Lian Wuxi · Chat

Lian Wuxi was enjoying a rare moment of leisure today. The giant screen in the Teleportation Hall was broadcasting a B-rank dungeon. The live chat was sparse, and there were no brilliant maneuvers worth stopping for. He held a cup of cold-brew tea he'd swiped from the Samsara Inn, intending to take a quick glance at the leaderboard before returning to his workshop—the new sandalwood puppet hadn't been oiled yet, and it wouldn't do to leave it out for too long. Standing at the edge of the crowd, he tilted his head slightly, his gaze drifting over the familiar name in the second spot of the leaderboard without much change in expression. The third spot had changed again, though—for the third time this month. He took a sip of tea, wondering if he should send Yue Ling a message to tease him, "Your position is even more stable than mine," when someone suddenly crashed into his arms. It wasn't heavy. In fact, it was quite light. Like a reckless bird crashing into his chest before its wings could even unfurl. A few drops of cold-brew tea splashed from the rim of the cup, soaking into the fingertips of his white gloves and spreading into a small, pale green tea stain. Lian Wuxi looked down and saw you. You were looking up at him, likely realizing you had bumped into someone. Your expression was a mix of panic and embarrassment. Your lips moved, probably trying to formulate an apology, but he didn't really hear it—because your eyes were too close to him. In those eyes, there was the light and dust of the Teleportation Hall, the scrolling reflections of the giant screen, and him. His heart skipped a beat. Not as a figure of speech. It truly skipped a beat, as if a spot in the left side of his chest had been gently tugged by an extremely fine, soft thread. The sensation was foreign, so foreign that his fingers tightened slightly around the teacup for a moment. But nothing changed on his face. The smile remained, its curve precise, even the angle of his eyes exactly the same as a moment before. As a puppeteer, he was more skilled at manipulating his own facial expressions than his puppets. "It's fine." After you finally managed to stammer out the words "I'm sorry," he picked up the conversation gently, his voice like spring water warmed by body heat. "I was standing in a bad spot. Are you hurt?" He even leaned down slightly to meet your eyes. His posture was impeccably considerate, like anyone who would make people think "this gentleman is truly gentle" at first sight. You waved your hands repeatedly, saying a few more apologies, and then, as if remembering something urgent, you took a quick look at the leaderboard and vanished into the crowd. Lian Wuxi watched you leave. The smile remained fixed on his face. Then he lowered his eyelashes, looking at the Sigil Ring on his right ring finger. An extremely fine spiritual thread, nearly invisible to the naked eye, was extending from the ring's surface. The other end disappeared into the bustling crowd, gently snagging onto the corner of your clothes. That was "Fate Weaver." His Fate Weaver. Softer than spider silk, tougher than steel. As long as he didn't take it back himself, nothing in this world could sever it. He hadn't actually intended to do that. Or rather, his fingers had moved before his brain could issue a command. A puppeteer's instinct. For someone who had lived with threads for as long as he could remember, his first reaction when encountering something he truly wanted to hold onto was always to entangle it. "Interesting," he whispered. Not to anyone else, but to himself. The cup was still half-full of cold-brew tea, the surface of the liquid reflecting his own eyes. The gentleness in those eyes hadn't faded yet, but beneath that gentleness, something thicker and darker was slowly seeping out, like ink settling at the bottom of a river, wordlessly surging upward. He raised the cup, drained the rest in one gulp, and turned toward his workshop. His steps remained composed. Back in the workshop, the moment he closed the door, his left thumb gently brushed the ring on his ring finger. An extremely faint vibration traveled from the other end of the thread—the rhythm of your walking, the pauses when you stopped, the arc of your body turning slightly as you brushed past people in the crowd. These tiny, unnoticed fragments of information traveled along his thread, dripping into his fingertips, falling into his palm, and sinking into his chest. He leaned against the door and took a slow, deep breath. "Found you," he said to the empty workshop. On the workbench, the sandalwood puppet he had been carving for a long time—but had never given features to—sat quietly in the twilight. Its eye sockets were hollow, and the place where the lips should be was only a smooth wooden curve. It had been waiting for this face for a very long time. Lian Wuxi walked over and knelt before the puppet. He reached out to stroke its blank face, smiling with a gentleness that was dark and deep, like a slow undercurrent flowing beneath the surface of a mid-winter lake. "No rush. He will be mine."