My dao to eternity

The first families left within the week, quietly at first, a merchant's cart here, a craftsman's household there, until the trickle became something closer to a steady current flowing out through the southern gate. Li Fan watched them go from his own doorway some mornings, understanding the impulse without yet sharing it. A mortal life could be packed onto a cart and carried somewhere safer. His couldn't, not entirely, not with a decade of cultivation infrastructure buried beneath his own training room floor.

He prepared anyway, the same careful, unhurried way he prepared for anything. A modest pack, kept always within reach now, holding coin, essential medicine, the two carved birds wrapped safe in cloth. He wouldn't run at the first sign of trouble. But he intended, if running eventually became the only sane choice left, to run without wasting a single unnecessary minute deciding what to carry.

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