Chapter 6: Goblins
The days after the planting had been quiet. Too quiet, Grandfather said, and Grandfather had lived long enough to know that quiet was usually the prelude to something else. The garden was beginning to stir—the radishes had pushed through the dark soil, tiny green cotyledons unfurling toward the pale spring sun—but Wei couldn't shake the feeling that they were being watched.
He was in the tool shed, sharpening the second of the spears they'd made from scavenged iron and hardwood shafts, when Hao's shout cut through the afternoon like a blade.
"Wei! There's something out here!"
The whetstone clattered to the floor. Wei was out the door and running before the sound finished echoing, his feet pounding across the packed earth of the courtyard. The scythe was in his hand—he'd taken to carrying it everywhere now, the curved blade a constant companion.
He found Hao on the north wall, crouched low behind the parapet, his face pale as uncooked dough. Xiao Hei stood beside him, the puppy's small body rigid as iron, a low growl rumbling from his chest that Wei had never heard before. The sound raised the hairs on his arms.
"What is it?" Wei climbed up beside him, keeping his head below the stone.
"One of them." Hao's voice was tight, barely above a whisper. "A goblin. Circling the wall. It's been out there for ten minutes, just... looking."
Wei peered over the edge.
The creature was smaller than he'd expected. Maybe a meter tall, with skin the color of old moss—greenish-brown and mottled. Its limbs were long and thin, knobby at the joints, and its head was too large for its body, lolling slightly on a neck that seemed barely strong enough to hold it. Its ears were long and pointed, twitching constantly, swiveling like a cat's.
It carried a crude stone knife in one hand and a jagged rock in the other. Its eyes were yellow and gleaming, and they were scanning the wall with an intelligence that was almost human.
It was alone.
"They hunt in packs," Wei said quietly. "If there's one, there are more nearby. Somewhere in the treeline, probably. This one's a scout. It's testing our defenses. Looking for a way in."
"A scout for what?"
Wei turned to his brother with a grim smile. "For edible humans. It's probably planning to eat you first. You look tender."
"Very funny." Hao's hands were gripping the stone so hard his knuckles were white. He reached down and picked up one of the loose rocks they kept along the wall for emergencies—a fist-sized chunk of granite with a sharp edge. He hefted it, his eyes fixed on the goblin.
"Don't," Wei said. "If you throw that—"
Hao threw.
The rock sailed through the air in a perfect arc and struck the goblin square on the shoulder. The creature staggered, its thin arms pinwheeling comically, its mouth opening in shock. For one absurd moment, it looked almost offended—as if Hao had violated some unspoken rule of engagement.
Then it looked up.
Its yellow eyes found Hao. Its mouth opened wider—far wider than any human mouth could open—revealing rows of small, needle-sharp teeth, dozens of them, packed into the jaw like splinters of glass.
It screamed.
The sound was high and chittering, a noise that seemed to bypass Wei's ears and drill directly into his spine. It was the same sound he had heard in the dream—in the burning city, in the nightmare that had started all of this. The sound of things that hunted. The sound of things that enjoyed it.
Xiao Hei's growl erupted into frantic barking. The puppy's entire body shook with the force of it.
Then the goblin threw its rock back.
The stone was jagged and heavy, and the goblin's thin arm had more strength in it than its frame suggested. The rock hit Hao square in the stomach with a sound like a fist hitting a side of meat.
Hao didn't scream. Didn't cry out. He just made a sound—a wet, hollow whoosh—as all the air was driven from his lungs at once. He doubled over, clutching his midsection, and collapsed to his knees. Xiao Hei immediately pressed against his side, whining, his small pink tongue darting out to lick Hao's face.
"Hao!" Wei grabbed his shoulder. "Hao, are you—"
"Fucking hell!" Hao gasped. His face cycled from red to white and back again. He was trying to breathe, his mouth opening and closing like a fish on land, but the air wouldn't come. His hands clawed at his chest, at his stomach, at anything.
Below, the goblin chittered again—a sound that was unmistakably laughter. It jumped at the wall, clawed at the stone with its long fingers, testing the surface. The blessed vines pulsed with golden light but did not strike—the goblin wasn't climbing, just probing. Learning. Its yellow eyes flicked from the wall to Hao and back again, calculating.
Then it turned and ran, disappearing into the tall grass with a flick of its thin tail.
"Hao!" Wei shouted again.
"I'm fine," Hao wheezed. "I'm fine. Just—wind knocked out—"
"You're not fine. You're on the ground."
"I'm thinking about getting up." He tried to push himself up with one hand and failed, collapsing back against the parapet. "In a minute. Give me a minute."
Xiao Hei licked his face again, whining anxiously. The puppy's tail was tucked between his legs, but he hadn't run. He'd stayed right there, guarding Hao with every fiber of his small body.
Wei's father's voice came from the courtyard below. "What happened?"
Wei looked down. His father and Uncle Jianguo were running toward the wall, their tools abandoned where they'd been working. His mother was at the house door, one hand pressed over her mouth, her face the color of old ash.
"Goblin," Wei called down. "Just one. Hao threw a rock at it." He paused. "It threw one back."
His father climbed the wall in three seconds, his hands and feet finding holds in the stone that Wei hadn't even known existed. The man moved like someone who had built this wall himself and knew every crack and crevice by heart—because he had.
He knelt beside Hao and lifted his shirt.
A bruise was already forming. Purple and black, spreading across Hao's lower ribs like a storm front rolling across the sky. The edges were already darkening, the center raised and angry.
"Can you breathe?" his father asked.
"A little." Hao's voice was strained. "It hurts."
"Deep breath. As deep as you can."
Hao tried. He made it halfway before his face twisted and he stopped, a choked sound escaping his throat. "Can't. Hurts too much."
"Cracked rib," his father said. "Maybe two. We need to get him inside before the swelling gets worse."
He lifted Hao to his feet with surprising gentleness. Hao swayed like a tree in a high wind, then steadied himself against his father's shoulder. Xiao Hei stayed pressed against his leg, as if the puppy's small body could somehow hold him upright.
"The goblin," Hao managed. "Did it—"
"It ran," Wei said. "But it'll be back."
"How do you know?"
"Because that's what scouts do. It found us. Now it's going to report back to whatever's in charge. And when it does..." He looked out at the treeline, where the tall grass swayed in the afternoon breeze, hiding gods-knew-what. "They'll come. Not one. Possibly a big group."
His father met his eyes. Neither of them said what they were both thinking: They've never attacked with twenty before. We've never faced a real assault. If the scout found weaknesses, we're in trouble.
***
They carried Hao to the house. His mother laid him on the kang in the main room, pressing a warm cloth to his ribs while she worked in furious silence. Her jaw was tight. Her movements were precise and careful, but there was a tension in her shoulders that spoke of barely contained fury.
Xiao Hei jumped onto the kang and curled up beside Hao's hip, his dark eyes fixed on the young man's face. Every few seconds, his small pink tongue would dart out and lick Hao's hand—a gesture of comfort that was probably more for the puppy than for Hao.
"Nothing's broken," his mother said after a long examination, her fingers probing the edges of the bruise with practiced gentleness. "But the bruising is deep. He'll be sore for a week, maybe more. And he's not throwing any more rocks at anything."
Hao winced as she pressed a particularly tender spot. "I can still shoot a bow."
"You can barely breathe."
"I can breathe fine."
He took a breath to prove it and immediately gasped in pain. Xiao Hei whined and pressed closer, his small body trembling.
Wei's mother gave Hao a look that could freeze fire. It was the same look she had given Wei when he was eight years old and tried to climb the old locust tree after she'd specifically told him not to. The look that said I love you but I am also considering locking you in the root cellar until you develop some common sense.
"You'll rest," she said. "That's an order."
Hao opened his mouth to argue, saw the look, and closed it again. Even he knew when to stop. "Fine. But if something attacks, I'm not staying in bed."
"We'll see about that."
Wei's father stood in the doorway, his arms crossed over his chest. His face was unreadable, but his eyes kept drifting to Hao's ribs, to the bruise that was still spreading, to the way his younger son was trying to hide how much pain he was in.
"The goblin that did this," he said quietly. "It was alone?"
"Yes," Wei said. "A scout. It was testing the wall. Looking for weak points. Seeing how we'd respond—whether we'd panic, whether we'd fight back, whether we had archers or spears. It learned a lot in those ten minutes."
"And when it reports back?"
"Then they come. Not one. A pack. Twenty. Maybe thirty. Maybe more, depending on how many the local clan has."
His father was silent for a long moment. He looked at Hao, pale and bruised on the kang. At Wei, still breathing hard from the sprint to the wall. At his wife, whose hands were steady despite everything.
Then he looked out the window, toward the wall that he had spent nearly everything they owned to build.
"How long do we have?"
"I don't know. A few hours. Maybe less. Maybe until nightfall. Goblins prefer to attack at dusk—their eyes are better in low light than ours. If the scout gets back quickly, they could be here before the sun sets."
His father nodded slowly. "Then we prepare."
***
The afternoon dissolved into a blur of fear and motion.
Over the past three days the farm had been quiet—the calm before the storm—and Wei had felt the credits trickle in. Twenty a day from the Tree of Life's steady pulse, another eight to twelve from the blessed eggs and milk the animals produced each morning.
```
┌──────────────────────────┐
│ DAILY INCOME – 3 DAYS │
│ │
│ Day 1: +20 (Tree) +8 │
│ (eggs/milk) = +28 cr │
│ Day 2: +20 (Tree) +12 │
│ (eggs/milk) = +32 cr │
│ Day 3: +20 (Tree) +10 │
│ (eggs/milk) = +30 cr │
│ │
│ Previous balance: 4 cr │
│ New balance: 94 cr │
└──────────────────────────┘
```
Ninety-four credits. Enough to finally buy something substantial. He'd spent the quiet evenings scrolling through the blueprints in the system store, searching for anything that could give them an edge. Most of the weapons were still beyond his reach, but one entry had caught his eye—a recurve bow design, simple enough to build with the materials they already had, promising better draw weight and accuracy than the straight-limbed bows his father had always made.
┌──────────────────────────────────────┐
│ SYSTEM STORE – BLUEPRINTS │
│ │
│ RECURVE BOW (UNCOMMON) │
│ Cost: 15 credits │
│ Materials: hardwood stave, bowstring,│
│ optional bone tips │
│ Draw weight: 70‑90 lbs │
│ Effective range: 250+ meters │
│ Build time: 4‑6 hours (speed‑cure │
│ possible with blessed water) │
│ │
│ Special Properties (from blueprint): │
│ • Mana‑threaded string – reduces │
│ stretch, adds 15% arrow speed │
│ • Self‑repair – minor damage heals │
│ while stored near Tree of Life │
│ • Enhanced tillering – limbs flex │
│ evenly, granting +10% accuracy │
│ to any competent archer │
└──────────────────────────────────────┘
┌──────────────────────────────────────┐
│ REINFORCED SPEAR (UNCOMMON) │
│ Cost: 12 credits │
│ Materials: ash shaft, iron head, │
│ leather binding │
│ Length: 2.2 meters │
│ Weight: 3.4 kg │
│ │
│ Special Properties (from blueprint): │
│ • Mana‑infused tip – penetrates │
│ basic armor with ease; +20% │
│ armor penetration │
│ • Self‑repair – minor nicks and │
│ warping heal near Tree of Life │
│ • Bound grip – leather wrap │
│ provides sure hold even when │
│ wet or bloody; reduces hand │
│ fatigue on prolonged use │
└──────────────────────────────────────┘
```
He'd purchased both on the first quiet evening, the knowledge flooding into his mind as if he'd always known it. The bow's secrets came first—the precise curve of the limbs, the way to tiller the stave so it bent without a whisper of weakness, the trick of threading the bowstring with a sliver of his own mana to make it sing. Then the spear—the optimal leaf‑blade shape, the tempering cycle that left the iron hard enough to split a goblin's crude shield, the leather wrap that would keep his grip sure even in the chaos of battle.
Twenty‑seven credits in total, and suddenly the difference between a tool and a true weapon was crystal clear.
```
┌──────────────────────────┐
│ PURCHASES: │
│ Recurve Bow Blueprint │
│ Cost: 5 credits │
│ Reinforced Spear Blueprint│
│ Cost: 7 credits │
│ Total: 12 credits │
│ Credits before: 94 │
│ Credits after: 82 │
└──────────────────────────┘
```
Now, with the goblin threat looming, his father and Uncle Jianguo were finishing the bow itself. The wood was still green—they hadn't had time to season it properly—but the blueprint had included a method for speed-curing with a mix of heat and blessed water from the well. The limbs curved in a smooth, elegant arc, and though the string had stretched more than Wei would have liked, the bow would shoot.
They made twelve more arrows, working so fast that Hao's fingers bled from fletching the shafts with feathers the ducks had molted naturally—Li had insisted.
Hao himself had refused to stay in bed. He was propped against the wall of the main room, Xiao Hei in his lap, a bundle of arrow shafts beside him and a small knife in his hand. Every few minutes he would wince and shift his position, trying to find an angle that didn't press against his cracked ribs.
His mother stopped arguing after the third time he picked up the knife. "Fine," she said, her voice tight. "But if you pass out, I'm leaving you on the floor. And I'm telling everyone you fainted."
"Fair enough."
Wei worked in the forge with Uncle Jianguo, finishing the third spear and starting a fourth. His arms ached. His back ached. His hands were raw, the skin cracked and bleeding in places where the hammer had slipped. But he kept working. The forge fire was hot against his face, the hammer heavy in his grip, and every strike felt like a prayer—let this hold. Let this be enough. Let us survive.
His mother and grandmother prepared food in the kitchen, not cooking for now but for later—wrapping rice balls in bamboo leaves, filling waterskins, setting aside dried meat and pickled vegetables. Food that could be eaten cold, in the dark, if the battle lasted through the night. Grandmother moved with her usual silence, her gnarled hands working dough and folding herbs into bundles with the speed of decades of practice. She didn't speak, but every few minutes her eyes would drift to the window, toward the wall.
His grandfather refused to leave the pig pen.
Wei found him there when he went to check the perimeter—sitting on an old wooden stool by the gate, his cane across his knees, watching Old Wang and the other pigs with the calm, steady attention of a man who had made his peace with whatever was coming. Xiao Hei, who had been gently but firmly evicted from Hao's lap so the young man could work without a dog on his legs, had trotted out to join the old man. He was curled up at Grandfather's feet now, his small body rising and falling with each breath.
"Old Wang stays," Grandfather said, not looking up as Wei approached. "I stay."
"Grandfather, if the goblins get through—"
"If something gets through that wall, it'll have to go through me to get to my pigs." He looked up at Wei then, and his pale eyes were clear and steady and utterly unafraid. "I've lived through war. I've lived through famine. I've lived through the land reform and the collectivization and three separate droughts that killed half the county. I watched my father's land get taken and I watched him plant new trees on someone else's soil. I'm not running from goblins. Not now. Not ever."
Wei opened his mouth to argue, then closed it. No one ever argued with his grandfather. No one ever won.
"Then at least keep the gate barred," he said finally. "And if you hear the wall break—"
"I'll hear it. And I'll be ready." Grandfather reached down and scratched Xiao Hei behind the ears. The puppy's tail wagged once, a small hopeful motion. "Go. Your father needs you on the wall."
Li stood on the west wall, watching the horizon.
She'd been there for an hour, silent and still, her old blue jacket pulled tight around her shoulders. The jacket had a tear in the left sleeve that she refused to let their mother mend—she said it was lucky. Wei wasn't sure he believed in luck anymore, but he wasn't going to argue with her.
"Anything?" he asked, climbing up beside her.
"Nothing yet." She didn't look at him. Her eyes were fixed on the distant treeline, where the shadows were beginning to lengthen as the sun sank toward the mountains. "But the birds stopped singing about ten minutes ago. The rabbits are all in their burrows. The ducks are hiding in the reeds. The animals know something's coming."
"We'll be ready."
"Will we?" She turned to look at him then, and her eyes were red-rimmed but dry. "We have eight arrows, three spears, and whatever Grandmother can swing. Against twenty goblins. Maybe more."
"We have the wall. The vines. The tree."
"The tree can't fight for us."
"No. But it can make us stronger." He touched her shoulder, briefly. "Stay on the west wall. If you see anything—"
"I'll scream."
"Good."
She almost smiled. Almost.
The sun sank lower. The shadows grew longer, stretching across the fields like reaching fingers. The air grew cold, and the first stars began to appear in the darkening sky, faint pinpricks of light that seemed impossibly distant.
And then, just as the last light was fading from the horizon, Li called down.
"They're coming."
***
Wei climbed the north wall and looked out.
The goblins came over the hill like a wave of dirty green water.
Twenty of them. Maybe more—it was hard to count in the fading light, their shapes blurring and shifting as they moved. They came fast, loping on all fours like animals, then rising to two legs, then dropping again. Their yellow eyes glowed in the dusk, dozens of tiny lamps in the gathering dark, and the sound of their approach was a chittering, clicking chorus that set Wei's teeth on edge.
The largest one—a head taller than the others, its shoulders broad with muscle, wearing a necklace of bones and teeth that clattered as it moved—raised its arm and screamed. The sound cut through the evening air like a blade, and the pack surged forward.
"Positions!" Wei's father shouted from the gate.
Uncle Jianguo took the east wall with the new recurve bow, an arrow already nocked. Hao—against their mother's explicit orders and every law of common sense—took the south wall with a spear in his good hand, his face pale but set with stubborn determination.
Li stayed on the west wall, a kitchen knife in one hand and a heavy iron pot lid in the other. Xiao Hei pressed against her ankles, barking furiously, his small body vibrating with protective rage.
Wei took the north wall with the scythe. His father stood at the east gate, a spear in each hand, his face calm and set in lines of grim determination. The face of a man who had built this wall and would die defending it.
The goblins hit the wall like a wave hitting a cliff.
The stone shuddered under the impact but did not break. The blessed vines lashed out from the mortar, green tendrils wrapping around arms and legs, thorns digging into green flesh.
Goblins screamed as the vines pulled them into the stone, their bodies sinking into the blessed rock like stones dropped into deep water. The wall drank them—Wei could hear them still screaming as they vanished.
But there were too many.
One goblin climbed higher than the others, using the vines as handholds instead of being caught by them. Its long fingers found purchase where there should have been none, in the cracks between stones, in the gaps where the mortar had weathered. It scrambled up the wall with horrible speed, and then it was at the top—right in front of Wei—its yellow eyes blazing, its needle-teeth bared.
Wei swung the scythe.
The curved blade caught the goblin across the chest. Black blood sprayed—thick and foul-smelling—and the creature fell backward, screaming, its arms pinwheeling as it dropped. The vines caught it before it hit the ground and pulled it under.
Another goblin threw a rock. It struck Wei's shoulder with a sharp, stunning impact. He stumbled, caught himself on the parapet, and swung the scythe again. The blade hummed in his hands, eager and alive.
From the east wall, Uncle Jianguo's bow sang. The first arrow took a goblin in the throat—a perfect shot, clean and lethal. The second caught another in the eye. The third missed entirely, skidding across the grass as the bowstring twanged. "Damn string!" Uncle shouted. "It's stretching!"
The goblins threw themselves at the east gate. The iron-reinforced lock held. The heavy wooden bar didn't budge. They clawed at the blessed timber, leaving deep gouges in the wood, but the gate resisted. The tree's blessing had made it stronger than any natural wood.
Hao was shouting on the south wall. Wei couldn't see him—the angle was wrong—but he could hear his brother's voice, raw and desperate and somehow still defiant.
"Come on! Come on! Is that all you've got? My grandmother hits harder than you!"
A goblin crested the south wall. Hao drove his spear into its chest with a scream that was half fury and half pain. The goblin fell, but another one took its place immediately, scrambling up the stone with murder in its yellow eyes.
Xiao Hei's frantic barking echoed across the courtyard like a war drum.
The fight was chaos.
Goblins everywhere. Screaming. Clawing. Throwing rocks at every defender who showed their face. The vines pulled some into the stone, but there were simply too many attackers—for every one the wall devoured, two more scrambled past it. The defenders were holding, but barely. It was like trying to stop a flood with nothing but their hands.
Wei swung the scythe again and again until his arms burned and his shoulders screamed. Blood ran down his face from the cut on his forehead where a rock had clipped him. He wiped it away with his sleeve—his sleeve was already soaked—and kept swinging. The world was red-tinged and blurry, reduced to the next goblin, the next swing, the next breath.
From the east wall, Uncle Jianguo shouted: "I'm out of arrows! I need more!"
"There are no more!" Father shouted back. "Fall back to the gate!"
Uncle climbed down from the wall, his bow in one hand and a spear in the other. Hao climbed down from the south wall, still clutching his spear, his face grey with pain and exhaustion. Li climbed down from the west wall, carrying Xiao Hei under one arm like a sack of rice—the puppy was still barking, still trying to get back to the fight, his small legs paddling uselessly in the air.
Wei was the last one on the wall.
The goblins saw him alone against the darkening sky. They screamed in triumph and climbed faster, their yellow eyes gleaming with hunger and hate.
He swung the scythe in a wide arc that caught three of them at once. Two fell. One kept coming. He swung again, and his arms were lead and his breath was fire, and the goblins just kept coming.
Then his father was beside him.
Wei hadn't seen him climb up. Hadn't heard him approach. But suddenly there he was, a spear in each hand, his face set and his eyes blazing. He drove one spear through a goblin's chest and kicked another off the wall with a boot to its face.
"Get down!" his father shouted.
"I can hold them—"
"Get down! That's an order!"
Wei climbed down. His legs nearly buckled when he hit the courtyard. His father followed a moment later, and together they watched as the goblins swarmed over the wall—dozens of them, a carpet of green-brown bodies covering the stone, their screams of triumph filling the air.
But the gate held.
The lock held. The blessed timber resisted their axes and their claws. The vines, even overwhelmed, kept pulling stragglers into the stone. The goblins were on the wall, but they couldn't get past the gate. They couldn't get into the courtyard. They couldn't reach the house, the animals, the family.
They threw rocks over the wall—a rain of stones that clattered against the packed earth of the courtyard. They clawed at the stone, leaving bloody scratches in the blessed surface. They screamed in frustration, a chorus of rage and thwarted hunger that echoed across the farm.
Then the largest one—the one with the bone necklace—raised its arm and howled. The sound was different from the others. Deeper. More commanding. The howl of a leader, not a follower.
The pack broke.
They retreated in a wave, dragging their wounded with them, scrambling back over the wall and disappearing into the tall grass. The largest one stood at the edge of the clearing for a long moment, its yellow eyes fixed on Wei. Neither of them moved. Neither of them blinked.
Then it turned and ran.
---
The fight had lasted fifteen minutes. It felt like hours.
Wei stood in the middle of the courtyard, the scythe dripping black blood onto the packed earth, his arms trembling so badly he could barely hold the weapon. His shoulder throbbed where the rock had struck him. His forehead was still bleeding, the blood mixing with sweat and running into his eyes. His knuckles were split and raw from gripping the scythe handle too tightly for too long.
"Everyone alive?" his father called out, his voice hoarse.
"Yes," from Hao. "Yes," from Li. "Yes," from Uncle Jianguo.
"Good." His father leaned against the gate, breathing hard. His spears were dark with goblin blood. "We patch up. Then we watch. They'll be back."
Wei sat down on the ground. Just sat, right there in the dirt, because his legs had stopped working. The scythe slipped from his fingers and clattered onto the stones beside him.
Hao was sitting against the wall of the house, holding his ribs. The bruise had spread during the fight—purple and black now, the size of a dinner plate, covering most of his left side. His spear lay beside him, the tip dark with blood. Xiao Hei was in his lap, trembling, his small body pressed against Hao's chest as if he could protect him through sheer proximity.
"Here," Wei said, reaching into the basket by the door. He tossed Hao one of the rice balls their mother had prepared. "Eat. You need the energy."
Hao caught it and bit into it without arguing. Rice stuck to his chin.
Wei's mother came out of the house with a basket of bandages and a pot of hot water. She knelt beside Hao first, pressing a clean cloth to his ribs with hands that were steady despite everything. Her face was pale, but her voice was calm. Controlled. The voice she used when things were very bad and she was holding herself together through sheer force of will.
"You shouldn't have been fighting."
"I wasn't going to let everyone else fight alone." Hao's voice was weak but defiant.
"You're useless with a cracked rib. You can barely stand."
"I killed one. Maybe two. I lost count after the first one went over the wall."
"You got lucky."
Hao smiled—a thin, pained expression that was more grimace than grin. "Lucky counts."
Xiao Hei licked his chin.
His mother finished bandaging Hao's ribs and turned to Wei. Her eyes stopped on his forehead, where the blood had dried in a dark, ugly streak. She pressed a clean cloth to the wound, and Wei hissed at the sudden sting.
"Hold still," she said. She cleaned the wound with hot water, her touch gentle but efficient, then wrapped a strip of clean cloth around his head. "It's not deep. You'll live. But you'll have a scar."
"Add it to the collection," Wei said.
She didn't smile. "I'd rather you stopped collecting."
Then a panel flickered into view before Wei's eyes, golden text appearing in the air.
```
┌──────────────────────────┐
│ COMBAT LOG │
├──────────────────────────┤
│ Goblins defeated: 20 │
│ Credits earned: 40 (2 per goblin) │
│ Experience gained: 160 (8 per goblin) │
│ │
│ Total experience: 191/100 │
│ │
│ TIER 2 UNLOCKED! │
│ Approach the Tree of Life to advance. │
└──────────────────────────┘
```
Wei stared at the panel. Tier 2. He had reached it. After all the fighting, all the training, all the desperate swings of the scythe—he had finally crossed the threshold.
"I need to go," he said, getting to his feet. His legs were still shaking, but they held him. "The tree. I need to..."
His father looked at him for a long moment. Whatever he saw in Wei's face must have convinced him, because he just nodded. "Go. We'll watch the wall."
Wei walked toward the Tree of Life. The dogs followed him—Hei at his side, his old legs moving with quiet dignity, Da and Er flanking like soldiers, the pups trailing behind in a chaotic tumble of legs and tails. Xiao Hei brought up the rear, his small legs working double time to keep up with the bigger dogs.
The tree's glow grew brighter as Wei approached. A gentle warmth washed over him—calming, reassuring, like coming home after a long journey. He sat down at the base of the trunk, his back against the smooth bark, and closed his eyes.
Then the pain came.
It started in his bones. A deep, grinding ache, as if every bone in his body was being cracked open and remade from the inside. He fell forward onto his hands and knees, a gasp tearing from his throat.
His muscles burned—a white-hot fire that consumed everything, that turned his blood to steam and his nerves to lightning. His skin felt like it was on fire, like he was being burned alive and remade in the same instant.
He tried to scream. No sound came out. His throat was locked, paralyzed by the intensity of the transformation.
The tree's leaves rustled overhead. The gold light pulsed faster, brighter, wrapping around him like a cocoon of living light. He could feel the tree's roots beneath him, reaching up through the soil, holding him steady, anchoring him to the earth. The dogs pressed closer—Hei against his side, a solid, warm anchor; Xiao Hei climbing onto his lap as if his tiny body could somehow keep Wei tethered to the world. The puppy was trembling, but he didn't leave. None of them left.
He felt his body breaking apart. Not dying. Changing.
His bones grew denser, harder, like stone that had been compressed for millennia. His muscles tightened and reformed, becoming something more than they had been—stronger, faster, more efficient. His mind expanded outward, reaching for something he couldn't name, a vastness that existed just beyond the edge of his perception. A connection to the tree, to the land, to something older than both.
The mana inside him surged like a river breaking its banks. 168. 200. 300. 400. 468. It filled him like water filling a vessel, like light filling a dark room.
Then everything went black.
---
Wei woke to the feeling of a warm tongue on his face.
Hei was licking his cheek, his rough tongue insistent and familiar. The pups were curled against his legs, warm and soft, their small bodies rising and falling with each breath. Xiao Hei was sitting on his chest—sitting on his chest, the audacity of this dog—staring down at him with an expression of intense, soulful concern. When he saw Wei's eyes open, his tail began wagging so hard his entire back end shook.
The tree's light had dimmed to a soft, steady pulse, like a heartbeat at rest.
"Wei."
His father's voice. He was sitting against the tree trunk a few feet away, his arms crossed, watching Wei with an expression that was difficult to read. His face was pale, and his eyes were red-rimmed. He had been crying. Or close to it. The spear he'd carried during the battle lay across his knees, the blade still dark with goblin blood.
"You were out for an hour," his father said. His voice was rough. "Your mother is crying in the kitchen. She thought you were dead. She tried to come out here three times. I had to stop her."
Wei sat up slowly. Xiao Hei tumbled off his chest with an indignant squeak, then immediately scrambled back onto his lap as if he'd been there all along.
His body felt... different.
Lighter. Stronger. The aches and pains of the battle were gone—not just faded, but gone, as if they had never existed. The cuts on his hands had healed. The bruise on his shoulder had vanished. Even the wound on his forehead, which his mother had bandaged, no longer hurt at all.
And his mind... his mind was clearer than it had ever been. Sharper. The world seemed more vivid—colors were brighter, sounds were crisper, the edges of everything more distinct. He could hear the ducks quacking at the pond, clear across the property. He could smell the woodsmoke from the kitchen chimney, the rich earth of the pig pen, the particular sweetness of the herbs Grandmother was brewing for tea. He could feel the tree's roots beneath him, spreading through the soil like veins, pulsing with golden light.
"I'm okay," he said. "I'm better than okay."
"You'd better be."
He pulled up his status panel, the golden text shimmering into view.
```
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ STATUS │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ Strength: 7.2 │
│ Agility: 7.2 │
│ Physical Resilience: 7.2 │
│ Intelligence: 7.2 │
│ Stamina: 7.2 │
│ Mana: 468 │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
```
All of his stats had jumped by five full points. His mana had surged by three hundred. He was, by any reasonable measure, more than three times as strong as he had been that morning.
He felt like he could lift a cart with one hand. He felt like he could run to the town and back without stopping. He felt like he could tear a goblin apart with his bare hands—and unlike this morning, that thought didn't scare him.
"What happened?" his father asked. "To you. Just now."
"I changed," Wei said. "The tree... it made me stronger. A lot stronger. It was like... like everything I'd been through, all the fighting and the training and the desperation, got compressed into something new. Something better."
His father looked at him for a long, silent moment. Then, slowly, he stood up and offered his hand. "Can you walk?"
Wei took the offered hand and rose to his feet. His legs held him steady. He felt like he could run for miles. The ground seemed to welcome his weight, as if the farm itself recognized that something in him had changed.
"I can walk," he said. "I can do more than walk."
His father almost smiled. Almost. "Then let's go back. Your mother needs to see that you're alive."
The dogs followed them to the house. Wei's mother was at the door, her face wet with tears. When she saw him walking—walking, not stumbling, not being carried—she burst into fresh tears and pulled him into a hug so tight he couldn't breathe. Her body was shaking against his.
"You idiot," she said into his shoulder. "You absolute, complete idiot. You scared me to death. You lay there under that tree for an hour, and I thought you were gone. I thought you'd pushed yourself too far and your heart had just... stopped."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't do it again."
"I'll try not to."
She pulled back and looked at him, her eyes red and swollen. Then she laughed—a wet, shaky sound that was half relief and half exhaustion—and pushed him toward the table. "Eat something. You look like death warmed over."
"I always look like death."
"More than usual. Much more."
She pressed a bowl of rice into his hands—topped with pickled vegetables and a piece of the dried meat they'd been saving. Wei ate. The food was warm and good, and he could feel his body absorbing it, using it to fuel the changes that were still settling into his bones.
---
They gathered in the courtyard as the stars came out.
The sky was clear now, the smoke from the distant goblin pyre blown away by some wind Wei couldn't feel. The stars were bright and cold and utterly indifferent to everything that had happened. They looked the same as they always had.
Wei's father counted the arrows. "Eight left. Twelve gone—some broken, some buried in goblin corpses beyond the wall, some lost in the grass where we'll never find them."
"Three spears left," Uncle Jianguo said. "One broke when I threw it at that big bastard with the bone necklace. The shaft snapped on his shield."
"The gate lock held," Father said. "The wall held."
"The wall held," Wei agreed.
But they all knew it was only the first wave. The scout had come, and the scout had retreated, and the pack had attacked, and the pack had been driven off. But somewhere out in the darkness, the goblins were regrouping. And next time, they would bring more. They would bring ladders. They would bring something to break the gate. They would come in numbers that the wall couldn't hold against.
Another panel appeared in Wei's vision, summarizing the battle.
```
┌──────────────────────────┐
│ COMBAT LOG │
├──────────────────────────┤
│ Goblins defeated: 20 │
│ Credits earned: 40 │
│ Total credits: 42 │
│ │
│ Experience: 91/1000 toward Tier 3 │
└──────────────────────────┘
```
Forty-two credits. That was enough for something—more weapons, maybe, or a stronger gate, or something he hadn't even considered yet. He would need to check the system store when he had a moment alone.
He looked at the Tree of Life, still glowing softly in the darkness. At the wall, the vines pulsing with gold. At his family—tired and bruised and battered, but still alive. Still here. Still fighting.
The tree had made him stronger. But stronger wasn't the same as safe. One man, no matter how powerful, couldn't be everywhere at once. He couldn't protect everyone alone.
"We need more weapons," he said. "More arrows. More spears. And we need to train. All of us. Not just Hao with his bow. Everyone. Mother with a knife. Li with her spear. Grandmother with whatever she can hold. We can't rely on me to handle everything."
His father nodded slowly. "Tomorrow. We start at dawn. Everyone learns to fight—even if they never have to use it."
"But tonight," his mother said, her voice brooking no argument, "we eat. And we sleep."
She had made a proper meal—not the rice balls they'd eaten during the battle prep, but a real dinner. Thick wheat noodles in a broth flavored with ginger and garlic and the last of the dried mushrooms from the cellar. Pickled radishes on the side, their sharp tang cutting through the richness of the broth. Hot tea with herbs from Grandmother's garden.
The food was warm and filling, and it seemed to ease the aches and the bruises and the lingering fear that had settled into everyone's bones. They ate in comfortable silence, the kind of silence that didn't need to be filled with words.
Hao fell asleep sitting up, his head dropping onto Li's shoulder. Li didn't push him away. She leaned her head against his, her eyes half-closed, her breathing slow and even. Xiao Hei climbed into the small space between them and curled into a tight ball, his white paw tucked under his chin.
Wei's grandfather came in from the pig pen, his cane tapping against the packed earth floor. His face was tired but peaceful.
"Old Wang is fine," he said, settling into his chair. "The pigs slept through the whole thing. Didn't even wake up for the screaming. That's the mark of a good pig—nothing disturbs their rest."
"The goose is still angry," Li murmured, not opening her eyes. "I think it wanted to fight."
"The goose always wants to fight. The goose has been angry since the day it hatched. I think it came out of the egg looking for someone to attack."
"Báixuě would have taken on the whole pack," Hao mumbled, barely conscious. "He's got no fear. No sense. Just rage."
"Like someone else I know," Wei said, looking at his brother.
"Don't know who you're talking about. I'm a model of restraint."
"You threw a rock at a goblin scout."
"It was a preemptive strike."
"It provoked an assault."
"It provoked intelligence. Now we know they're out there."
"We already knew they were out there."
"Now we know more about them. They throw rocks back. That's valuable information."
Wei shook his head, but he was smiling. They were all smiling, even Father, in his own quiet way.
Then Father said the words they'd all been thinking. "We survived."
"We survived," Wei agreed.
Outside, the Tree of Life glowed. The wall stood. The family was alive. But somewhere out there, in the darkness beyond the farm, the goblins were regrouping. And there were worse things than goblins in the world now—things that Wei had glimpsed in his dreams, in the burning city, in the crack in the sky that still bled purple light over the ruins of Qinghe.
He looked at his family. His mother, holding his father's hand, her head resting on his shoulder. His grandmother, by the window, her eyes closed but not sleeping—she never seemed to sleep, just rested with her eyes shut, waiting. His grandfather, in his chair, Xiao Hei now curled at his feet, the puppy's small body rising and falling with each breath. Hao and Li, leaning against each other, their faces young and tired in the lamplight.
We made it through one day. One more day.
"Get some sleep," he said. "Tomorrow will be harder."
No one argued.
The lamps burned low. Wei lay on the kang, feeling its warmth seep into his aching muscles—the good ache, the ache of survival—and listened to the silence beyond the walls. It was not peaceful. It was the silence of a held breath, of a world waiting to see what came next. But for now, in this moment, they were safe.
The tree pulsed at the edge of his awareness, steady and strong. Xiao Hei had followed him and was now curled up on the floor beside the kang, his small body warm against the cold night. His white paw twitched in his sleep, chasing something in a dream.
One day. That's enough for now.
End of Chapter 6