Yun Jieshi was bewildered by the hag's grip on his shoulder. The way she pulled him back gave him the split-second impression that there was a bomb in the cabin, but as it turned out…
"What?" he hissed, glaring at the old woman. Fury took him and he tried to pull away from Qui Tian's grip.
Why was she stopping him?
He could influence and interact with phantoms even if they were Disharmonised (or rather, in spite of it). But of course, Yun Jieshi realised that the old woman wouldn't know that he had such an ability. She treated him like a child despite calling him a Sage.
But he wasn't a child and this was far from dangerous for him.
Yun Jieshi was bubbling with desperation. This was the second ghost he'd seen since Feng Jie Hong… whom he failed to save.
Was there more that needed to be said about how miraculous this find was?
"Please. Let me go. I just…" Reining in his anger, the little monkey meant to explain to Qui Tian that it was alright, and that he could talk some sense into the phantom, when he noticed…
The hag was staggering and shivering. She plopped onto the snow.
"Hey!" Yun Jieshi cried as he rushed up to her and held her arm behind her hemp cloak. "What's wrong?"
Why was Qui Tian suddenly frail?
"Away…" the hag said weakly, and Yun Jieshi felt her flesh pulse. He was alarmed. As she held her temples, suddenly sweating profusely, the little monkey saw the hemp covering her back rising and twitching. Was it her spine again?
Unsure what to say or do, he fumbled, thoughts of the phantom beyond them forgotten.
"Uh… come on! Hold on!" cried Yun Jieshi. What could he do? He didn't know how to take care of the hag beyond cooking her good meals and massaging her feet. The only solution to the pain he knew was…
'That incantation!' he thought.
That incantation she used when her hunchback inflated.
…But he didn't know the incantation. It was super complex.
"Write that incantation again! The one you always use!" He tore a slip of hemp from her cloak and brought it to her hand. Without hesitation, he bit into his thumb, providing his own potent blood. "Here! Come on!"
But the hag wasn't even looking at him. Her eyes beyond those swollen eyelids were still staring at the phantom weeping inside the cabin. Yun Jieshi had to pull her face down to make her look at the hemp slip and his blood which was likely to freeze in the next few seconds.
The old woman raised her hand to take it with her finger.
…And then she collapsed into the snow.
"No! Hey! Please wake up!" Yun Jieshi cried, but the hag would not rise. She must have fallen unconscious because the effects of her talismans were immediately dispelled.
The raging snow and cold immediately feasted on them both. It crashed onto them with a vengeance, perhaps colder and rougher than usual. The instruction from the talisman responsible for that had collapsed.
Yun Jieshi shook the hag desperately, his hands trembling. It still did no good. She was out.
Or dead, a dark thought implied.
"No!" Yun Jieshi rebelled. The hag couldn't be dead. It couldn't be.
But her fate, even if it was positive would turn dark if he continued to hope for her to wake up.
The little monkey had to carry her back to their cabin as quickly as he could.
'Pluck my life!'
Yun Jieshi looked at the phantom in the ruined cabin. It was oblivious to his and Qui Tian's existence, just as Feng Jie Hong had been.
It ached the Discount Sage not to attend to the ghost immediately, but he had no choice. He gritted his teeth. His hag was more important. Shrinking his ruan and placing it underneath his tongue helped him maintain a bare semblance of composure.
Yet still, he found it in him to curse the little foxes he could sense watching from the distance before pulling Qui Tian by the arm and getting under her. Heaving her up was no easy task. Even when he pushed up her torso, his arms erect, her limbs still dangled limply on the snow.
Groaning, the little monkey took the first step. It was less than pretty, but a step nonetheless. The hag's cloak moved to block his vision, and he realised then that he needed to adjust it, as well as the large bow he had slung around his shoulders.
Begrudgingly, he dropped the old woman, tied the ends of her cloak and then heaved her again.
A clock was racing somewhere within him. The hag was still warm but it felt like each second the little monkey took in this blizzard was a minute deducted from some twisted five-minute-rule meant to dictate how long someone who had mysteriously collapsed had before they kicked the big one.
Yun Jieshi spared another glance at the weeping phantom before beginning towards the hag's cabin.
The journey was rough. On top of his own anxieties about Qui Tian's fate, Yun Jieshi had to wrestle with his sense of direction. Because he and the hag had taken a route – routes, really – they weren't familiar with, he got lost a few times. It didn't help that the terrain was about as friendly as a taipan. That, coupled with the bow hanging around Yun Jieshi had forced the little monkey to drop Qui Tian more times that he was comfortable admitting.
'Please don't die! Please don't die!' he kept thinking while cursing the nebulous reason why Qui Tian had collapsed to begin with.
What had happened?
She kept looking at the weeping phantom when he was trying to make her create that special talisman of hers.
But that didn't make any sense. If monsters like this black feathered bird or the real monster didn't scare Qui Tian, why would phantoms…
Yun Jieshi almost stumbled when a thought came to mind.
'Is it because… is because of the Disharmony?'
That must have been it!
Qui Tian was so wary of Disharmony that she had tested Yun Jieshi for it over several days with her teas. He had even gotten the impression that she would have killed him instantly if he exhibited the slighted hints of it by failing to pick the right tea.
The little monkey shuddered. The feeling of dread he got far surpassed the terror the black-stalked flowers he was winding around could instil in him.
'Even being that far from that phantom caused her to become like this?' he sneaked a look at Qui Tian's placid, wrinkled face. 'And here I was trying to get close!'
Guilt mounted against the little monkey, but he didn't let it consume him. Not yet.
His determination carried him over the next few hours. By the time he pushed open the door to the hag's cabin, Yun Jieshi could hardly feel his limbs. Both he and Qui Tian were caked with snow and frost.
The little monkey only allowed himself to collapse on the floor and thaw after placing the hag on his (rather, her) bedroll and covering her up as much as he could. When he felt strength return to him once more, Yun Jieshi collected some of the coals burning in the middle of the cabin in bowls and placed them around Qui Tian.
She remained unresponsive, but she was warm and breathing. That sustained Yun Jieshi's hope for a little while.
While warming himself and preparing something to eat, Yun Jieshi's eyes kept darting to the hag. He hoped he'd seen her move, but most of the time, it turned out to be the shadows. Another time, it was when Zi Kun shook everything as he devoured the world again, bringing forth the night.
Still Yun Jieshi kept hoping. Yet, even as he did, he couldn't help but feel the desire to seek out the weeping phantom and redeem himself.