Year 65 of the Firefolk Era, the night of the autumn equinox.
Beside the well in the Ruin Abyss, the charcoal-pencil forest shone like a sea, and countless fireflies rose from every corner of the Nine Provinces—
The Night Watch Lamps of the northern snowfields became fireflies, the oil in the ancient wells of the Western Desert burned out and became fireflies, the shining threads of the southern islands' fishing nets snapped and became fireflies...
One, ten, a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand—
Like a rain of stars, the fireflies converged on the Ruin Abyss from mountains and rivers, deserts, islands, and deep valleys.
Xiaoman stood beside the well, tilted his head toward the sky, and said softly, "They've come back."
Su Li stood at the heart of the forest with the Hearthfire Record, turned to its final page, and took up her brush to add:
"The lamps have passed their light on; the fireflies return to the river."
Midnight came, and ten thousand fireflies moved as one.
They neither flew toward the forest nor settled in the well, but dove one by one, plunging into cracks in the earth's veins and merging with the old course of the Heart Flame River.
Points of light entered the veins like stars falling into a river. The Heart Flame River—the great artery of the earth's veins across the Nine Provinces, once frozen by Eternal Night—slowly revived, steeped in firefly light.
The river of light first appeared like a silver ribbon wound around the earth.
It neither surged nor roared, but flowed quietly, its light like fireflies, its pulse like breathing, winding along the old courses through the mountains and rivers of the Nine Provinces.
Its first stretch flowed through Soulbreak Valley.
A lost caravan was trapped amid wind and sand, its food