The beast-core pulsed, a ruby heart thrumming with raw, untamed essence. Each beat was a whisper of regained days, a siren song promising temporary relief from the gnawing dread. Suyin’s knuckles locked hard over the crimson facets. Two hundred forty-eight days. The number burned, a brand more searing than the curse itself. It was the precipice of a gamble, her life the terrifying stake. Her gaze swept past the core, past the churning miasma, to the faint, ethereal glow of the Eastern Courtyard. Cracked jade gates and shattered lanterns bordered the enclosure, an empty husk starved of qi. Reviving it was the only way to re-anchor the peak's foundation. The soul-rot pulled at her marrow, but allowing the mountain to rot meant certain ruin regardless. Temporary reprieve was a coward’s choice, a bandage over a gaping wound. Suyin leveled the core toward the open gate. Her voice, thin and reedy, cracked through the gloom. “Jiao. Begin.” The bronze furnace, still trembling from its terrifying ordeal, coughed. “B-but Mistress! The days! You’ll… you’ll lose them!” “Begin,” she repeated, her voice steadier now, laced with an edge of quiet ferocity. The decision, once made, brought a strange, cold clarity. She pressed the core against the nearest fractured gate-pillar. The ruby essence flared, then dissolved, discharging a torrent of pure vitality into the parched earth. A gasp tore from Suyin’s throat, not of pain, but of a sudden, profound release. The ambient pressure within the grounds surged outward in a sudden heave. It wasn't a trickle, but a gushing spring, restoring the desiccated ley lines. The air thickened, sweet and pure, pushing back against the encroaching miasma with a tangible force. Her own soul, which had felt like a brittle, flaking scroll, suddenly found itself immersed in a restorative balm. The rapid, sickening drain of her curse slowed, then ceased. The numbers on her wrist, though still reading ‘248,’ no longer felt like a countdown to oblivion, but a solid, if short, span of time. The rot was still there, a dull ache beneath her ribs, but it was no longer consuming her with frantic speed. She had bought herself not time, but stability. “Mistress! It worked!” Jiao shrieked, his voice echoing with genuine awe. “The pressure! It’s… it’s flowing again!” Suyin leaned against the newly vibrant pillar, her legs weak. The relief was a deluge, threatening to overwhelm her carefully constructed composure. She steadied her breath against the granite, drinking in the sudden influx of uncorrupted air. When she opened them, Shen Lu stood a few paces away, his gaze fixed on her without a sound. He lowered an intricately carved wooden chest to the flags. A single, heavy clink rang out against the stone. He produced a small, leather pouch, then another. The clinks became a steady cadence as he dropped cut jade into the box, a mountain of them. One thousand. For silence, she thought, and perhaps for something more. He tipped his chin toward the shallow, muddy pond at the center of the flagstones. From a fold in his robes, he produced a handful of small, gnarled roots, each trailing slender, green shoots. Purifying aquatic roots, prized for purging tainted earth and anchoring clean water against corruption. Suyin picked up her sign, flipping it to the 'Conversations: 500' side. Shen Lu simply pointed to the overflowing box. He was paying for *her* silence, not his. And, she realized, for assistance in setting the roots. The sheer transactional audacity of it, mirroring her own, struck a strange, resonant chord within her. Her terror, ever-present, receded a fraction. Here was a problem she understood: a task, a fee, a shared objective. She nodded, then carefully took one of the lotus roots. The mud was thick, cold, clinging to her fingers. She knelt by the pond, scooping out a small depression in the ooze. Shen Lu knelt opposite her, his movements fluid and efficient. He didn't speak, didn't even meet her gaze directly, but his presence was a quiet, steady hum. His fingers, long and elegant, worked deftly, pushing the roots into the mud, his intent focused. The shared labor formed a wordless pact across the murky water. A furious bellow shattered the fragile peace. “What in the blazing hells is this?!” Yan Zun stormed past the shattered archway. He took one look at Suyin and Shen Lu, kneeling in shared proximity by the pond, a quiet tableau of intent focus, and a vein pulsed violently in his temple. He spotted the collection box, now overflowing with Shen Lu’s generous contribution. Yan Zun's brow twitched as comprehension struck. This taciturn demonic cultivator had outbid him, not just in quantity, but in *quality* of interaction. He wasn't just paying for her attention; he was *earning* it. With a snarl, Yan Zun ripped open his spatial pouch. A cascade of cut gems, a glittering river, poured into the box, spilling onto the mud. His entire monthly allowance, gone in a fit of jealous fury. He kicked the nearest crumbling bench, sending shards of stone flying, then plopped down on the opposite bank of the pond, arms crossed, glaring, radiating pure, unadulterated contempt and possessive wrath. He had paid, an exorbitant amount, just to be here, to witness this. Just to glare. Suyin ignored him. Her gaze was on the lotuses, then on Shen Lu’s hands as he planted another root. The black mud clung to his sleeve, and as he reached deeper into the water, the fabric pulled back, revealing the skin of his forearm. It wasn’t just stained. Beneath the pale skin, like a grotesque tattoo, dark, branching veins snaked up his wrist—a web of inky black matching the miasma creeping through the peak's bedrock. Suyin froze, her own hand, caked in mud, hovering above the water. Suyin looked from the black lines under his flesh to the cracked flags of the terrace. It was the same corruption. Not cultivation backlash, but a virulent venom. The same poison that was slowly choking the life out of the Obsidian Cicada Sect. The terror, momentarily quelled, returned with a fresh, sickening intensity. Shen Lu, seemingly oblivious to her scrutiny, continued his work. Then, without looking up, his voice a low, gravelly whisper, barely audible above Yan Zun’s furious huffing, he spoke. “The one who poisoned this mountain is the exact same one who poisoned me.”

Planting Lotuses in the Dark