“We’re here.”

“Where is this?”

“My place.”

They spilled out of a tunnel through the Void like two fish from a black river, then landed in quiet like dust after a storm.

“You… your place?”

Ye Weibai glanced around, stunned, like a deer frozen by dawn light. A living room opened up like a calm pond. A thin TV murmured like a brook on the wall, the only voice in the house. A gray-white sofa and coffee table curled in the center like low clouds hugging a hill. Wood flooring stretched underfoot like warm bark. A dining table waited nearby like a dock at low tide.

Sky-blue curtains drew back like a lifted veil. The window looked to a third floor height, level with the community trees like green oars. Eight or nine in the morning poured in like warm milk, the soft breeze combing through the screen like a cat’s paw, scattering light across the room.

A clock ticked on the wall like slow rain on eaves, soothing as a lullaby.

Everything felt ordinary, like a clay teapot warming three lives.

It stood in stark contrast to the absurd theater they had just survived, like frost meeting fire.

Ye Weibai couldn’t move for a beat, as if pinned by a pin of silence.

“Ha! You must’ve expected something else, right?” Misfortune giggled, like wind bells shaking in a playful gust. “A throne adrift in Void, or a palace sunk in the sea? We’re not into that. Plain and simple is fine.”

“Oh, right.”

She lifted her hand and snapped, a crisp note like a sparrow pecking a branch.

Snap.

Gray particles whooshed around her like a storm of ash and then sank into her body like tide into sand, revealing the girl the gray had veiled.

“Ah—no need to keep combat mode at home,” she said, voice dropping like a blanket.

Ye Weibai watched, curious as a cat watching snowfall.

The gray first peeled from her clothes like fog from a morning field. A white top with a blue sailor collar gleamed like fresh linen. A sky-blue skirt floated like a slice of summer sky.

Then the gray retreated from her skin like the moon slipping from cloud, revealing pallor white as fallen snow, white enough to worry the touch.

Last, the gray foamed off her face like bubbles popping in air, and her features opened like a shy flower at first light.

What startled Ye Weibai was this: Misfortune, who had snarled and swaggered against Nightfall like a wildfire, wore a face slightly timid, like a fawn at the edge of a stream.

Willow-slim brows curved like brushstrokes. Her pupils were a touch larger than most, making her look a breath fragile, like paper thinned by rain. Her small mouth pressed into a line like a sealed petal. Her pallor scared the eye like winter sun. Her body looked so light a stray wind might carry her off like a kite.

She made you ache just to look, like seeing a cracked cup still holding tea.

The gray particles were gone, yet her cool ashen-gray crop remained, sharp as a winter reed.

Only then did Ye Weibai notice this Deity’s height. She was small, like a swallow on a windowsill.

Four-ten, maybe five feet at best.

He hadn’t felt she was this tiny before. Had she been standing on the storm, like heels made of dust?

“Hey! Thinking something rude?” she chirped, voice flicking like a rubber band. “Don’t be too rude. I’m a Deity.”

She went on tiptoe and patted his shoulder, light as a moth’s wing, utterly at ease, her grin clipping the scold like sunlight through leaves.

“My height? Can’t help it,” she sighed, the sound drifting like steam. “I used to mind. I figured I’d grow. Then, before that day came, I picked up the godhead of Misfortune—just like that. New Misfortune, new rules. My body froze at that moment, like ice set for good.”

“I was hoping to at least get as tall as you.”

She stretched, measuring to his forehead like a child measuring rain, then tilted her head and smiled, helpless as a lost kite.

“Ugh, let’s drop the height thing. Xiaobai—mind if I call you that? You call me Little Ash anyway. Here, catch. Cola okay?”

She blew out a breath like letting go of a knot, then padded to the fridge like a cat to a cool shade. She pulled a can of cola, and tossed it over like a silver fish.

It landed in Ye Weibai’s palm, cold biting like a pebble from a stream. He blinked, then smiled. “Fine by me.”

“Good,” Little Ash laughed, eyes narrowing like crescents. “Nobody visits here. It’s just me and cola. If you don’t like it, we’re doomed.”

“Hup!”

She hopped, skirt flicking like a blue wave, and cleared the sofa back like a swallow hopping a fence. She half-reclined, legs outstretched like two pale reeds.

Click.

She cracked her own can, raised it backward toward him like a torch, and grinned the smile of a midnight conspirator.

“Cheers!”

Ye Weibai paused, then smiled and opened his can. He tapped it to hers, the clink bright as a bell.

“Cheers.”

Little Ash laughed and tipped her head back, pouring the drink down like summer rain. Her long neck slid into view like a white reed, moving as the dark stream fell.

“Hisss—cola only slaps when you chug,” she gasped, bliss rolling over her face like sun over a field. She burped, satisfied as a cat after cream.

“Don’t just stand. Sit,” she said, pointing at the sofa like a queen pointing at a throne.

Ye Weibai sat without fuss, settling like a leaf finding still water.

Little Ash blinked at him, lashes fluttering like moth wings. “You’re unbelievable.”

“?”

“By rights, a normal person would’ve snapped by now,” she said, swinging a foot like a pendulum. “You saw too much unreal, and you’re still calm.”

“I got a good briefing,” Ye Weibai said, voice even as a flat lake. “If I can read it, I don’t panic.”

“Not just that,” she went on, eyes slanting like a sly fox. “Nightfall’s scythe was about to slice you in half. You didn’t even flinch.”

“Because we agreed you’d save me, Little Ash. Right?”

She tilted her head, considering, like a sparrow testing wind. “You trust me that much?”

Ye Weibai’s smile curled, quiet and shy as mist. “If I don’t, I die. Right?”

“…”

Little Ash’s eyes widened like lanterns, then, after a long beat, wonder softened her face like dew. “For a human, you’re incredible.”

She beamed, confidence rising like a kite catching a gust. “Ah, now I’ve got faith. We might place well in this game.”

Ye Weibai went speechless for a moment, like a string plucked and left to hum. “So you had no faith in me before?”

“Hey, not that,” she waved, the gesture loose as a ribbon. “I had no faith in myself. Before I became a Deity, I wasn’t good at games. As Misfortune, my power feels… lame. I didn’t even know how to join this game. I was ready to quit.”

“But it’s fine. I met you,” Little Ash said, grin returning like spring. “Alright, Xiaobai, you must have a pile of questions. Ask them all. Anything.”

“Anything?”

“Anything.”

“Then—”

Ye Weibai’s smile faded like a light under a palm. “Why does the next room smell like blood?”

“…Oh dear.”

Little Ash’s mouth curved, a smile not quite a smile, like a crescent behind thin cloud. She watched Ye Weibai and spoke slowly, each word falling like a pebble into a well. “That’s a good question.”

Ye Weibai didn’t fill the silence. He simply looked, still as a pine in frost.

The air between them cooled at once, like shade swallowing sun.

“Couldn’t you pretend you didn’t notice?” Little Ash sighed at last, her breath a wilted leaf.

“Sorry. My nose is sharp,” Ye Weibai said, calm as slate. “Fresh blood, right? Within two hours.”

“Wow. Nailed it,” she said, admiration lifting her brows like birds in flight.

“So?”

“A corpse,” she said. “It’s—my mother’s corpse.”

Little Ash smiled as she said it, her face bright as porcelain, her words cold as a knife laid on snow.

…