The wooden door opened only a finger's width.
An eye appeared in the crack—clouded, sharp, honed in darkness like a blade. It scanned Yueyao's face, then her hem, then lingered where her sleeve hid the bruised ring around her wrist, as if it could measure last night by the color of skin.
"Buy a road?" the hoarse voice repeated. "With what?"
Yueyao didn't push inside.
Places like this hated grabbing. The moment you grabbed, you owed. And the moment you owed, the price went up.
She opened her hands, palms empty, voice steady. "With something you can use. And something you can't afford to refuse."
A dry snort from behind the door. "Everyone says that."
Yueyao didn't argue. She only drew the old copper seal from inside her collar and let the engraved Moon catch the light—just a flash—then hid it again. Not offered. Not surrendered. Only shown.
The eye narrowed.
The door opened wider.
A smell of medicine and old paper rolled out. The room was dim; light cut in from the doorway and revealed shelves packed with worn ledgers. Bamboo tubes. Wax-sealed notes. Loose copper coins. A neat row of small wooden tags inked with tiny characters—labels for secrets that wanted to stay labeled.
An old man sat inside.
Not ancient, but bent at the back, throat rough as if smoke had lived there. His eyes, though, were bright—too bright. He turned a single abacus bead between his fingers slowly, as if weighing Yueyao's worth.
"Who are you?" he asked.
"Yueyao," she said without hesitation.
He stared at her for two beats, searching her face for an older shadow. Not finding it, he smiled faintly. "Yueyao should have been dead."
Yueyao's stomach tightened, but her expression didn't move. "I'm alive."
"Alive doesn't mean you're still you," he said. "You're buying a road. Where does the road lead?"
"To money," Yueyao answered. "And to life."
His smile deepened. "Tell me. What do you think you lack?"
Yueyao didn't circle. "A place to sleep. A place to keep ledgers. A place to hide goods. A place where I can't be dragged away whenever someone decides."
The old man lifted his chin. "The pawnshop doesn't house you?"
"The pawnshop offers a cage," Yueyao said. "I need a nest."
A low hum, almost approval. "Then what do you trade?"
Yueyao drew the contract from her sleeve, not fully opening it—only enough for the pawnshop's mark to show.
"I'm their property right now," Yueyao said. "Property can be valuable. Property can also be broken. I don't plan to break."
The old man's eyes narrowed. "So?"
Yueyao lowered her voice. "So I'll tell you something the pawnshop doesn't want told."
Silence.
The kind of silence that appears when a knife is set on a table and everyone decides where not to put their hands.
The old man stopped turning the bead. "You know a pawnshop secret?"
Yueyao didn't claim "I know." She started with a harder fact. "The pawnshop takes despair in the front and takes lives in the back. But the thing they fear most isn't the magistrate. And it isn't the guild."
His gaze sharpened. "What do they fear?"
Yueyao spoke two words. "False books."
The abacus bead halted.
Yueyao continued, steady. "They survive because debtors can never tell what they truly owe. Interest slips. Handling fees. Re-appraisals of collateral. They split every number into fragments until you can't assemble the whole. You think you owe thirty taels. What you really owe is a net you can't calculate."
The old man didn't speak. But his eyes grew brighter, as if asking: Why are you the one who can untie it?
Yueyao gave him a reason that could stand on the ground. "I don't fear ledgers."
The sentence came out flat—like stating the color of a wall. Not learned in the last few days. Something older, something that lived in her hands like muscle memory.
"I can rebuild broken accounts," Yueyao said. "I can take scattered entries and stitch them back into a single spine. And I can write it in a way that forces people to understand—because it becomes proof."
The old man's smile vanished. "What road are you buying from me?"
Yueyao met his eyes, word by word. "A place to stand. A cover. A road that lets me reach out of the pawnshop's cage without being snapped back."
He measured her in silence for a long time.
Then footsteps sounded outside the door.
Not hurried. Not heavy. Controlled.
Someone stopped at the threshold without knocking, as if already confident the door would open.
The old man's brow tightened. He slid the latch halfway closed again and dropped his voice. "You bring a tail?"
Yueyao's pulse tightened—
and Xing'er's calm voice cut clean inside her mind.
"Not them."
A voice outside answered, clear and lazy with a hint of a smile. "Old Yu. I'm here to pick something up."
The old man snorted. "You chose a fine moment."
The latch slid back.
Light spilled in, drawing the outline of a young man. His clothes weren't luxurious, but they were clean and fitted, sleeves tied close to the wrist. He moved like there was wind at his heels. His eyes were bright—too bright for a hungry man, and not the greedy brightness of a pawnshop clerk either.
He glanced into the room.
His gaze paused on Yueyao for half a breath—surprised, and yet… as if confirming something.
Then he smiled. "A guest today?"
Old Yu grunted. "Not your business."
The young man wasn't offended. He stepped in a little, casual as if the place belonged to him. "How is it not? Your rumors are expensive."
He set a small bundle on the table and answered Old Yu's earlier question with a grin.
"Li Mengqi."
He paused, amused by his own name, then added, "Some people call me Li Mengqi with a different tone. Depends on what you like."
A faint vibration touched Yueyao's chest.
Not a memory.
A premonition—as if fate had plucked a string somewhere in the dark.
Inside her mind, Xing'er warned, low and sharp: "Don't let him set the rhythm."
Yueyao pressed the feeling down and looked back at Old Yu.
"You want proof," she said. "That I can tear open a hidden ledger."
Old Yu's eyes were knife-sharp. "Prove it."
Yueyao nodded.
She drew a blank sheet from her sleeve, dipped her brush, and wrote fast—not emotion, not story. Structure.
"The pawnshop earns from three places," she said. "First: valuation. They press collateral low on purpose. Second: charges. They split interest into harmless names so debtors don't recognize it. Third: time. They delay you until you can't reconcile anything."
She wrote short, clean lines—each one a thread pulled from the net.
"Give me three days," Yueyao said. "I'll show you the route of one hidden account. And you trade me a place to live, a cover, and the first stake to reopen my shop."
The room went quiet enough to hear ink drying.
Old Yu stared at her for a long time. Then he slapped the abacus bead against the table once, a sharp sound.
"Fine."
He pointed to a small wooden tag in the corner. "That little courtyard. You sleep there. Three days. If you bring me nothing, I sell you back to the pawnshop."
Yueyao didn't relax.
This was a deal, not mercy.
But it was a nest.
She nodded once. "Agreed."
Li Mengqi leaned against the doorframe as if he'd just watched a play and found it entertaining. Then he smiled and said, lightly:
"Yueyao."
He spoke her name.
Yueyao's eyes snapped up.
Even Old Yu frowned. "How do you know her name?"
Li Mengqi shrugged, lazy. "Guess."
Yueyao didn't believe him.
Inside her mind, Xing'er offered only one sentence:
"He isn't simple."
Yueyao tightened her grip on the contract hidden in her sleeve.
From this moment, her turning point was no longer only about money.
It was people.
It was games.
It was a man named Li Mengqi standing near her future like he'd been waiting at the crossroads all along.
And in this game, Yueyao would earn her first real silver—
and earn back the one who had been carved out of her—
no matter where he was.