At daybreak, Chen Wuya was already standing in the middle of the open ground.
He wore no outer robe, only a short jacket washed pale with wear. Its sleeves were rolled to his elbows, revealing two lean but sturdy arms. An iron rod was planted beside him, its tip pointing down like a flagpole propped up on the spot. He clapped his hands. His voice was not loud, yet it carried far. "Everyone, come over. Today I'll teach you something practical."
Several children came running first and formed a circle. Then the women preparing food, the men chopping wood, and the few "outsiders" who had entered the camp yesterday—the herb gatherer, the blacksmith, and the porter—ambled over as well. No one spoke. They only exchanged glances.
Old Wu Tou leaned on his cane at the back of the crowd and silently swept his gaze around.
Chen Wuya cleared his throat. "I've worked out a method these past few days. I'm calling it the Body-Shaking Self-Defense Technique. You don't need strength or practiced moves. As long as you know how to breathe, you can do it."
Someone laughed.
"The force doesn't come from the dantian. It comes from your heels." He spoke with a solemn air. "Stamp your foot, and the force shoots up from the ground, surges to the top of your head, then presses back down. It can shake a person flat."
The laughter grew even louder.
"The qi doesn't travel through the Conception and Governing Vessels. It has to flood backward into your ears." He continued, actually covering his ears with both hands and pretending to hold his breath. "Try it. When your ears start buzzing, your heartbeat slows down, and even if an enemy attacks you, they won't be able to strike accurately."
Everyone looked at one another, then followed along skeptically. Some turned red in the face without producing any effect, while others jumped around wildly and made the children clap.
Chen Wuya slowly swept his gaze across the crowd.
The system gave a faint tremor in his mind.
[Detected three abnormal fluctuations in qi and blood. Matching Blood Demon Art circulation patterns. Confidence: eighty percent]
Without revealing anything, he began setting the rhythm. First, he thrust out a palm. It looked loose and limp, but Misaligned Force surged through his body, crashing along the reverse meridian route into every limb and bone. Each movement caused the air to tremble faintly, and the dust on the ground leaped in response.
The onlookers instinctively imitated him. Most merely went through the motions. But the three men were different.
The herb gatherer's shoulders tightened slightly, and his breathing hitched for an instant at a certain point. The blacksmith's fingers twitched around the bowl in his left hand, as if struck by an electric current. The porter stood with his head lowered, fine sweat beading at his temples as his nostrils flared faintly.
The corners of Chen Wuya's mouth lifted.
He knew that practitioners of the Blood Demon Art had an instinctive aversion to unconventional force paths. Just as water had to vaporize when it met heat, their bodies would react without their awareness. No matter how well they controlled their consciousness, they could not conceal the movement of their qi and blood.
He ended the exercise and clapped his hands. "All right, that's enough for today. But..."
His voice paused, and everyone fell silent.
"Something was buried beside the well last night. I know who did it."
The crowd stirred.
He remained calm. "A piece of black cloth and a salve carrying the bitter-almond scent. Northern Desert's Soul Severing Ointment. Applied to a blade, it makes a person limp and silent within three days. Someone among you wants us to die without a sound."
No one spoke.
"I'm in no hurry to catch anyone." He slowly walked forward. "But I'll make this clear: anyone who dares touch a single blade of grass in this camp will learn exactly what Misaligned Force Piercing the Bowels means."
He stopped in front of the herb gatherer.
The man lowered his head and clenched the strap of his basket.
"Brother, the first thing you did after entering wasn't look for food. You walked around the wall once. Counting the sentries? Checking the water source? Or memorizing which rooms housed the able-bodied workers?" Chen Wuya stared at him. "You say you gather herbs, but every plant in your basket is withered. You didn't even bring the roots. How could they have been dug up? They look more like they were taken from an apothecary."
The man's Adam's apple bobbed.
Chen Wuya turned and looked at the blacksmith.
"You eat with your left hand. Very clever. But your right sleeve is bulging, and something inside is pressing against your wrist pulse point, obstructing the circulation of your qi and blood. When you practiced the Body Shocking Technique just now, your right middle finger trembled three times. Anyone who has practiced the Blood Demon Art will react like that when their true qi takes a wrong turn."
The blacksmith's expression changed.
Finally, he looked toward the porter. "You hid in the woodpile, and your breath-holding technique is decent. But you forgot that when a person is utterly still, dryness makes the nasal passages itch. You sneezed last night. You made no sound, but your shoulders trembled once. One of the children saw it."
The three men all took a step back.
Chen Wuya suddenly raised his voice. "You aren't refugees! You're spies from the Northern Desert Royal Court Imperial Guard! You wear Wolf Head copper clasps on your chests, hide Soul Severing Ointment at your waists, and practice the Blood Demon Saber method of guiding qi. Am I right?"
The air froze.
System Notification: [Target heart-rate peak has exceeded the critical threshold. Identity confirmed]
The herb gatherer suddenly raised his head, a vicious glint flashing through his eyes.
The blacksmith's right hand quietly slid toward his sleeve.
The porter shifted his feet apart and lowered his center of gravity.
Chen Wuya had been prepared for this.
He drove the iron rod into the ground. Misaligned Force exploded outward, and the sand beneath his feet burst apart with a thunderous roar. Three waves of vibration shot straight toward the men's soles. They leaped up almost simultaneously to evade them. Their movements were clean and decisive, and when they landed, their footsteps matched perfectly—a reaction drilled into them by military training.
The crowd erupted.
"Did you see that?" Chen Wuya shouted. "A real refugee walks with his head down, afraid of tripping over something. He gulps down his food, afraid there won't be any left. When he laughs, it comes from the heart—it isn't something he learned through drills! That jump of theirs just now was so synchronized, it looked like a military exercise!"
Old Wu Tou came forward, leaning on his cane. His voice was low. "How did the Azure Waves Sect fall thirty years ago? It was because people like these disguised themselves as beggars and refugees, probing out every detail bit by bit, then slaughtering everyone in the middle of the night."
The villagers grew furious.
Some snatched up carrying poles, while others raised their hoes and quickly surrounded the three men.
The herb gatherer still tried to struggle. The moment he drew his dagger, two strong men pounced on him and pinned him to the ground. The mechanism hidden in the blacksmith's sleeve had barely sprung halfway out when a palm strike of Misaligned Force from Chen Wuya knocked it aside, sending the steel needles into the dirt. The porter turned to flee, but Old Wu Tou swept his cane across, catching his legs and sending him sprawling face-first into the mud.
The three men were bound tightly and escorted to the center of the open ground.
Chen Wuya crouched in front of the herb gatherer and reached into his clothes, pulling out a copper clasp. It bore a Wolf Head totem, with a Royal Court serial number engraved along its edge.
"Who sent you?" he asked.
The man clenched his teeth and remained silent.
"Not telling is fine, too." Chen Wuya rose and surveyed the entire crowd. "But I want everyone to understand: this won't stop here. They'll come again, with different faces and different names. They may even disguise themselves as refugees more convincingly. But as long as they dare come, I'll dare expose them."
He pointed at the three men. "They thought disguising themselves would let them slip inside, but they don't understand that the real flaw isn't in their movements. It's in their hearts. They don't understand hunger, pain, or what it means to live one day at a time. No matter how convincingly they pretend, they won't escape all those watching eyes."
The children crowded at the front, their eyes wide.
A seven-year-old girl raised her hand. "Brother Chen, can we still play 'Find the Shadow' from now on?"
"Of course." He smiled. "And starting today, everyone will be a 'shadow finder.'"
Old Wu Tou walked to his side and said in a low voice, "There are still people behind them."
"I know." Chen Wuya gazed at the distant ridgeline. "But this step has to be theirs first."
He picked up the iron rod and lightly tapped it against the ground.
The three spies were dragged to the rear camp and locked up. The villagers spontaneously organized patrols, and the atmosphere was tense yet orderly.
Chen Wuya stood in the middle of the open ground, the wind lifting the hem of his clothes.
He suddenly remembered the piece of black cloth he had touched the previous night. Beneath the bitter-almond scent, there seemed to be another smell hidden there—extremely faint, like ink mixed with the ashes of old paper.
He had smelled that scent in the deepest part of the academy library.
He lowered his head and looked at his hands.
Misaligned Force circulated through his meridians, radiating a faint heat.
Just then, an elderly woman who had been cooking suddenly spoke from within the crowd. "Young Chen, you said just now that the force comes from the heels... I tried it, and my knees feel warm. Did I practice it correctly?"
He turned around and smiled. "You didn't just practice it correctly. You understood it even faster than I did."
The old woman grinned and turned back to her work.
Chen Wuya withdrew his gaze and was about to speak.
Old Wu Tou suddenly reached out and pressed down on his shoulder.
"Look at the blacksmith's soles," the old man said in a hushed voice.
He lowered his head.
A little dried mud clung to the man's coarse-cloth soles. It was dark brown, with a strange pattern, as if pressed by some kind of seal.
The pattern looked like an open book, with one corner missing from the middle.
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