Wu Hao dismissed the notification quickly, but hunched over, waiting until 726 approached. A few quick moments later, he was staring down at 726, who'd fallen onto his back and seemed to have been knocked out.

  He rubbed his hand. It'd taken two punches, this time, because he'd sprung his trap too early.

  Didn't change anything else, though. The rest still sprung up to obey his commands, and the commands themselves didn't vary as long as the day itself didn't vary, and unless Wu Hao put in the effort to make it change, it wouldn't.

  Though sometimes he wished it would. Without doing it on purpose he'd managed to funnel his life into a short, 24-hour repetition of trying something, dying, and then adjusting his plans little by little.

  If only that was so easy now. All that had changed from yesterday was that he knew that even without him, the prisoner would be freed and would slaughter everyone present, except Uncle, who he'd let live.

  Wu Hao didn't even know why, either. Why had Uncle Bai been sent to free a demonic cultivator? Why had he even known that there had been a cultivator there to free at all? How could he manage to survive attempting to kill Uncle?

  Questions stacked atop questions and yet no answers seemed forthcoming.

  Right, he thought, when they'd climbed to a vantage point. Wu Hao directed the others forward, taking a moment to stare out into the nothingness to gather his thoughts. Time for a new plan.

  Unfortunately, without a way to break the mental blocks that had been placed on him, there was nothing he could do. The only thing he could think of was repeatedly trying to kill Uncle and suffering through the backlash, then hoping that the backlash was so fierce it would kill him. That way, he'd get immunity.

  That hadn't been how it'd worked, though. He'd been killed with a mace earlier, and the result had been the Shining Diamond Mace Art, which looked vaguely interesting but wasn't much use without a mace. Wouldn't help Wu Hao much in trying to regain the mastery of his own mind, either.

  He shook his head and continued, 732 walking past him and shooting a curious look. He had the same blank-eyed stare as all the others, but Wu Hao felt something - a genuine curiosity that had been beaten out of the others.

  Mid-step, his foot paused.

  732 had always been odd, hadn't he? Wu Hao still recalled him simply never mentioning that time that he'd killed 589 and came in with blood over his rags, even when Father had demanded answers, and there'd been other incidents like that. His feelings had always seemed just a touch less repressed than the others, his timing always a bit coincidentally in Wu Hao's favor.

  All this time, Wu Hao had put it aside - found the other boy odd but never more interesting than trying to solve the problems that he was actually facing.

  Maybe it was time for that to change. Maybe it was time that he investigate 732 properly.

  He went through the motions for the rest of the day, watching 732 out of the corner of his eye the entire time. He'd never before noticed, but the more he watched the other boy the more he realized that 732 was having to put actual effort into being the way that the other deathsworn were. That said, there was always a task in the way that meant Wu Hao couldn't just talk to the other boy.

  Finally, though, Uncle Bai sent them out to go forage in the mountain forests nearby, where they'd usually find the Mountain's Breath Mushroom, and Wu Hao's chance had arrived. They marched up to the destination Uncle had sent them and stopped, all heads turning to Wu Hao.

  "I may not be here when you return," Wu Hao announced. "Leave whatever you forage here, I'll take it all. That's all."

  Some nods. No questions what he was doing if he wasn't doing it here, which was one of the benefits of how they'd been trained.

  "726," he said. "Go investigate that stretch over there. Go. 729, you're in charge of everything between those two trees. 720..."

  When they'd all been sent out, 732 was the only one left. He looked at Wu Hao, and again there was that little prickle of curiosity in his qi.

  "Come on," Wu Hao said, turning on his heel. He moved away from the small clearing, moving to a place he'd left out of the search on purpose. The remnants of trees that'd fallen lay where he knew they would be, and 732 kept standing while Wu Hao inspected the location carefully, just in case.

  "Let's talk," Wu Hao said. He sat down on one of the treetrunks, knowing that it'd leave a stain on his rags but unable to bring himself to care.

  "Brother?" 732 asked, his tone betraying absolutely nothing. He remained standing, stock-still, limbs unmoving. Wu Hao could read him, though - his qi was spiking into shocks of panic and fear.

  "My name," Wu Hao said very carefully, "is Wu Hao."

  732's mouth fell open. "Your - name?"

  "Yeah," Wu Hao said quietly. "Came to me suddenly, couple of days ago."

  "Huh," 732 said. As far as reactions went, it wasn't exactly what Wu Hao had hoped for, but he'd have to take it.

  A cold wind whispered through the mountain forest, whipping at the leaves and seeping into Wu Hao's rags. Neither of them shivered, but 732 hesitated for a moment. He looked as if he was about to bolt, to make a run for it. But then, instead, he spoke.

  "Ye Qingfeng," he said. "Of Ox Head Village."

  Relief surged through Wu Hao, as heavily as if he'd broken his filter. His spirits soared, and he couldn't help but grin like an idiot. He stretched out a hand, and 732 - no - Ye Qingfeng shook it.

  Wu Hao jerked the face coverings down, exposing his mouth to the open air. That felt good, too, especially once Ye Qingfeng did the same with slightly more hesitancy.

  "Nice to finally meet," Wu Hao said, smiling slightly. It felt good to be able to smile, for once.

  "Yeah," Ye Qingfeng said, returning his smile. "Shame it took so long for you to wake up."

  He sighed, in obvious relief, then they spoke at the same time.

  "How long have you been -"

  They both stopped mid-sentence, realizing they'd interrupted each other, and Ye Qingfeng laughed while Wu Hao smiled. The sound of laughter stopped a moment later as they both looked around, but no one seemed to have heard.

  "Two days ago," Wu Hao said. From Ye Qingfeng's conception of time, at least. From his own it'd been... a month, maybe? He was losing track of how often he'd died, where, and why. "Waking up is a good way to put it, I think."

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  Ye Qingfeng tilted his head. "What changed?"

  "No clue," Wu Hao admitted. That wasn't strictly true, but he wasn't going to tell Ye Qingfeng about the deaths.

  The other boy dropped down, sitting down on the treetrunk opposite Wu Hao. He seemed more animated, all of a sudden, like he'd been holding himself back for ages.

  "What gave me away?" Ye Qingfeng asked.

  Wu Hao hesitated. In a previous life, he'd - no, Ye Qingfeng wouldn't believe that, would he?

  "Little things," he said instead. "Nothing huge, just little ways in which you actually seemed to think. The others never do. I only noticed because we're all spending day and night around each other."

  Ye Qingfeng grimaced. "Glad it's just that," he admitted. "If the Uncles found out..."

  Wu Hao nodded. He'd experienced the joys of sticking out. Better that Ye Qingfeng didn't.

  "I've got a question," Wu Hao said, rubbing his hands against the cold. He nearly stopped himself a few times before realizing that 732 didn't care if he betrayed the fact that he was still a human being, not just Father's tool.

  "Ask," Ye Qingfeng said, stretching a little bit with his arms behind his back. It had to have been the first time either of them had relaxed even slightly in weeks. Maybe it wasn't smart to immediately let every barrier fall, but Wu Hao couldn't help himself.

  "This," Wu Hao said, and tapped the side of his head. "The blocks. How did you get rid of them?"

  "Oh," Ye Qingfeng said, eyebrows rising. "You mean you've still got that? I'd have hoped that whatever got you your name back, well..."

  "Yeah," Wu Hao said. "Same for the filter."

  Ye Qingfeng made a small noise of agreement.

  "So," Wu Hao said. "How did you? Break these blocks."

  The other boy shifted slightly on the treetrunk, staring into the distance before his eyes refocused.

  "My father's a rogue cultivator," he said, then amended: "Was. I think. I don't recall much of how I was taken, but he tried to stop it, and..."

  He seemed uncomfortable all of a sudden, like the chill of the wind had finally come through.

  "Sorry for your loss," Wu Hao said, wishing he had anything better to say. Ye Qingfeng's grief felt almost palpable, his qi subsiding slowly and settling deeper. Retreating from the world.

  Ye Qingfeng nodded, swallowed, then spoke again.

  "Father taught me a few things," he said. "Not much - nothing too important, not a secret art or anything, just the basics of qi. Everything he knew, which honestly wasn't all that much. When I woke up again after all the treatments, I just - I basically ripped out the needles, wove qi into my head, and then forced the needles to anchor to that qi instead."

  He noticed that Wu Hao didn't understand, so he explained: "I don't really recall the fine details. The first days I kept expecting someone to realize what I'd done and undo it somehow, but none of them ever bothered."

  "Huh," Wu Hao said. He rubbed his hands together. "Can I -"

  "It's impossible," Ye Qingfeng said. "You can't do it."

  Wu Hao grunted. "What do you mean?"

  "It's focused qi," he explained. "Straight from that old bastard Zhao. And Father's qi is mingled in there, as well."

  Bastard Zhao? He meant the cultivation guidance Uncle, probably. It was clear that Ye Qingfeng was relishing the chance to speak his mind.

  Wu Hao couldn't blame him.

  "It's rooted too deep," Ye Qingfeng said. "I've checked out several others while they were sleeping, trying to find out if I could repeat it, but I can't. I can't even get the needles to move at all."

  Wu Hao shifted, a little bit. "You can't?"

  "Sorry," Ye Qingfeng told him.

  Huh. An idea had occurred to him, a desperate plan that was probably really stupid. Nonetheless, he had nothing else.

  "Do you know anything," he asked, "about qi attunements?"

  Ye Qingfeng's eyes flitted to the side, as if recalling something.

  "Maybe," he admitted. "Maybe not under that name."

  "It's something Uncle Liu told me," Wu Hao shared, louder now that it was his turn to share a theory. "Qi has a certain taste, right?"

  "What?" Ye Qingfeng asked. "No it doesn't."

  Wu Hao's thoughts stopped. "Wait, what? It doesn't?"

  "Never noticed it," Ye Qingfeng said. "My father never mentioned it, either. I think he would have, if he could."

  "It does to me," Wu Hao insisted. "Your qi smells like grass after rain. 726 smells like pine. Uncle Bai smells like pungent wine. Father smells like something sweet that's rotting."

  "Wow," Ye Qingfeng said, eyes wide. "I never - wait."

  He peered at Wu Hao, looking at him from a few sides. "Are you sure you're not a sensor?"

  "A what?"

  "A sensor," Ye Qingfeng said. "You can detect qi from a distance. Some of the better sensors can even read emotions, they're like living lie detectors if they practice enough... It's pretty rare, I think."

  Wu Hao's brow furrowed. He'd thought that everyone could do what he did - that there had been absolutely nothing special about him except the dying and the reviving. It felt odd to realize that he wasn't as common as he'd thought.

  "Right, well," Wu Hao said, thrown from the question he'd been about to ask. "I was hoping to ask if you knew whether that taste was the same as an attunement, but if you can't detect qi then you wouldn't know."

  Ye Qingfeng's lips pursed.

  "I think they should be," he said, a little uncertainly. "Why?"

  "Zhao's qi feels like ice to me," Wu Hao said. "I'm hoping that that means he's attuned to water."

  "Probably," Ye Qingfeng said, thinking. "There's only five kinds of elements and two alignments, anyway, I think he's probably got a yin water alignment if he feels like ice to your senses..."

  Wu Hao nodded. "Good. I've got a plan, then."

  He started to stand up, and after a while Ye Qingfeng followed him.

  "Mind sharing?" he asked.

  "I'll try to take the blocks off this night," Wu Hao said. "Tomorrow, I'll ensure we get a particular mission with Uncle Bai. I'll wait quietly and try to - try to kill Uncle. After that, I don't know what'll happen."

  He stood, ready to get started on the next part of what might be called a plan, and Ye Qingfeng stood together with him, after giving him a wide-eyed look.

  "You'll really try to kill an Uncle?" Ye Qingfeng asked.

  "I'll have help," Wu Hao said. Hopefully.

  Ye Qingfeng stared at him a little while longer, then he swallowed. He pulled the face covering up again jerkily, made a half-turn to look away from Wu Hao.

  "Do it on your own," Ye Qingfeng said, trying to affect coldness. "Don't involve me."

  And with that, he walked off.