The Inn of Wealth - 31

The forty-seventh day since the Butterfly Ginger bloomed, the well water has changed. Shopkeeper Jin was the first to discover it. That early morning, as usual, he carried his bucket to the well. As he bent down to draw water, before his hand even touched the rope, he saw a faint blue light shimmering on the surface of the water at the bottom of the well. It wasn't moonlight, nor a reflection; the water itself was glowing. He crouched down, staring for a long time, then whispered, "Asu, come look." Asu emerged from the kitchen and stood by the well. She didn't bend down, just looked down. There was no surprise on her face, as if she had been waiting for this moment for a very long time. "Wuxuan," she said. The water surface at the bottom of the well trembled slightly, as if someone had gently tapped the wall from deep within. Then, the light began to spread—not bubbling up from the bottom, but seeping out from the cracks in the well wall, spreading like roots onto the stone slabs around the well's mouth, and then along the ground towards the banyan tree. Shopkeeper Jin silently took two steps back, still holding the bucket, water already spilled on the ground. He said nothing, but his body reacted before his consciousness did, retreating a distance. Where the blue light flowed, the pebbles on the ground began to move on their own. It wasn't like being pushed or swept away by an external force, but more like they had found their original positions and took a few seconds to rearrange themselves. When the light stopped, the stones around the well's mouth had been rearranged into a complete circular array. Larger stones formed the outer ring, smaller stones the inner ring, with a shallow groove in between, like an unfinished magic circle awaiting its final piece.