That day.
Night deepened, and Lime Alley lay as silent as a graveyard.
The lights in the Old Wrestling Hall were still on. Dim yellow light spilled through the crack in the door, spreading over a small patch of flagstones.
Xiang Weisha sat beneath the light, the wrestling jacket his grandfather had given him spread across his knees. Its indigo fabric had been washed pale, and he polished its brass buttons over and over.
It was the last thing his grandfather had passed down to him, but it was already covered in the marks of time.
He did not know what his grandfather had experienced in his youth, nor did he understand why his grandfather had been so determined to guard this Jiaodi hall.
All he knew was that this Jiaodi hall and the two feet of yellow earth beneath his feet were what his grandfather had spent a lifetime protecting. They were the roots of the Jiaodi legacy and his only remaining attachment in this world.
After folding the wrestling jacket and placing it on the wooden table beside him, Xiang Weisha stood and put the stone training weights in the courtyard back in place.
Once he had finished, he extinguished the light and pushed open the wooden door.
The night wind rushed in, as cold as a blade, scraping painfully across his face.
Xiang Weisha instinctively pulled his old padded coat tighter around himself.
But the moment he stepped outside, he stopped short.
Someone stood beneath the old locust tree at the mouth of the alley.
The moonlight was too faint to reveal the man's face, illuminating only a stocky silhouette with broad shoulders, a thick back, and powerful limbs. Standing there, he resembled a low wall, a fierce brutality radiating from him that set him apart from