The system's chime woke the entire village before the sun had fully bled into the sky. It was the kind of chime that made merchants and midwives and bladesmen look up, not because it required action but because it promised change.
Lian's labor had begun in the quiet before dawn. The midwife, seasoned to face screaming storms in the form of birth, guided Lian through each heave and breath. Bales of herbs steamed in the corner to ease the process. Bai'e lay outside the hut, face in his paws like a patient guardian.
When the child came, it was not with flares or heavenly trumpets but with a simple, human wail that seemed to brazenly demand to be recognized. The cry threaded through the hut and out, curling through the village until people who had not meant to wake were up, huddled around the doorway and bearing witness.
The system annotated the event with quick businesslike efficiency.
[Child Born: Lian's Son. Blessing Granted: Guardian's Breath. Effect: Nearby children and infants gain a small passive protective aura when within the village boundary; list of protections logged to Host.]
Qingmu toddled into the hut with all the solemnity of a child deputized to present a bouquet. He sniffed the baby, batted at its tiny fingers, and then, with the matter-of-factness only toddlers possess, stuck out his own chubby hand. The baby gripped it and the two of them, different as dawn and root, blinked at one another.
Lian's exhausted smile was wide and real. "He likes you," she whispered, tears streaking down the soot on her cheeks. "He...he settled when he saw you."
The village celebrated with the clumsy, human joy of those who know their own frailty and prefer to meet it with song and stew. Huo Ling'er roasted seeds until they popped like laughter. Shi Yi quietly made sure the outer watch was double-tight. Shi Hao trained two of the older boys with steady commands, teaching them how to watch a sleeping child without blinking.
Liu Shen watched from her branches—a goddess made leaf—her presence folded into the hush. "The first blessing warms the home," she told the elder in a voice like wind through chimes. "A small bloom becomes a promise."
That night, the child slept under a blanket sewn from many hands. The system logged the Guardian's Breath as a blessing that would subtly accrue value: the village's children recovered slightly faster from minor injuries, nightmares became less frequent, and the midwife found that her herbs worked a fraction more potently. Small things, but in a world that prized small advantages, they matter.
For Qingmu the event was a puzzle whose pieces had the shape of a new friend. He would wake at odd hours to make sure the infant's chest rose and fell. He discovered a strange adult habit of protection that made his chest swell in a way even his tiny hands could not explain.
Outside the quiet joy, the world still watched. The Runan scouts returned with terse notes; there had been an attempt on the road to intercept a gift bound for the village. Someone tried, and failed. While the blade that failed was not the village's, the implication was clear: there were hands willing to stab for a taste of what the Willow Child's influence could produce. The birth had not only gifted the village with warmth — it had stirred shadows that liked warm things.
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