Chapter 213

The darkness inside the bamboo hut was heavier than the night outside the mountains. The moment Ye Fan’s fingertips brushed the doorframe, the door creaked open on its own. The old sorcerer’s shadow, which had looked like a coiled snake, was now cowering in the corner. His withered hands were groping around blindly—the ceramic lid of a bronze lamp rolled across the floor near his feet, and a dim blue flame flickered unsteadily in his palm, casting deep, knife-like shadows of the wrinkles on his face. "You've arrived at just the right time, young friend." The old sorcerer’s voice was hoarser than usual, his knuckles tapping rhythmically against the lamp. "I had just calculated that the star paths had drifted by three fingers when I heard your footsteps crushing the dew." Ye Fan pulled the door shut behind him, the mountain wind striking the bamboo walls with a muffled thud. He untied the blood-stained cloth from his waist, recited the small characters from the stone tablet word for word, and finally fished out the burning hot object from his tunic—it was the half-bronze talisman he had just pried from the base of the stone tablet. Its engravings fit the gap in the star map of his Inner World with absolute precision.