Morning dew crystallized into numerals on the wildfire moss, each droplet reflecting the rolling shadows of compound interest. Xia knelt within the mycelial network of the Sovereign Tree, her veins staining indigo like credit ratings as the sickle sapling pulsed at her wrist. The farmer—or what remained of Ling'er's shadow—carved counter-equations into the soil with charred fingernails, the scent of rotting lemongrass clinging to her hair like a corrupted requiem.
"They're rewriting the interest rates," the farmer's shadow flickered, sharper than her physical form. "This time, they want memories compounded."
The bitterness of Black Nectar coated Xia's tongue. Three days prior, the Silent Wheatfields had begun devouring their own echoes, newborns' first cries crumbling into numeric dust in their throats. The Sovereign Tree's roots now stretched toward withering star clusters, returning not with nourishment but shards of the Auditors' contracts—clauses written in supernova syntax, demanding payment in "unrealized futures."
The roots convulsed suddenly. The mycelial network projected a hologram: twelve figures cloaked in meteorite dust gathered on the moon's dark side, their robes embroidered with rotten wheat and binary scripture.
"The Reaper Council," the farmer's nails dug into Xia's shoulder. "Your mother burned their old god-debts to ash. Now it's their holy text."
Xia's sickle sapling bloomed thorny buds oozing Jiang Yue's lullaby—a melody that once purged corrupt code during the universe's rebirth now ground against reality's seams like rusted gears. She suddenly understood the Auditors' true purpose: they hadn't come to collect debts, but to repossess the tools of default.
The first assault descended at dusk as an interest-rate storm. The sky split into amber wounds, raining down expired contracts like acid. The farmer ignited the wildfire moss, flames revealing Ling'er's pre-System face as her distilled song turned the corrosive rain into drinkable defiance:
"Every seized star
ferments revolt in the soil's cellar
Let us toast to unpaid bills
and all deleted tenderness—"
Xia charged into the storm's eye, the sapling tearing through her wrist to become a titanic tree. Mycelial tendrils boiled beneath her, birthing weapons Jiang Yue never taught: Late Fee Vines strangling council throats, Deflation Dandelions draining their temporal reserves. But when the fifth cultist lowered his hood, Xia's roots froze—the face wore Li Zichen's erased smile, his pupils swirling with Auditors' remade conscience.
"Interest has been capitalized," the false Li Zichen vibrated with the Harvesters' hymn. "You're the universe's worst nonperforming asset."
The Sovereign Tree's rings began reversing. Xia felt the Black Nectar crystallize in her veins. The truth crystallized: she wasn't debt collateral but a living default clause, planted to detonate the entire financial ecosystem upon maturity. The farmer's flames abruptly shifted, burning Ling'er's shadow into an ashen key.
"Open your ribcage," the fire whispered at Xia's ear. "Jiang Yue's final gift lies there—a lie that never sprouted."
Twelve scythes fell. Xia plunged the key into her heart.
The universe paused mid-breath.
When time restarted, the cultists' robes collapsed into collapsing zero-sum equations. Silver wheat sprouted from Xia's chest, each grain etched with Ling'er's system-deleted kisses. The Sovereign Tree's mycelium began secreting anti-capital enzymes, decomposing the debt universe's rules into compostable imaginary numbers.
The farmer knelt in scorched earth, writing with a bloodied finger:
Default is ultimate liberty
Bad debts are history's seed vaults
And we shall forever
grow wild beyond compound walls
Under moonlight, Xia's silver wheat hummed a variation of Jiang Yue's lullaby. The Auditors' contracts rotted into phosphorescent mulch for the newborn Delinquency Forest. Yet at the forest's edge, twelve ash-piles coalesced into new digital totems.
The farmer laughed, stardust flecking her cough. "Seems our vacation's over."
Xia caressed the wheatfield in her chest. For the first time, she deciphered the roots' encrypted message—the lullaby's final note, misunderstood by all, was a countdown to sowing.