“Sis! We’ve got to go back and warn everyone!” Her voice rang like a bell in stormlight.

“Move, Flan!” Remi’s shout cracked like lightning over dry grass.

Remi seized Flan’s hand and bolted toward home, two reeds swept along by a hard wind.

Behind them, a black warship stalked the sky like a hawk shadowing rabbits on a plain.

Flan felt the chill bite and tugged Remi to stop, fear crawling like frost over stone.

“Sis, stop! That ship’s tailing us like a wolf! We’ll lead it home! We have to split!” Her words tumbled like pebbles down a slope.

Remi cut the idea down like a blade through grass.

“No! How do you know it’s after us? What if it locked on our home, and we’re just in the tide? I won’t leave you!” Her vow burned like a lantern in fog.

She tightened her grip and pulled again, a small river dragging a twig toward the sea.

Flan stared at their locked hands, moonlight on water trembling, and whispered, “Sis…”

Aboard the ship in the clouds, metal hummed like cicadas at noon.

“Report. The Xingli has a trackable target. Should we adopt a tailing strategy?” The voice was crisp as frost.

Whoosh—A holo-screen bloomed in the air like a white lily, showing two small girls fleeing across a grass sea.

On a lavish throne at the center, a figure nodded, calm as a stone in a stream.

“Follow them. We should find the thing we want,” the figure said, voice flat as iron.

“Yes!” The reply snapped like a banner in wind.

Crew moved in a smooth rush, the ship sliding after the girls like a shark in dark water.

“Sis! We really can’t keep running toward home!” Flan’s plea shook like leaves in a gale. “We’ll ruin everyone like wildfire in dry reeds!”

“No, Flan!” Remi’s answer hit like a drum in the rain. “Adults handle this, and we’re just kids like saplings in snow! We can only warn them fast, buy them time like grains of sand!”

Flan tore her hand free and sprinted another way, a startled fawn leaping across the meadow.

“Flan!” Remi’s cry flew after her like an arrow of light.

She lunged to grab Flan back, then a vision slashed her mind like lightning splitting a pine—home shattered, roofs like broken shells.

Terror surged first, hot and sour as smoke, then thought came like cold water—If I chase Flan, our home may drown, and I’ll be the knife; if I don’t, most might escape, and I’ll be the shield.

Which weighs more—the one or the many, the ember or the hearth? The questions beat like twin wings.

For a heartbeat, her five-year-old mind spun like an overworked abacus, beads clicking like rain, and still she’d overestimated it like a child staring at the moon.

Aboard the airship, lights glowed like winter stars.

The white-robed figure faced the central throne and reported, voice thin as a reed. “Report. One native has broken off, the other stands still. Likely the runner realized we’re tracking them. Recommend a change.”

“Then capture the runner,” the throne-figure said, words cold as a blade. “Use her to threaten the other girl.”

“Yes! All units, commence capture! Target, the blonde girl!” Orders flashed like sparks into dry tinder.

Five smaller craft burst from the hull like seeds blown from a giant pod—small only beside the mothership, each as big as a house.

They arrowed toward Flan like swifts in high summer, and Remi saw them, dread blooming like ink in water.

She threw down her thorny thoughts and sprinted for Flan, wild as fire racing uphill.

Flan had seen the five from the start, each one a black beetle in the sun, and her four-year-old legs were bean-sprouts against the wind. On this endless plain like a green ocean, she knew they’d catch her; it was only time, trickling like sand. All she could do was stall like a fox and think of a path through a dead end.

A bold spark lit in her mind like a struck flint.

They want me alive, to force me—or Sis—to lead them home, she realized, the thought sharp as a thorn. If I’m “dead,” their map turns to fog. I just need a way to “die,” like a candle snuffed to save the house.

Yes—the slope from before, a dark lip against the sky.

She swerved at once, a fish cutting current, and ran for the hill, the five craft turning after her like wolves gripping a scent.

The slope rose ahead, close as a held breath, and hope flooded her eyes like first stars at dusk.

Closer. Almost there. Just a step more, she thought, wind like drums in her ears. If I jump, they can’t net me in time.

The nearest craft watched her drive herself toward the cliff and radioed back, puzzled as a rook. “Report. The blonde girl has forced herself to the hilltop. She has no exit. Capture chance: one hundred percent.”

The reply wasn’t praise but a roar, hot as a forge. “Faster! Grab her before she reaches the top! She means to kill herself and break our plan! If we lose their camp, we’ll waste ages combing this land like ants, and we don’t have that time!”

He understood the point like a nail to wood, yet he doubted a four-year-old’s death-will, and he kept an easy pace like a cat stalking a sparrow.

The central figure glanced at the agitated commander, curiosity curling like smoke. “Why the panic?”

“Heh…” The commander chuckled, a sound like a knife on glass, mocking either the question or himself. “I didn’t expect a four-year-old to think this far—spot our aim at once and choose death like a soldier. That’s not childlike at all. If she were my student, I’d spoil her like spring rain.”

“Then spare her and make her your student,” the figure mused, words drifting like falling ash.

“Forced fruit tastes bitter,” he said, voice low as dusk. “If your father’s killer becomes your master, would that sit in your chest like sweet water?”

Silence fell like snow. Then a sigh, light as a reed bending. “Yeah… fair point.”

There—she’d made it. The lip of the slope hung a single step away, the edge thin as a knife over the world.

One step, and she’d succeed like an arrow finding its mark. One step, and she could bend her people’s fate like a river turned by stone.

She drove her front foot forward, weight pouring over the void like sand from a jar. Her back foot lost purchase, and her small body tilted into death’s path like a falling petal.

Fear flared first, then memory wheeled like lanterns in a night parade; most were sun-warm moments with her sister, hand in hand like twin swallows.

What a pity, she thought, a wry smile in her chest like a cracked cup—only four years, not enough to carve more days with Sis.

Her body dropped, eyes closed like shutters at dusk, and faintly she felt a call tug her like a thread.

“Flan! Flan! Flan!” The name struck her like pebbles on still water.

Remi hurled herself from the same brink, a hawk stooping through sky, streamlining every limb to fall faster than rain.

Snap!

Got her hand—warm and small—as if snagging a silver fish from dark water.

With a hard pull, arms burning like ropes, the five-year-old reeled the four-year-old in, and somehow, miracle-bright, folded Flan into her arms like a rescued bird.

She pressed her forehead to Flan’s shoulder, breath warm as tea, and whispered at her ear like wind in bamboo. “This time, I caught you. Don’t you dare run.”

She twisted midair, baring her back to the earth like a shield, taking the wind’s flaying claws so Flan wouldn’t bleed.

In her ears, the wind she heard every day sang again, a song she loved like clear streams—yet this time it rasped different, rough as sand.

This wind… I hate it.