The frost-covered ridge was silent, save for the clink of bells at her wrist. The Bellkeeper stood alone, her cloak heavy with ice, her eyes tracing the mountain's scars. Years ago, her family had guarded the bells—seals of an ancient covenant. The Azure Flame Sect demanded them, and when her kin refused, their blood stained the snow.
She touched a bell, its chime soft but heavy. "You took my voice," she whispered, the sound swallowed by the wind. The sect had bound her to silence, but the bells spoke, guiding her to a new debt—Qin Mo, the boy marked by the wolf's core.
[Quest initiated: Find the Shard-Bearer. Balance the mountain's scales.]
Her fingers traced a scar on her wrist, a reminder of the sect's chains. The bells had rung the night the wolf fell, their sound tied to the Silent Tax—an ancient force that claimed souls for the old gods. She would find Qin Mo, not for the sect, but to keep the balance her family died for.
The wind carried a distant chime, his chime. She stepped into the snow, her bells singing softly.