Grandmother's main room before sunrise; cold blue-grey light through cracked shutters, funeral papers pushed aside, Du Heng's annotated registry half-visible in Wen's satchel.

Wen begins with obvious hiding places in the old house: floorboards, bed frame, shrine table.

The roof beams and hanging herb bundles reveal the house's practical dangers.

Wen checks old veterinary bottles and medicine jars stored near farm tools.

Grandmother's yard and chicken shed; the behavior of animals points Wen away from the house interior.

A mark on the feed sack triggers Wen's memory of her grandmother's old rules.

Wen opens the grey corn sack and finds it packed to protect a hidden bundle.

Inside the grandmother's house again, Wen unwraps the hidden book on the table beside the public registry.

Wen reads the ledger's format and realizes it is bureaucratic, not romantic or ceremonial.

The meaning of the bride list begins to invert in Wen's mind.

A contract note in the ledger explains the village rule in plain procedural terms.

Wen reads entries showing how the contract is used to decide water, land, and which families are vulnerable.

Wen finds a set of entries that name women not listed on the public bride wall.

The ledger implicates Wen's grandmother directly as a deputy recorder.

Wen reads the entry her grandmother made for Wen's grandfather's death.

Wen processes the double injury: grandmother as participant and preserver of evidence.

Wen finds newer inserts that connect death records to pharmacy supplies.

The ledger shows entries after Luo Qing stopped being called wife, connecting her survival to recordkeeping.

Wen decides what to take and what to leave, balancing proof against danger.

Wen leaves grandmother's house and heads toward the village pharmacy before the village fully wakes.

At the pharmacy, Luo Qing receives Wen before Old Pharmacist Gan opens the shop front.

Wen presses Luo Qing for a plain answer about the ledger's purpose.

Luo Qing gives Wen the operational truth of the death accounting without dressing it as legend.

Wen exits the pharmacy with confirmation that the evidence leads to the Du altar.