The morning after Yue Lian's confession, the sky turned the color of old bruises.
Hanxi had spent the night studying the jade slip, absorbing what fragments of information it contained. The Twilight Dao wasn't just a cultivation method—it was a philosophy. A way of understanding that all things contained their opposite. Light held darkness. Strength required weakness. Life fed on death.
To walk the twilight path is to embrace paradox, the text read. The sun that rises must also set. The moon that wanes must also wax. Neither is complete without the other.
But the fragment was incomplete, ending abruptly mid-sentence: Those who seek the Third Moon must first—
Must first what? The text was corrupted, unreadable.
"Storm coming," Wei Feng announced, studying the clouds. "Big one. We need shelter."
Yue Chen consulted with his guards, then pointed ahead where the road forked. "There's an inn about five miles north. The Whispering Willow. We've used it before—the proprietor is trustworthy."
Something about the name made Hanxi's instincts prickle. "Are there other options?"
"Not within twenty miles. And this storm..." Wei Feng gestured at the clouds, which were now roiling like an angry sea. "This isn't natural weather. I can feel qi disturbances. Someone's either performing a major cultivation technique or something very large and very angry is nearby."
Thunder rolled across the sky, confirming his assessment.
"The Whispering Willow it is," Yue Chen decided.
As they traveled, the wind picked up, carrying scents that made Hanxi's wolf instincts scream warnings. Blood. Fear. Something burning that wasn't wood.
And underneath it all, a qi signature he'd felt once before—in the clearing where he'd fought the bandits. No, not fought. Before that. In the forest, when he'd first absorbed the wolf fang.
The Dusk Codex had been watching even then.
"Wei Feng," Hanxi said quietly, moving his horse alongside the guard captain's. "We need to skip this inn."
"You sense something?"
"I smell death ahead. Recent death. And..." Hanxi closed his eyes, extending his enhanced senses. "Cultivators. At least three, all with corrupted qi signatures. Twisted solar-lunar energy, like oil mixed with water."
Wei Feng's hand moved to his sword. "Dusk Codex?"
"Has to be. They're waiting for us. Or waiting for me, specifically."
"Can we outrun the storm?"
Hanxi looked at the sky. Lightning now danced between clouds, and the wind had become strong enough to rock the wagons. "No. If we try, we'll be caught in the open. At least at the inn we have walls and shelter."
"Walls can become traps."
"Yes. But I'm tired of running from these people." Hanxi's hand went to his sword. "Maybe it's time we had a conversation."
Wei Feng gave him a long look. "You're starting to think like a predator. That's good for survival, bad for your humanity."
"Right now, I'll take survival." Hanxi urged his horse forward. "But we need a plan. How many guards can we count on in a fight against cultivators?"
"Against Qi Condensation realm? Maybe four, including myself. The rest are regular soldiers—brave, but outmatched." Wei Feng's expression was grim. "If there are really three Dusk Codex cultivators waiting, we're in trouble. Their techniques are designed to counter both solar and lunar cultivation. They've had a century to perfect fighting people like you."
"Then we don't fight fair."
"Now you're talking my language."
The inn appeared through the rain like a specter—a two-story building with a willow tree growing through its center courtyard, branches spreading over the roof like protective arms. Under normal circumstances, it might have looked welcoming.
Right now, it looked like a tomb.
"I don't see anyone," Xiaohua observed, her hand on her sword. "No lights, no smoke from the chimney. No one tending the stables."
"They're here," Hanxi said. His enhanced senses painted a clear picture: three cultivators hiding their presence in different parts of the inn. Several corpses—the inn's staff and previous guests, killed to clear the location. And something else. Someone else. A fourth presence, old and powerful, that felt neither corrupted nor hostile.
Just watching.
Yue Chen made the decision. "We have no choice. Guards, maintain vigilance. Young Master Wāng, stay close to my daughter."
They pulled the wagons into the courtyard, where the willow tree's branches provided some shelter from the driving rain. Hanxi helped Yue Lian down from her wagon, and she grabbed his arm, her grip tight.
"I can feel them too," she whispered. "Three cultivators, Qi Condensation mid-levels. Their qi is wrong—twisted. Like someone tried to force light and darkness together and created only shadow."
"Can you tell where they are?"
"One in the main hall. One upstairs. One in the kitchen." She pointed to each location without looking directly at them. "But there's someone else. An old woman, I think. She's in the cellar, and her qi is... strange. Powerful but somehow absent. Like she's hiding in plain sight."
"The innkeeper?"
"Maybe. Or maybe the person we're really here to meet." Yue Lian's eyes met his. "That jade slip I gave you? One of the fragments mentioned that the Third Moon sometimes takes on mundane identities. Hides in plain sight. Tests those who seek her."
Before Hanxi could respond, the inn's front door swung open.
A woman stood in the doorway—ancient, bent with age, wearing simple servant's robes. Her hair was white as snow, her face weathered by centuries. But her eyes...
Her eyes were the gray of perfect twilight, where day and night became one.
"Travelers seeking shelter from the storm?" Her voice was surprisingly strong, carrying easily over the wind. "Come in, come in. Though I'm afraid my usual hospitality is... limited today. The staff has taken ill, you see. Very suddenly."
The lie was so blatant it was almost insulting.
Yue Chen hesitated, but what choice did they have? Lightning cracked across the sky, and rain began falling in earnest. "We appreciate your generosity, grandmother. We'll pay fair coin for rooms and food."
"Oh, there'll be payment," the old woman said, her smile revealing teeth too sharp to be entirely human. "One way or another, there's always payment."
She stepped aside, gesturing them in.