With the children back, Guyi Town buzzed again, like swallows returning to eaves and doorways filling with lamplight.

Joy rose in some homes like warm smoke, while sorrow sat in others like cold stones; most kids returned safe, a few scraped and bruised, and some never would.

Xi, the “great hero” who saved them, found her name fluttering through town like bright flags in wind.

Kooson and Amelie felled the three‑headed nether dragon, but Xi drove off Lagu and led everyone home, a steady lantern in the storm.

Families kept arriving at the Glachidor Clan’s gate with baskets and bows, gratitude like a tide that never ebbed, and Xi tasted what a hero’s crowded days felt like.

Watching the kids tussle in the distance, warmth pooled in her chest like sun on still water.

Compared to the days of flight and dust, this peace felt soft as moss.

Happiness has always been near us, she thought, like shade under a familiar tree; we just never looked.

From the forge rang the rhythm of hammer and iron, sparks flying like fireflies; the blacksmith, son recovered, struck with renewed spring thunder.

Under the ancient town tree, several children pinched odd shapes from damp earth, their laughter like bright birds—was that what people called a child’s heart?

No, something felt off, a cloud crossing her face as quickly as wind.

She snatched up a small stick like a branch warding off mischief.

You little rascals, don’t play around the ancient tree! she barked, voice snapping like dry twigs.

No one knew which age that tree had birthed from; its roots felt older than stars and salt wind.

Out of respect, the town kept a clear rule: aside from festivals, no one approached the tree’s circle, as if its shade were a shrine.

Yet, for endless years, a strange current flowed—children under ten always slipped close like minnows to a spring, ignoring grown‑ups like a breeze dodging fences.

Xi had done the same once, memory drifting back like fallen leaves on a stream.

She’d long thought there were three reasons.

First, the tree’s spread was a great sail, and beneath it the heat broke like a wave; the cool there beat a river swim, a breeze sharper than iced water.

Second, grass around its roots grew thick and emerald, resilient as a mountain slope; no trampling dulled it, no season dried it, always level, always green.

A small spring winked in that meadow, so kids kneaded mud into little folk and rolled like cubs along the blades—holy ground to small hearts.

The third reason was a whisper she couldn’t name, a tug like moonlight on tides.

As a child she felt nothing odd, but grown, memory rang like a bell—this tree drew children as if bewitched, thought sprouting like ivy until their feet wandered there.

Adults barred the place not only for rituals, but for that uncanny pull, worry nesting like sparrows under their ribs.

The tree had never harmed a soul, yet every parent’s brow held storm‑gray, because they remembered being small and heedless too.

The mud‑playing kids saw Xi’s stern face and grinned like sun after rain, no fear at all.

“Xi‑jie, look! Isn’t this mud person just like you?” one piped, eyes shining like dew.

“Come play with us, Xi‑jie!” another chirped, voices clattering like beads.

Their chatter darkened her mood like dusk drawing in.

She was their hero, yes, but that made her warnings soft as cotton.

No more playing—scatter, or I tell your parents! she snapped, words cracking like ice.

They didn’t fear Xi, but the word “parents” struck like a drum, and they bolted faster than rabbits, feet kicking up dust like moths.

Xi dropped onto the grass, breath easing like rain on clay, and gazed up at leaves stitching shade like green quilts.

Here was cool as river stone; in the blistering summer, the ancient tree was a perfect refuge.

Far off, kids’ cries rose like valley echoes, and cicadas by the pond rasped like silver saws sawing sunlight.

It feels like something’s missing, she thought, a hollow like an empty seat at supper.

These past days had been storms and then clearing skies; sitting safe with family now filled her like warm soup.

She remembered bringing the children home, and her mother clasping her and weeping at the gate like rain.

To a mother, a happy, safe household is enough—no risk, no blades; that wish can sound selfish, yet it’s love like bread and salt.

Her father praised her, saying she’d kept the Glachidor Clan’s honor bright like a brass plaque.

Her mother nearly argued thunder for thunder, yet Xi still felt a steady worry in her father’s eyes, a lantern never extinguished.

Family’s safe, everything’s steady as a calm lake… so what’s missing?

“Hee‑hee, sis, found you,” a light voice chimed, and small hands covered her eyes like soft leaves.

“Xian, kids aren’t allowed here,” Xi said, warmth rustling like wind; the voice was her sister’s, familiar as home smoke.

Xian lifted her hands, chin up like a sparrow.

“I’m not a kid anymore—I’m thirteen. Only under‑ten can’t play here, right?”

“Sis, what were you thinking? And where’s Big Brother? Why didn’t Big Brother come back with you?”

Big Brother… the word fell like a pebble into deep water.

Right, that’s what feels missing, she thought, a gap like a door left ajar.

She didn’t really know how Ouyang was.

She had asked Amelie and Kooson; both said he was fine, hard to kill, and he’d pop up again like a cork on a wave.

But the ache in her chest pressed like fog; breath felt tight, as if a hand were wrapped around her ribs.

No, she told herself, while Kooson and Amelie are still here, I’ll ask what that guy’s doing.

I can’t let him wander about wrecking things, she thought, pinning down resolve like a hairpin.

Clutching her chest where it throbbed like a trapped bird, she headed toward the clan residence, steps steady as stones.

In the Karosen Kingdom capital, a heavy thing had happened lately, like thunder without clear lightning.

Nobody knew the details; the city bristled with alert eyes like hedgehog quills.

Nights once bright as festivals now sank dark; few dared stroll under the pale moon.

In a shadowed corner, a girl in an emerald gown watched the patrolling guards glide past like fish.

She smoothed a cascade of emerald hair that trailed like ivy to the ground.

“Eika, how’s it look?” the maiden whispered, voice thin as silk, to the delicate‑faced boy behind her.

“Bad,” the boy said, leaning to the wall like a wilting reed.

“To dodge that big, black‑clad brute, I can’t use space magic now. Nabelia, how did you provoke him?”

“How would I know?” Nabelia huffed, words snapping like thorns.

“He says I poisoned him. The palace is huge as a maze; how was I supposed to know that fool would eat the food I dosed? How’s that on me?”

A year ago, the Hericot siblings had been summoned to this world by Ouyang, like seeds carried by a stray wind.

They swore to shine before the Demon King like stars in deep skies.

But Ouyang and Xi rode off on an airship, skimming clouds like silver carp, and left the siblings at Irina’s house.

The Demon King departed, yet Nabelia never abandoned restoring the Hericot Clan, a banner she held like a sword.

If Demon Kings meant orderly chaos, then she would lace the world with disorder, bold as stormlight, and win reward.

Still, as an ancient bloodline, the Hericot shouldn’t rely on crude arson; their chaos must be elegant, high‑tier, like masked balls turned upside down.

So all year, Nabelia staged several “high‑end” chaotic deeds, aiming for sorrow and despair like winter rain, yet each farce ended in comedy, laughter rolling back like spring.

Recently she heard of a sky‑shaking blast in Nightfall Forest, rumor fluttering like crows.

Promising the world an abyss, she went there, skirts like leaves brushing earth.

But a second explosion roared like a mountain splitting, and the siblings, hearts thudding like drums, chose safety first and slipped into the Karosen capital to observe like owls.

There, a whim sparked in Nabelia’s mind like flint: a neat way to brew chaos.

Poison.

Kill a kingdom’s high leaders, and the country falls into inner storms like trees in a gale.

One nation’s storm spreads to neighbors like brushfire, then to races and routes, until the whole continent sways like a field in wind.

In theory, it was splendid, a blueprint drawn with cold ink.

In practice, two fools toppled it by accident, and one was the Demon King she worshiped like a distant sun.

After the failure, a black‑haired man named Lagu latched onto her like burrs, claiming her poison gave him diarrhea.

What a joke—Nabelia’s brews didn’t stoop to mere stomach gripes, she thought, pride stiff as steel.

Believe it or not, he tailed them relentlessly like a shadow.

If not for someone from the palace hunting Lagu like a hawk, Eika wouldn’t have had a heartbeat to cast spatial shifts to flee.

Days turned into chases, dozens of times, fear beating like rain on windows.

Seven times he blocked their path, walls closing like canyon cliffs.

By some crooked luck, each time despair choked them like smoke, the palace hunter arrived, and Lagu had to bolt like a startled boar.

So, Lagu hunted them, and the palace man hunted Lagu, a chain like wolves and hounds.

Nabelia couldn’t fathom humans, their hearts a puzzle box.

She’d nearly poisoned that palace hunter into silence, yet when danger bit like frost, he drove Lagu away like sweeping ash.

A savior indeed, she thought, grudging warmth flickering like a candle.