Wu Tan City – Xiao Clan Main Hall
I returned before sunrise.
My robes were scorched. The map fragment was hidden beneath my inner sash, the serpent token tucked in the lining of my boot. Father was already waiting when I entered the main hall.
His expression told me everything: the scouts hadn't returned. Again.
> "What did you find?" he asked.
I dropped the charred token on the table.
His eyes narrowed.
> "This… this is ancient. Not from the Empire. The carving is—serpentine."
> "Tagan Desert," I said. "The fire that attacked our merchants isn't natural. It's stolen."
> "Stolen?"
> "A cult is binding artificial flames. And they're killing anyone who tries to trace it."
Father exhaled slowly, as if realizing he'd been holding his breath since I left.
> "This is beyond us."
> "No," I said. "It's the beginning."
---
Later That Day – Xiao Clan Library
There was one place in Wu Tan that still remembered old magic: the sealed archives of our clan's founders.
Using my father's personal key, I descended into the cold stone chamber buried beneath the main courtyard.
Dust filled the air like fog. Scrolls bound in dried beast skin lined the shelves.
And there—behind a bronze carving of the Xiao ancestral sigil—I found it.
A brittle, yellowing journal.
---
> "The fire beneath the sands was never ours to claim. We stole it from the serpents. And one day, they will return to take it back. That fire will not choose lightly. It sleeps until awakened by rage… or desire."
– Entry #137, Xiao Jien, Year 342, Post-Empire Calendar
---
The fire beneath the sands. A buried flame.
That was what the cult sought.
And perhaps… the same flame Medusa herself guarded.
---
Nightfall – Private Courtyard
> System Prompt:
"Phoenix Core Sync: 42%
Tracing energy signature from Serpent Eye Token...
→ Result: Dormant Fire Source Detected
→ Location: Outskirts of Tagan Desert – Crater of the Dying Moon
That name didn't exist on any modern map.
But the journal had a sketch—half-torn, buried between loose pages.
When I aligned it with the map fragment I'd taken from the cultist, they clicked perfectly.
I now held the full path to the Dying Moon Crater.
---
> "I need to leave Wu Tan."
My words rang against the courtyard wall.
The moment I said it, something inside me unlocked—not in the system, not in my flame…
In me.
The feeling of standing too long in a tiny room while a storm raged beyond its walls.
I needed that storm.
---
Three Days Later – Wu Tan Outskirts
With Father's reluctant blessing and three rare Qi Gathering pills, I left the city under moonlight.
No fanfare. No guards.
Just me, my flame, and the map stitched into my cloak.
> Destination: Tagan Desert
But as I crossed the border into the scorched canyons beyond Jia Ma Empire's southern rim, I felt it.
> A heartbeat. A pulse of fire.
It didn't come from me.
It came from her.
---
Meanwhile – Tagan Desert
Queen Medusa stood atop a sunlit dune.
Behind her, a procession of snake-people warriors prepared to descend into the Crater of the Dying Moon, seeking out the strange disturbance awakening there.
She held a pearl in her palm.
Inside it, the image of my flame danced like a caged bird.
> "He draws near…"
Her lips curled into something between amusement and threat.
> "Let's see if he can survive my sands."
---
[End of Chapter 8]