The Nine Primordial Swords

The sunset over Luofeng City was like an old branding iron that could never be warmed, lodged reluctantly in the gray, misty hills to the west. It stingily scattered a few dim rays of golden light, cloaking this frontier town in the worn-out hues of dusk.

At the end of the most remote alley in the west of the city, a low mud-brick house shivered in the cold wind. The air inside was heavy with the bitter smell of medicine. A tiny oil lamp barely illuminated the gaunt face on the kang.

"Cough, cough, cough..." A fit of violent coughing ripped through the silence, as if trying to cough out the last traces of life. Ye Lingxiao knelt beside the kang, gripping his grandfather's twig-thin hands tightly. The chill in his palms made his heart tremble. The old man's sallow face was lined with deep furrows. His cloudy eyes struggled to open a narrow slit as he looked at the boy he had raised all by himself.