"Friends out there, we're spending the night in here. If you're not afraid of freezing to death, go right ahead and keep standing guard.

But let me tell you something: set one foot in this shop and you're dead."

Ning Chen shouted it toward the street while he searched the dead man in black. Finding nothing useful, he kicked the body out the door.

Then he went into the room.

It wasn't big. There was a clay stove with a fire roaring in it, and on top sat a pot of sliced cured pork, bubbling away.

It had been payday, and the shop boy had quietly bought himself some cured pork and wine as a treat. The pork had barely gone into the pot when all this happened.

There wasn't much pork, and the wine wasn't anything good.

His monthly pay was small, barely enough to live on.

Naturally Ning Chen wasn't going to eat for free. He tossed the boy a few pieces of broken silver.

The boy flatly refused. Ning Chen had saved him, he said, so he couldn't take his money too. The hotpot was his treat.

What he forgot was that Ning Chen and Feng Qizheng were the ones who'd brought this trouble down on him in the first place.

Ning Chen pressed the silver on him anyway and pulled him over to eat and drink with them.

Feng Qizheng slurped down some wine. "Ning Chen, you said those people are Myriad Nations Society?"

Ning Chen gave a slight nod. "Most likely."

"Then why are they so set on getting my pendant?"

Ning Chen lowered his voice. "Maybe it has to do with a legend."

"What legend?"

"The legend goes that there are two jade pendants, called the Heavenly Yang and Earthly Yin Pendants. When the two are joined into one, they have the power to twist time and space."

Feng Qizheng's eyes went wide. "The hell? Twist time and space? Isn't that bullshit?"

A smile escaped Ning Chen. "It is pretty much bullshit. But sometimes bullshit turns out to be true."

Feng Qizheng said, "I…