parentshiftbook Chapter 1 Gray Eyes Arrive in Town
Chapter 1 Gray Eyes Arrive in Town
At dusk, Qingxi Town is as quiet as an ancient well.
In the blacksmith's shop, Shen Chi was finishing a hoe. The hammer struck the red-hot iron with a rhythm as steady as a heartbeat. This was what his father had taught him—"You can't rush when forging iron, or the iron will crack. You can't rush when you're in a hurry either, or you'll make mistakes."
His father has been dead for three years.
The hoe belongs to Old Chen next door. Old Chen said, "My wife wants a bamboo grove, and I promised her. Could you forge me a good hoe? I'll come pick it up in three days."
Shen Chi agreed.
He will keep his promises.
------
A scream came from the entrance of the town.
Shen Chi's hammer stopped in mid-air.
A second scream. Then came the woman's cries.
Ah Zhu peeked half her head out from the inner room, still clutching an unfinished grasshopper in her hand: "Brother Shen Chi, outside..."
"Don't come out." Shen Chi put down the hammer and walked to the door.
Three men in grey robes were walking from the town entrance into the town. Their faces were covered with grey cloth, revealing only a pair of eyes—grey eyes with pupils like frost. They were the "Grey Eyes," the underworld enforcers of the Yansheng Pavilion.
Where the gray eyes passed, no one dared to utter a sound.
They stopped at the entrance of Old Chen's yard.
As Old Chen was being dragged out, he was still shouting, "I didn't do anything! I just... I just stood in front of the monument for a little longer!"
I stood there a while longer.
This is sin.
In the third hundred years of the Locked Heart Era, even standing in front of the stone tablet for a while is considered "abnormal emotional fluctuation".
Old Chen's wife rushed out, knelt on the ground, and hugged the gray-eyed leader's legs: "Please, he's old, he just... he just remembered the vows we made in front of the tombstone on our wedding day..."
The gray-eyed leader glanced down at her. His gaze wasn't that of someone looking at a person, but rather that of someone looking at an object blocking their way.
He kicked her away.
Old Chen's wife fell heavily to the ground, her forehead hitting the threshold, and blood flowed down her eyebrow.
Shen Chi gripped the hammer handle tightly.
Reason told him—ignore it.
Interfering means certain death. My father said before he died, "Live on. Don't meddle. Qingxi Town doesn't need heroes."
But his hands were shaking.
It's not fear.
The hoe was still resting on the stove. Two words, "Never Apart," were engraved on it. Old Chen said he had promised his wife that no matter how poor they became, he would never leave her.
Three days later, he came to collect it.
Shen Chi agreed.
He has to keep his promise.
------
As Shen Chi walked out of the blacksmith shop, A-Zhu whispered behind him, "Brother Shen Chi..."
He didn't turn around.
"My lord." Shen Chi's voice wasn't loud, but everyone in the suffocatingly quiet town heard him.
The gray-eyed leader turned his head.
"He's from our town. He didn't break the law."
The gray-eyed leader sized Shen Chi up and down. He was a blacksmith, dark-skinned and thin, about seventeen or eighteen years old, wearing an old apron with burn holes in it.
"What are you?" the gray-eyed leader asked contemptuously.
"I'm a blacksmith. He ordered a hoe and is supposed to pick it up in three days. If you take him away, I won't be able to do this business."
The townspeople gasped in shock.
The gray-eyed leader laughed. He loosened Old Chen's collar and walked towards Shen Chi.
Do you know who we are?
"From the Yansheng Pavilion."
"You knew that, yet you still dared to stop me?"
Shen Chi didn't speak. He gripped the hammer tightly.
The gray-eyed leader drew his sword. The blade was jet black, engraved with dense runes—the patterns of the Heart-Locking Nails. Anyone wounded by this sword would have a portion of their emotions stripped away.
"I'll give you one more chance." The gray-eyed leader pointed his sword at Shen Chi's throat. "Kneel down and say 'I don't care anymore,' and I'll pretend I didn't see you."
Shen Chi looked down at the hammer in his hand. Engraved on the handle was a line of words in his father's handwriting: "Hold fast to your promises, and let your tools warm the world."
He gripped the hammer even tighter.
Three days later, Old Chen came to pick up the hoe, and I agreed to it.
"That means there's nothing to talk about."
The gray-eyed leader thrust his sword forward.
Shen Chi dodged to the side. He didn't have much combat experience, but after three years of blacksmithing, his reaction time was much faster than the average person. He swung his hammer at the sword.
The hammer broke.
Fragments flew everywhere. Shen Chi's hand split open, and blood dripped down between his fingers.
"Fan Tie dares to challenge the Heart-Locking Blade?" The gray-eyed leader sneered and kicked Shen Chi in the chest.
Shen Chifei went out and knocked over his own blacksmith shop's stall. Ironware clattered all over the ground.
"Brother Shen Chi!" A-Zhu tried to rush out, but was held back by the neighbor next to her.
Shen Chi lay on the ground, blood seeping from the corner of his mouth. He saw Old Chen being pressed to the ground by Gray Eyes, saw the bloodstains still wet on Old Chen's wife's forehead, and saw A-Zhu trying to cry but unable to.
He tried to get up.
My hand couldn't support me. The wound on my thumb and forefinger was too deep; I couldn't exert any strength.
The gray-eyed leader walked up to him and looked down at him.
"Blacksmith, remember this day. Remember the consequences of meddling in other people's business."
Raise the sword.
The sword fell.
------
The sword stopped in mid-air.
Shen Chi gripped the sword blade.
His palm was cut, but he didn't let go. He held on tightly.
The gray-eyed leader's pupils contracted slightly.
He used seven-tenths of his strength in that sword strike; not even a blacksmith, let alone an ordinary enforcer of the Yansheng Pavilion, could withstand it. Yet this young man caught it barehanded?
Shen Chi raised his head.
There was fire in his eyes.
It was golden, like molten iron, like furnace fire, as if something was burning in his chest.
A burning sensation in my chest.
Iron-gray lines spread from his heart, through his skin, and through his clothes. Like cracks, they hinted at something sealed away for too long, finally breaking free of its cage.
He didn't know what it was.
All he remembered was that, in that brief moment, he recalled his father's words, Old Chen's promise of "never leaving," and his own words, "Come and collect it in three days."
He made a promise.
That's what we have to do.
The gray-eyed leader tried to pull his sword back, but couldn't. Shen Chi's hand was like an iron clamp, firmly locking the blade.
Shen Chi stood up.
The scattered pieces of iron hammer on the ground began to vibrate. Drawn by some unseen force, they floated up and gathered to Shen Chi's right.
Ding.
The first piece.
Ding.
The second piece.
The fragments spun, fused, and recast above Shen Chi's palm. Molten iron dripped from between his fingers, but Shen Chi felt no heat. He only felt the pulse in his chest, like another heart.
A new hammer took shape in his hands.
It's heavier than before. A new line has appeared on the hammer, emanating from within, like an invisible promise embedded in the hammer's skeleton.
The gray-eyed leader finally drew his sword. He took two steps back, his expression changing drastically.
"You...you are the one who upholds the promise?"
Shen Chi didn't answer. He took a step forward.
The gray-eyed leader swung his sword again. Runes on the Heart-Locking Blade lit up—this strike carried the power to strip away emotions.
Shen Chi did not dodge.
He smashed it.
The first blow. The sword breaks.
The Heart-Locking Blade split in the middle. The gray-eyed leader's tiger's mouth was also cracked by the impact.
The second blow. The armor shatters.
The armor on the gray-eyed leader's chest was dented, and fragments of the runic heartlock armor were embedded in his flesh.
The third strike.
The gray-eyed leader was sent flying backward. He crashed through a wall, then another, before slamming heavily onto the stone monument at the town entrance.
The stone tablet trembled. A layer of dust fell from the characters on it.
The stone tablet is inscribed with three characters: "Monument to the People's Hearts".
The remaining two gray-eyed men exchanged a glance, dropped their weapons, and ran.
Shen Chi stood there, panting heavily.
The hammer in his hand returned to its original state, except that there was a thin crack on the hammer body, like a scar, or more like a mark.
The iron-gray patterns gradually faded and disappeared into the skin.
A-Zhu ran out, hugged his waist, buried her face in his chest, and finally burst into tears.
"It's alright now." Shen Chi patted her head. His hand was trembling.
Old Chen knelt on the ground, staring at the hoe. A faint golden line had appeared on the hoe.
Shen Chi looked down at his palm. The wound on the web of his hand was still bleeding, but it no longer hurt. In its place was a strange warmth that spread from his chest to his fingertips.
He didn't know what it was.
All he knew was that, in that brief moment, he had fulfilled a promise.
In the distance, atop the tallest clock tower in Qingxi Town.
An old man, blind in one eye, leaned against the railing, holding a jug of wine in his hand. He gazed in the direction of the blacksmith's shop, his one eye, which was not blind, gleaming.
He smiled.
"Finally, it's here."
He spilled the wine from the jug onto the ground.
"Old Shen, your son is even more formidable than you were back then."
------
The twilight in Qingxi Town is as quiet as any other day.
Perhaps from today onwards, things will no longer be peaceful.
On the monument to human hearts, in the spot where the gray-eyed leader had been struck, something is glowing.
Very faint.
Like a spark.