Radeon stepped back from the Preta. He straightened his spine, then returned to it with measured steps.

Fay kept her stance and did not move. Her awareness was clear. She watched first how he shifted his weight, how his feet chose stone, how his shoulders angled away from the broken wall.

But her thoughts were still too inexperienced to catch the pattern.

Radeon saw the confusion on her face.

"Fay." His voice stayed low. "Retrace every step. Every pose. If you missed one, guess. Then keep moving."

She did not ask why. She obeyed. She took one step, then another, copying the shape of herself from moments ago.

Arms. Hips. Breath. The way she had leaned. The way she had flinched.

The Preta followed them. The reason was simple. The hungry ghost's rage had been addressed, soothed enough by chant and the respect towards its ancestor.

If he did not do it, the place would be safe for everyone. Others could come and go as they pleased.

Radeon would not spend a week of hard work in this cursed place only to let strangers arrive later and harvest what he had prepared.

For this need to trace backward, it was in the nature of ghosts. Ghosts longed for one thing above all.

To turn back time. Back to a past life of mundanity, or a past life of power.

The group of Tiyanak participated too, tumbling and giggling in their infant shapes, though they had not been infants at the start.

Sin wore them into this form. Their existence was a task, dragging heart demons out of the living world like worms from soil.

The battle recommenced, slow and deliberate. The Preta drew its punches with a practiced manner now, not wild flailing.

Radeon answered in kind. Their movements blurred in Fay's eyes.

Her own body shook with effort and fear. Sweat poured down her temples.

Her face scrunched tight as she tried to remember every shift, every pivot, every placement of heel and toe.

Radeon began to slow. He needed them back at the point in the exact moment. The exact pattern. That was the whole purpose.

It helped that he had deliberately made her presence thin during the earlier clash, keeping her from leaving too hard an imprint.

At last, they reached the starting line again. The Tiyanak tumbled around where they had been.

The Preta still hid by its stake, watching with wet eyes, as if the game had reset.

Radeon led Fay out of the cavern. His chant did not stop.

Hours passed in swallowing dark. Then the stone mouth of Voulgrim Evershades opened before them. They stepped out.

People in hoods saw them emerge from the cursed place and immediately dashed away.

Radeon recognized them. He did not call out. He only smiled inside. He had let Fay go without her invisibility cloak for this very reason.

Two young cultivators walking out after more than a week meant only one thing to watchers.

They knew how to traverse the dark safely. Radeon turned and walked in the same direction the hooded figures had fled.

Fay followed, quieter now, still clinging to the rules, still saying nothing.

A few mountain ranges away, the hidden camp waited. Radeon had tasked them to pretend to be nomads, to disguise their women and children, to look harmless and desperate.

When he arrived, the group looked thinner. A few faces were missing.

Nine people stepped forward. Elders from the minor families tied to the mine. They had not stayed idle while he was gone.

They had scouted too, searching for a back up plan if all else failed.

A man bowed. His voice was gruff as coal.

"Venerable Radeon. My name's Shears." She nodded toward the younger girl at her side. "This is my granddaughter, Thimbles. We've been waiting on your return," he said, laying the flattery between his words.

Radeon called Humphrey over and stepped onto its head. The beast tried to lift itself to make him look dignified.

Radeon kicked its skull down, crushing the hog's effort to please him. Then he raised his voice.

"Listen up. You're not miners anymore. You're townfolk now. I've found us a place. Easy to hold, hard to reach. A peak. Strong ground. If you want safety, you build it with me."

Murmurs rippled through the gathered people. Surprise. Hope. Then the sharper thing underneath.

Doubt. Nothing in this world came for free.

Radeon watched their faces as if they were fruit on a branch. Surprise ripened into hope. Hope bruised into suspicion.

He gave them time to taste it. Time to argue in their heads. Then he spoke again and made the hook plain.

"This won't be free," he said. "Everyone pays in something. No exceptions, man, woman, child, or old."

Murmurs rose at once. Heads leaned together. In other towns, you showed up, you worked, and that was the price.

No one asked you to pay before you even built a roof. Radeon let the noise grow.

He knew some would still gamble if the reward sounded sweet enough. He continued.

"This is a land offering." His eyes swept the crowd, catching the greed go down hard. "Do it right, and your kids eat from it. Their kids too, then after that."

Fortune was the only word that could make miners forget their aching backs. The mine itself was fortune to them, brutal as it was.

It meant three meals a day. It meant your children might not starve before they learned to swing a pick.

Shears stepped forward. Her posture stayed respectful, but her voice carried a blade.

"Venerable, speak plain from the heart. It's best we know what's being asked of us for such a fortune."

Radeon did not make them wait. He beckoned Campion. The bison hurried over and Radeon opened the large cabinet where the rations were kept.

Radeon pulled out two chests and set them down where all could see.

He opened the first. Rice. Plain. White. Common.

He opened the second. Gold. Not ornaments. Not jewelry. Simple coins.

Radeon tapped the rim of the chest with one knuckle, then took two coins, one lower in quality.

"Brighter is better. Bigger is better," he said.

Radeon paused, then lifted a container of rice, letting grains spill through his fingers in a thin stream.

"For the rice, take the best you've got," he said. "Most of you eat the same sack. I want the clean, fat grains. Pick them out."

The murmuring sharpened. Some faces relaxed at the simplicity. Some tightened at the insult of being asked to sort their own food for another man's ritual.

Those who could read began to whisper old stories, traditions half remembered, offerings that bought luck and warded disaster.

Radeon listened without seeming to. He let them build meaning around his demand. He was weaponizing their imagination and turning it on them.

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