Chapter 4: The One Who Knocks Lightly

  The stranger did not ride.

  He walked into the vilge just past dawn, barefoot on the wet stone road, robes untouched by mud, and eyes hidden beneath a broad straw hat. No one heard him arrive. He was simply... there.

  Children stopped mid-py. Dogs slinked back under homes. Even the wind seemed to stall.

  Only Shen Liang saw him smile.

  The man’s face was sharp but not unkind. His skin bore no age, but his presence felt old — older than the evergreen, older than the stories, older than the way people look when they forget to hope.

  He spoke softly. “Is this pce called Zhaotun?”

  The vilge elder nodded, and offered tea. The man accepted, but didn’t drink.

  “I come seeking signs,” he said. “Small things. Unnatural things. Shifts in the breathing of the nd.”

  *****

  He made no demands. He offered no name. But people answered.

  A goat that birthed twins with no eyes.

  A pond where fish floated belly-up, untouched by decay.

  A night with no moon and no stars.

  He listened to each with equal silence.

  Then he asked, “Has anyone dreamed of the sky moving?”

  Everyone was quiet.

  Except Shen Liang.

  He didn’t speak. But the stranger looked at him — as if he'd already heard the answer.

  *****

  Later, Shen Liang found him by the old evergreen, standing alone.

  “You feel it, don’t you?” the stranger said.

  “Feel what?”

  “The weight that doesn’t press. The sound that doesn’t make noise. The thing that is always almost about to happen.”

  He smiled faintly. “We call that the edge.”

  Shen Liang hesitated. “You’re a cultivator?"

  “I used to be,” the man said. “Now I’m just… waiting for something to remember me.”

  They stood in silence for a time.

  Then the man stepped forward, pced a finger gently on the bark of the split tree, and sighed. Not in sorrow — but recognition.

  “Old things are waking. Some will sing. Some will hunger.”

  He turned to Shen Liang. “When the stars begin to speak, do not answer too quickly. Not all questions deserve truth.”

  Then, he was gone.

  No footsteps. No sound. Not even the sme ll of dust left behind.

  *****

  That night, Shen Liang stood at the edge of the field where the lightning once struck.

  The grass had begun to bend — all of it — in the same direction, like it bowed toward something deep underground.

  And in his chest, somewhere between breath and heartbeat,

  a quiet voice spoke for the first time:

  “You are te.”

  (End of chapter)