Lan Qi jumped angrily onto the shore. Behind him, the raft had completed its final mission, and had finally split into seven or eight logs. They were carried downstream by the rushing river, and then buried in the raging current, until they turned to dust and disappeared along with the river into the great crevasse a kilometer away.

The White-headed Eagle sat on the wet riverbank. A mutated shrub beside the river twisted and turned, then extended its sharp sawtooth leaves ...