Xinyue was silent on the way back to camp. There was too much for her to think about, to process, and she couldn’t help but feel as if she forgot to ask the Master something important. The thing she forgot pestered her, flying just outside of her reach as she tried over and over to catch the tail end of the thought.

  It wasn’t until much later, when she woke up the next day, that she realized what she had forgotten. Strapping on her sword and armor, she prepared to set off for General Yichen’s quarters.

  “General.” Haoran’s voice came from outside her door, and Xinyue choked back the guilt that flooded through her at the sound of his voice. She reminded herself there was no reason to feel guilty; he was her subordinate, and she treated him as such. Her relationship with Haoran and Zixin was different than Yichen’s and his subordinates. But then why did her insides feel so sticky and unpleasant?

  “Come in.”

  There was a slight pause.

  “I’m not alone, General. General Yichen has accompanied me and wishes to enter.” Haoran’s voice had a tinge of guilt if Xinyue wasn’t to be mistaken.

  “Enter.” Now she wouldn’t need to make her way to his tent, he had come to see her himself.

  In entered Yichen and Haoran entered. Standing so close to each other, comparisons were easily made between the two men. Yichen was only a bit taller than the wiry Haoran, but his presence enveloped that of her subordinate. She could say it was his bearing as the Crown Prince of Long, but even without his title, Xinyue guessed he would suck the air out of any room he walked in.

  “General Yichen.” Xinyue nodded to the man. “To what do I have this honor?”

  Yichen smirked. “If you were anyone else, General, I would think you were mocking me.” He was glancing around the room, craning his neck to look at the table with the map of the kingdoms and the various pieces of functional furniture. Xinyue’s tent was far less comfortable or opulent than his.

  Xinyue kept her face purposefully blank. “I don’t know what you mean, General Yichen.”

  “Right, of course you don’t” That damn dimple came back out.

  “General.” Haoran saluted, and Xinyue kept her embarrassment in check and forgetting that her subordinate had entered with the General.

  “Haoran. Did you have something to report?”

  “Yes, General.” Haoran glanced up at Yichen and shifted on his feet a bit.

  “It’s probably the same reason why I’m here.” General Yichen walked with his hands clasped lightly behind his back, his gold armor gleaming in the lantern light. He walked over to the map on the table. “There’s been another bandit attack.”

  “When? And Where?” Xinyue joined General Yichen at the table.

  “In a small village beneath this mountain.” Yichen stabbed his finger onto the map. The bandits’ attack was not far away from where they were camped, an easy ride away. If Xinyue didn’t know any better, she would say that the bandits were almost taunting them with how close they were.

  “How many were injured or killed?”

  “They’re still counting.” Yichen shook his head. “The bandits set fire to quite a few residents after they finished looting them.”

  Xinyue closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Do they normally attack like this?”

  “It’s not unheard of.” Yichen shrugged. “Normally, there are a few people who are in the crossfire, but this time, there were far more than in the other precedents.”

  Xinyue looked at the map, a pattern was forming in her mind. “We should go to the site?”

  “Already ahead of you,” Yichen smirked. “The horses are saddled and waiting.”

  Xinyue knew that she needed to discuss the other thing with him. It was important, but it was also important to get to the site as soon as possible. To look at the damage when it was fresh, to get into the head of the bandits.

  Xinyue trailed after Yichen and let him lead her and Haoran over to the horses. Zixin and the others were already waiting, along with a small contingent of troops that would be helping to stop the fires and to control the damage.

  By the time they got to the village, Xinyue’s mind had already imagined different scenarios. Each one more gruesome than the last of what the village looked like, of the destruction that was caused by the bandits.

  The first thing that Xinyue saw was the smoke as it rose into the sky, a dark ink stain on the otherwise clear blue. As they got closer, the ash sprinkled down like snow, slowly catching onto their horses’ hair and sticking to their clothing. The party paused for the soldiers to cut off pieces of their clothing to wrap around their mouths and noses.

  “It’s just going to get worse as we move closer to the entrance of the village.” Yichen prepared them all. “Keep your calm and listen to your superior officers’ instructions.”

  “Yes, General.” The troops behind them saluted.

  The smell was the worst; it smelt rancid and dirty. It was the burnt smell of lives that were taken too soon and of people’s livelihoods. The ash and smell of smoke stung and pricked at Xinyue’s eyes as they clopped through the barren main street of the village. All the villagers had taken shelter in the houses that were still standing. Children ran around calling to their parents, searching for whatever was left of their shattered childhood. Stray animals wandered by without owners, rummaging for food in the carts that were strewn about on the ground.

  “Is this the worst of it?” Xinyue watched as one of the children clutched at her older brother’s hand, her knuckles a bright white. In her other hand was a small paper doll, singed from the fire.

  “No. The magistrate’s office and one of the other houses further down got the brunt of the attack.” Bowen answered from behind the generals.

  “One of the other houses?”

  “Yes, the damage was pretty severe. They couldn’t possibly rebuild, not to mention the razing of their fields.”

  “Fields? Was he a court official?”

  “No, a regular civilian. A farmer.” Bowen shook his head a bit.

  “Was he a wealthier individual? Someone connected heavily to the kingdom’s government?” Xinyue tried to find the connection. There must be some connection.

  “No. We questioned him earlier. He’s a rice farmer with a small family. His house was barely a shack, apparently, it had been a few rough harvests for him.”

  Xinyue turned this news over in her mind; both a civilian and the magistrate’s office had almost equal levels of damage? Why would the bandits do that if they were cultivators fighting for freedom from the kingdom’s government?

  “The Magistrate is just ahead.” Yichen kept riding on his horse. Hongyi had separated from the generals. He called to the soldiers around them and directed them in putting out the still blazing fires that were eating away at the rest of the village.

  “Where are they getting the water?” Zixin asked just as they came up on the Magistrate. His hat with large swaths of fabric on either side of his head precariously perched. He was covered in soot, and in his hands he carried scrolls; some edges of the paper were burnt as if he had wrestled them from the fire’s grasp.

  They all dismounted from their horses. Their shoes were immediately coated in the black remains of the fire.

  “We are fortunate. The reason the village was built here in the first place by our founding fathers was because of the river nearby.” The Magistrate bowed, then blanched as he realized what he had done. He looked at the scrolls in his hands, then at his Crown Prince. He was debating what was more important, proper etiquette or his ravaged books that he had saved.

  He was fortunate, the Crown Prince waved him off. “Right now I’m here in my official capacity as the General of Long, not as the Crown Prince.”

  The Magistrate exhaled a great sigh in relief and seemed to hug the scrolls closer to his body.

  “The scrolls must have been very important for you to save them?” Haoran eyed the saved scrolls with pleasure. He was known to adore reading and probably thought the man was justified to fight the fire back just to save a few papers of noteworthy literature.

  “Right you are, Sir!” The Magistrate beamed, the soot on his face not taking away from his bright demeanor. “These are the founding records of our village. They depict our history, the maps, and everything that makes our village, well, our village.”

  “Do you also have a census in there? We will need it for logistical purposes.” Haoran’s eyes gleamed in excitement. “The map would also be a great help in the search for any people who are hiding or who we may have missed.”

  “Ah, well, yes.” The Magistrate deflated as he handed over the scrolls to Haoran.

  “I will return them once we’ve finished accounting for the dead and injured.” Haoran nodded and patted the Magistrate’s hand in reassurance. He could understand the pain of a fellow book lover in giving up his precious possessions.

  “I thank you sincerely.” The Magistrate saluted.

  “Magistrate, could you tell us a first-hand account of the bandits? Exactly how many were there?” Xinyue got straight to the point. They needed their investigation to proceed in order to catch and bring to justice the people who did this.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  “Um, well, the thing is, I don’t know.” The Magistrate rubbed the toe of his shoe into the dirt. The fine fabric was coated with the blackened soil that you could hardly see the bright blue underneath it. “They appeared all at once and disappeared as suddenly. I want to say there were hundreds, but that seems to be impossible.”

  It tracked what Xinyue and her troops had experienced in the forest days earlier. The bandits were definitely one and the same.

  “Do you have any idea why they attacked?” Yichen asked. Xinyue nodded at Yichen’s question, perhaps the bandits left a political message.

  “No, that’s the strange thing, well, I guess not as strange as people appearing out of thin air.” The Magistrate rambled, trying to string together his thoughts. His face was flushed, and his hands kept fiddling with the long sleeves of his official robes. He kept glancing at General Yichen, his eyes shifting away and back to the general. “There doesn’t seem to be anything missing.”

  “What do you mean?” Zixin leaned forward a bit, curiosity crawling up his spine, filling him with questions and a feeling of unease.

  “There was nothing stolen at all.” The Magistrate seemed uncomfortable with the attention as he shifted impatiently from foot to foot.

  “The bandits didn’t steal anything? At all?” Yichen tilted his head. This village was far different than the others that had reported sightings of the bandits.

  “Well, they did burn things to the ground, does that count?” The Magistrate’s voice came out as a squeak as Yichen leveled his icy blue, almost white, eyes at the man.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.” The Magistrate flinched as Yichen whipped away from him and started walking toward the burnt-down Magistrate building. The fire was already put out, and the structure of the building, while damaged, was still standing.

  Yichen stared at the building. It was damaged but not destroyed, same as the farmer’s home.

  He kicked at a piece of wood that had once been a part of the outer wall.

  “Thank you for your time. I’ll let you know if we have more questions. Go check on any family you have here.” Yichen didn’t turn away from the Magistrate’s office.

  “Yes, thank you, General, Sir.” The Magistrate turned and scurried off, barely remembering to say his farewells to the other present soldiers.

  “Bowen, go with Haoran and check with Hongyi about the missing and dead. Ask for any survivors’ reports. Also, ask for a list of any stolen objects, not simply burned down or destroyed, but specifically taken by the bandits.” With Yichen’s orders, Bowen immediately turned to find Hongyi. Haoran opened his mouth to argue his assignment, but one look from Xinyue and he snapped it closed.

  “They’re searching for something.” It was the only conclusion that Xinyue could come to. “They thought it would be here in the Magistrate’s office or in the farmer’s home.”

  “Yes, but what?” Yichen turned to face Zixin and Xinyue, his brow furrowed.

  The thing that had been niggling at Xinyue’s mind for the past day suddenly burst forth. “The Master, yesterday.”

  “Yes?”

  “He didn’t seem opposed to what the bandits were doing.”

  “Yet, he did seem to have joined with them either.”

  “Yes, but that’s the thing. I don’t know why, but he seemed to be waiting for them to do something before he joined them. There seemed to be an implication that he hadn’t joined them ‘yet.’ That he would.” Xinyue thought back to their conversation with the Master and his wise, unnerving stare.

  “So what would he be waiting for?”

  “Maybe they need to find the thing that they are looking for?” Zixin tilted his head to the side.

  “That’s my conclusion as well,” Xinyue stated with a slight nod of her head. It was the simplest conclusion based on several deductions, and it would be the only thing that made sense. Perhaps the bandits were on a political quest, but they were also in search of something important for their cause. There could be several reasons, but that seemed to be the reason that worked the most for the story in Xinyue’s mind. “But we need to find what they were looking for and why it would be important enough for them to burn down villages to find it.”

  Yichen sighed. “We’ll start with helping out here and staunching any remaining fires. Hongyi, Bowen, and Haoran will take note of anything missing as well as the people still unaccounted for. While the Magistrate may believe nothing was stolen, we still need to hear from other people who were affected by the bandits. We also need to do more research on our theory. We still don’t know if it’s necessarily a thing they are looking for, or a person.”

  Xinyue nodded. General Yichen’s plan was logical and thorough. It would help to rule out other possibilities instead of jumping to conclusions or making wild guesses. After all, in the other villages, there were things stolen, and the reports seemed to be of common bandits, except for the disappearing act.

  “How much was stolen from the other villages?” Xinyue had to raise the question. She had read the reports, but she needed assurance, to check with others. Was their theory based on an assumption?

  Yichen ran a hand over his mouth and took a moment to think.

  “I read the reports,” Zixin entered the conversation, “Most of the things that went missing were food items and money.” His voice was impatient, and his words tripped over each other, demonstrating his excitement. Their mission, the simple case of bandits, had become more interesting than what Zixin first imagined.

  “Things that could have been burned in the fires set by the bandits?”

  “Exactly. Or misplaced in the ruckus.” Zixin nodded a bit, but his eyes were unfocused, blank. He was already thinking about the future and their new theory. His mind raced as he jumped from theory to theory, as to what the object the bandits were looking for.

  “In the other villages, were there any specific buildings that were targeted and damaged more than the others?”

  “No.” Zixin shook his head. “Most of the damage was to farmers’ fields and sheds. The bandits infrequently targeted homes.”

  “What about attacks on the trails or the roads?” Xinyue thought back to their first day in the Long Kingdom and the welcome the bandits gave them. She hadn’t heard about the bandits attacking before on the roads, but that could have been an oversight.

  Yichen shook his head. “It’s the reason why we told you to meet us here. They normally don’t attack on the roads or trails. Most of the bandits that we’ve heard about since setting out to this area don’t share the same characteristics as these.”

  Xinyue nodded. All the points were connecting, but there were still large chunks missing. What were the bandits searching for, and just who was leading them? What temple were they a part of, if they were part of a temple?

  The simple case of stopping bandits on the border between two kingdoms had increasingly gotten more complex and difficult to comprehend. Xinyue had expected to only be in the Long Kingdom for one week, two weeks at most, but here she was continuing on the journey to find out exactly who these bandits were and their connection to the temples.

  “General.” Haoran came from where he had been sorting through the scrolls of the Magistrate, his hands covered in dark ash. “We have gathered reports from most of the soldiers that all the fires have been put out. They’re collecting the bodies and preparing burials for the deceased.”

  “Good, thank you, Haoran.” Xinyue could rest a bit easier knowing that the people were going to be watched over by the gods. Maybe they could even manage to find or make some paper money to burn for the people who lost their lives.

  “Out of all the people we have interviewed so far, none have had anything stolen. Some say that they lost money in the fire, but none can confirm that the bandits took any of the money or other belongings.” Haoran’s words confirmed everything that they knew.

  Xinyue and Yichen turned their heads to share a long look. The ash continued to rain down on their heads, and the crying of children echoed in Xinyue’s ears. But, for a brief moment, Xinyue had a moment of clarity. She and Yichen were on the right track to discovering the bandits’ purpose.

  “General Xinyue, look after the census and Haoran.” It was an order. “I am going to check on the damage from the fire.”

  “Yes, General Yichen.” Xinyue nodded to him and walked over to where Haoran stood. He was poring over the scrolls that the Magistrate had given him. Double-checking names and dates. Xinyue made herself busy by checking the other lists and scrolls for anything important.

  “Oh, General, did the Magistrate forget something?” Haoran interrupted Xinyue’s reading.

  “Hm?” Xinyue glanced at Haoran. Then looked to where he was staring.

  General Yichen and the Magistrate were in deep discussion, just the two of them.