The Old Woman ran through the rain, a raincloak snapping like a wet wing. Mana pooled under her soles. She skimmed a puddle, rose slow as mist, wind curling beneath her feet.

A Key of piercing blue gleamed in her fist. A thin ray refracted from the crystal inside, like a firefly’s thread, tugging her toward the outskirts.

The shower had come sudden. The air outside the city felt damp as moss. Yet the drops were sparse, and leaves shook them off. By luck, the mountain paths stayed dry.

She rushed, urgency buzzing in her bones. Two pursuers hounded her rear. One wore a Bluetooth earpiece and cradled an Arcane Firearm, the newest model. Gray Mana swirled in its guts, muted under the gray night.

The other was a woman in a dark-blue qipao, a round silk fan in hand. Her pale fingers flicked, and the fan sent out a gale. Dirt and pebbles leapt and spun. A smile tipped her lip, and her refined face gained a slice of dangerous charm.

Their clothing clashed like thunder and flute. One tied to tech. One like a banished fairy dropped from the Celestial Court. Yet they stood on one line, and the prize was the Old Woman’s Key.

She whirled. Her palms slapped earth. Stone and soil surged up like a tide and coiled into a massive earth dragon. It wrapped her tight. The wind couldn’t pry it open. The storm’s lash only cut a small notch along its scales.

The Mana bullet left the barrel with a crack, black as pitch. It lanced through the notch like lightning. Where black Mana struck, clay exploded like dry bread.

The earth dragon roared. Broken rock clattered like hail. But the Old Woman—cocooned a breath ago—was gone like a shadow swallowed by ground.

The qipao woman eyed the angered earth-element dragon. She gripped her round fan with both hands. A blade of gale poured from the silk like snow. It whirled into a white energy mass, ringed with razor wind blades.

The white core lunged. As it neared the dragon, wind blades shaved the air clean and carved a deep, cruel scar across clay scales.

The earth dragon had no life to feel pain. It hugged the ground and drank earth-essence. Its jaws gaped and spat stone spikes sharp as tusks. The Arcane Firearm shot them down one by one with calm, gray flashes.

The dragon was fierce, yet outmatched by two. But the Old Woman never meant to slay the pursuers. She meant to find where the true Key lay and move it first.

Cut two, two more would come. Alone, she could never kill a river’s worth of enemies and hounds.

She surfaced deep in the mountain woods. The earth dragon had hidden her shape, and her earth-burrow took her far. Now she stood on a hillside, breath even as rain.

The Key burned brighter. The guiding line shone like a silver reed. The real Key must hide on the peak ahead.

She slipped through the mid-slope thicket. Mossy stone bricks appeared underfoot like old scales. Shock flickered in her eyes. She had been here before.

Moss-brick walls rose on both sides like green ribs. At their end stood a refined Daoist hall. In the yard, ancient pines and cypresses held the wind like old men shouldering cloaks. Leaves whispered down, crisp as chimes.

This was the hall of Yuan Dai, the former Warden. Her own predecessor had insisted on building here. Her predecessor’s disciple, Yuan Dai, trained here for decades. Even after she rose to Cantata Three, one of the highest, she would not step away unless the Twelfth District burned.

Now it seemed her master raised this hall to guard what lay within. What thing demanded two generations of the Twelfth District’s Cantata Three to stand watch?

The Old Woman glanced at the Key. Light twined it like silk. Understanding settled like rain on stone.

Following the Key’s pull, she stepped into the back of the hall.

Deep within stood a towering wooden statue, a Daoist without a carved face. He wore traditional robes, a bell at his waist, a sword in hand. Incense ash carpeted the floor like gray frost. Spent sticks lay scattered, crisscrossed like fallen reeds.

The hall had seen war. Support pillars were webbed with cracks. Stone tiles showed the same broken veins.

She halted at the threshold. To feet that didn’t know, this was a simple hall. It wasn’t.

Three great Formations meshed within like gears. The wooden statue was their heart. From behind it, several Array Patterns unfurled like roots. Two slipped into darkness along the flanks. Four hid under the redwood altar that held the censers. Someone clearly meant to keep hands off the Key buried in this hall.

“Terrifying Formation skills, that boy.”

She guessed who set them. She had met him once, a single nod in a crowded world.

These three linked arrays were deep as a well in winter. She alone couldn’t crack them by force. She had planned to take the Key, but it was safer here than in her sleeve.

“Right about here.”

She turned to leave. Two female voices sounded outside the hall.

“She’s crafty. Still left a footprint.”

The two Cantata Two had followed her faint trail. A spark lit behind the Old Woman’s eyes. A plan, sharp as flint.

She could flee; that was easy for her. But these two were strong and came from another District. If she could borrow these three Formations and bury them here, the Twelfth District might breathe easier.

She moved fast. At the door, she left a deliberate smear of Mana and drew it deeper inside. Then she melted into the shadows on the sides, wrapped herself in earth and stone, and waited like a patient root.

“The instrument pinged!”

She frowned. Her earth-burrow was honed to the bone. In the same realm, almost no one sensed it. Even a Cantata Three needed time. How did two green Cantata Two pick up her trace so quickly?

Tech. Of course.

She softened the wall, opened a small hole, and peered out. She wanted to see what device sniffed out her “scent” so fast.

Soil Mana Detector—the big letters flashed on the casing.

They had hunted her for days, chasing the Key. But her command of earth let her slip at will. She was thorny as bramble.

So they begged their superiors and got a Soil Mana Detector. It could lock her earth-burrow’s direction in minutes.

It didn’t just read dirt. It read the Mana in dirt—a crown piece of the new era’s geological survey.

Her earth-burrow was a way her Mana wore a body. Use it, and Mana prints would cling. She blended into soil, making the ground “more” while she passed. When she left, the “more” withdrew. The total earth didn’t change, but the soil she crossed loosened. Its hardness differed from its neighbors. The device could paint a clean arrow right to her path.

She sighed and smiled. Age had crept in. Young blood had caught her tail with toys. Still, she would teach them a lesson. Old ginger bites hotter.

“Mana detected! The old hag’s inside!”

They tucked the instrument into a Spatial Box. The earpiece girl drew her Arcane Firearm. The qipao girl tightened her grip on the round fan. One led, one followed. Step by step, they entered the hall.

They stopped at the door like twin statues. The qipao woman felt a wrong wind. The gun girl spotted faint Array Patterns snaking out from the statue’s feet.

They froze in place. The gun girl spoke first.

“There’s a Formation buried here. Stay sharp.”

The qipao woman nodded. Gravity shadowed her cheek. The Mana inside felt off—like bait, left by the Old Woman to draw them in. Trap, her bones warned. Forward meant danger.

The Old Woman had sold them short. They’d sniffed out the kill. But so what? Their feet had already crossed the line.

She slipped into the floor without a sound. She crept behind them like a worm of earth. Mana surged through her limbs. One kick each. Before they could blink, both flew into the waiting Formation.

The long-silent Formation woke with a whoosh. The two were swept inside like leaves in a whirl.

“Fight your granny? You’re miles too green. Back when I was in the Abyss, you two were still on milk. In you go!”

Light poured from the wooden Daoist, a pale gold like dawn fog. A face surfaced on the once-blank wood. Dead eyes kindled with a thread of spirit.

Hidden arrays gathered into invisible hands and clamped around their ankles. The wooden sword breathed a transcendent chill and hewed a wave of force.

The qipao woman snapped her fan open. She met the cut and held. The statue wasn’t finished.

Age had gnawed the Formation. It could restrain, but not crush. The Cantata Two in the qipao could still strike back.

At the door, the Old Woman clicked her tongue. Not enough pressure. She decided to make it hurt.