The boat rocked gently against the current, its weathered hull creaking with each rise and fall of the tide. Mist clung to the waves like fingers, dragging silence over the world. Mo Gufeng did not move. He sat still, his small arms bound at the wrists, and stared ahead with eyes too old for his young face. The salty wind tugged at his hair, but he did not blink.
Behind him, the old ferryman glanced over his shoulder. His face was sunken, teeth yellow and crooked, lips drawn tight into something between a smirk and a sneer.
"You're small for a killer."
Gufeng didn't respond. Not because he lacked the words, but because he wasn't sure if he believed them. The title killer felt like someone else's skin—worn, stretched, cracked. He had taken lives. That much was true. But was that what made him a killer? Or was it something deeper, something rotting inside?
The boat bumped against the shore with a hollow thud. The island loomed ahead like the back of a sleeping beast—forests draped in fog, cliffs sharp as broken blades, and a warped wooden pier covered in sand and time. No guards waited. No welcoming committee. Just the hush of waves brushing against forgotten bones.
"You walk from here," the ferryman said, spitting into the sea. He tossed a tattered sack beside the boy with a careless grunt. "Food for two days. After that, you hunt—or starve."
He reached forward with a jagged knife and sliced the rope binding Gufeng's wrists. The boy stood slowly. His legs trembled—not with fear, but from the strain of long travel and the ache of sitting still for too long. He caught the sack and slung it over one shoulder, stepping onto the cold, damp wood of the pier.
The old man did not watch him go.
The mist thickened as Gufeng walked inland. Each step brought him deeper into silence, the kind that clung to skin and crept into ears. His feet found a narrow trail winding between jagged stones and tangled undergrowth. The scent of rot hung in the air—moss, old blood, decay. The island had teeth, he realized. It just didn't bare them right away.
Not long after, he noticed the first sign of life.
Footprints.
Larger than his own, pressed deep into the earth. They wove between trees and vanished into the brush. He crouched low, fingers brushing the impressions. Fresh—within the day.
Caution whispered in his bones.
"Strike like the snake," his father's voice echoed. "But think like the eagle. Watch first. Kill later."
Mo Tianxie had never been a gentle teacher. His lessons were carved into bruises and branded with pain. But they had kept Gufeng alive.
Still, this was not the training field. This was not the Five Evil Beast Sect. Here, blood wasn't spilled in ceremony or discipline. It soaked the roots of trees and dried in patterns on bark. It had a smell Gufeng was beginning to recognize: old, desperate, human.
A strange feeling prickled beneath his skin. Not fear. Something else.
Doubt.
Why send me here?
If I'm broken, why not just kill me?
His stomach growled. A low, coiling reminder of hunger.
By nightfall, he found a crumbling structure deep in the jungle. The remains of an old hut—wooden walls split from moisture, roof half-collapsed. The fire pit was cold but intact. Inside, a pile of furs still held the faint impression of a sleeper.
He crouched low and sniffed the bedding. Smoke, sweat, a hint of sour herbs.
Someone had been here recently.
He sat with his back to the wall, dagger in hand, eyes fixed on the doorway.
He did not sleep.
The jungle whispered all night—branches scraping against one another, small creatures rustling in the undergrowth. A screech owl cried once, distant and sharp. But no one came.
By morning, mist curled along the ground like smoke. Dew clung to his skin. He chewed a piece of dried meat from the sack, jaw tight with silence.
Then—snap.
A branch broke nearby. Gufeng froze. The sound was heavy, too large for an animal. He crept to the hut's edge and peered into the trees.
A boy stumbled into view. Wild black hair, skin streaked with dirt, maybe ten years old. He carried a sharpened stick and a bruised apple.
The boy stopped short when he saw Gufeng, eyes narrowing. "You're a child," he said bluntly.
Gufeng didn't answer.
"You're not mute, are you?"
"…No."
"What's your name?"
"…Gufeng."
The boy squinted, then gave a crooked smile. "I'm called Sanlang. I won't kill you. Not yet."
That last part dangled between them like a trap. Gufeng only nodded.
Sanlang grinned wider. "Good. I'm hungry. Got anything?"
Gufeng offered him a strip of meat.
They ate in silence for a moment before Sanlang started talking again—fast, words tumbling out like stones down a hill. He had been on the island for over a year, sent here after stabbing a tax officer who had tried to drag his mother away. He said he had Tendon level strength, though Gufeng couldn't tell. The boy was wiry, all movement and twitching energy, but unrefined—more beast than martial artist.
"You're from the mainland, huh?" Sanlang asked between chews. "You got that look. Like you know where your next strike goes."
Gufeng didn't answer. Because lately, he wasn't sure anymore.
In the weeks that followed, Gufeng met others.
Yao Xiang was the oldest. He never smiled. His skin clung to his bones like wax, but his hands were strong. Gufeng once saw him carry a dead boar—larger than himself—without a sound. He spoke rarely, but when he did, the others listened.
Then came Mingli, a girl with a sharp jaw and sharper mind. She never fought directly. Instead, she trapped game and people alike—poisoning wells, stringing tripwires, whispering lies that led to blood. She reminded Gufeng of his sect's snake hall.
Damao was next. Loud, brash, with fists like hammers and a laugh like thunder. He charged into fights with no plan, no thought, only the joy of movement. Yet he was strangely loyal, the kind of boy who would follow you into fire if you shared your food once.
Last came Shuang.
She was quiet, pale, her hair tied back with a vine. A silver locket hung at her throat, polished smooth by years of wear. She never took it off. Gufeng noticed she often stared at the sea, like she expected someone to arrive.
At first, they didn't trust one another. They slept apart. Ate separately. But time wore suspicion down the way rivers wear down stone. Hunger, danger, cold—they pressed bodies together by necessity.
Then came the attack.
A rogue band of prisoners—three men and a woman, all at Tendon level—descended on their camp at dusk. They struck fast, brutal. Sanlang took a gash across his shoulder. Mingli's trap snapped too late. Damao was beaten to the ground.
Gufeng stood firm.
He was only Skin level. No match for them in raw strength.
But he had been trained by Mo Tianxie.
He fled into the jungle, darting between trees, leaving a trail as bait. The attackers followed, hungry for the smallest, the weakest. He led them past a wasp nest and through thick vines, then doubled back toward a muddy slope Damao had once collapsed. The ground gave way.
Two of the enemies never rose again. The other two limped off, bleeding and cursed.
That night, they buried the bodies in silence.
Later, as they sat around a rare fire, Shuang tore a piece of hard bread in two and handed half to Gufeng.
"You didn't run," she said.
"I couldn't."
"You could have. You chose not to."
He looked into the fire. "I don't know if I chose anything."
Shuang tilted her head, watching him. "You think too much for someone raised to kill."
He nodded. He couldn't help it.
That night, he sat apart from the others. The stars above the island were alien—sharp and strange, glittering like scattered bone. He pulled his sleeve back and touched the tattoo on his shoulder.
The mark of the Five Evil Beast Sect.
A black circle of beasts surrounding a blood moon. The metal-fanged tiger, the twisted-branch monkey, the water snake, the flaming eagle, the earth-footed bull. A mark of allegiance. A curse of identity.
Tonight, it burned.
Not with shame.
With confusion.
He had expected monsters here. Instead, he found people. Broken, twisted, bitter—but people. Some worse. Some—like Shuang—who still believed in things like kindness.
He dreamed of his father's voice.
"Strike like the snake… but think like the eagle."
He woke with a question in his throat:
What if the eagle didn't want to strike at all?