, each step a click on old bones, and avoided the crowds like a fox skirting traps. He headed for the outskirts.
He sat by the riverbank, letting the water’s music write its score on the air, watching dandelions lift like tiny suns on the wind.
Far off, he saw someone searching along the bank, a lone figure bent like a reed. The river ran silver between them, but he still made out her face.
Leticia—the girl with demon blood, the girl who hadn’t given him up. As if feeling his gaze brush her like sunlight, she looked up. Her gold hair was ruffled like wheat after a gust. She offered him a small smile, pale but steady.
He noticed what her hands were doing. She was digging wild greens from the earth, fingers stained like new shoots.
Her maid uniform was gone, traded for a simple white dress thin as paper. Fine for summer, but winter would bite like wolves. Ouyang hadn’t expected this: after all that, she hadn’t broken. She’d chosen to live, spine like bamboo, bending but not snapping.
Leticia—just as Ouyang once said—the name means joy. It was her parents’ wish threaded into her name: live happily, live strong.
Her life wasn’t happy, not really. Yet she wore joy like a lantern in fog, guiding her own steps.
Something stirred in him, a quiet tremor like wind moving the surface of a lake. He stood and walked forward, slow as a thought. Leticia noticed him as he neared the water. When he set his foot on the river’s skin, she gasped, voice bright as a bell, “Chef, careful…”
But the fall she feared never came. Ouyang stepped onto the surface and didn’t sink, the water bearing him like polished stone. He walked across, one calm stride after another, and stopped at her side.
“So… this is magic?” she said, smiling with a flake of wonder, eyes lit like stars. “I didn’t expect the chef to know magic.” In her world, mages were high and distant, like towers. Ouyang, to her, was a cook with warm hands and a sharp knife.
He ignored the praise and asked, confusion clouding his face like rain, “Why do this? Don’t you hate me?”
“Maybe you were only playing a prank,” she said, voice gentle as moss. “But if everyone knew, you’d be removed. Someone who can make food like that can bring more joy than I ever could. My father and mother taught me to let everyone feel joy. I don’t have that power, not really. So I want you to stay, Chef. Make good food, and let everyone taste a little happiness.”
