"You didn't see the four pillars," the first merchant said. "Four. Simultaneously. From a cave in the eastern valley. My cousin's friend is a Foundation Establishment cultivator — he was passing through the area on a commission. He extended his spiritual sense toward the cave. He said the energy was real. Core Formation. Four of them. And the women — he saw them the next morning. Village women. Torn clothes. Bare feet. But radiating Core Formation energy."
Zhou Hai snorted. He took a drink from his wineskin. "Women. Barefoot and pregnant in the fields, and now they're Core Formation cultivators. The world's gone mad."
Caihong — his wife — said nothing. Her needle paused. Her dark eyes — plain, tired, the eyes of a woman who had spent twenty years following a wine merchant along dusty roads — flickered toward the forest. Toward the darkness beyond the campfire's light.
