Black sap dripped from the iron ties beneath the rubber soles of her shoes. The air smelled of rotten copper and drowned soil. She walked straight toward the mass of snarled wood, her fist clenched tight over the silver pendant. "I know you're hurting," Sora said. Her tone was steady, stripped of panic, the exact cadence she used when soothing a mangled stray on the metal examination table. "You carried her name for fifty years while the concrete choked you out. She never asked you to become this poison." The massive knot of roots shuddered. High above, suspended in the vaulted darkness of the subway line, a visage formed from pale burls and wet bark. Two hollow recesses fixed upon the tiny metal oval poking through the veterinarian's knuckles. For three seconds, the venomous reek thinned. The wailing pitch that had rattled the iron tracks subsided to a ragged rasp. Then the blight surged back, violent and foul. "Die!" screeched a voice like tearing timber. "False mouth! Sunder the vermin!" A root thick as an oil drum ripped through the gravel bed, barbed with jagged shards of industrial glass, driving straight toward her chest. Feng Jiu spared no thought for calculation or the cost to his burned meridians. He threw himself across the tracks. His palms struck the bedrock. The ley lines of the metropolis—slumbering beneath tarmac, neon, and storm drains—snapped awake. Azure fire tore through his marrow, bursting from the pores of his forearms. He caught the root bare-handed three inches from Sora's collarbone. The impact cracked the bones in his left wrist. The splintered wood gouged deep trenches through his jacket, spraying foul ichor across his collar. Feng Jiu bared his teeth, grinning through the iron tang pooling under his tongue. "Did you think a Grandmaster leaves his landlady unprotected?" "Feng Jiu!" Sora cried, reaching for him. "Hold the pendant! Do not pull back!" Rather than deflecting the strike, he drew it in. He pressed his torn right hand over her closed fist, seizing the silver casing between them. Instead of blasting the root with destructive intent, he opened his dantian completely, turning his flesh into an open conduit. He forced the surging energy of the subway arteries through the locket. The sorrow of Ji-Hyeon's death met Sora's unyielding compassion, and Feng Jiu acted as the furnace, burning the sludge away. A brilliant, sun-white fire washed through the subterranean chamber. The soot peeled from the bark in blistered sheets. The rotting smell burned off, replaced by the clean, sharp scent of river reeds after summer rain. The monstrous bulk shrank, its violent spasms slowing into a calm sway. Where blackened vines had choked the ceiling, pale green leaves unfurled, raining cool, dewy droplets over the ballast. The arboreal spirit drifted downward. It was no longer a hulking engine of rot, but a slender, luminous figure crowned in willow shoots. It paused before Sora, bowed its leafy head in profound gratitude, and dissolved into a ribbon of emerald mist that sank into the wet stone, racing toward the Han River to cleanse the riverbed. Feng Jiu collapsed to his knees against the ties. The blue radiance vanished from his skin, leaving him gray and hollowed. Sora dropped beside him, her hands hovering over his bloodied shoulder before wrapping firmly around his ribs. "You idiot. You reckless, arrogant idiot." "A victorious grandmaster deserves a warmer greeting," he croaked, leaning his head against her shoulder. For once, his towering pride raised no objection to the contact. *** Morning light spilled across the linoleum of The Warm Paw Clinic. The smell of antiseptic and brewed barley tea felt like heaven after the subway filth. Nabi sat atop the medicine cabinet, washing a calico paw with complete indifference to the cosmic battle that had concluded hours prior. "Hold still," Sora ordered, dabbing iodine onto the gouges on Feng Jiu's arm. Her brow was knitted tight. "The treatment stings worse than the strike," Feng Jiu grumbled, sitting on an examination stool with his shirt unbuttoned to the waist. He tried to puff out his chest, but a sharp wince spoiled the majesty. "Good. Maybe you'll remember it before jumping in front of a tree trunk next time." Her fingers softened as she taped a square of sterile gauze against his skin. Her gaze remained lowered, though her thumb lingered against his bare shoulder, tracing the edge of the collarbone. "Thank you. You saved my life down there." "You stood before a raging ancient entity without trembling," Feng Jiu said quietly, his voice dropping to a low, intimate timbre. He captured her fingers, pressing her palm against his chest, right where his pulse beat steady and hard. "A woman of such valor would turn any master's head. I have lived centuries across different skies, Han Sora, yet I find myself bound entirely to this small room. To you." Her cheeks turned pink. She opened her mouth, her dark eyes shining with something tender and raw. "Feng Jiu, I—" The clinic door chimed and banged open with concussive force. Mr. Park strode in, clutching an antique brass astrolabe that ticked like an angry hornet. He paid no mind to Feng Jiu's bare chest or their clasped hands. "Put your shirt on, boy!" Mr. Park barked, slamming the metal instrument onto the reception desk. Sparks jumped from its brass dials, scorching the appointment book. "The willow is clean. The river is breathing again. But look at this damn needle!" Sora pulled her hand back, flustered, while Feng Jiu glared murder at the old tea seller. "Old man, your sense of timing is an abomination." "Timing? The world is rotting!" Mr. Park tapped the spinning compass needle. It wasn't pointing north. It was spinning wildly, pointing south toward Busan, then east toward the ocean, shuddering with violent tremors. "The Weeping Willow was just a splinter. The Grey Fade didn't start in Seoul, and it isn't stopping here. Ley lines across the entire peninsula are choking on Graveblight. Tokyo, Beijing, London—the rot is waking up everywhere." Mr. Park leaned across the counter, staring dead into Feng Jiu's eyes. "My ancestors' scrolls spoke of a shepherd from the clouds who could wake the earth. I thought it was old fairy tales. But you pulled the roots together down there. You survived it." The old guardian jabbed a calloused finger into Feng Jiu's chest. "You healed one river, Grandmaster. Now tell me how you're going to save the rest of this world." Feng Jiu slowly buttoned his shirt, the pain in his bones forgotten as his gaze locked onto the wild compass needle.