South of Hangzhou Bay, where the fertile lands surrendered to the stark, saline embrace of the coast, lay the vast, shimmering expanse of the Qiantang Salt Fields. This was a landscape sculpted by human labour and the relentless sun – a sprawling mosaic of shallow, rectangular evaporation ponds mirroring the immense sky, separated by narrow, raised dykes of packed earth. Tiny, isolated watchmen's huts dotted the panorama like lonely stones. The air here was sharp, tasting of brine and iodine, carrying the faint cries of distant gulls and the pervasive silence of immense, flat space. By day, labourers raked the crystallizing salt under a punishing sun; by night, watchmen patrolled the dykes, guarding the precious harvest against thieves beneath the vast, often unnervingly bright, moon. It was a place of harsh necessity and stark, minimalist beauty, but recently, the nights had become filled with a terror as cold and empty as the salt flats themselves.

  The trouble began with whispers among the night watchmen, men accustomed to solitude and the strange tricks moonlight could play on the reflective water. They spoke of seeing figures patrolling distant dykes – figures that moved with human gait but cast no shadows. Even under the brilliant coastal moon that should have etched every form in sharp relief against the pale salt crust, these figures remained stubbornly shadowless, their presence marked only by their dark silhouettes against the shimmering water or sky.

  Initially, these sightings were dismissed. Fatigue, moon-glare, mirages born of loneliness. But then came the disappearances. Old Man Feng, a watchman whose knowledge of the labyrinthine dykes was unparalleled, vanished during his patrol. His lantern was found extinguished near a section known for its deep, stagnant brine pools, but there was no sign of struggle, no tracks leading away into the soft mud at the water's edge. A week later, two younger watchmen patrolling together failed to report back at dawn. Their shared hut was empty, their meager belongings untouched. A search party found only one dropped patrol rattle near a desolate intersection of dykes, the ground around it feeling unnaturally cold.

  Fear, stark and chilling, replaced dismissal. Watchmen began refusing night duty or patrolling only in pairs, their eyes constantly scanning not just the horizon for thieves, but the ground beside figures in the distance, searching desperately for the reassuring anchor of a shadow. Those who did encounter the shadowless figures returned deeply traumatized, often incoherent. They spoke not of attack, but of an overwhelming sense of cold, emptiness, and profound disorientation. Some claimed that, in the presence of the shadowless figures, their own shadows seemed to flicker, fade, or momentarily detach, leaving them feeling terrifyingly untethered, their very essence threatened. One man, young Liang, was found wandering miles away, weeping, unable to clearly recall the encounter but obsessed with the feeling that 'something had tried to steal his darkness'.

  Overseer Yan Kun, the stern, pragmatic manager responsible for this vast section of the salt fields on behalf of a powerful Lin'an merchant guild, found his production quotas threatened and his authority challenged by the spreading panic. He listened to the reports with growing impatience, attributing the phenomena to mass hysteria fueled by local superstitions about drowned sailors or spirits trapped in the brine. He ordered extra patrols (though finding volunteers was increasingly difficult) and threatened dismissal for spreading 'idle tales'. Yet, even he felt the change in the fields at night – a deeper silence, a colder edge to the wind, a sense that the vast emptiness was not empty at all, but held a watchful, hollow presence.

  It was Ah Cheng, a quiet, observant young salt worker whose friend Liang was the watchman found weeping and disoriented, who sought help beyond the overseer's rigid skepticism. Ah Cheng had noticed strange patches appearing near where Liang had been patrolling – areas on the dykes where the salt crust seemed greyer, duller, absorbing the moonlight rather than reflecting it, and where even the hardy salt-marsh weeds refused to grow. The ground there felt unnaturally cold and dead to the touch. Remembering tales from travelling merchants about a wandering Taoist priest, Xuanzhen, known for resolving inexplicable phenomena rooted in landscape and spirit, Ah Cheng made discreet inquiries and learned the Taoist was currently visiting a temple further down the coast. Taking leave under a pretext, he journeyed to find him, his heart heavy with fear for his friend and the community.

  Xuanzhen listened patiently in the temple's quiet herb garden as Ah Cheng recounted the eerie events – the shadowless figures, the disappearances, the strange psychological effects, the blighted patches of earth. The specific detail about the lack of shadows immediately caught Xuanzhen’s attention. Shadows, in Taoist cosmology, were not mere absences of light; they were intrinsically linked to the Yin aspect of existence, to the physical body's anchor, and subtly connected to the soul's grounding in the material world. Figures without shadows suggested beings operating outside the normal laws of Yin and Yang, or perhaps entities composed purely of concentrated, aberrant Yin energy.

  Intrigued and sensing a profound imbalance, Xuanzhen agreed to investigate. He travelled with Ah Cheng back towards the salt fields, adopting the guise of a geomancer hired by a concerned (fictional) relative of Overseer Yan Kun to assess the 'unhealthy vapours' rumoured to be affecting the workers.

  Arriving at the salt fields was like stepping onto another planet. The vast, flat expanse stretched to the horizon, the shallow ponds reflecting the sky with blinding intensity under the midday sun. The air tasted of salt and sea. Yet, beneath the stark beauty, Xuanzhen felt the disturbed qi. The Yang energy of the sun felt strangely weak here, diffused by the immense reflective surfaces, while a powerful, cold, stagnant Yin energy seemed to rise from the brine-saturated earth itself, particularly concentrated in certain areas.

  Overseer Yan Kun received Xuanzhen with gruff skepticism but allowed him access, clearly hoping the 'geomancer' would quickly dismiss the workers' fears. Xuanzhen spent the day walking the dykes, ostensibly taking readings with his Luopan compass, but actually sensing the flow of energy. He confirmed Ah Cheng's observations: certain patches of earth felt unnaturally cold, dead, radiating a profound Yin chill that seemed to absorb light and vitality. These areas corresponded with the locations of the most frequent sightings and Liang's encounter.

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  He spoke with Old Man Hui, a retired salt worker living in a nearby hamlet, whose memory held generations of local lore. Hui nodded grimly when Xuanzhen mentioned the shadowless figures. "The sea takes, Master Taoist, and sometimes... it gives back things changed," he murmured, gazing out at the shimmering fields. "This land wasn't always fields. Ages ago, the sea covered much of it. Villages drowned, ships wrecked... their bones lie beneath the salt. And shadows... shadows anchor the soul. They say in places where the Yin is too strong, where the sun's Yang struggles to reach, shadows can weaken, detach... or things can rise that have no need of them, things made only of night and cold water."

  His words confirmed Xuanzhen's growing suspicion. The entities were likely Ying Mei – Shadow Essences or Shadow Demons. Not ghosts of specific people, but elemental beings formed from concentrated Yin energy drawn from the deep history of loss and drowning associated with the submerged land, coalescing in this unique environment where the balance was skewed. These beings, lacking their own Yang anchor, were instinctively drawn to the shadows of the living, attempting to absorb that anchor, that fragment of soul-essence, to gain substance or perhaps simply out of an alien hunger born of their own profound emptiness. Their touch didn't necessarily kill physically, but could detach the shadow, leading to madness, soul-loss, or the victim being drawn entirely into the Yin source.

  That night, under a brilliant full moon that cast long, sharp shadows across the salt pans, Xuanzhen kept vigil near one of the blighted grey patches, shielded by protective talismans. Ah Cheng waited nervously at a distance. As midnight approached, the air grew bitingly cold. The silence became absolute. Then, Xuanzhen saw them.

  From the stagnant brine pools and the grey patches of earth, figures began to coalesce. They shimmered, indistinct at first, like heat haze rising from cold ground. Then they solidified into dark, humanoid shapes, tall and thin. They moved with a silent, gliding motion across the salt crust. And they cast no shadows. Even under the intense moonlight, the ground beneath and behind them remained uniformly pale. They were walking voids, absences given form. They radiated an intense psychic cold and an aura of utter emptiness that sought to draw warmth, light, and essence towards itself. Several figures converged, gliding silently along the dykes, seemingly patrolling, drawn towards the distant huts where the living watchmen huddled.

  Xuanzhen understood the danger. These were not beings to be fought with swords or conventional exorcisms. They were manifestations of profound Yin imbalance. Restoring the balance was the key.

  He formulated a plan focusing on reinforcing the Yang energy and grounding the excessive Yin. He explained it to Overseer Yan Kun, framing it in terms of correcting 'harmful environmental energies' affecting the workers' minds and bodies. He required mirrors consecrated under the midday sun, specific Yang-attribute herbs and woods (pine, mugwort, peach wood), black tourmaline powder (a mineral known to absorb negative energy), salt gathered from healthy areas, and the participation of the remaining watchmen. Yan Kun, desperate to restore order and production, reluctantly agreed.

  The ritual took place over several nights, culminating on the night of the waning moon when Yin influence would naturally begin to recede. Xuanzhen chose the largest blighted area as the focal point. First, during the preceding days, he had the watchmen, guided by Ah Cheng, place the consecrated mirrors at strategic points around the affected zones, angled to catch and reflect the strong midday sun deep into the grey patches, infusing the area with concentrated Yang energy. Second, he prepared mixtures of the black tourmaline powder and pure salt, instructing the watchmen to discreetly spread this mixture along the edges of the blighted zones and near the entrances to their huts, creating grounding barriers. Third, on the night of the ritual, he gathered the remaining watchmen. He explained they were not fighting ghosts, but restoring the land's balance, anchoring light against shadow. He had them light small, controlled fires using the pine and peach wood, feeding them with powdered mugwort, the smoke rising, carrying purifying Yang energy across the flats. Finally, Xuanzhen stood at the center of the largest grey patch, facing the direction from which the Ying Mei usually emerged. He held no weapon, only a single, perfectly polished bronze mirror to catch the moonlight, and began a deep, resonant chant. He invoked the celestial powers of the Sun and Moon, the regulators of Yin and Yang. He called upon the stabilizing power of the Earth. He didn't command or banish, but affirmed the natural order, the essential balance, visualizing the excessive Yin being gently drawn back into the earth, the weakened Yang being replenished by the reflected moonlight and the ritual fires, the connection between the living and their shadows being strengthened, anchored.

  As he chanted, the Shadowless Watchmen manifested. Drawn by the ritual's energy, perhaps ten or twelve figures coalesced from the brine and the blighted earth, gliding silently towards the fires and the chanting Taoist. The cold intensified. The watchmen huddled closer to their fires, chanting the simple grounding mantra Xuanzhen had taught them, fighting the urge to flee, fighting the feeling of their own shadows flickering.

  The Ying Mei approached Xuanzhen, their featureless forms seeming to absorb the moonlight. He felt the chilling psychic probe, the attempt to drain his own anchor. He held the mirror steady, reflecting the pure moonlight directly at the advancing figures, intensifying his chant, pouring his own balanced qi into the affirmation of natural order.

  The effect was dramatic. As the reflected moonlight struck the shadowless forms, they seemed to recoil, wavering like smoke in a breeze. They couldn't bear the concentrated Yang energy, the assertion of balanced reality. Their forms flickered, grew indistinct. The purifying smoke from the fires swirled around them, further disrupting their coherence. With silent, drawn-out sighs that seemed absorbed by the vast silence of the salt flats, the Ying Mei dissolved, fading back into the moonlight, the brine, the earth, their unnatural concentration dispersed.

  The intense cold lifted. The air felt clean, crisp, tasting only of salt and sea. The watchmen let out ragged breaths of relief, their shadows stretching long and reassuringly solid behind them in the moonlight.

  In the days that followed, the grey, blighted patches slowly began to recover, salt crystals forming naturally, hardy weeds tentatively reappearing. No more shadowless figures were seen. The disappearances stopped. The watchmen's fear subsided, replaced by a renewed respect for the stark landscape they patrolled.

  Xuanzhen departed the Qiantang Salt Fields, leaving Overseer Yan Kun to grapple with events his pragmatic mind couldn't fully encompass. The encounter with the Shadowless Watchmen was a profound lesson in the fundamental importance of Yin and Yang. It demonstrated how landscapes scarred by history and saturated with specific elemental energies could birth entities reflecting that imbalance, and how the most fundamental aspects of existence – even one's own shadow – could become vulnerable when the natural order was profoundly disturbed. Restoring balance, Xuanzhen knew, often required not fighting the darkness, but skillfully, courageously, re-anchoring the light.