Chungpo City

After being pushed away from her mother, Ruan Mu Chou sprinted back to her, only to find all three of her beloved guardians, unmoving.

Her mother looked so peaceful and yet so remorseful as she lay on the snow covered stone, without any breath left in her body.

"AHHH!" screamed Ruan Mu Chou mournfully.

She was in so much agony, that she caused herself a throbbing headache that would no doubt leave her dysfunctional for a couple of hours, later. But she didn't care. Her mother, who just a few hours ago was up and alive and warm as a freshly baked cinnabon, was now as cold as the snow slowly covering her body along with everything in sight.

She wanted to mourn her mother then, but she could not. Li Feng was still waiting for her and she still did not know whether their pursuers were part of the same people who caused her entire known life to go down in flames. She had to run and take Li Feng with her. She had to. It was her mother's final wish and they were each other's last remaining thread to what they now had only in dreams and memories. So after hugging her mother and kissing her head one last time while burning her image in her mind, she ran to where she had left Li Feng and hoped he had stayed there like she had told him to.

As she ran to his hiding spot, she made eye contact with him and she could tell he wanted to burst out in sobs as he saw her figure growing closer and closer without any of their relatives by her side. She knew this because the moonlight reflected off the tears that were silently rushing down his cheeks. The only reason he had not wailed out loud was because she had held a finger to her lips to keep him silent. She did not know whether the perpetrators were still nearby or if they had returned to make sure they were completely successful, but she could not risk it.

When she reached him, she lifted him into her arms and ran deeper into the forest as quietly as she could. Common sense told her to run towards public spaces, but the entire region knew her family crest, an obsidian snake with it's mouth wide open to the sky and a gray-white eye above it, which was embroidered into all of her clothes as well as Li Feng's, and if they were to notice how burned and tattered her clothes were, people would speculate as to what could've possibly happened. If any where to find out what really happened that night within the darkness of the trees, she and her brother would face a greater danger as she would have to run away not only from the perpetrators of the fire and her previous pursuers, but she would have to evade malicious slave traders, now that she and Li Feng had no more protection. So she decided to take her chances with the forest and hoped that the trail she had left behind while sneakily traveling to the nearby city long ago would still be there.

It was.

...

After running through the path for half an hour, she finally saw the glimmers of light against the night sky of the city. Despite this, she didn't slow down. This stemmed from her fear of an attacker jumping out of the dark once she slowed down. So, she kept on the well-used path at the same pace.

When she finally got to the city, Chungpo, she was blinded by the lights everywhere. She had always come to this city during the day and so the lights were mostly all turned off, but now that it was night, she noticed all of the lights around her.

"Close your eyes, Feng'er." she told Li Feng and at this point, he was just so exhausted that he did not care for the lights around him nor the festival music or whether it was day or night. He only cared for his elder sister who had been stretching herself thin without any respite, but he could not keep his eyes open and so he slipped into a deep sleep.

Once, she felt his breath become steady and his being become limp, she began to want to focus on her surroundings.

There wasn't enough time to look around though. Winter had arrived and they had no roof over them. Neither did they have money or food. From all her running, she was famished, but she needed to settle the "roof" problem first.

As she wandered the streets of the city, the night became colder and colder. The roads that were bustling with people who ignored them earlier, were now virtually empty as it was nearing dawn, so no one helped. Eventually Ruan Mu Chou found a small seemingly abandoned cottage at the furthest place in the outskirts of the city.

The cottage itself had stone walls and a wooden door. Inside there was a dusty dining table, bed, and a fireplace. The kitchen was little more than a stove and a sink.

'It will need a bit of dusting and cleaning tomorrow, but it should suffice...for now.' she thought

In the meantime, she decided to slide down the wall behind her, with Li Feng still in her arms. She took off her outer robe and covered him with it to prevent him from becoming sick. Right now, all she wanted to do was sleep. She was so very exhausted and numb. Most people hated the winter where she lived at, but right now, it helped numb her entire being. She felt no sadness, no anger, no happiness, and no pain. She just existed, at that moment. And it was probably for the best.

...

When she woke up, hours later, Li Feng was still in her arms and the cottage was still cold as ever. That wasn't what she noticed first though. It was the burning she felt on her arms, back, and legs.