Dawn broke over the silver cliffs of Moonlight Gorge, ten miles north of Black-Mud Marsh.
Tucked beneath a waterfall of sparkling mountain spring water stood the camouflaged oak door of [Pocket-Dimension Hotpot Shelter #4]. Inside its five-square-mile pocket hall, Wolf-Chief Cang Ya and four hundred thousand evacuated Wolf-Tribe citizens were waking up to the smell of Auntie Qin’s warm millet porridge and steamed scallion buns. Connecting corridors linked them to the other one million two hundred and fifty thousand demon evacuees.
Outside on the mossy stone ledge in front of the shelter door, nine-year-old Su Nuannuan was watering a row of potted morning-glory flowers with her [Rank 6 Sweet-Honey Pink Watering Can].
Beside her, seventy-year-old Grandpa Fu stood in his immaculate black butler’s tailcoat. He balanced the morning supply ledger on his [Rank 6 Jade-Abacus Cane] while a kettle of honey-chamomile tea whistled softly on a portable clay stove.
“Grandpa Fu, look!” Su Nuannuan smiled brightly as the first ray of morning sunlight touched the gorge. “The purple morning-glories opened all their petals at once!
That means the four hundred thousand wolf pups inside the shelter slept without a single nightmare last night!”
“That is because Miss Nuannuan planted Sweet-Dream Lavender around the air vents before bedtime,” Grandpa Fu said with a warm, grandfatherly bow. “And our Young Master should be finishing the evacuation of Green-Stone Antelope Town ten miles west right about... now.”
