"Come back, my child. Come back!"
"Your bed is waiting at home, and your quilt, and a meal your mother cooked. Your little sister is waiting for you too."
"Do you remember your sister? Her name is Lin Yao. She's a year younger than you, and now she asks me every day where her big brother went."
Lin Chen's hand trembled, and his other foot took another step.
"Come back with me," Lynn said. "I'm not here to capture you. I'm here to take you home. Your father has come for you."
"From now on, our family will live together and never be apart!"
The golden thread gave a sudden pulse in Lin Chen's chest.
Warmth poured through from the other end of the thread, like a little river of scalding water.
Lin Chen couldn't help taking another step forward.
Seeing that the time was right, the Zombie Leopard rose from the ground and staggered toward the valley's exit, leading the way.
Lin Chen followed it, one step, two steps, three steps.
His eyes were full of tears, his mind full of those images.
The woman sitting beside the window, that aged face, those eyes just like his...
And the words she had spoken.
Come back with your father. Your mother is waiting for you at home.
He followed the Zombie Leopard out of the valley, through the undead settlement, and toward the territory's border.
Lin Chen walked among tens of millions of undead. Those along the road made way for him, and some watched him with hollow eye sockets, utterly expressionless.
But he had eyes only for the staggering Zombie Leopard ahead.
He wanted to go back, to return to his parents and find the family love he had lost so long ago.
When he reached the border, a