Am I a Teacher

The moment Chen Guan stepped inside, the blue stone lamps of the circular hall, the black-and-white stone tiles, and the dry circular pool were all swallowed by the darkness behind him.

There was no sensation of falling beneath his feet, nor the usual pull of a teleportation array.

Chen Guan simply took one step forward, and the light before his eyes abruptly changed color.

A grayish-yellow sky pressed down overhead.

Narrow alleys were lined with squat, low houses, their eaves worn and broken, missing most of their tiles, their walls sandblasted white by the wind.

The ground wasn't paved with stone—only hard-packed dirt, dry and cracked, the fissures stretching from his feet to the end of the lane.

In the distance, the faint outline of a wall was visible.

The wall was very low; atop it stood a few weathered wooden poles, hung with tattered cloth. When the wind blew, the strips of fabric slapped against the poles, producing a very faint rustling sound.

Nothing about this place looked like a modern city, let alone somewhere beneath an ice sea.

Guan Jinyue stood beside him. Her longsword was still in her hand, and a silver glint flashed within her sleeve—the spatial ability that had been suppressed earlier had mysteriously recovered.

She first swept her gaze across the surroundings, then looked at Chen Guan.

“Is this... inside the mural?”

Chen Guan’s eyes fell on himself.

His original clothes were gone, replaced by an old, long robe. The fabric looked ordinary, with wide sleeves that hung down to cover half the back of his hand.

The robe was a dark color, its edges frayed and worn by wind and sand.

But the coffin strapped to his back was still there, and the ring on his finger hadn't vanished—it was as if he had simply changed clothes in a single second.

The clothes on Guan Jinyue beside him had changed too.

She wore a black robe, her silver hair tied up with a black cord, her long sword hanging diagonally at her side. The robe concealed her original outfit, seamlessly blending her into the wind and sand of this old city.

Her appearance hadn't changed, and from her reaction, his hadn’t either.

Chen Guan tried to summon Baal.

There was no response in his mind—not even static.

This was worse than before.

Baal had been completely shut out, like a virus on a computer being caught and quarantined by 360 Safety Assistant.

Chen Guan lifted his head and looked ahead. Under a crumbling eave, a child sat on the doorstep.

The child was very thin, wrapped in a cloak washed to a pale white, with seven dark buttons on its front lapel.

He held a piece of dried bread in both hands, his head bowed, nibbling at it slowly.

The bread was hard as rock. Every time the child bit off a piece, he had to let it soften in his mouth before he could swallow it.

When Chen Guan saw those seven dark buttons, his steps came to a halt.

Beidou?

After taking a couple more bites, the child seemed to hear footsteps and looked up at Chen Guan.

His face was much clearer than it had been in the mural. He wasn't very old, his face was smudged with dust, but his eyes were bright, carrying a sharpness that years of hunger hadn't yet worn away.

He first looked at Chen Guan, his expression showing no wariness.

Then, only afterward, did he notice Guan Jinyue.

The child’s chewing slowed, and he lowered the bread in his hands a little.

“Teacher, who is this person?”

As the words landed, Guan Jinyue and Chen Guan exchanged a glance. Neither of them spoke.

That one word—teacher—had already laid out their positions clearly.

In this story, Chen Guan had become the robed figure, the one from the mural who took the child through the desert, the coast, the snow plains.

As for Guan Jinyue.

In this story, she had no assigned role—she was an outsider.

Chen Guan lowered his sleeve to cover his ring and stepped forward two paces.

“This lady is a friend of mine.”

The child gave a little ‘oh’ and accepted it quickly.

He didn’t press further, nor did he keep staring at Guan Jinyue. He simply broke the dried bread in his hands into two halves, tucked the smaller half back into his robe, and held out the bigger half to Chen Guan.

“Teacher, do you want some?”

Chen Guan looked at the piece of bread. There were a few teeth marks on it, and the edges were smudged with dust.

The child held it out to him very seriously.

Guan Jinyue’s gaze flicked over the bread and then settled back on the child’s face.

She had clearly recognized that this was the same child from the mural.

Chen Guan didn’t take it.

“You eat it.”

The child withdrew his hand and took a small bite.

Then, “I’ll save half for tonight.”

Chen Guan looked at the smaller half of bread tucked in the child’s robe. This kid appeared to have been living this way for a long time.

He recalled the mural—in the earliest painting, the child sat beside some ruins, and the robed figure stood before him, reaching out a hand.

Before Chen Guan could fully process the information, the child had already jumped down from the doorstep, brushing the dust off his cloak.

“Teacher, you’re back early today.”

Chen Guan went along with it.

“Yeah, there wasn’t much going on today.”

When he heard that, the child’s eyes brightened a little.

“Then, will we practice reading today?”

Chen Guan followed the thread. “Yes.”

The child immediately turned and ran into the house.

The house was very low—its doorframe so short an adult would have to stoop to enter.

Inside, there was little furniture: a wooden table with a missing leg propped against the wall, its broken corner resting on a stone; in the corner, a few bundles of hay were piled with old cloth spread on top—presumably where the child slept.

Guan Jinyue walked to the doorway but didn’t go inside immediately.

Her gaze swept every corner of the room. There was no trace of spiritual energy fluctuation, nor the warm, lived-in feeling of a real home.

It didn’t feel like an illusion, but it was too real—so real that every grain of dust could settle on a sleeve.

Chen Guan ducked his head and entered.

The child had already pulled out a thin wooden plank from under the table, picked up a piece of charcoal, and sat down neatly in front of the table.

He placed the half-bread on the corner of the table, covering it carefully with his cloak as if to protect it.

“Teacher, I can write that character from yesterday now.”

Chen Guan walked to the table. On the wooden plank, a character was drawn somewhat crookedly.

Gui.

Chen Guan recognized the character, but the script here was different from the ancient script used outside.

It looked almost like modern characters, but had a few strange, bent strokes, giving it a somewhat awkward structure.

The child looked up at him, as if waiting for praise.

Chen Guan stared at the character, a chill crawling up his scalp. Damn. I shouldn’t have agreed.

“Not bad.”

The child immediately gripped the charcoal tighter, his lips pressing together uncontrollably in a suppressed smile.

Guan Jinyue stood by the door, watching this scene. Her grip on her sword loosened a fraction.

It seemed to be the first time she had seen Chen Guan speak to a child like this—neither cold nor warm, with no deliberate coaxing.

But that simple “not bad” was already enough to make the kid at the table happy for half a day.

The child wrote another word on the plank.

Jia.

When he reached the last stroke, he paused, and asked softly, “Teacher, if gui and jia are put together, does it really mean ‘going home’?”

Chen Guan looked at the wooden plank.

Gui jia—going home.

The vision from the circular pool, the mouth shape the child had made to him, the line from the forum threads—all of it clicked into place at once.

Chen Guan didn’t answer too quickly. He wasn’t sure which words he said in this story might trigger a change.

Nor was he sure whether this child before him was a memory left behind by Beidou himself, or an old shadow reconstructed by the Vow’s remnants from the murals.

Guan Jinyue spoke instead: “Where is it that you want to go back to?”

When the person inside the story couldn’t say the words, she would have to be the one to say them.