Zhao Qingsnow’s wounds were brutal, blood-holes pitted her limbs and lower belly like worm-eaten fruit.

Frost and darkness mana tore at each gash like twin wolves worrying a carcass.

The Old Woman fed her a mouthful of mana, a guttering candle giving one last flame.

She clung to a single breath like a leaf in a storm; the outlook was bleak.

One more mishap, and her life would snuff out like a blown lantern.

Good news: Night Frost found a black-market hospital that needs no real-name registry, a shadowed door in a wall of eyes.

The price was unclear, but it could dodge District Twenty One’s Order Keeper surveillance.

By tomorrow, Zhao Qingsnow’s bounty posters would frost every street and alley.

The hospital lies at District Twenty One’s heart, under the Rotten Heart Tree like a rotten tooth in a jaw.

Zhou Jiaxin said it once served the lower classes, a plain clinic like a straw hut.

After the black market moved in, it fell under their banner; with shiny gear, they take any patient like fishermen netting all.

As long as you can pay, the gate opens like iron bars oiled by coin.

Zhou Jiaxin led Night Frost out of the lab; she glanced at the lake’s center, a cold eye.

Those people still hadn’t handled the Mud King, a stubborn mire like a beast sunk in tar.

Their focus stayed there, so Night Frost slipped like a shadow; that was a blessing.

She left the park at a gallop, following Zhou’s directions toward the central rim, a needle threading ruins.

In a few steps, scenery flipped from glitter to rot: suits to rags, towers to crumbling husks.

She’d thought the Rotten Heart Tree’s effect was mild; reality rose bigger than any textbook, like a storm beyond maps.

Night Frost stood on a broad road skirting the center, an artery rimmed with cold guardrails.

Several officers kept watch ahead, eyes fixed on the road’s vanishing point like hunters at a choke.

They tried to drive off the huddled crowd in ragged cloth, a flock pecked by winter.

Disgust and loathing filmed their eyes, like oil on water that refuses to mix.

They looked at those people as livestock kept from necessity, pigs penned under iron skies.

If they wished, they could draw the guns at their waist, aim at skulls, and pull the trigger like thunder.

They ignored Night Frost on the outer curb, mistaking her for a spectator, a sparrow on a wire.

One officer stepped up and asked, “Miss, this isn’t your place, please go back.”

Night Frost nodded, cool as frost on glass, said she was only looking, chatted briefly, then left.

Front entry was impossible; cameras bloomed like cold eyes, outnumbering those in the Modification Center.

Not just here; seven or eight posts ringed the area, chess pieces on alleys and streets.

About thirty guards watched every mouth of stone, fearing vagrants would leak out like water.

And this was only a shard outside the center; imagine how much steel District Twenty One poured in.

With Zhao Qingsnow hurt, the Order Keepers would hunt her trail like hounds.

They’d comb every hospital, and if she appeared, they’d seize her like a net snaps shut.

She likely wouldn’t set foot in a legal hospital, a deer avoiding lanterns.

They came to District Twenty One carrying hidden tasks, secrets folded like blades.

A Cantata Two Magic Maiden entered without registration, a strike against Order, enough for prison walls.

So Zhao Qingsnow must not show herself, unless she’s tired of breathing.

If there were another entry, it’d be salvation, a side door in a fortress.

Night Frost hesitated on the street, her gut tight as wire.

Security felt like iron thorns; she struck down one reckless plan after another.

She strode into a nearby restaurant, an island of light in gray rain.

Her phone showed nothing, a blank lake without ripples.

She didn’t know where the others were; Zhao’s fight had been close to the center like sparks near tinder.

Given the Old Woman’s speed, they’d return before dawn, a shadow racing the sun.

Night Frost had to find that black-market hospital before dawn and ferry Zhao in like smuggling flame.

Security blocked every path, a wall of spears.

Just as despair welled, a figure formed behind her like a silhouette in fog.

She snapped around, every nerve taut like drawn bowstring.

The man’s clothes weren’t fancy, threadbare as bark.

His beard was unshaved, his frame slight, cheekbones jutting like cliffs.

He looked as poor as those penned in the center, but something set him apart, a flicker of difference.

He ordered coffee with a flick of fingers, gripped the ceramic cup like a warm stone, and drained it.

Night Frost understood; he carried a touch of leisure, a thin elegance like smoke.

He wore the slum’s face, yet his aura wasn’t that of the penned herd.

He was sharp, eyes like screws that see what holds you together.

He seemed to know exactly what Night Frost needed, a key to a locked gate.

He drew a yellowed business card from his pocket, letters blurred like ink in rain.

The name fit District Twenty One’s taste, rough and workmanlike.

“Lauen,” he said, “that’s my name. You’re seeking a way into the slums.”

Night Frost stayed cautious, surprise pricking like sleet.

He’d pierced her plan with one line; her guard rose, but curiosity tugged like a fishhook.

She’d dodged every camera, so how had he noticed?

Sales begin by hooking interest, like bait in dark water.

To Lauen, the why didn’t matter; he’d asked because a question opens doors.

“The why’s not important,” he said, voice level as a blade.

“What matters is, I know how to get in. I escaped from there.”

He didn’t intend to answer her question; a hidden entry outweighed answers like gold outweighs chatter.

Night Frost scanned him again; he did look like someone who’d broken out from a pit.

Slum folk get repelled at the outer ring, yet Lauen seemed to be doing fine, a rat who found a seam.

He’d likely found work or ran illegal errands, ferrying people past steel eyes.

He felt credible; he looked too much like the slum, and standing here meant he’d found a secret vein.

If his words held, Zhao Qingsnow’s life could be saved like a flame cupped from wind.

The only thing unsaved might be Night Frost’s wallet, a purse set to bleed.

Lauen knew she was sharp; no need for long explanations, just clean lines.

He was a ferryman; rich folks wanted dirty work done, so he led them to the black-market boss.

Then the boss handled the rot, like butcher and blade.

Night Frost fit that silhouette, he’d seen many like her, and for his future he meant to gouge.

“This number,” he said, raising a finger like a hook.

“I’ll take you to any place in the slums, as long as you can pay.”

Night Frost watched his finger, guessing sums like stones: one hundred, one thousand, or ten thousand?

“A thousand?” she asked, the word like a tossed coin.

Lauen finished his coffee and shook his head, greed gleaming like wet fangs.

His pitch poured out like a wolf salivating over a fat sheep.

“No, no. Someone like you? Only a hundred thousand fits.

The black market has goods even the District Twenty One Magic Maidens lack.

You’ll get value; killing and robbing leave no trace.

Even if the Order Keepers catch me, I’ll die before I reveal you.”

He’d misunderstood; Night Frost sought no killing, no buying.

She lowered her voice, cold as night frost, and cut him off.

“I need that hospital.

Sorry, nothing else interests me.

I can do it without you, so don’t waste time.

One thousand is my bottom line, my minimum.

If you won’t accept, I walk.”

She stood to leave, a blade of intent.

He’d opened at a hundred thousand, greed like a swollen leech.

She wasn’t rich; even cut and sold by the pound, she wouldn’t fetch that.

Lauen didn’t chase at once; confidence sat in him like a cat in sun.

He believed she’d return; he knew he’d broken a sales rule, ignoring the client’s ground.

The city had brimmed with rich spenders lately, gold like rain.

He’d reflexively tagged Night Frost as one of them.

But she wasn’t; she looked ordinary, the kind that works and endures.

In District Twenty One, ordinary folk eat and live better, yet their lives mirror the slum’s: under rich thumbs.

“Fine,” he muttered, “I’ll lose a little.

We’re the same kind.

Cheating the rich doesn’t mean I cheat the poor.”

He was right; Night Frost was a poor one.

Lauen caught up, agreed to her price, and thumped his chest like a drum.

He promised the Order Keepers wouldn’t find them, a ghost route under stone.

Night Frost told him to wait for two people, ghosts yet to arrive.

At first light, Night Frost felt movement under the earth, a tremor like a mole’s path.

She dodged cameras and hauled the Old Woman up from below, a bundle of shadow.

The Old Woman’s face was chalk-white, mana scraped clean like a dried riverbed.

Zhao Qingsnow’s blood drenched her arms, red vines around bone.

Her breathing was thin as thread, as if she’d reached the road’s last stone.

Lauen’s eyes went still, then flared with anger like fire under ash.

He thought of his daughter, about the same age and height, a heartbeat away.

Who had hurt a girl this young so savagely?