The sun hung high—a silent witness to the golden deluge.
Drumbeats—twang—reverberated across the Norfall Barrens as the Tacet Discords crumpled beneath the relentless rain of molten gold.
For a heartbeat, silence held sway. Then, hundreds—perhaps thousands—of TDs surged toward the Vanguard Base, yet not a single soldier need not raise any weapon. At the front, one mercenary stood with his bow aloft, each twang a decree of ruin.
The moment the Tacet Discords dared breach the red line Lian had etched across the battlefield, a volley of arrows answered in kind—silent, swift, and final. No warning. No echo. Only the collapse of those who had crossed it.
Lian stood unmoved, a monolith against the storm, sentinel and executioner in one.
Another wave surged. With hands worn by exhaustion, body shriveled by hunger, mind flickering between dream and wake, Lian reached once more for the bow.
His fingers closed around the string—unyielding and merciless—and drew back. No hesitation. No tremble. The bow groaned beneath a burden no waking man should bear.
And yet he did—for he had taken this quota, this commission.
He was a mercenary, bound not by comfort or cause, but by the promise of completion.
The final arrow arced through the air and struck true. Silence dared to settle once more over the desolate Norfall Barrens. Then—a piercing shriek shattered the quiet, slicing through the stillness as a shadow spilled over the dying sun.
The shadow was bird-shaped but did not swoop like a hawk, fierce and swift, nor whirl into chaos like the wailing Tacet Discords.
It came slow, deliberate—each vast wingbeat measured, thrumming against the barren winds like the tolling of a mournful bell.
Lian's hand instinctively slid to his bow. A subtle prickling unease settled over his senses—there was something wrong with this Tacet Discord's approach.
Steeling himself, he withdrew his bow back slightly, eyes narrowing as the creature landed just beyond the red line, courteous and deliberate in its arrival.
Three heads turned toward the battlefield. One gnawed absently at the air, jaws moving with a mind of their own. Another gleamed with sharp, wicked calculation. The third remained still—unreadable—its gaze locking on Lian with uncanny focus.
It made no move to attack. No roar, no threat.
It simply stood, despite its legendary name.
This was no ordinary beast. The Overlord-Class Howler from the Desorock Highlands—an Impermanence Heron, legendary among the Tacet Discords for ruthless violence and cold inscrutability.
A tense silence snapped through the ranks. Half-trained soldiers, their fear tangled with adrenaline, raised rifles. Gunfire erupted.
Clink—Clang—Clink—
Bullets never found their mark. Sharp, deadly arrows cut through the air, intercepting shots with unerring precision.
Lian's hands moved with fluid grace, eyes never leaving the creature—swoosh—another arrow flew, splitting a bullet mid-flight.
Lian's gaze swept over the tense ranks of ranged soldiers. His voice cut through the rising tension—low, calm, and sharp as a blade: "Lower your weapons. It has not crossed the line."
The battlefield fell into uneasy quiet—electric with anticipation.
Bow in hand, Lian stepped forward, weaving past twisted corpses of Tacet Discords, past the trembling front line, moving steadily toward the towering storm of a being before him—wings dark as thunderclouds, eyes deep as unsolved riddles.
Neither stirred.
They regarded one another: the wrathful, three-headed Heron and the silent figure of Impermanence.
One head tilted uncertainly, releasing a soft, plaintive cry—a question, not a challenge.
Lian stood calm amid the creature's mournful agitation. Slowly, deliberately, he crossed the red line, moving closer to the living storm.
He lifted his hand.
The Heron leaned in, pressing one of its massive head gently against his open palm.
Memories flashed—fragments of a village bathed in calm sunlight, a young girl's radiant smile, a shepherd's crook resting idle—all shattered by ruin.
Corrupted echoes. Fractured frequencies. The ache of loss.
Through the static, the message came clear: That girl… she lives. Or rather—her frequency remains.
Another cry escaped the Heron's throat—soft, desperate.
Lian's voice held steady, untouched by emotion.
"I'm a mercenary," he said flatly. "I don't work for free."
Though he spoke in the human tongue, the Heron understood. The gnawing head tilted back and spat out a small orb, shimmering with a deep blue glow. A star etched on its surface flickered like a distant galaxy.
Lian caught it, before examining it.
It was a Lustrous Tide.
One of the rarest treasures in the world. Not something purchased with common shell credits. You needed Astrite—a currency few dared trade.
He looked up at the Heron, and whispered, "Fly high."
With powerful wingbeats, the Heron took off, narrowly evading a lethal strike that screamed past Lian's face—so close it brushed the breath from his skin. A single feather drifted down in its wake, tumbling through the air like a falling star.
Jiyan had returned.
Watching the Tacet Discord vanish into the horizon, he clicked his tongue. "Tch. I'll get that bird next time."
Then he turned to Lian, and the base. The Vanguard Base stood tall, its defenses unbroken—just as it had been when Jiyan left on the expedition to rescue his soldiers.
Though he wanted to question Lian about the Heron, Jiyan held his tongue. He knew Lian was only one man—tasked with guarding the base alone—while Jiyan himself relied on countless soldiers.
In this harsh world, Jiyan understood which battles to fight, and whom to trust. Some questions were better left unasked, some alliances better left untested.
Lian had done an exceptional job defending the base, and besides, whatever business Lian carried wasn't something Jiyan felt he had the right to pry into—unless necessity demanded it.
With a respectful clasp of his hands, Jiyan said, "Thank you. For defending the base while I was gone."
Lian said nothing. He simply stooped, took the fallen feather in hand, and turned back toward the base.
Inside the main command center, the air hummed with quiet tension. A holographic map of Huanglong hovered above the central console, glowing with faint cerulean lines.
Lian stepped forward, eyes scanning the terrain. He pointed to a location some distance from Jinzhou.
"What place is this?" he asked.
The soldier operating the map glanced at the location and replied, "That's a ruined village. It's known as Qichi Village."
Without hesitation, Lian reached for his long hair—though instead of a single strand, three came free.
In his other hand, the Heron's fallen feather rested, light and dark intertwined in its vane. Meticulously, he bound the strands together, weaving the feather into his hair like a charm of memory and mourning.
Then, he secured the braided thread into his Terminal, letting it trail through the air like a sentient kite, as if guided by memory rather than wind.
"Go," he commanded.
The Terminal shot forward, bolting past the tents in a blur of light and motion, racing toward the ruins of Qichi Village.
***
Nestled in the scarred heart of the Central Plains, Huanglong, Qichi Village lingers like a ghost—its silhouette a memory of what was once a humble, thriving settlement.
The white-plastered, blue-tiled houses—now chipped and listing—teeter on fractured stone foundations, mute witnesses to the seismic violence that split the land like an old wound.
Pale violet flora creeps across the earth like smoke, curling through broken walls and hollow doorways, softening the ruins with a beauty too quiet to trust.
At the village's heart pulses a Tacet Field—a spectral vortex where Resonance Cord light twists skyward like a snapped divine tendon.
This luminous thread, endlessly turning, seems to tether the shattered earth to a realm not meant for human eyes—a place where Tacet Discords are said to be born.
The air thrums with dissonance, subtle but unrelenting, as though the land itself still remembers every scream it once held.
No birds sing in Qichi. Only the low reverberation and the rustle of disturbed leaves break the hush. The Tacet Field has hollowed more than stone and soil—it has fractured memory, bent time, leeched emotion from the very air.
Travelers speak in hushed tones, few daring to cross the village's edge. Those who do find more than ruins. They find a place where the past refuses to stay buried—a monument to untended grief, to stories the world forgot to mourn.
A similar feeling stirred within Yangyang and Rover, now standing before a Tacet Discord unlike any they had encountered.
It loomed—spherical, bloated, like a drowned star fallen from grace, its violet skin stretched thin over pulsing, quivering flesh.
Its surface was disturbingly smooth, like a malformed fruit on the verge of bursting. Stubby limbs twitched with stilted effort, as if motion itself were a borrowed idea—an imitation of life, not life.
Two curved horns jutted from its head, aglow with a poisonous gradient of neon violet, pulsing rhythmically like a heartbeat not its own.
From the torn slit of a mouth came no sound. Yet its presence emitted a low, vibrating hum—felt more than heard—like mourning whispered through waterlogged stone.
Its back was jagged and asymmetrical, spiked as though reality had tried and failed to erase its shape.
Beneath it all, something gleamed faintly—a fragment of golden plating near its underbelly—it was a Tacet Core.
And this TD, was known as a Tick Tack, a Common Class Whisperin TD widely distributed in the wild. But this Tick tack, it was different.
It did not attack. It simply stood—bloated and trembling, a grotesque echo of existence—whispering in a voice barely louder than the wind: "Ugh… uh? Uhh…"
A ripple of unease coursed through the air.
"Watch out!" Yangyang snapped upright, her arm instinctively shielding Rover. Her gaze flicked to the TD which hid in the ruin grounds, but again—it simply hid, and not attack. "Something's wrong. Why hasn't it attacked?"
The thing shifted—not to strike or flee, but merely to breathe, to tremble. Then, it spoke again, voice like static filtered through a cracked speaker: "Nngh… brother… Help… Help…"
Rover's brows furrowed. The unease in his chest twisted—into pity? Empathy?
"It's not attacking," he murmured. "Is it… trying to talk to us?"
The Tacet Discord repeated its broken litany, voice locked in an endless loop. "Help… Brother… Help…"
Yangyang's eyes softened, confusion giving way to something tender, kinder.
"It's only muttering the same thing," she said gently. "This isn't like the others…"
She stepped forward, crouching cautiously beside the creature.
"Tacet Discords usually attack the living." She muttered, her voice evident with confusion of this strangeness. "They feed on frequencies to stabilize their form. When those frequencies recombine, a new Discord is born."
She paused. Her voice falling to a whisper. "This one… it probably devoured human frequencies."
Her hand brushed the creature's oddly soft crown. Its skin twitched beneath her touch—but did not retaliate.
"Maybe," she said, voice trembling, "these words aren't from the Discord itself. Maybe they're what's left of someone. Their final thoughts. The last trace of their pain."
A long silence stretched between them. Dust swirled in the breeze. Nothing else moved.
Yangyang pressed her palm to the creature's head, tuning herself to the Streams. Her brows knit, her eyes began to glisten.
"…I'm sorry," she whispered.
Rover stepped closer. "Are you talking to it?"
"No," she replied, shaking her head slowly. "I'm not that skilled. But I can feel something… a tangled knot of emotion. Grief, fear… and longing. Like it's waiting."
She looked up at him. "I think I understand now."
Rover nodded. "Go on."
"It's not crying for itself. It's not asking us to help it. It's mourning this place," Yangyang said, her voice thick with sorrow. "Everyone who once lived here. The entire village is still echoing through it—pleading, aching to be remembered."
The Tacet Discord slumped forward, as if in mournful agreement.
"Something terrible happened here," she continued. "And it wasn't long ago. The traces are still fresh in the Streams."
Rover's gaze lingered on the creature. "This place was hidden for a reason."
Yangyang nodded. "The Tacet Field masked it. Or maybe… someone didn't want it ever found."
She stood, solemn and still. "We have to keep going. There may be survivors. Or at least… the truth. Someone involved is close—I can feel it."
She glanced toward Jinzhou. "I'll inform Chixia. But if we wait for a full investigation, it might be too late."
Then, quietly, almost shyly, she added, "I know I don't have proof. It's just… a feeling."
"I believe you," Rover said, his voice firm. "Jinhsi's token led us here. That's enough."
Yangyang gave him a small, grateful smile. "Thank you, Rover. Please stay vigilant."
Her gaze returned to the Discord.
"And this little one…" she whispered, brushing a trembling hand across its rounded body, "let's leave it be."
To be continued...