The eighth day of the sixth month.
It should have been a day of sweltering heat under a fiery sun.
Yet, as the Emperor stood upon the Heavenly Temple, his gaze fell upon nothing but a vast, white expanse of snow.
The heavy snow, which had been falling for two months, had only just stopped the day before yesterday.
The entire Cangyun Country had become a frigid world of snow.
Countless bodies had been pulled from beneath the snow in just two days.
The city echoed with incessant cries of mourning.
As the cold wind howled, the Emperor's somber face grew haggard and grim.
All the officials, dressed in thick fur cloaks, stood with the Emperor. They watched as the State Preceptor on the Heavenly Temple performed a divination, chanting incantations to ask for heaven's will.
A moment after the State Preceptor shook a silver bell, the tortoise shell he had thrown into the fire cracked open.
