The rain had stopped by morning, but the air still felt heavy—like something unspoken pressed against the rooftops of the Eastern Capital.
As Ziyan and the others walked back to the teahouse, the world around them had changed. Not visibly. Not yet. But she could feel the weight of new eyes on her—shadows lingering too long at the corners of windows, strangers passing twice in the same alley.
"They've set spies on us," Feiyan muttered, not bothering to hide her distaste. "Probably sent by those tribunal officials you humiliated yesterday."
"They're waiting for a mistake," Shuye added, watching their reflections ripple across a rain-slicked street. "An excuse to take someone else."
"They'll wait a long time," Li Qiang said quietly.
But Ziyan knew better than to believe in silence. Power had shifted, and now the tribunal—exposed, but not defeated—was watching like a snake beneath snow. They weren't finished. They were waiting for her flame to flicker.
Back inside the teahouse, the group gathered in the quiet of the back room. A single lantern lit the scrolls spread across the table—maps, ledgers, the remains of Duan Rulan's last gifts.
Ziyan sat at the head, one hand resting near the phoenix emblem on her palm.
"We need to decide our next move," she said. "Rulan left behind more than names—she left direction."
Feiyan leaned forward. "You think she's still alive?"
"I know she is. Her final letter ended with one phrase: 'The roots grow in Nan Shu.' That wasn't just a message—it was a path."
Shuye unfolded one of the older scrolls. "Nan Shu is south of the borderland prefectures. Just past the mountains. It's close to the conflict zone."
"That's no accident," Ziyan said. "Because I also learned something else—something she never shared publicly."
She hesitated. Then: "Duan Rulan had a daughter. A young girl. Her name never appeared in records… but she died. Killed during the Grand Commandant's ambush against Xia two years ago. The price of a 'tactical victory.'"
Feiyan's expression darkened. "He sacrificed her village. Used it as bait."
"She never forgave them," Ziyan said. "But she waited. Planned. She used me—not as a pawn, but as a continuation. She wanted me to survive long enough to see where the rot truly lies."
A pause filled the room.
Then Lianhua spoke, her voice quiet but firm.
"But if we leave now, we'll look guilty. And with spies still watching us… we'll never reach Nan Shu without being followed."
Ziyan nodded. "That's why we wait—just long enough to turn their eyes away."
"And then?" asked Shuye.
"Then we leave," Ziyan said. "Together."
That night, long after the lanterns had been dimmed and the house had grown still, Ziyan stood alone in the garden courtyard, staring at the reflection of the moon rippling in the koi pond.
The silence was comforting—until it wasn't.
She turned at the soft scrape of boots against stone.
The figure in the shadows stepped forward, cloak damp with travel. The hood fell away.
Ziyan's breath caught.
"You," she whispered. "I thought you died at the traffickers' camp. I thought you ran."
The man didn't move.
"I had to stay hidden," he said. His voice was familiar, low and even. "If I stayed near you, they would've known who I was."
Ziyan stepped forward, emotions tangled. "You were the one who helped me escape. I remember your face—your eyes. But you never said anything. Never told me you were from Xia."
"I didn't lie," he said. "But I didn't tell the whole truth either."
Her eyes narrowed. "Why rescue me at all?"
"Because of your family. Because you're Li Ziyan."
He stepped closer, pulling something from inside his cloak.
A worn scroll. The seal long faded.
"You were never just a discarded noble's daughter. The Li family has ties going back generations—to court officials, to exile records, to secrets buried under palaces. Even in Xia, your name was whispered."
Ziyan took the scroll.
"And Duan Rulan?"
"She knew," he said. "She used me as a link between the shadows and the fire. She sent me to watch from a distance. But I broke from Xia when I saw what they did to their prisoners. I don't serve them anymore."
Ziyan looked at him, and for the first time, truly saw him—not just the spy, or the shadow from her past, but the thread that had quietly pulled her toward this moment.
"What's your name?" she asked.
"…Wei," he said at last.
She nodded slowly. "I need your help, Wei. I want to leave this city. But I want to burn the last thread behind us before we go."
Over the next three days, Ziyan moved carefully—no grand gestures, no proclamations. Just precision.
One by one, she exposed the remaining tribunal officials who orchestrated Lianhua's arrest. Not by force, but with ink.
A misplaced ledger that revealed their dealings with illegal tax collectors.
A torn shipment scroll linking a magistrate to smuggled coins from Xia.
A single interview with a low-level clerk who revealed that several arrests had been staged for "political choreography."
She did not demand executions.
She demanded truth.
And truth, once unchained, was more terrifying than fire.
On the fourth morning, as the smoke of incense drifted over the tea garden, Ziyan stood beside her allies—Feiyan, Lianhua, Shuye, Li Qiang… and Wei, now cloaked not in shadow, but in purpose.
The wagons were packed. Their path south had been quietly secured. No banners. No farewells.
Just one final message left pinned to the tribunal doors, signed with a single phrase:
The flame watches. The flame remembers.
As they rode out of the Eastern Capital, mist curling around the wheels of their cart, Ziyan looked once over her shoulder.
Not in fear. Not in mourning.
But in recognition.
The city behind her had tried to erase her.
And failed.
Now she rode for Nan Shu.
Toward Duan Rulan.
Toward truth.
Toward the storm waiting to be named.