The charcoal in the side hall crackled softly.
Zhou Xuan looked at the woman across from him. Her words, "I can never get them back," landed heavily in the air, leaving him at a loss for how to respond.
Lin Qingzhu cradled her teacup, the rising steam blurring her face. She slowly began recounting what she had lived through over the past ten years.
There were no tearful accusations, no exaggerated embellishments. In an utterly calm voice, she simply laid out those perilous experiences one by one.
"When the Demonic Calamity first broke out, the Western Desolate Region was a pot of boiling chaos. To protect themselves, the major sects sealed their gates outright, without caring whether the wandering cultivators and mortals outside lived or died."
Lin Qingzhu lowered her gaze to the tea.
"I took several dozen workers from the Cloud Pavilion, loaded every resource we could carry onto carts, and fled north."
Zhou Xuan listened quietly without interrupting.
"We ran into demonic beasts several times along the way. Once, the caravan we hired was trapped in demonic mist out in the wilderness, and more than half the people died. The surviving guards were scared out of their wits. They clamored to split up and divide the baggage."
Lin Qingzhu paused, gently rubbing her fingers along the rim of her teacup.
"I poured all the top-grade spirit stones onto the ground and told them that whoever could keep the Cloud Pavilion's banner alive would get those stones. With a rich enough reward, I finally managed to steady their hearts."
Beneath the table, Zhou Xuan's fingers slowly tightened.
He looked at her hands, their joints pronounced, clearly bearing the marks of considerable hardship.
Ten years ago in the Fengqin Kingdom, those hands had done little more than flick the beads