“What do we do now?”

Cerqin asked after Spring Tide’s guess, her voice a tight string, vibrating with worry like a bow in a winter wind.

They had teased out useful strands, yet nothing knotted shut; the other side’s aim stayed a shadow behind a paper screen, the citywide mana corridor sat like a coiled bomb, and the soul-curse gnawing at Spring Tide and Silver Luan offered no clear release.

“If they want to use a bearer of divine power for something,” Aileaf said, her face clouding over like a stormed sky, “the change will likely hit in the next two days.”

Her weak tone was gone; under the darker timbre simmered worry and anger, like rain and thunder sharing one cloud.

“No matter how special a god’s power is,” she went on, “a twist in the soul ripple always leaves a mark, like ink bleeding through rice paper; once a soul’s tolerance hits its breaking point, the fallout could be worse than for a common mind.”

Emotion energy in them was heavy as mountains and deep as seas; if it crested past the line, the self could drown like a candle snuffed by its own wax.

They would become living dead in truth, walking shells under a cold moon.

“What do we do then…” Cerqin’s breath shivered like a reed, impatience beating in her chest like drums.

“Is there no way to fix it?” Her words fell like thin rain on stone.

Aileaf’s brows drew tight like knotted thread; after a hush heavy as fog, she shook her head, a leaf refusing to stir.

Spring Tide fell silent after laying out her guess, and Silver Luan kept her quiet like a blade sleeping in a scabbard; no matter how they strained, a pressed, breathless air hung among them like smog over a harbor.

“Let’s set aside why they’re doing this,” Spring Tide said, her voice calm as still water cutting through the eerie hush. “Aileaf, can you find the core woven by the city’s mana-gathering nodes?”

Since their own soul-curse had no good cure, she steadied her heart like hands on a rudder.

If the enemy’s aim involved a divine power-bearer, then by that logic, they wouldn’t casually trigger a bomb that could blast all of Eastwind City into ash.

That letter’s threat—do anything and we blow Eastwind City early—could be a painted tiger on paper.

The real goal might be to bleed time like sand through fingers.

They hadn’t smashed nodes earlier for two reasons, a balance of wind and weight.

First, they couldn’t read the other side’s temper, a mask behind a mask.

Second, finding every node and the core they braided wasn’t easy, like mapping underground rivers by the tremor in the soil.

You need to feel mana’s current like a fisherman reading tides, and you need knowledge like charts to match the flow.

Even if you sense natural mana like a breeze across skin, calculating node positions takes study as layered as lacquer.

Spring Tide and Silver Luan didn’t have that craft; their eyes were sharp, but the math was a different blade.

Aileaf, as a researcher, could measure it, her mind a compass and her hands a scale.

“Start by removing the biggest threat to the city’s lives,” she said, nodding like a bamboo stalk in steady wind.

“No problem. Leave it to me. With enough materials, I can finish the array work in half a day.” Her tone held a quick, clear ring, like steel tapped with a fingernail.

She’d need precise data, drawn with arrays like snowflakes cut in jade; those reagents cost coin, and her lab held mostly potions, as bare of array metals as a winter tree.

With the next step set, they moved fast, their feet drumming through streets like rain.

“By the clock, support should be close,” someone murmured, hope flickering like a lantern in a draft.

The Holy Maiden’s procession had left Eastern Sea City again; even with wheels like swallows, reaching Eastwind City needed time, and counting the wounded convoy’s return, three to four days might bring fresh hands.

“Mm.” Cerqin walked beside Spring Tide, her spirit dulled like a dim brazier, worry pinching her brows into a shallow valley.

“Why that face?” Spring Tide asked, a teasing wind pushing at a rigid door. “That’s not like you.”

Cerqin bit her lip, pain flashing over her fine features like a shadow crossing water.

“If we don’t break that curse, you’ll die.” The truth fell like a blade that couldn’t be sheathed.

“Mm. I know.” Spring Tide’s face stayed calm as a still pond, as if naming a small thing, a pebble tossed and sunk.

“That’s why we’ll defuse the biggest bomb first,” she said, resolve tightening like a knot. “We save as many innocent lives as we can.”

“Even if we succeed,” she added, voice lowering like dusk, “staying here could still be dangerous; their true aim is a mist we can’t catch.”

She squeezed Cerqin’s hand, warmth blooming like tea in winter, and—rarely—let a gentle smile show like sun on frost.

“So leave Eastwind City soon.” The words were soft, but they pushed like wind on sails.

“I won’t.” Cerqin’s refusal stood like a stone in a stream.

“Even if it’s your master’s order?” Spring Tide’s tone danced like a joke, but the string beneath was taut.

Cerqin’s silence thickened like night ink; her heart clenched, not wanting to watch someone dear vanish like smoke again.

“I don’t want you to disappear…” Her plea trembled like a kite in a sudden gust.

“Being that serious isn’t like you,” Spring Tide said, a wry curve to her lips. “I thought your head was full of lewd thoughts.”

The air fell still again, quiet as snow.

“I heard the cultists hiding in the city plan to blow all of Eastwind City!” a voice burst from a nearby alley, rumor flying like sparrows.

“Is that real? Who told you?”

“The Adventurers’ Guild folks said it. Their higher-ups vanished like stones dropped in the lake. It could be true!”

The chatter carried like wind through reeds, pricking Cerqin’s and Spring Tide’s ears; both started, hearts tensing like bowstrings.

Spring Tide’s brows drew tight, sensing a wrongness like iron in the water; she gripped Cerqin and quickened their steps like a runner before rain breaks.

They bought the materials fast and hurried back to Aileaf’s lab, their urgency beating like hooves.

Silver Luan wasn’t there; small Aileaf stood at the bench, slicing reagents with neat motions, her blade flashing like fish-scale light.

They were about to speak when Silver Luan rushed in, her face tight as wire; she, too, felt the city’s pulse go weird, like a drum off beat.

“This is clearly their deliberate play,” Spring Tide said, voice flat as a sword’s spine. “But what does it buy them? Anyone with skill will either run or try to break nodes.”

“The rumors say the strong of every major faction in Eastwind City have vanished,” Silver Luan added, her tone a chill that crawled like mist.

“They might already have met misfortune,” Spring Tide said, the word falling like ash.

“In any case, we need to find the core faster.” Her gaze burned like a lamp in fog.

Despite that resolve, the three of them couldn’t help Aileaf much; they could only stand by the bench and watch, hands useless as empty sleeves.

So Spring Tide and Silver Luan went out to scout, like hawks skimming rooftops; the weakest among them, Cerqin, stayed behind, her feet rooted like a sapling in wind.

“If only I had the strength to change this,” Cerqin said, her breath low as embers; even Sixth Rank Spring Tide and Silver Luan were helpless before this storm, let alone a Third Rank sparrow like her.

If the enemy didn’t clearly want to keep a divine power-bearer for something, they’d likely have erased them already, like names wiped from wet ink.

“I’m sorry,” Aileaf said, hands busy among bottles and glare, like a carpenter among tools. “I have no cure for a soul-curse either.”

“This isn’t your fault!” Cerqin’s reply snapped like a twig, but warmth lingered like steam.

“Do you love the two of them?” Aileaf asked, voice calm as glass.

“Mm.” The sound carried want and care, the body’s hunger like fire, the heart’s clutch like thread.

“Killing the caster isn’t likely,” Aileaf said, reason heavy as stone. “They should be high rank—at least Seventh Rank.”

“But there might be a way to delay the threshold,” she added, hope thin as silk, yet present.

“Really?” Cerqin brightened like a lamp suddenly lit, but Aileaf’s tone held no joy, only the weight of thorns.

“It’s only a delay,” she said. “You gamble a mountain of risk for a drifting miracle, like praying to a moon behind clouds.”

The method was to absorb the vast fear the curse bled from their souls, drinking it like bitter tea; only a soul at the same tier could share that weight.

And the one who shares will be stained by the curse, like dye taken by cloth.

Aileaf didn’t want to lose Cerqin either; her gaze held a quiet plea like dew clinging to green.

“How long until the threshold?” Cerqin asked, decision dropping like an anchor.

“At most a day,” Aileaf answered, the word sharp as frost.

“How long can we delay?” Cerqin pressed, hope and dread twined like vines.

“If I share it with you…” Aileaf began, and Cerqin cut her off with a hard breath, “No.”

Silence answered Cerqin, a hush thick as felt.

At last, Cerqin looked up, words catching like fish in a net, and saw Aileaf’s face set with resolve, her motions stopping like a pendulum stilled.

Cerqin bit down, then let a crooked smile bloom like a flower in snow.

“Thank you.”

“If we share it fifty-fifty,” Aileaf said, voice steady as a road, “we can extend three days.”

Cerqin’s expression dimmed like dusk; three days was too short, and the Holy Maiden’s guard might not hold any high-rank blades.

Too much could happen in three days, like storms rolling and breaking without warning.

Betting life on a foggy miracle wasn’t wise, yet sometimes only a blade in the dark could cut a knot.

“Will you die with me, little Aileaf?” Cerqin asked with a sudden bright smile, a reckless blossom in the night; Aileaf blinked, then smiled back, two sparks answering.

“I believe in a divine power-bearer’s luck,” Cerqin said, faith lifting like a kite in wind.

“Then tell me what to do,” she whispered, her voice a thread pulled tight.

…

When Spring Tide and Silver Luan returned, Aileaf’s node measurements were nearing the final stitch; as they stepped in, they felt a strange warmth in the air, a scent like rain after dusk.

Spring Tide blinked at Cerqin staring at her like a doe at a lantern, and at Aileaf’s flushed face as she worked at the bench, hands moving like swift swallows.

“What happened?” Spring Tide asked, suspicion pricking like needles.

Silver Luan felt it too; her eye twitched like a taut string.

“This atmosphere…” she said, the words trailing like smoke.