They left Hazelrun that same evening.
He didn't look back.
The first day was calm. The second too.
By the third, the road had already grown emptier perhaps too empty..
The World was too large.
Villages swallowed by the horizon. Land stretching endlessly. Skies too wide. Forests too deep.
The caravan had its rhythm:
Walk. Stop. Check wheels. Feed beasts. Eat hard bread. Sleep with one eye open.
Lyn kept to himself.
He observed others carefully, mapping them.
The more he watched, the more useful Emberbar seemed. Caravans talked. Caravans complained. Caravans carried rumors.
Which meant Emberbar received them.
Twice along the way, ash winds brushed across plains and took some people down. Everyone flinched when it happened the second time.
Lyn didn't. Not the first time and not the second time.
Most had a way to defend themselves. Lyn did so using Light Deflect, and the unfortunate died by the ash winds. Perhaps it was their fate to die by the winds of ash.
Each time, the caravan leader glanced at him a little differently.
By the tenth day, those around started noticing Lyn more due to natural human curiosity; they began asking questions:
How dangerous ashfall was. What it felt like. If rifts were real. What he worked as and other vain questions
Lyn answered calmly.
Half-truths only.
Already practicing.
Already sorting prey.
Most people were simple; most were afraid of being alone, so they chatted about anything to keep it from getting quiet. As such, this alone was a great way to gather information; fools forget that staying quiet is an option.
By the fourteenth day, people spoke of Emberbar.
"Busy recently."
"Too much movement."
"Tension in the air."
"People buying fake life-saving charms."
"Rumors everywhere."
Lyn listened.
Said nothing.
The fifteenth sunrise stretched across the sky.
A darker shape formed in the distance.
Emberbar.
He adjusted his cloak.
Money. Distance. Noise to disappear in.
Exactly what he needed.
The caravan slowed as Emberbar turned from a smear to reality.
Walls first.
High but not impressive, it was a mid-sized trade town after all, layered reinforced stone and hardened stonelight-ore. Scarred. Patched. Ugly in places. Formations pulsed faintly through carved veins.
The smell followed.
Smoke, iron, and sweat, too many voices.
Emberbar was loud, alive, and careless.
The caravan rolled into the outer plaza, where caravans were inspected, taxed, and tolerated. Merchants argued before stepping off wagons. Someone was already screaming about prices. A child nearly got run over and went his way as if nothing had happened.
Lyn stepped down quietly.
He didn't thank the caravan master. The caravan master didn't offer a farewell.
Just a small nod.
Respect between strangers who owed nothing to each other.
Lyn disappeared into the crowd.
Buildings stacked upward. Streets layered. Stalls everywhere. Noise feeding upon itself. Rival sect patrols glaring too long before moving on.
Information lived here.
So did trouble.
Lyn blended in easily. Clothes clean enough not to look pitiful. Plain enough not to invite greed.
He walked.
Map memory formed naturally:
Main roads. Residential areas. Cultivation markets. Taverns where tongues loosened. Alleys where deals breathed.
He stopped once near the entrance, at a message pillar hammered full of notices.
He scanned lazily.
Fire-path beast sightings. Missing people. Minor bounties. Sect announcements.
But one idea repeated again and again:
Rifts and sky anomalies.
Fear disguised as paperwork.
He filed it away.
Fear sold well.
He didn't walk toward an inn.
He checked his pouch.
Empty.
He sighed.
He immediately adjusted.
That night, he slept in the caravan rest yard, sitting beside crates like he still belonged. No one cared. Too many bodies passed through Emberbar daily for anyone to waste effort on one quiet presence.
Cold ground and stale air are still better than debt.
He slept lightly.
Woke early.
Blended into the morning crowd before responsibility found him.
By midday, he had mapped three districts, four taverns heavy with gossip, two alleys soaked in quiet business, and one plaza where desperate people naturally collected.
He stopped there.
Sat on the edge of a low stone structure
"What do I need first?" he murmured.
Income..
He needed people to look at him and think: "He knows something I don't."
His fingers tapped his leg thoughtfully.
Sect disciples with too much pride. Wanderers with no roots. Merchants terrified of disasters. Dao Chosen afraid of falling behind.
Plenty of prey.
A faint smile appeared.
Lyn sat in the plaza like another tired traveler, cloak wrapped loosely, posture relaxed but composed. He looked like someone who belonged here, but wasn't important enough to be remembered.
He placed a small scrap of cloth beside him, laid out like a beggar's mat.
He waited after all, patience was a resource too.
If a tiger is too impatient, he might not catch any prey after all
Before long, a trio of 'sect' disciples passed by, laughing too loudly. Their robes carried sect crests, but cheap fabric betrayed their rank.
Lyn didn't call out to them.
He just sighed softly, regretful, sad even
They walked five steps past him.
Then one of them slowed and turned around. Moments later, the other 2 followed.
One of them frowned and, out of curiosity, asked: "Sir, what are you sighing about?"
Lyn lifted his gaze lazily.
For a moment, he didn't answer.
As if debating whether to bother. He was murmuring nonsense to himself quietly...
Already, they leaned closer as if wanting to grasp some of his murmuring.
"Nothing important," he said quietly. "Just thinking about whether I should bother warning strangers. If I speak and I'm wrong, I look like a fool. If I'm right… well…"
He halted and lifted his gaze to the sky, like a man who had lost his family and could do nothing but stare upward, heavy with grief and quiet despair.
Silence filled the space he left.
Humans hated unfinished sentences.
"What warning?" another disciple asked, slightly uneasy.
Lyn scratched the side of his face."You're heading toward the merchant quarter, right? You should avoid it for the next few days."
They exchanged glances.
"Why?"
Lyn's expression didn't change.
"Because Heaven doesn't open rifts randomly," he said softly.
"When ash patterns break twice in the same region, it can only mean that something is preparing to descend. Hazelrun and the ridge weren't accidental; they were signals and were predetermined."
Inwardly, Lyn laughed. He made all this up on the spot!
They stiffened. They remembered hearing something about Hazelrun
He let them stew.
"I shouldn't say more," he added with mild annoyance. "Outer disciples can't outrun Heaven anyway. He scoffed before saying, "Forget what I said and move on."
He leaned back, as if the conversation had bored him now.
They were completely hooked.
"Explain more to us! How was it predetermined?!"
"What are the signals!?"
"Ash patterns?!? it has a pattern??! Sir, do you perhaps know how the weather phenomena start?? How do ashfall and ash winds even form??"
They were starting to be very worried and paranoid. Most people believed that Heaven itself sent disasters in the form of weather Phenomena.
He exhaled like someone reluctantly dragged into trouble.
"There's a pattern," he said. "Even sect records avoid printing it publicly… because panic doesn't help anyone."
He sighed in 'worry'
People like them viewed libraries as too costly; the majority were like this. Of course, if they had visited a library, they would have seen that the section on weather and rifts was basically empty.
Usually, basic knowledge was passed down by parents, and so there was no need to buy basic information shards and waste contribution points for nothing.
His eyes dimmed slightly.
"But when Heaven tries to create something and fails, it doesn't stop. It tries again. Somewhere nearby. Stronger each time."
He watched their throats tighten.
Perfect.
One swallowed. "So… Emberbar is next?"
"I didn't say that," Lyn replied casually.
"But if I were you, I'd avoid large gatherings. Avoid metal structures. Avoid standing beneath layered formations."
He stopped again.
Their breathing grew heavier.
"Why?" another whispered.
He tilted his head, as if weighing whether this was worth the trouble.
"Now we're getting into things the sect calls 'restricted speculation.' "
His voice lowered.
Lyn then looked left and right as if being paranoid that someone else might overhear him
"And speculation is never free," he said.
They finally understood.
One grimaced. "How much?"
"No cost," Lyn said.
They blinked.
He let the confusion breathe.
"I don't sell lies. If you want nonsense, there are plenty of street fakes. Information is only valuable if it keeps someone alive. So—"
He pointed lazily toward the busy marketplace.
"Go enjoy your day. If a rift opens over Emberbar this week… pretend you never met me."
He then suddenly stood up, turned away, and was about to leave
They panicked immediately.
"Wait!"
A hand grabbed his sleeve.
As expected. Now—how much would I get?
"Look… we aren't rich, but we're not broke either," the disciple forced a laugh. "If something's going to kill people, we should at least know how to avoid being the unlucky ones, right?"
the others nervously nodded in fear, agreeing with him
He let them sweat for a few seconds.
Only then did he look back, eyes calm and tired.
Like a man doing them a favor.
He sighed.
"I don't give complete truth," he said slowly. "Only half-truth. If you accept that, we can talk."
They nodded too quickly.
Of course they would.
People trusted honesty more when it came with limits.
He sat back down.
They leaned close without being asked.
He lowered his voice.
"Signs a city is close to being chosen by Heaven:
Red afterglow in normal sunlight.
Weird symbols appearing in reflections.
Animals avoiding the area.
Formations losing efficiency."
They swallowed every word like medicine.
"And the reason it becomes dangerous,"
He continued calmly, "Is because Heaven repeats failed creation using the same spatial anchors. Territory anchors. Route anchors. Caravan anchors. If a failed creation happens near Hazelrun…"
He tapped his finger lightly on the stone floor.
"…its echo will repeat anywhere linked to that road."
One turned pale.
Another clenched his jaw.
The third swallowed hard.
As expected
Lyn leaned back.
"Believe it or don't," he finished. "Heaven doesn't care what mortals like us think."
They murmured amongst themselves before they gave some tokens to him
He accepted calmly.
"Last advice," he added quietly. "If ash falls again… don't run indoors. People hide. People die. Go somewhere open, there's more air outside than inside. Sealed-off buildings make it easier for your lungs to burn."
If they followed this advice, they would quickly lose their lungs. In truth it was for the best to stay indoors, if one goes outside in the open- sure you get more air.. and with it ash.
He left without looking back. Rumors always outran truth. That never changed, no matter the World.
He disappeared into Emberbar's streets, cloak melting into the crowd, pockets slightly heavier, steps steady.
The World was unpredictable
Which meant sooner or later…
Something would happen.
And when it did?
People would remember the quiet man who warned them first.
That was worth more than a handful of tokens.
It was the beginning of a business.
And possibly…
A problem.