“Ready!”

Chen’s voice blew through the alley like a cold wind. Already Ruyi was running—running where she saw the cannon aiming, tracking the clump of stragglers rushing for the side streets. For Chrysanthemum Street. She dashed for them and found a knot of humanity clogged in the middle of the street. They tried shoving their way through the wards, but they got tangled up in the fluttering tarp, tripping over the rolling beds, the screaming patients and healers. They were blocked off, held still as the shadow of the cannon fell over them.

Ruyi stood numb with shock. Not a hospital, they wouldn’t—

“Fire!”

She wasn’t thinking; she just moved. She kicked off the walls, launched herself up to meet the falling brightness, and her body flared white with essence. It struck her in the chest. Her world was burning light, howling air, and she hit the ground hard, smoking, blistered with bloodstreaks. It felt like she’d been stabbed in the chest with a hot poker. Her mask, most of her robes were burnt off, and only then did she realize how crowded the street really was. Every eye was on her, most bulging. Mouths hung open. She felt uncomfortably seen; her skin crawled.

“Lady Ruyi?” croaked a woman.

Those cannons could down Core Formation cultivators.

She realized with horror that they knew. They knew. But there was no time to think on it.

“Ready!”

She tore up the sides of the leaning skyscraper. She’d scaled it in three strides and another took her clean across the roof. One last bound and she was flying for the cannon, for the boy squinting through the sight. It took so long to fall! She wouldn’t make it—she screamed desperately as she could.

“Fire!”

But this cannon held still while the rest of the world rocked around her—the boy had jerked up, caught a glimpse of her, let out a scream of his own. She landed on his chest as he was trying to scrambled out of his seat. He went head-over-heels into the alley below. Then she smashed the cannon once, twice, thrice, her fists denting the steel until they broke clean through. It drooped listlessly.

It wasn’t enough. There were just too many. Everywhere she looked the streets were smoking, slick with blood, piled up with charred heaps that might’ve been bodies once—or maybe they were burnt-out buildings. It was impossible to tell. A few streets down she saw a skyscraper leaning farther and farther, groaning hideously as thousands of planks of wood snapped at once. Smoke billowing from its charred base.

She didn’t know what to do. Everywhere she looked—there were just too many—she braced for Chen’s next command.

But it didn’t come.

“Really, now?” he said.

She hopped three rooftops, dropped, and dashed for the main street.

Jin stood there, spear unsheathed, breathing hard. His arms were slick with blood, as was the tip of his spear. He was alone. Before him stood the full might of the Imperial Guard, rows upon rows of them, filling up the street.

Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.

“Stand down!” Jin roared. “This is an order!”

Ruyi’s heart sank. Chen’s face twisted.

“What do you think you’re doing, Jin?”

“This is as far as you go.”

What did he think he was going to do—stop them all by himself? Ruyi wanted to tear her hair out. He was such an idiot. He wasn’t thinking straight, he was doing what was right. He thought he was the only thing between the Lower City and certain destruction.The two men stared at each other in dead silence.

“This is treason,” said Chen.

“I know.”

A silence.

“Archers,” said Chen, voice tightly calm even as a vein bulged angry purple on his temple. “Set your aims on the traitor.”

But there was hardly any movement on the walls. Even from down here she could sense their hesitation. They loved Jin. The guards on foot looked uncertainly at him, then at one another, then at Chen. The only ones who looked certain were the silver-cloaked Guards leading the pack. Their swords were already leveled at him.

“Jin,” cried Ruyi. “Run!”

He didn’t so much as look at her.

“Rue,” he said calmly. “Seek out Mother. She’ll take care of you. I have some business to take care of.”

There was no changing his mind. He had that look on his face. She left out a growl of frustration.

Then she ran out into the street, fists clenched. “If you’re staying, I am too.”

Jin looked at her, stricken. “Rue—“

“All the better,” said Chen. He smiled at her. “Take the girl for me, will you, Liu? A traitor’s family is property of the Emperor to do with as he pleases. As for Jin… only one fate awaits traitors. One hundred gold to the man who slays him!”

On the wall and the ground faces slowly hardened. Swords whispered free of sheaths.

“Don’t you dare change,” was the last thing Jin said to her.

“Fire!” screamed Chen.

Jin drew an arc in the air, and where his spear passed a sliver of sun stayed behind. It flared out, making a bubble of heat. A hail of arrows fell, but when they drew near their qi seemed to evaporate. They boiled to nothing mid-air.

Chen raised his fist and the Guard surged.

Jin’s spear blazed white, wisps of qi trickling off it, so hot the air shivered. Where he stabbed there was a blast, an explosion of heat and wind, and clumps of smoking bodies went flying. Ruyi’s eyes were on the silver-cloaked swordsmen and the men they led sneaking around their sides, trying to get at Jin from the back. One lunged. Late Core, fat, metal greaves, breastplate scaled like a dragon and a greedy smile. He reached for her.

She smashed four knuckles into his face, sank them so deep she heard the nose break once, then twice. His head snapped back; his body followed and he went over. He didn’t even have time to scream. His face was mottled black and white, badly frostbitten, a corpse left out in a blizzard, glistening slightly.

“What?!” screamed Chen.

Surprise rippled through the crowd. They weren’t so eager to get at her now. The Nascent swordsmen moved in from either side. They came at her slowly, then all at once. One blade flashed green, one steely grey. She breathed frost at one, got it in his eyes, ducked under, ripped him to the belly, stabbed him there so that her essence surged into his insides, made him gasp, fall to a knee, sword clattering from nerveless fingers. Then a line drew up her back painful hot, and she cried out. She turned and crushed a fist into the other swordsman’s face.

She couldn’t see what happened to him. There was no time. The crowd was on her, dozens of steel points all at once and she had no place to go. She was nearly back-to-back with Jin. The swordsmen were getting to their feet. She sucked in a deep breath and blew.

A blizzard howled out of her mouth. Nothing like what she could’ve done in demonform, but it had the crowd skittering back. She stamped down hard. Essence splashed into the ground and a tundra crackled to life. Skittering soldiers slipped on it, bowling each other over. Even the Nascents seemed on unsure feet. She chanced a glance back and saw Jin’s half of their little circle was a molten wasteland, the ground seething black-yellow-red. A circle of black-red and white-blue, half fire, half ice.

They rushed her and she smashed them back. They rushed her again and she swept them aside. Dozens fell and didn’t get up, lost under snowdrifts. But there were just so many, and with the Nascents jabbing at her a new red line cut deep on her arms, her thighs every rush. She could see the confusion in the swordsmen’s eyes. Their slashes should’ve hacked off a limb. Her pain was a distant thing, irrelevant, and though her blood ran fast and hot her heart felt very cold. She stopped thinking—about how many there were, about how hopeless she felt. They wanted to get at Jin, but they couldn’t have him.

“Miss Yang,” came Chen’s droll voice. “You’ve been lying to us.”