Li Xin had already slipped home quietly. He went straight back to sleep.
In his dream, the Die stirred—subtle at first—but he clamped down on it fast. Even asleep, Li Xin’s instincts kicked in. Years of psychological tug-of-war had trained him well.
By the time the sky lightened to a dull gray, Aunt Fei was already up making breakfast. At this hour, Li Xin was always awake—either exercising or out hunting. She didn’t understand the bizarre stretches and drills he did, but she knew he was strong. Real strong.
She’d made his favorites: boiled bird eggs, goat milk, and mixed grain flatbread sprinkled with chopped green onions. Meanwhile, little Xueyin was still fast asleep, her cheeks puffing out as she softly blew bubbles in her dreams, lips gently smacking. She was probably dreaming about food again.
“Aunt Fei, save that for Xueyin. I’m built like a tank.”
“You eat it,” she said firmly. “We’ve had some surplus lately. Business is good. Nothing happened yesterday, right?”
Aunt Fei’s tone held quiet concern. She already knew something had happened.
“Nothing to do with us,” Li Xin shrugged. “I’m heading out to hunt for a few days. Oh, right—if anyone official comes asking, just tell them the truth.”
He didn’t want her to worry, so he briefly explained that the Night Watchmen had discovered his psionic awakening. With a guy like that, they were probably too busy to care. Maybe they’d forget all about him the moment he walked away. Better not to offer himself up. If they didn’t forget, well—he’d handle it then.
Lin Fei nodded. Truthfully, she didn’t think it was such a bad thing. A stable, official job wouldn’t be the worst outcome. But she could tell Li Xin wasn’t interested in that kind of life. Besides, everyone knew good things like that didn’t often make it down to the people in the Underground.
Li Xin set off with his usual gear: handmade weapons, crude but effective. The spearheads were carved from carefully scavenged beast bones—ugly as hell, but reliable. Better than wasting money on mass-produced blades. As for the kind of gear Luo Jin carried—Hextech weapons? Those were elite-issue, reserved for high-ranking Night Watchmen. Guys like Li Xin weren’t even allowed to dream about owning one.
Even gang bosses like Qi Eight-Blades couldn’t afford them. Not that Qi was much of a comparison—he still carried around a damn machete like it was the old world. Total embarrassment of a gangster.
Li Xin moved fast. He knew the forests outside the city like the back of his hand. Every hunt out there felt like a reset button. No masks, no pretending—just him, the wild, and whatever wanted to kill him.
Lately, though, something was off.
There were fewer beasts than usual. A lot fewer. He’d had to push deeper and deeper just to spot anything. Even the heart of the woods was nearly empty. It was like the animals were avoiding him.
The forest was a death trap for ordinary people. Only hunters and lunatics came this far in. Li Xin paused in a small clearing, bone spear slung over his shoulder, a custom-forged dagger tucked at his waist. He drew in a long, deliberate breath—filling his lungs until they burned. Then he raised his right hand.
With a faint shimmer, a white six-sided die appeared in his palm and began to roll.
This was how he gauged a hunt—through the Die.
Not because he enjoyed gambling with a cursed relic, but because over time, he’d learned one hard truth: Divine Relics couldn’t just sit idle. And hunting was the perfect low-risk time to test it. Even if it went haywire, at least no civilians would get caught in the blast radius.
“Today’s haul is gonna be good,” he muttered.
The Die spun in midair, whirling faster and faster. Li Xin watched it with laser focus.
Yesterday, Xueyin had stopped in front of a shop window in the city. A pink dress was on display—simple, but cute. She didn’t say a word, but Li Xin had seen the look in her eyes—longing, restrained, like she didn’t even think she had the right to want something so small.
She didn’t own a single nice dress. Not one. He had to bring something home today.
The Die’s spin slowed. If it staggered, lost rhythm, or wobbled erratically—that meant the reading was null.
The rules were clear.
Low number = bad. High number = good. Five = uncertain but valid. Anything else, you had to interpret on the fly.
This time…
One.
A valid reading.
Li Xin felt a chill.
Shit.
Before the thought had finished forming, a wave of piercing pain stabbed into his skull. He winced, eyes squinting against the pressure. It wasn’t like the first time, when the pain had floored him. These days, he could ride it out. Barely.
But that roll… One almost never came up. It meant today’s hunt was guaranteed to be a waste—or worse. He might lose something.
Without a word, he threw his bag over his shoulder and turned around. Best move? Go home and sleep this one off.
Squelch.
A sudden stench hit him in the face—rotten, animal, acrid. Like a sealed corpse cracked open.
What the hell—?
A step later, his foot slipped.
“Goddamn it—who the hell left a trap out here?!”
He caught himself on the edge of a pit. Inside, sharpened stakes glinted in the gloom. One wrong move and he’d have been skewered.
He leapt back—straight onto another nasty surprise.
Another squelch.
No time to think. He tightened his grip on his pack, one hand gripping the spear, the other clutching the dagger. These weren’t just tools—they were everything he had.
Better to fight with a weapon than bare fists.
He kept walking. Light faded as he moved deeper into the trees. Overhead, a raven cawed three times—loud, grating, close. He glanced up just in time to see it vanish into the canopy.
Wait. Where the hell’s home again?
****
Back in Blackwater, peace held—for now.
Despite being a slum, the Underground had its own kind of charm. Its own rhythm.
Lin Fei had already started her day’s work. The neighbors drifted in and out, chatting, asking after Li Xin or making small talk with her. Beside her, Xueyin sat curled up with a book.
The Lunar Church did offer a special blessings class, but only to surface citizens. People from the Underground weren’t eligible.
So Lin Fei taught Xueyin herself—reading, writing, whatever she could manage. Li Xin’s hunts varied in length. Sometimes he was gone a day or two. Sometimes more than ten.
No matter how long he was gone… they waited.
Even after all these years, Lin Fei still couldn’t fully relax whenever Li Xin went out hunting. She worried—how could she not? His hunting income made up nearly eighty percent of their household’s survival. Her small side jobs barely covered the basics. It was only thanks to him that they could afford what counted as “luxury” in a place like this.
The night she first met Li Xin had been the worst night of her life.
She’d just arrived in the Underground with little Xueyin in her arms. The rain was brutal, the air freezing. And then there he was—some half-dead teenager lying motionless in a drainage ditch.
His eyes locked with hers, but he never called for help. Just stared upward, lips tight with defiance, like he was trying to get one last look at the night sky.
She hadn’t meant to get involved. She never meant to. But somehow, her arms were already around Xueyin and her back bent to carry this stubborn, broken boy through the Underground.
She had no idea how they made it through those first few days. Somehow, they did.
Li Xin had a will like iron. He’d had a constant fever—burning up for days—but he survived.
At first, he helped with chores, odd jobs around the place. Then one day, he came home carrying a wild rabbit and a duck. That was the first time they’d had meat.
From then on, everything started to change.
Soon, word got out. The local gang in charge—Spade Crew—heard about his hunting. Lin Fei had panicked. She thought the good days were over.
But surprisingly, Spade Crew didn’t touch them. Not only that—they stopped bothering anyone in their whole area.
Day by day, time crawled forward.
Lin Fei never said anything out loud, but her eyes kept drifting to the door. It had been four days since he left. He still wasn’t back.
And without Li Xin around, even little Xueyin had lost her spark. The house felt hollow.
Meanwhile, Luo Jin was drowning in paperwork.
His transition to the Order Academy was anything but smooth. He was supposed to be learning the ropes—getting familiar with protocols, names, policies. But he couldn’t just act like a grizzled street cop anymore. Here, every word had weight. Every handshake had layers of meaning.
He’d already considered quitting. More than once.
It wasn’t that the Academy was bad. On paper, it was prestigious, safe, and full of opportunities. A life under the sun.
But the endless meetings, social niceties, and forced pleasantries… that crap grated on him. Hard.
Still, he clenched his teeth and adapted. The Lunar Church had made it clear—his job was to fix the place, clean up the rot, and represent the Church’s authority while doing it.
That meant managing both the elite and the grunts. He was supposed to be the bridge between them. He wanted to bring a few people from his old unit, but the systems were totally separate. The Order Academy looked down on the Night Watchmen—saw them as disposable muscle, dirty-fingered enforcers, not the kind of people who belonged in hallowed halls.
Frankly, if the Academy wasn’t in complete shambles, they never would’ve asked him in the first place.
Now he needed help.
But who?
His old team? Too raw. Too blunt. A bunch of loose cannons.
Then again… if you weren’t a little unhinged, you didn’t survive in the Night Watch.
That’s when the click-clack of heels echoed down the hall.
Casey strolled in, wearing a new pink uniform, the kind that could turn heads on any catwalk. Her tiny feathered hat bobbed lightly as she walked. The whole look was polished, playful, and completely out of place in this stiff, grim office.
This wasn’t standard issue. Night Watchmen didn’t make that kind of money. Everyone knew Casey didn’t live off her paycheck.
“Captain, here’s the investigation file you asked for,” she said sweetly, placing a folder on his desk.
Honestly, any boss with a subordinate like her was bound to be in a slightly better mood.
“Investigation file? Not much going on lately, is there?” Luo Jin said, half-joking. “You should knock off early. Go date someone. Get married. Have a kid. Twenty-seven’s the golden age for women, after all.”
“Captain,” Casey gave a coy smile, “you’re a lifelong bachelor. What would you know about any of that?”
She slid the file toward him.
“Or you could just sleep with me and cut the small talk.”
Luo Jin flinched. His lips twitched into a half-smile, half-grimace.
“Ahem. Who’s the file on?”
“Li Xin,” she replied. “An Awakened from the Underground. Interesting kid.”
She’d already skimmed the report.
Luo Jin blinked, took a second to process, then smacked his forehead.
Shit. That brat. I told him to come find me… and he just blew me off.
(End of Chapter)