Silence after the screaming was a different kind of terror. The Kholkis tried to gather its power; the group’s hearts were pounding. The cold made them shiver.
The big man was the first to break the quiet. "They’re coming back," he grunted, his eyes narrowing where the guards had disappeared. The group had not died as intended; they might not be coming to rescue them. In the ledger of the Mill, they were now just slaves who had escaped from slavery.
Han sighed, his eyes drifting toward Feng, shivering in the cold. He called out to Feng in his usual voice with a hint of a tremble.
"Feng, you do realize that we are no longer slaves, right?" Upon hearing Han’s words, Feng stared down. His eyes looked everywhere but at him. Regret consuming him. He was ashamed of himself for being a coward. Feng loved his life, which was precious, even if it meant living in control and having no freedom.
Feng’s eyes rested on the snowy surface. He listened as they spoke of the guards coming back. It was his choice now whether he wanted to live as a free human or be a slave.
Then Feng spoke in a whisper. "They will catch us sooner or later..."
"We are dead either way." Han countered. They were deadweights, after all. Finally, Feng’s footsteps came closer, joining them, but deep within his heart he was still scared of the future.
"I’ll be blaming you if I die, Han," his voice, raw and disappointed, filled with teeth-gritting frustration.
Mo Fei swept his gaze over the snowfield. There was no place to hide. For what seemed like miles, there was only pale ground. Then his eyes landed on a cave a little further from them.
Mo Fei stared at his chains. ’It would be difficult to drag the beast, and we are bound to it.’ He darted his eyes. There was a large stone planted into the ground.
"Baldy!" Mo Fei called out the big man. "Can you lift that stone? I have a plan, but we need to break these shackles first."
Baldy? Hearing that term, the big man’s eye twitched, staring down at Mo Fei with an expression that promised offense. He loomed over Mo Fei, his shadow swallowing the boy whole.
"I have a name, boy," he rumbled, the words echoing in the air. "It’s Grig." Grig? A weird name, like a distant shore Mo Fei had never seen before.
’So this world also had different continents?’ Then he continued.
"Okay, Grig, try breaking my shackles." When he said that. Grig didn’t move. He remained rooted, his gaze pinned to Mo Fei like a hawk. His hands hovered near the stone, fingers curling and uncurling, but he made no move to pull it out.
"How do I trust that you won’t sprint the moment you’re free?" He asked, his voice dropping to a raw rasp. Then Grig spoke again. "You’re quick; you are clever. What stops you from running away?"
Mo Fei opened his mouth, but the words died in his throat. Beside them, the woman pulled her knees to her chest, her fingernails digging white crescents into her arms. She looked up, her eyes bloodshot and burning with a cold, desperate fire that made Mo Fei flinch.
The woman’s voice trembled, her breaths hitching between sentences. "We are dead if we stay. If he runs, we’re just... dead anyway. Stop overthinking and move!"
Han stepped forward, his palm landing heavy on Grig’s shoulder. His voice was solemn, filled with reassurance.
"Grig, if he wanted to run away, he could have done that instead of helping us to hold kholkis. We’d not have been breathing. Isn’t that enough reason for us to pay back?"
Mo Fei felt a cold prickle at the back of his neck. He was right, he realized; the thought tasted of copper. "Wait, I could have been miles away by now instead of showing that stupidity. I might have found a way, right?"
He pushed the thought aside; trust was a better shield than solitude for now.
"They’re right," he muttered, his voice strained as he heard the crunch of boots. "Break yours first if you have to. Just do it now." They heard the voices, trying to find their location.
The standoff lasted a few seconds, then Grig lurched towards the stone and picked it up. With a curse dissolved into the air, he wrapped his scarred hands around the large stone; he stood in front of Mo Fei. Currently, it was his choice: who do you trust the most when the only currency was a chance?
The stone came down on Mo Fei’s shackles with a crash that echoed in the snow plain. A shower of snow stung his face, and the iron band around his ankle shattered. He was free from the beast now, and then with another loud thud, Grig broke the chain tied to his wrist. Mo Fei stumbled back from the sudden movement.
At that moment, when his chain broke. The bracer remained on his wrist but was no longer attached to the chain. He noticed that something was off when he looked at Kholkis. It was sleeping now, a slight exhaustion in the predator and a calamity.
"It slept..." His plan to use it as a weapon against them had evaporated. They couldn’t drag it. They couldn’t take the risk of waking up; now the situation would certainly turn against them.
There were two thoughts in his mind: ’Either make the Kholkis furious to attack the guards or simply escape before they come.’
"Bal– I mean Grig, now break the shackle of you and this.... This–" He gestured toward the woman, trying to forge a way to address her.
The woman’s eyes stared at the distant figures emerging from the snow.
"Elara," another foreign name. Grig nodded, and with another loud thrust, it broke the chains of the woman. His hand moved toward Han and Feng. Grig gestured silently, and he quickly broke the chains.
"I appreciate your efforts, Grig, but you have to hurry and break yours too," Han said quickly.
Grig’s own shackle was left. Just then they heard a loud voice from behind them. The same tall man was on his horse. The elegant and majestic horse with eyes sharp like a warrior’s.
A warrior’s horse, definitely not suited for a madman like that tall guard. The man jumped off his horse, his boots digging into the snowfield.
The man stared at them; his expression was one of profound disappointment, as if they had failed their purpose. "Is he going to kill us just by staring? If yes, then what’s taking so long? I don’t have any energy for this bullshit." A reckless thought, born of exhaustion. Of course, he didn’t say anything. It was foolish to say this to someone who was holding a spear taller than him.
Han glared at the guard quietly, his expression asking for freedom, while Feng was clearly on the verge of breaking down. He was prepared to beg for his life, a moment showing the two sides of a coin.
The tall man’s gaze swept over them and the sleeping Kholkis, then to their shattered chains.
"Survived, eh? Didn’t expect to see such a sight; the beast is sleeping, which indeed saved you." He let out a short, humorless laugh, almost too disgusting to feel like a joke.
"Let it be then; at least we got our five slaves back." Mo Fei’s instinct screamed to run into the nothingness of the snow, but he stopped. His sprint would only mean suicide; they could easily catch him, and worse, he would leave behind Han, Elara, Grig, and Feng.
He wasn’t too heartless or a pathetic person who left anyone just to survive. Even if it was his goal. It wasn’t out of kindness but because he knew his situation. He had done that before. He remembered that paranoid man he had left behind. That had been a cold necessity, but this time it was different; they had fought beside him.
He knew exactly what the guard’s ’disappointment’ would turn into if he left them behind.
"Grig," he whispered, his eyes locking on the guards. "Break the chain on your leg. It’s time to run."
Grig froze; the stone remained high. His eyes darted from Mo Fei to the guard. The tall man hadn’t moved, but his hand rested on the hilt of his sword. He was giving them just a cruel moment to see what they’d do.
"Do it," Elara urged, her voice tight. "We’re dead if we go back now. You heard him. We are surprises... Surprises get made into examples."
Grig’s jaw tightened. He brought the stone down and smashed it into the chains on his leg; fortunately, it broke in just one hit. The chain connecting his ankles shattered; the metal sound echoed.
One of those guards, holding a spear, moved forward slowly. The man laughed mockingly, stopping just near Mo Fei. "Now you are planning to run? Where are your manners of a slave?"
"My manners, huh?" Mo Fei looked up. "I don’t respect a low-quality guy." He lunged forward, taking the spear from his hands. The guard tried pulling back, then he kicked the guard in the nuts.
The guard gasped, his eyes widened. His hands let go of the spear, his body falling on the ground and groaning. "Go philosophize this manner now, asshole." Mo Fei quickly stepped back and shouted.
"RUN!" He stabbed the spear into Kholkis’s chest. The soft part of its flesh pushed the spear deeper. Before the Kholkis could open its eyes, they were already moving.
In that same moment, the tall guard’s patience snapped. He ordered his followers. "Take them now!" he barked, and the other guards... fifteen of them, on foot... surged forward to catch them.
But then... The Kholkis awakened with a loud screech. Its eyes squinted, furious about the stab. It looked down at the guards holding the spears, then it looked at the spear on its chest. All of their breaths stopped in realization.
"Oh fuck..."
The Kholkis opened its wings. Finally, it gathered its full power. The intense wind threw small ice spears that rushed toward the guards. Their bodies got cut in different places, bleeding in pain.
Then finally it smacked its talon on the ground. The whole ground shook like an earthquake. The guards gulped, stepping back. Their bodies trembled.
***
Meanwhile, the group sprinted across the snowfield. In that chaos, Feng froze. No one had the time to grab him.
Mo Fei’s eyes scanned around. He looked at the cave and pointed toward it to run through it, a wordless command. They rushed inside the cave, warming up their bodies. Inside, there were various paths. It was a perfect place to hide, with seven paths in the cave. They plunged into the first path without hesitation.
It was a beautiful path; there were paintings crafted on stone. All of their faces were blurred, their one hand raised toward their throats. They were wearing a simple outfit, yet everything was so detailed that the art felt real. Mo Fei was surprised by that, yet he didn’t have the opportunity to stop and examine every detail.
When he was going to enter the first path for a glimpse. He saw a weird mark. The pattern was somewhere he had seen before, and then it went out of his sight.
***
Meanwhile, the guards. They ran, scattering around and running for their lives. The Kholkis smacked its talon onto a guard. His body got crushed by the weight, his whole body compressing on the ground. The flesh clung to the snow. An instant death. All the other guards, horrified by that, ran toward the cave. The tall man already left them behind, his horse sprinting toward the cave. He didn’t even look back.
While Feng was there, he couldn’t even move from fear. The Kholkis stopped near him.
Swoosh!
The beak pierced his flesh; it swallowed his entire body in one bite. Then it turned toward the guards running. It flew high, launching itself toward them.
***
As the group moved further. Mo Fei saw a flash of regret in the face of Han. Grig’s brows furrowed.
Han tripped while running away, a sweat dropping from his forehead. "Tch, why were you foolish?" That moment when he began to run. He had glanced behind. Feng had fear on his face but also a silent acceptance.
"We might never meet again," Han mumbled to himself, "but if we do, then I’ll apologize for leaving you. The world is cruel, and someone like you would never understand; you don’t know that begging for saving your life won’t work. You needed to fight for your freedom. Stay alive, please, even as a slave. Stay alive." Han closed his eyes shut and opened them again.
"This path is not en–" Mo Fei’s words stopped. His feet skidded to a halt. Elara and Grig crashed into his back, their breath catching. Mo Fei’s eyes were widened by the sight.
"That was really a bad idea... Right?" In his line of sight, a centipede made of bone and decaying flesh was resting. Each part of the centipede was a bump of spine and cartilage that was turning yellow. It was covered in a thin layer of wet stuff that looked like rotting flesh, like a blanket.
The exit was behind it. Interestingly, there was no initial attack, and Mo Fei couldn’t find the reason.
In world three, Ji Tang behaved similarly and did not attack at first, but this time the situation was different.
The three slaves’ shoulders were raised slightly. Elara let out a soft, trapped sound, and Grig’s hand tightened around his fabric. Han stared at the Centipede. Its eyes were hollow, a dark void that seemed to suck their souls out into them, devouring light. They were frozen, then Mo Fei heard footsteps echoing from the cave entrance. Feet scraped to a halt.
The tall guard shouted in a cold and final, commanding voice.
"Close it off; this cave will be their grave."