The village wasn't on any map.
They found it after crossing a ridge south of the Crooked Pines, nestled in a basin where the sun clung just a little too long to the roofs.
There were no guards. No sect flags. Just lanterns strung across the streets, too bright for daylight.
A woman waved them in. She smiled too much. Showed too many teeth.
Baek-Ha whispered, "This place reeks of peach blossoms."
Sim sniffed. "I don't smell anything."
"Exactly."
---
The villagers offered stew, tea, and rest.
No names. No questions. Just kindness.
Too much of it.
Sim, exhausted, took a bowl without thinking.
Baek-Ha didn't touch hers.
---
Ten minutes later, he collapsed.
---
His qi surged, then buckled. Not pain disorientation. He stumbled through a haze of phantom pressure, like someone had tied his insides into knots and whispered lies into each fold.
The world bent sideways.
He fell into the grass, eyes wide, vision stuttering.
He saw:
The inside of his old office.
Blood on Baek-Ha's lips.
A sword slicing through his reflection.
None of it was real.
None of it stopped.
---
Baek-Ha dragged him to an abandoned shed behind the well.
His body convulsed.
His qi flared erratically fire blooming through his skin, burning the edges of his sleeves.
She smacked his face. "Focus!"
He growled something in a language that wasn't his.
She grabbed both sides of his face. "Listen to me, Gwan. You're poisoned. Not dying. But if you keep fighting your own core, you'll tear it apart."
She needed to stop the energy spike.
Needed to ground him.
She stared down at him, heart hammering.
Then she made a choice.
---
She ripped off her outer shirt.
Underneath: bindings, soaked in sweat.
She took his hand still twitching
and placed it against the scar on her ribs. A long, pink line from a wound she never explained.
"Feel that?" she whispered. "That's real."
His fingers curled against her skin. Weak. Uncontrolled.
But his eyes started to come back into focus.
She leaned close. "That's who I am. Not some idea you hallucinated. Not a ghost. I'm here. Right now. So are you."
His breathing slowed.
Bit by bit.
Until the fire inside him sank back into place.
---
He passed out.
Not peacefully.
But safely.
She exhaled.
Put her shirt back on.
And sat there, watching over him.
---
At sunset, the villagers set fire to their own homes.
One by one.
No screaming. No chaos.
Just smiles and flames.
Baek-Ha watched from the shed.
"They're purging," a voice said beside her.
She didn't flinch.
The masked man stood in the shadows.
Not an assassin.
The man from Black Hollow Lake.
He looked thinner. Paler. Still too clean.
"You poisoned him," she said.
"I guided him."
"By nearly killing him?"
He tilted his head. "To survive the Veil Root, one must detach. Not just from fear. From identity. From comfort. This test was necessary."
She stood, fingers twitching toward her blade. "If he dies."
"He won't," the man said. "He's past the breaking point. Now we see what's left."
---
That night, Sim woke.
His shirt was soaked. His eyes red.
Baek-Ha sat beside him, arms around her knees.
He croaked, "Did I say anything stupid?"
She didn't look at him.
"Only everything," she said softly.
He groaned. "Sorry."
"Don't be."
Silence.
Then he asked, "What happened to your scar?"
She paused.
Then said:
"My mother gave it to me. Not with a weapon. Just her words."
He looked at her.
She didn't cry.
Just said, "She said I was the reason he died. That if I'd cried quieter, the soldiers wouldn't have noticed the hut."
Sim reached for her hand.
Held it.
She didn't pull away.
He whispered, "That's not on you."
She whispered back, "That's why I don't want you to die. I can't have another ghost with my name stitched into it."
---
The village burned until morning.
No one screamed.
No one resisted.
And by dawn, there was nothing left.
---
[Veil Root Path: Stabilization Progress – 64%]
[Mental Core Formation: Initiated]
---
They left the valley before noon.
Sim's legs weak.
Baek-Ha's expression unreadable.
Neither of them spoke about the scar again.
But from that day on.
They never slept more than an arm's length apart.
---