By the time Lí Zhì returned to the village square, the morning bustle had shifted into confusion.
A group of neighbors stood around the communal well. Voices overlapped—worried, frustrated.
"I filled my buckets just an hour ago!"
"But now it's dry—completely dry!"
"That's impossible. There was plenty of water yesterday."
Lí Zhì squeezed through the crowd. The well was clean and intact, the ropes and buckets undisturbed, yet when he leaned over the stone rim and looked down, he saw nothing but darkness.
No reflection.
No glimmer.
Just empty space.
A shiver ran across his skin. Old Liu's words echoed in his mind: It doesn't remember its own name.
"Boy."
Lí Zhì jerked upright. His grandfather, Lí Shān, stood behind him, leaning heavily on his bamboo cane. His snowy brows drew together in concern.
"You were gone early," the old man said. "Did you feel it too?"
Lí Zhì hesitated. "Feel… what?"
"The shift in the air." Lí Shān tapped the ground with his cane. "The land is uneasy; it's like the world is trying to speak but keeps forgetting the words."
The pulse of warmth in Lí Zhì's chest returned, almost in answer.
His grandfather studied him quietly. "Something is stirring in you as well. You don't need to hide it."
"I don't understand what it is," Lí Zhì admitted.
"You're not supposed to. Not yet."
Before he could ask more, the village chief hurried toward them, panting.
"Master Lí Shān! Come quickly—Old Liu is collapsing!"
Lí Zhì's heart dropped.
He sprinted back toward the river with his grandfather beside him. When they arrived, they found Old Liu slumped on the shore, hands trembling violently. A few villagers tried to support him, but he kept pushing them away with a look of panic.
"Everything is slipping away," he whispered. "All the memories. I can't hold them."
Lí Zhì knelt beside him. "Uncle Liu! Look at me. What's gone?"
The fisherman's eyes were glassy. It took effort for him to form even a single word.
"Names."
He clutched at his own head.
"Names of spirits… rivers… even seasons…" His voice shook. "Something is devouring them."
Lí Zhì felt the world tilt slightly, as though gravity itself listened to Old Liu's fear.
Lí Shān placed a steadying hand on the fisherman's shoulder. "Breathe. You're not alone."
Old Liu shook his head. "It's already here."
As if in response, a sharp, cold ripple spread across the river—no wind, no movement. Just a tremor, like the surface shivered in fear. A sliver of light seemed to extinguish as the ripple passed.
The villagers stepped back.
Lí Zhì felt the pulse in his chest flare, bright and urgent. For an instant, the world sharpened—colors brighter, sounds clearer, the air vibrating with energy he could now perceive.
Then a voice—not heard, but felt—slid through him like a cold fingertip on his spine:
One forgotten. Many to follow.
He froze.
No one else reacted. Only he had heard it.
Old Liu gasped—once, sharply—and then went still. Not unconscious, not hurt… simply empty, as if something had taken pieces of him that would never return.
Lí Zhì swallowed hard. "Grandfather… what's happening?"
Lí Shān tightened his grip on his cane.
"The world is forgetting itself."
"And whatever is causing it… is drawing closer."
He looked at Lí Zhì—not with fear, but with the kind of seriousness that carried the weight of secrets.
"Zhì'er," he said quietly, "before the sun sets, you and I must speak of truths I had hoped to save for another lifetime."