Corpse Puppet Master

Night laid its weight on the outer sect, heavy and unmoving, like a layer of cold ash that clung to stone and skin alike. The cracked tiles of the small room reflected a thin thread of moonlight, enough to catch the edge of bruises but not enough to soften them. Outside, wind stirred the moss that had crept down over the eaves, carrying with it the faint, metallic tang of corpse mist drifting from the gardens.

Gu Muye sat cross-legged on the straw mat, back braced against the rough stone wall. Every breath tugged at bruises along his ribs, pain spreading out like slow fire. Across from him, Zhou Min leaned against the other wall, face swollen and discolored, eyes shadowed but still watchful. The bruises and split skin on his cheek made it hard for him to close his mouth fully, and every now and then he paused, shifting to ease the stiffness in his legs.

The small candle on the floor guttered in the draft that slipped under the door, its light throwing shapes across the walls. Neither spoke for a long while, letting silence stretch until it felt almost natural. The quiet was different now: not the heavy stillness of waiting to be beaten again, but something softer, almost tired.

"They're reading the list tomorrow," Zhou Min said at last, his voice rough with weariness. "Forest team."

"I know," Gu Muye replied. His tone stayed flat, but something shifted behind his words, a tension that had nothing to do with pain.

"You think they'll call us?" Zhou Min asked, glancing away as he spoke, as though afraid of the answer.

"Could be," Gu Muye said. "Could be they won't. Doesn't matter much. One day or another, everyone's turn comes."

Zhou Min let out a small, humorless laugh that caught on bruised ribs. "Feels different when it's your name on the list, though."

They fell quiet again, listening to the distant rattle of a bone chime swaying somewhere in the dark. Wind brushed against the outside walls, carrying whispers that sounded almost like voices but faded into nothing.

"You've been quiet," Zhou Min said after a moment, his gaze sliding back to Gu Muye. "More than usual, even for you."

"I've been thinking," Gu Muye answered, voice low.

"About what?"

"How long we'd last if we kept waiting for kindness."

Zhou Min made a noise deep in his throat that could have been a laugh or a sigh. "Not long," he agreed. "Not here."

He shifted again, the rough stone scraping against his robe. His fingers traced a crack in the wall beside him, dirt caught in the groove. "Can I ask something?" His voice softened as he spoke, words slower, careful.

Gu Muye nodded once, the motion small but deliberate.

"Why do you really want to live, Muye? Not just because you're afraid to die."

The question hung there, almost louder than any shout might have been. Gu Muye's gaze dropped to his bruised knuckles, fingers curled slightly against his knee. Back in the other world—a life that felt so far away it might as well belong to someone else—living had been something he did because he was supposed to. Work, eat, sleep, wake; repeat until the weeks blurred into months and nothing changed except the deepening weariness behind his ribs.

"I did what I was supposed to," he began, voice low, words shaped by exhaustion as much as memory. "Worked. Endured. Waited for something better to come. But it never did."

Zhou Min watched him quietly, not speaking.

"It stayed small," Gu Muye went on. "Gray. Even when I did everything right. Like living through a window, seeing the world but never really stepping into it."

He paused, the memory of that cold routine as sharp as fresh bruises. "If this world is going to be cruel too… then I'd rather feel it all. Pain, fear, danger. Anything but fading out quietly again, forgotten."

Zhou Min's mouth twisted, half a grimace from pain, half from words that settled close to something in his own chest. "Sounds stupid when you say it."

"I know," Gu Muye said, the faintest flicker of dry humor touching his tone. "But it's true."

Zhou Min let the silence stretch a breath longer, then shook his head carefully. "Not that stupid," he admitted. "Better to feel something than nothing at all."

They sat without speaking, breathing rough from bruises and the cold that crept into bones through thin robes. The candle burned lower, shadows pulling long across the cracked floor.

"My father makes bone charcoal," Zhou Min said after a while, voice softer now, as if the darkness had stripped something raw and honest from him. "Poor family. Sent me here because the sect feeds its own, even if it feeds them ash."

He paused, swallowing. "At first, I told myself I'd get strong enough to send silver back. Maybe even make them proud. Now… I just don't want to die yet. Not before I see if there's something beyond empty halls and rotting bones."

"You still hope," Gu Muye said, not as mockery but as quiet observation.

"Hope's cheap," Zhou Min replied. "Costs less than corpse powder."

"But still costs something," Gu Muye murmured.

Zhou Min's shoulders lifted, the movement small, constrained by pain. "Cheaper than dying for nothing," he said.

Their words faded back into the hush, but the silence felt different: not heavy with fear, but filled with something quieter, older, like understanding that needed no more words.

"You remember our first week here?" Zhou Min asked, eyes drifting to the candle flame.

"I remember," Gu Muye said.

"You didn't laugh when I spilled bone ash all over my robe," Zhou Min went on, a faint smile trying to pull at bruised lips. "Thought you were made of stone."

"It wasn't funny then," Gu Muye said.

"Still isn't," Zhou Min agreed, and the small laugh that escaped them both felt painful but real.

They spoke of small things then: the sting of bone dust in the lungs, the sour smell of corpse-refining powder, the way the stone paths glistened after rain, dark and slick as old blood. The words were fragile, not meant to last, but they filled the cold room with something that felt closer to life.

Outside, the moon slipped lower, shadows creeping across walls that had seen too many names forgotten.

Tomorrow, they knew, the list would come. And it might have their names on it. Or the next list, or the one after that. But always, the names kept coming, and the forest always waited.

"We keep planning," Gu Muye said, voice flat but steady.

Zhou Min nodded. "Watch Wu Yuan. Keep bruises fresh so they don't think we're hiding strength."

"And if we're chosen?" Gu Muye asked.

"Then we watch," Zhou Min replied. "And if there's a chance—"

"We take it," Gu Muye finished.

They laid out the fragile plans in low voices: hiding scraps of powder behind a loose stone near the water trough, moving slower during drills to look weaker, but not so slow they drew scorn. Watching the older disciples' eyes, catching the flick of a sleeve or the glance that meant punishment was coming.

The planning itself felt like defiance: not loud, but stubborn, the quiet refusal to let fate crush them without a fight.

As Gu Muye's thoughts turned sharper, clearer in the cold night air, he felt it deep in his dantian: a brief warmth, like a breath of heat in winter. It was gone almost before it came, and pain washed thought back into silence. He didn't dwell on it, but something in him hardened further, settling like a quiet vow.

"You ever think about home?" Zhou Min asked, voice softer, wearier.

"Feels like someone else's memory now," Gu Muye said.

"Yeah," Zhou Min murmured. "Me too."

They spoke anyway, trading half-faded memories that tasted of a world before this one: market stalls selling stale buns, fences falling to rot in backyards, alleys that smelled of oil and smoke. Words that belonged to boys who no longer existed, but lingered in scars and bruises.

The candle burned lower, its light softening, shadows drawing longer until they swallowed cracks and corners alike. The cold slipped deeper into their bones, but neither moved to chase it away.

Outside, the first hint of dawn gathered, a thin wash of gray across the courtyard beyond the window. Somewhere deeper in the sect, the bone bell tolled once, hollow and low, vibrating through stone and skin alike.

Tomorrow, the list would be read. Whether their names stood on it or not, nothing would stay the same.

Gu Muye drew in a slow breath, pain flaring under ribs before easing back to a dull ache. The thought that settled behind bruises felt as steady and heavy as the cold stone under him: if life stayed cruel, then this time, he would live it fully, not vanish unseen.

And when dawn broke, he and Zhou Min would be ready to see if their names had been called.