The bronze vessel in the dim chamber gleamed with corpse-wax luster. The gray-robed elder collapsed before the altar, black blood spattering its “戊戌年亥时生祭” (Sacrifice Those Born 1898, 9-11 PM) inscription. Vessels in the corner resonated violently—the leftmost one shattered, its fragments dragged into floor cracks by frenzied rats.


    “Seven years’ lifespan…for scrap metal…” The elder tore his robe open, chest etched with cracks mirroring Feng’s peachwood sword.


    Feng tweezed a rodent fang artifact from the well’s edge. The hexagonal tooth bore “Yunnan Troupe Zhou” carvings, red clay clinging to its serrations. The sow rolled in its pen, belly scar faint pink.


    “Document every detail about the gray-robed man.” Feng slapped a notebook on the table, eyeing the boy indoors—his neck smooth, Five Emperors coins clinking in his hands. As the farmer rambled about “hog plague remedies,” Feng pasted Yin Breaker talismans on the doorframe: “Remove these if they blacken.”


    Noon reeked of fish guts at the market. Feng selected a chipped vanity mirror, its mercury backing spiderwebbed. “This’ll do.”


    Vermillion inverted Bagua symbols adorned the frame. “Intact mirrors reflect truth—cracks refract ‘phantom moonlight’…”


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    Annals’ “Cracked Mirrors Reveal Yin” chapter stated: “Fractured glass gathers false moonlight, luring pseudo-souls. Beast-Human Hybrids use lunar energy to forge illness into proxy spirits—yet true soul restoration breaks the pact.”


    The farm’s peach stump anchored Feng’s mirror array. Noon light refracted onto the pen, conjuring a hazy aureole. When Feng reclaimed the coins, the boy wailed until three bloodstained coins were buried in the yard.


    “Activate at 戌时三刻 (7:48 PM).” Feng stabbed a fruit knife into northwest talismans. “Pour black blood at green flames.”


    Night fell. The sow circled anxiously under fractured moonlight projecting an infant-sized glow on its back.


    Green fire erupted from the mirrors. Thirty miles away, the gray-robed elder screamed as bronze vessels exploded. Rats gnawed his ankles. At the farm, the luminous spot began extracting the boy’s spectral form—


    Moonbeams glued the boy’s soul and swine fetus pseudo-spirit like magnetic poles. Feng gripped the coin strand: “Yin to yin, yang to yang!”


    He slashed through luminous threads. Stardust cascaded into the boy’s crown as smoke coiled into an inverted bowl barrier.


    Seven silver threads of fractured moonlight stretched taut. Feng’s sword severed them—pseudo-souls fed on lunar tethers.


    Dawn mist still clung to the air as Feng shouldered his pack. The farmer thrust a wad of crumpled bills toward him, but Feng pushed them back, trading instead for the chipped mirror. "Keep this to ward your home." Its mercury backing veined with bloody luminescence under the morning sun.


    Crossing Yunnan’s border, Feng rubbed the rodent fang’s carvings. A drunk’s radio blared: “…folklorist cracks cross-province fraud…” He tugged his hat low. Outside, wild rats mass-kowtowed toward distant cliffs.