Morning light entered the cabin through thin cracks. Yù Qíng was sitting in the middle of the bed, eyes closed. Her nightdress had slipped off one shoulder. She took a deep breath, trying to pull the energy resting in her abdomen upward. The air escaped between her teeth in a low hiss. The energy stopped halfway, warming her ribs without managing to advance.
Zhì Yuǎn stopped at the entrance of the cabin, blocking the light. He carried three old scrolls and two leather-bound books under his right arm. He watched his wife for a few seconds, his dark eyes moving over her body. Then he walked to the bamboo table and dropped the books and scrolls onto the wood with a dry thud.
He sat on the edge of the bed. The straw creaked under his weight. He raised his hand and pressed two fingers against the base of Yù Qíng's left collarbone, right in the hollow of the bone.
— The curve of this channel here is too narrow for the amount you're trying to push at once — he said, his voice low and calm. — The flow hits the bottleneck and spreads. Split it. Pull half into your left arm first. The rest will follow the vacuum.
Yù Qíng opened her eyes slowly. She breathed again, adjusting the pressure as he instructed. A shiver ran up her spine when the energy unlocked and flowed through her arms without getting stuck. She opened her eyes and slid across the mattress until her knees were pressed against his leg. Her cold hands rose and grabbed the front of Zhì Yuǎn's tunic.
— You see the points I can't see — she whispered, her face close to his. — You never miss.
Zhì Yuǎn lowered his hand to the center of her chest. His thumb stopped exactly on the spot below her sternum where, weeks earlier, he had injected too much pure fire and nearly burned her from the inside. He stared at that patch of skin for a few seconds.
— I almost killed you right here on this bed, Qíng — he said, low and direct. — I'm not going to rely on luck when it comes to your body. If you keep forcing energy without knowing what you're dealing with, one day I'm going to break you from the inside without meaning to.
Yù Qíng stayed quiet. The warmth of his fingers against her skin was a living reminder of that old burn.
Zhì Yuǎn pulled his hand away and stood up. He walked to the table, untied the leather cord of one of the scrolls, and opened the paper over the wood.
— The peddler came by yesterday — he said, returning to his normal tone. — I ordered this from the capital merchants weeks ago. I picked it up this morning. There are things here we need to know.
Yù Qíng got up from the bed and walked to the table, stopping beside his left arm.
Zhì Yuǎn tapped his finger on the scroll.
— The substance we swallowed and that cleansed our flesh, the books call it Qi — he said. He slid his finger to a simple drawing of a body with thick lines. — And these lines here are the meridians. That's where it flows.
Yù Qíng breathed a little deeper. The words gave a name to the thing they had been using without understanding.
— And there's more — he continued, opening one of the books. — Further south, beyond the mountains, there are people who use Qi the same way we do. They gather in groups called Sects. The texts say that the further they advance, the less they need to touch things to move them.
He set the paper down and turned his face toward her.
— We're in the dark, Qíng. If I make another mistake, it could kill you or me. We've already seen that Qi changes the body from the inside. If we keep going like this, sooner or later what we don't know is going to end up killing us. We're going to have to leave the village and look for answers somewhere else.
Yù Qíng kept staring at the scrolls. It wasn't the existence of other people using Qi that bothered her. It was hearing her husband say, with that coldness, that their lack of knowledge could destroy them.
Zhì Yuǎn rolled the scroll up slowly.
— In the last twenty-four hours, I wasn't just widening our veins — he said, returning to a more methodical tone. — I pushed the mill beyond its limit. I reached the eighth rotation, then the ninth. When it broke, there was no heat or cold left. What came out was something different. Thinner, harder to hold, but golden. It seems to be the base of the other energies. No extra properties… just pure. I call it Primordial Qi.
Yù Qíng blinked. Her hands rose and gripped his tunic tightly, fingers digging into the fabric.
The memory of her sister banging on the door during their cultivation came back strongly. Yù Qíng frowned.
— We would've been able to do this with a lot less headache if Méi stopped pounding on the door every hour — she complained, her tone turning irritated. — She doesn't understand that a locked door means we don't want anyone around.
Zhì Yuǎn stopped moving the books. He raised his gaze, and for a second something rare passed across his face — a trace of genuine surprise.
— While she was kicking the door and you were telling her to leave — he murmured —, I looked at her through the bamboo slats. I expected to see her channels thin or dry. But what I saw caught me off guard.
Yù Qíng lifted her face, paying close attention.
— Méi's meridians are broken — he said, his voice returning to a cold, direct tone. — There are entire pieces missing between her chest and her arms. The space below her sternum is like a cracked bowl. Qi from the world could enter, but it would leak out before nourishing anything. Her foundation has already rotted before it even began.
Yù Qíng stayed silent. The anger she felt toward her sister lessened a little. Knowing that the youngest had something wrong in her body cooled her irritation.
Zhì Yuǎn brushed his thumb along her jaw.
— Normal worldly energy isn't strong enough to fix this. The ice and fire we use would've blown her apart from the inside — he explained. — But the Primordial Qi that came from the ninth rotation doesn't expand and doesn't burn. It builds. If I can put enough of it into her, we can weld the missing pieces back together.
The temperature in the cabin dropped.
Yù Qíng's nails dug deep into Zhì Yuǎn's tunic, twisting the fabric so hard that her fingers cracked.
— We can only pass Qi if we mix our bodies — her voice came out low and sharp. — If you're going to pass that gold to her the same way you pass it to me, I'll break her neck. I don't care if she has my blood.
Zhì Yuǎn didn't pull back. He already knew exactly who he was holding. Instead of trying to calm her, he simply slid his large hand to the back of her neck, threading his fingers through her black hair and pulling her face against his chest.
— My flesh doesn't go into anyone else, Qíng — he said, his voice heavy and leaving no room for doubt.
Yù Qíng exhaled all at once, her entire body relaxing against him. Her cheek sank into his tunic, eyes closed.
With her still pressed against his chest, Zhì Yuǎn continued, now speaking more practically:
— And I won't need to touch her to heal her. The texts show that it's possible to push Qi outward without contact. If the southern cultivators can move things just with their will, then Qi can also be thrown through the air.
He stayed silent for a second, organizing his thoughts.
— The problem is that throwing Qi into empty space will dry us out fast. If I misjudge the force or direction, the matter will disappear into the air and be lost. We're going to need a lot more friction than we already do until I can expel enough without passing out.
Yù Qíng turned her face against his chest. A slow smile appeared on her lips.
— Then use as much of me as you want — she whispered, her nails lightly scratching the skin beneath his tunic. — We'll forge until the cabin collapses, if we have to.
Zhì Yuǎn didn't answer right away. His gaze dropped to his own right arm. Even with his head still throbbing from the previous day's effort, he focused on his skin. His forearm was clean and smooth.
— The black mud stopped coming out at the end of the third week — he murmured, almost to himself.
Yù Qíng slowly raised her face, following his gaze.
— The body already expelled what was rotting — she answered, her fingers tracing the muscles of his arm.
— That's what I thought at first — he said, his jaw tightening slightly. — But the filth didn't stop because we're clean. It stopped because the windows are locked.
Zhì Yuǎn closed his eyes and looked inside his own arm. Thousands of tiny holes covered the skin beneath the muscles. They were natural pores, but they were all clogged with a hard crust of black sludge — filth the body hadn't been able to expel in the past weeks because the exits were closed.
He chose a spot on the back of his right hand.
He focused part of the Qi flowing through his arm and forced it out of the main meridian, pushing it through smaller, dry channels that had never been used before. The pressure in his head increased. He kept forcing it, millimeter by millimeter, until the energy hit the base of the clogged pore.
The energy gathered there, pressing against the crust.
Zhì Yuǎn gave one final push.
Crack.
The sound was dry and sharp. A small black grain jumped from the skin of his hand and fell onto the table with a soft click. The pore opened.
Yù Qíng held her breath.
The hole didn't bleed. With the pore open, the internal vacuum pulled in the air from outside. A thin thread of cold air entered directly through the skin of his hand, descending through his veins without needing to pass through his throat or lungs.
Zhì Yuǎn opened his eyes and slowly turned his hand, feeling the air continue flowing in.
— It's possible to breathe through the skin — he murmured. His voice came out lower than usual. — We have millions of locked windows in our bodies. If I open them and clear out the remaining filth, energy from the air will enter on its own all the time. We won't dry out so easily.
Yù Qíng tightened her grip on his wrist, her eyes fixed on the spot where the pore had opened.
— And if the doors are open — she said, her voice low and quick —, you can throw Qi outward without needing to touch anyone.
— I can — he confirmed, still looking at the small grain of black sludge on the table. — But opening all these doors will cost a lot. It'll require much more friction than we normally have. Each pore will demand energy to be cleaned.
Yù Qíng stayed silent for a second, processing. Then she raised her face and looked at him with darker eyes.
— Then we won't stop — she said, simple and direct. Her cold hand rose and rested on his chest. — We keep going until you can do it.
Zhì Yuǎn didn't answer. He only nodded once, his gaze still low. The matter was left there for now. He stood up slowly and walked toward the cedar chest in the corner of the room.
---
The midday sun had already begun to descend when Zhì Yuǎn finished getting dressed. He tied the leather belt around his waist and put on his boots.
— The imperial inspector arrives tomorrow morning — he said. — Your father will need to weigh the coal sacks this afternoon in the courtyard. I'll help so there's no problem with the quota.
Yù Qíng stayed lying on the bed, watching him. After a few seconds, she answered:
— I'm not going. The noise those people make gives me a headache.
Zhì Yuǎn accepted it without arguing. He walked back to the edge of the bed, held the back of her neck firmly, and brushed his thumb along her tense jaw.
— Then stay here. I'll be back before nightfall.
He released her neck, walked to the door, removed the wooden log, and stepped outside.
Yù Qíng watched until his gray tunic disappeared among the trees. Then she stood up. The smell in the room was still strong — the dried sludge on the floor and the heavy scent on the sheets. She wrinkled her nose. It stained the space where his body should rest clean.
She grabbed a large bucket, went down to the stream, and filled it with cold water. She returned, lit the clay stove in the kitchen, and poured hot water into the bucket along with a piece of ash soap. Then she dropped to her knees on the floor and began scrubbing.
She scrubbed with force, teeth clenched. The hot water turned her hands red, but she didn't stop. She moved the cloth in short, violent strokes, scraping the dried sludge from the wood. The foul smell rose with the steam, but she kept going, removing every stain, every trace of filth that had come out of them. When she finished the floor, she changed the dirty sheets and put fresh straw in the bed.
Afterward, she gathered the used sheets, threw them over her shoulder, and went back down to the stream. She sat on the smooth stones at the edge and began scrubbing the fabrics in the cold water. The sun continued to descend slowly as she washed.