Dawn broke reluctantly over Li Village, the rising sun casting pale light on blackened ruins. Smoke curled upward, carrying with it the bitter scent of charred wood and sorrow. The night's horrors still lingered in the air.
Children whimpered softly as mothers gathered them close, and men with bandaged wounds stared blankly at the ground. Homes were gone, lives had been taken, and yet the village still breathed. Survival, though fragile, remained.
Madam Chen emerged from the shadows of her broken home, her infant pressed tightly against her chest. Li Wei slept peacefully, untouched by the cries and chaos around him. She kissed his brow, her tears dampening his hair. "You will not live like this," she whispered fiercely. "You will not grow up in fear."
Her words carried into the empty air like an oath to the heavens themselves, as though daring fate to listen.
Her vow was not just for herself or her family, but for the entire line of Chen blood that had struggled in silence. The child she carried was no ordinary boy; even she, a woman of common birth, could feel the strange hum in her arms, as though the world itself bent closer when he breathed.
Old Man Zhao lay weak inside his hut, attended by trembling hands. His body was frail, drained nearly to dust by the qi he had unleashed, but his mind burned as fiercely as ever.
"Zhao-lao," whispered Elder Han, standing beside him, "you should not have risked your life for that boy. He brings danger. The heavens have marked him, and we may all suffer for it."
Zhao's lips curled into a faint smile, blood still staining their corners. "The heavens marked him, yes. But tell me, Han… when have the heavens ever chosen wrongly?"
Elder Han's silence was heavy. His gaze shifted to the infant cradled outside by his mother. The star still lingered faintly in the morning sky, as though reluctant to fade.
Whispers spread like smoke across the village. Some called Li Wei a blessing, others a curse. Some saw him as hope; others feared that misfortune would follow wherever he went. None could deny the truth, however the heavens themselves had answered his birth.
The villagers shivered, sensing that they stood on the edge of something far larger than their humble lives.
By midmorning, the villagers gathered in the square, a space now scarred by ash and broken tools. The raid had shaken them deeply, yet survival demanded unity.
Li Shan stood, his body wrapped in crude bandages. His voice was rough, but steady. "We lost much, but we are not broken. We rebuild, as we always have. But…" His eyes shifted toward the Chen family. "We must also face what has begun."
Madam Chen's arms tightened protectively around Li Wei.
"Do not speak as though my son is a demon," she snapped, her grief sharpened into fire. "Last night he saved us as much as Zhao-lao did. The raiders fled because of him!"
Her defiance silenced the murmurs, though some still exchanged wary glances.
In the crowd, a few villagers bowed their heads in shame. They had been among those who shouted for the child to be given up when fear overwhelmed them. Now, with the sun exposing the truth of their cowardice, guilt ate at their hearts.
Regret was a heavy chain, but it could not erase the shadows of what they had almost done.
Zhao's voice, frail but commanding, drifted from where he sat propped on a chair. "The boy is chosen. Whether you call it omen or blessing, it is a path carved by fate itself. The only question left is whether we walk beside him… or stand in his way."
Silence fell. Even the birds in the trees seemed to hold their breath.
Finally, a woman stepped forward a widow whose husband had been slain by the raiders. Her face was streaked with soot, but her eyes glowed with conviction. "If the heavens chose him, then I will not curse him. Let him rise, for perhaps one day he will carry us all higher."
Others nodded slowly, and the balance shifted. Fear had not vanished, but it had been tempered by hope.
That day, Li Wei's name spread beyond the ashes of the village. Tales of the infant born beneath the star drifted with the traders and wanderers who passed by. Whispers turned into stories, and stories into legends. Even those who dismissed the tale could not help but repeat it, for fear that silence itself might offend the heavens. In distant taverns, men drank and muttered of a boy marked by destiny. In quiet sect halls, elders frowned at the rumors, weighing whether such a child was boon or bane.
Meanwhile, life in Li Village trudged forward. Fields still needed tending, homes needed rebuilding, and wounds needed healing. Yet beneath it all ran a current of change, a tide that none could resist.
Madam Chen rocked her son each night, singing lullabies she herself barely remembered. Yet even in her softest voice, there was iron. "Sleep now, Wei. Grow strong. One day, you will rise above all of this."
Zhao watched them from afar, his heart torn between pride and dread. He knew too well what such a destiny demanded.
In his youth, Zhao had seen another boy born under the omen of stars, one who rose like fire and fell like ash. He had promised himself never again to be entangled in heaven's games. And yet, here he was, bound by fate to protect this child.
One evening, as twilight painted the sky in hues of crimson, Zhao whispered to the infant who lay beside him. "The world will not forgive you easily, Wei. It will test you, break you, and bleed you. But if you endure… if you endure, even the heavens will bow."
Li Wei, though but a babe, smiled faintly in his sleep, as though he heard and understood.
And so, within the ruins of a forgotten village, destiny planted its roots deeper. Whispers became promises, promises became oaths, and a single child became the seed of storms yet to come.
And in that silence between one breath and the next, destiny itself seemed to lean closer, listening.