With effort the air howled in winds. At times it carried a faint sweetness from the fruits across the lane, primarily the taste was of metal and dirt. Around them, the market rambled its usual song: merchants quarreling over coin, wives scolding lazy husbands, birds fighting over crumbs. It was a chorus of small hungers.

  The little girl (referred to as “Little Ren” from now on) followed Ren Lin to their stall. It was a common sight among cultivators—slaves typically accompanied their masters on outings. Only when mortals were sent on errands alone were they seen without their owners.

  “So what do we do here?” the child asked, fingers leafing through a stack of couplets.

  “We take commissions,” Ren Lin said, pinning a sheet under a plank. “Poems, blessings, letters. People give coin; I give words.”

  “You’re a scholar?”

  Her head shook. “Not a scholar. A writer. I taught myself.”

  The girl blinked. “You can learn that by yourself?”

  A faint, cold smile touched Ren Lin’s lips. “The fact you question it is the very proof of our oppression.” She gently patted the girl’s head, a gesture that felt more like consoling a pet, rather than comfort. “You believe only the nurtured may prosper.”

  In response Little Ren’s brows furrowed. “But it’s true. Only if you get taught by people that are high high, can you become important too.”

  “High, high?” A dry chuckle escaped her lips. “You see the world through a keyhole. After all, she was the one who built the lock…”

  “Who?” The child’s ears shot up.

  “The princess, she sets this system up with the other royalties. Because of her all of you—of us have to suffer through all this injustice.”

  The girl pondered for a while. “But what about the king..? Doesn’t he control everything?”

  Her head shook again. “Do you know what a puppet show is?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Imagine the King is a puppet with strings. Powerful, grand! Who pulls those strings?”

  The child’s gaze turned inward, connecting the dots. When understanding dawned, her lips moved. “The Princess.” Little Ren’s eyes fell to the dirty ground. “Me—my parents… she was the one who turned us to… things?” A hotness flickered in the girl’s eyes. “She is evil.”

  Ren Lin’s hand found the girl’s back, a steady, false comfort. “It will be set right. I have been preparing.” With a magician’s swiftness, she took out the before stolen glove, it was faintly transparent.

  “A Core?!” She gasped.

  “This one is… special,” Ren Lin didn’t know what the Core could do, her voice mislead with a silken thread. “It feeds on righteous anger. It can erase the targeted person. Sadly, it can only be used once, and my chance is spent.”

  The girl’s eager eyes fell. “So it’s useless.”

  “Not for you.” She leaned in, her words for the child alone. “You can use it, the choice would be yours, of course. But remember: to sacrifice one corrupt life for the salvation of thousands… that is the choice of a true hero.”

  Little Ren’s gaze swept across the weary faces in the marketplace, then lifted, as if drawn by the distant yellow tiles of the red majestic palace.

  Within this royal chateau, in a chamber that smelled of silk and sweetness, Princess Feiyun Qingru concentrated her vision and mind on only one thing—refinement!

  “It is a pity, with those looks no matter how ambitious she is… sigh.” A maid peeped through the keyhole—she didn’t even need to finish her sentence, it was obvious what she meant.

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  The other maid answered, “it’s truly a shame. If only she wasn’t born in this family, her talents would definitely make her shine-”

  “She does not require your pity. Your duties lie elsewhere. Go.” A new voice cut through, majestic and sudden as lightning soaring through the sky.

  After making the servants retreat swiftly, the young man fluidly opened the door without making any sound.

  His figure was straight like a spear; he had a sword buckled at his waist. A necklace with a golden tag hid inside his robe—Third Order. His hair was like a nightscape—jet-black and parted in the middle, falling to his shoulders, little white dots spread across it as if they were stars. He said nothing. Moving to a carved chair beside the Princess’ bed, sitting, putting down teacups, the man watched over her.

  Hovering over her silk cloth, was a beautiful jade cube. It shimmered, its edges blurring the air around it like a heat haze. She poured her focus into it, her spiritual energy seeking to bind with the Core’s innate ability to distort perception. For a glorious moment, it held, the cube glowing with a steady, internal light.

  Then, a sharp crack echoed in the room. The light flared violently, and the jade cube exploded into a shower of harmless, dull-green sparks and dust.

  “I failed…” she sighed as she felt a pat on her back.

  “You did well.” His words aimed to comfort her. “In fact, it’s better to fail.”

  She jumped at the touch, as her vision darted to the young man beside her. “Brother you sneaked in again! You scared me!”

  Prince Feiyun Xing chuckled. “Not only that, but I brought my dear sister some tea too.”

  “You’re fortunate that your tea is so good…” Her eyes rolled, as a giggle slipped out. Instinctively, she raised a robed hand to hide her slightly crooked teeth, like always.

  Her brother's expression softened, a flicker of empathetic pain in his gaze. That small, habitual gesture of concealment never failed to wound him.

  Yet he let the moment pass, steering it back to safer ground with a gentle smile. "Well, you know what they say," he offered, his tone lightly playful. "Tea reflects the soul of the one who pours it."

  “Alright, alright… you pure soul,” she teased, lifting the cup to her lips.

  The taste was extraordinary—like divine sunlight had descended from the heavens to gracefully bathe in her mouth. It was beyond delicious. But unwilling to give her brother the satisfaction, Qingru kept her face carefully neutral.

  “What did you mean earlier?”

  “About failure?” His eyes flashed with conviction.

  “How can anyone grow without setbacks? A person who never tries—can they ever surpass someone who fails, learns, and keeps trying? Of course not. We grow through challenges. And when we stumble, we gain the insight to face it better next time.” He paused. “If I had to choose between a life of effortless success and one filled with failure and struggle… I’d choose the life with the most failures.”

  A clapping was heard after he finished speaking. “You do have quite a motivating tongue. Maybe you should give speeches?”

  “I will, on your birthday.”

  “It better be your best one.” Her hand reached out. Pinching his cheek, stretching it like some gummy.

  “Ow, ow! Stop!”

  “Then promise.”

  He gave in quickly. “Yes, yes, I promise!”

  The grip on his cheek let go, followed by a pat. “That’s how Xing Xing should be!”

  “I’m not a dog.” The Prince grunted, with a smirk forming on his lips. “Perhaps I should scare you more often…?”

  “I would rather not.”

  “Then, is this how you treat your amazing brother?”

  As if knowing what comes next, she slid to the other side of her bed. “Who knows…”

  “Who knows?!” He repeated, acting offended. “Wait till I get you…”

  Laughs could be heard from the room, while the Prince chased his sister. It was truly a sight of two siblings bantering around and having fun.

  …

  The laughter from the palace faded into the night like the last note of a distant flute.

  Far from its gold and silk, the road that led toward the city’s slums grew quieter with every step. The market’s noise dimmed, replaced by the creak of wooden carts being dragged away and the faint hum of insects waking under the moonlight.

  Walking ahead was Ren Lin, shoulders squared, her back carrying both exhaustion and resolve. The girl trailed behind, holding the day’s meager earnings in a pouch tied too tight around her wrist—as if letting it go would undo the small victory of surviving another day.

  “We do this… every day?” the child whispered, the question a breath of pain.

  “We do what we must to eat,” she replied, her voice without pity. It was a simple, brutal fact. “There is no other path.”

  The girl could only nod, her energy spent.

  Ren Lin stopped and turned, her form blocking the faint lantern light from a nearby alley. She knelt, bringing her eyes level with the child’s. In the half-darkness, her gaze was intense, unwavering.

  “But remember,” Ren Lin said, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial hush. She tapped a finger gently on her own pocket, right over the hidden Core. “This burden of a choice you carry… is the key. Soon, you won’t just survive this life. You will shatter it. You will change everyone’s.”

  She rose, taking the girl’s small, dirty hand in her own. “Come.”

  They moved on, two figures swallowed by the narrow, darkening lanes that led to the slums. Ahead, shadows gathered. Behind them, in the highest tower of the palace, a single window glowed like a captive star, its light too distant to even remotely reach their sight.