"I don't think that merchant knows what a crack is, man!" Líng Yá commented.

A crack didn't sufficiently describe what was now in their path. It was a gap several feet across and so deep that none of them could see the bottom. A makeshift bridge spanned the gap made of wooden planks so that merchants could continue to travel across it.

"Well the information was secondhand, though I honestly expected 'large crack' to be an exaggeration," Shāng Bù Huàn frowned, rubbing at his chin.

"It wasn't exaggerated enough!" Líng Yá pointed out.

Shāng followed the crack with his gaze, noticing it was slightly larger the closer it got to the forest to the west. He rubbed at his face with his sleeve. The weather certainly was warmer in the southern regions this time of year. "Given the timeframe, if the merchant's tale was accurate, this ravine is recent and happened within the few days that the brother was in the southern town."

"And given our travel time it's possible she's already moved again," Mù Tiān Mìng pointed out.

Làng Wū Yáo turned back towards their path where they left the last town behind. A buzzing noise had started without warning, the cries of summer singing out in the afternoon sun, but he couldn't sense anything that felt like a threat. It was just buzzing.

Mù followed his gaze back to their treed path. She wrinkled her brow, spotting the bugs on the trees buzzing away. "I hear them too. The summer cicadas have awoken. I was hoping we'd have a bit more time before they emerged. This could really complicate things."

Shāng sighed. Everything really was working against them right now. A plan of action would be particularly difficult with actual cicadas now in the mix. Not that plans had been particularly working for them lately. It was honestly what they were trying to avoid.

"I know you're from the colder regions. Have you heard cicadas before, Wū Yáo?" she turned to him.

Làng nodded. "Briefly at the palace." He closed his eyes, stepping towards the trees and listening to the buzz, stopping only a few feet away from his companions. He recalled this sound. He listened to it from the window in his room while stuffed into the palace. It was a spacious room, much larger than his entire hut in the mountains and where he stayed at the taverns. But even with how unnecessarily large it was, it still had felt like a cage.

Then he'd heard the sound one afternoon just outside his window. It was warm that day, marking the onset of the summer months. "Can you hear them? They're singing." He felt the same way that first afternoon. It was a song he'd never heard before, bugs singing out in a chorus just out of reach. They were singing freely, not caged up like he was.

Shāng closed his eyes, attempting to listen. "It just sounds like buzzing."

Làng smiled, amused. Perhaps the notion was all in his head, an association of that freedom that his soul had cried out for. He'd ignored that desire for so long, pushing all the supernatural songs and the pain in his heart into Líng Yá. He didn't know that there was another path for someone like him. He was a supernatural blade, one to be wielded by those more powerful. At least they felt more powerful at the time. He had his own resolve now and knew that they no longer had a hold over him.

Mù stepped up beside him, listening to the songs as well. "They are singing the songs of summer."

Shāng sighed. Leave it to the two musicians to understand this buzzing noise better than he ever could.

Làng recalled how he felt listening to their song the first time. "Their bodies, their instrument; the world, their stage. They sing only for so long, a seasonal concert only those who listen may hear."

She watched the cicadas perched on the trees, singing out their chorus in the early summer heat. "Do Yīn Xiàtiān's cicadas not sing?"

Làng placed a hand on his ear. He still recalled the painful buzz in his head that brought him to his knees. He recalled the buzzing from the last battle, the sounds of their approach, their movements in battle. "Their songs are like a broken string filled with malice." He had almost forgotten the songs he heard in the palace, but this trading route had reminded him of something pleasant from his caged past.

"A broken string." Mù closed her eyes, trying to recall the sounds from the last battle. She tried to separate them from the other noise of the battle, the sounds the sorcerous sword had made, and Yīn's desire to make Làng's song hers. It wasn't easy to separate. Her hearing wasn't quite like his. Hers ordinary hearing, and his was fueled by supernatural abilities.

She knew what a broken string sounded like. She played a stringed instrument herself. But to imagine a broken string with malice was a bit harder. There were aggressive tunes, ones with darker tones and even darker lyrics. Imagining them as a cicada was certainly a strange thought. He also could hear malice while she could not. The description made more sense that way.

"I wonder what would happen if Yīn Xiàtiān took command of these cicadas," Mù pondered.

"They would sing a foul tune," Làng replied with certainty.

"That will make it much harder for her to hide amongst the summer cicadas," Shāng observed. "I wonder if she knows the different tunes."

"Perhaps," Làng considered the thought.

"But it's not likely that buzzing obsessive freak would know that we know!" Líng Yá added.

"That's a good point," Shāng nodded. "It's pretty unlikely she knows how good your hearing is and how much you can hear." Not that Shāng understood it completely himself. He knew that Làng could practically map out the world with his hearing and hear more conceptual sounds like good and evil, but Shāng knew that from knowing him.

Yīn likely understood some amount of this after targeting Làng's hearing directly. Any ordinary person with a cicada in their ear would be crying in pain regardless, but Làng's attempt to continue fighting despite the noise was enough to indicate he was capable of understanding the world in a different way.

And the assassins were more intelligent than the imperials, at the very least. Yīn probably thought of all of this already. To some extent.

Làng turned, peering past Shāng towards the treeline further away. Birds suddenly scattered into the skies as the treetops swayed irregularly. A sour note barely resounded over the cicada's songs.

"Well that answers if she's still in the area," Shāng reasoned, seeing the visual signs of the earthquake-like effect. "We know where to find her."

Làng didn't quite like the idea of heading into whatever mess she was creating in that forest. They would be heading into her domain, and each time they encountered her, it was always as if she were controlling the environment. Buildings gave them a slight advantage for a place to land and cover, but cover only meant so much for a sword that could crack the land like it did where they stood.

He placed a hand on Shāng's shoulder, stopping him before he left. Perhaps they didn't have a choice. "The cicadas have changed their tune. It has become foul."

...

Author's musings

I've been teasing about the summer cicadas. Well here they are!

Làng's hearing is so sensitive and tuned to everything, I would imagine that he could tell the difference between normal cicadas and Yīn's. He has to hear something when it comes to illusions. They likely make a different sound. But if the memory was linked to his time in the palace, he would've tried to push it from his mind. Just like he wants to forget a bug in his ear. Gross.