Driven out of her home by her father in the middle of winter, the young girl lived for months in an abandoned mill; when the river froze over and then broke open, the villagers finally understood why she never left.

### Chapter 1: The Abandoned Child of the Blackwood River

That winter arrived in the frontier town of Blackwood with a fury unlike anything seen in half a century. Whirlwinds howled through the canyons, blanketing the rooftops in thick ice and transforming the once turbulent Blackwood River into a silent, deathly white ribbon.

But the cold of the land was nothing compared to the human heart. At the height of the first snowstorm of the season, a tragedy unfolded at the Vance family mansion – the owners of the largest lumber mill in the region.

“Get out of my house! You mother-killing monster!”

Alistair Vance’s roar pierced the night wind. He brutally shoved his nineteen-year-old daughter, Adeline, out onto the snow-covered porch. Following her were a few tattered clothes and a small, locked wooden box.

Adeline tumbled into the freezing snow, her bare hands bleeding. She looked up at her father with her ash-gray eyes—eyes identical to her late mother’s. Those eyes, along with Adeline’s strange silence since birth, were a thorn in Alistair’s side. His wife had died shortly after Adeline’s birth, and for nineteen years, he had believed this silent daughter was an omen, a creature cursed by the river. When the Vance family’s lumber mill began to fail and Alistair himself fell ill, he found the perfect excuse: to blame everything on his poor daughter.

“Never show your face here again. Let the river you love feed you!”

*CRASH!*

The thick oak door slammed shut, ending the last vestiges of warmth and affection. Adeline rose in the freezing night, her thin body trembling beneath her thin coat. She didn’t cry, for tears would freeze instantly on her cheeks. She clutched the wooden box tightly to her chest, staggering through the darkness, heading downstream.

The only place she could find refuge was an abandoned windmill on the edge of the Blackwood River. It had been abandoned for over thirty years, since the old windmill operator died. The enormous wooden turbine blades were rotten and covered in moss, and the townspeople always rumored that it was haunted by the spirits of those who had drowned in the river.

But for Adeline, that cold windmill was the only home still open to welcome her.

—

### Chapter 2: A Solitary Life in an Ice Fortress

For three long winter months, Adeline lived a life almost completely isolated from the human world. The townspeople occasionally caught glimpses of her slender figure peeking through the broken window of the mill, or saw her trudging along the frozen riverbank, gathering dry branches.

Everyone thought this deranged, mute girl would soon perish from hunger and cold. But Adeline survived tenaciously.

Inside the abandoned mill, she turned the ground floor into a makeshift shelter. She used dry leaves and rotting sacks as a mattress, and the firewood she gathered to build a small fire to keep warm at night. Strangely, Adeline never left the mill for more than fifteen minutes. Even when the charitys at the town church offered to take her to a social welfare center in the town, where it was warm and had hot food, Adeline resolutely shook her head. She clung to the stone walls of the mill as if it were her last fortress.

“She’s a real lunatic,” people whispered among themselves at the bar. “She’s driven to desperation by her father. That mill is both cold and dilapidated, right next to the frozen river; it’ll collapse when the spring floods. Yet she clings to it and refuses to leave.”

They didn’t know that Adeline couldn’t sleep a wink every night. She sat on the top floor of the mill, where the enormous iron and wood main shaft of the turbine was located. This shaft penetrated deep into the earth, directly into the riverbed beneath the building’s foundation.

Adeline would press her ear against the icy shaft for hours on end. She couldn’t speak, but her hearing was more acute than anyone else in the area. Through the metal sound-conducting rod, she heard sounds that ordinary people couldn’t hear: the cracking of the meters-thick ice layers beneath the riverbed, the churning of the underground water being compressed under immense pressure, and even the deep groans of the mountain upstream.

She was waiting for something. Something terrible that only she could sense. Every day, Adeline diligently performs a task that would make anyone who saw her think she’s completely insane: She uses her mother’s small wooden box – containing her grandfather’s antique mechanical tools, a former naval engineer’s – to repair the gear system of an old mill. Her hands are bleeding and calloused from tightening rusted screws and applying animal fat to joints that have been stuck for three decades. She turns the levers, freeing the auxiliary shaft locked by iron chains.

She’s not repairing the mill to grind wheat. She’s transforming it into a…

Other things.

—

### Chapter 3: Omens from Upstream

At the end of the third month, as the first rays of spring sunshine began to appear, the temperature rose suddenly. This should have been a time of joy for the people of Blackwood, but for Adeline, it was a death knell.

The rapid warming caused the snow on Mount Voron to melt into torrents cascading down the Blackwood River. However, the surface ice of the river near the town was still too thick to melt. This created an extremely dangerous hydrological phenomenon: **Ice Jam**.

Millions of cubic meters of water and massive icebergs from upstream rushed down, blocked by the solid ice wall at the bend just before the town of Blackwood. The water pressure below increased hourly, turning the river into a giant ticking time bomb. If that ice wall were to suddenly shatter, a cataclysmic flood, accompanied by razor-sharp shards of ice, would sweep away the entire low-lying town.

Adeline heard the monster’s awakening more clearly than anyone else through the iron shaft of the mill. The roaring of the choked water below caused the mill to shake violently.

She immediately ran into the town. Standing in the town square, Adeline tried to gesture with both hands, her face filled with panic. She pointed towards the river, then towards the sky, mimicking a loud explosion, desperately pleading for everyone to evacuate to the higher ground.

“What’s this? Is this mute girl having another fit of madness?” A lumberjack sneered.

Alistair Vance, her father, who was out strolling with his new business partners, felt utterly humiliated upon seeing his daughter. He approached and slapped her hard across the face.

“Get back to your rubbish mill! Don’t you dare disgrace me here!” He roared, “The river is fine, the ice is melting beautifully. Who are you trying to scare?”

Adeline fell to the ground, blood trickling from the corner of her mouth. She looked at her father, at the indifferent, arrogant townspeople. Her gaze shifted from sorrow to determination. She stood up, no longer trying to persuade them. She turned and ran for her life towards the windmill.

If they didn’t save themselves, she would be the one to bear the burden of the entire town’s fate, no matter how much they hated her.

—

### Chapter 4: The Climax – When the River Breaks

That night, disaster struck.

At two o’clock in the morning, a terrifying explosion, like a thousand cannons firing simultaneously, echoed throughout the valley. The massive ice wall upstream officially shattered under the unbearable pressure.

“The flood! The ice flood is coming! Run!”

The church bells rang incessantly in panic. The people of Blackwood awoke, but it was too late. From the bend in the river, a wall of water nearly ten meters high, mixed with tons of sharp ice shards, hurtled furiously toward the town at the speed of a bullet train.

In the darkness, death was imminent. The force of the water was enough to flatten every wooden house, every building, and drown the entire population in the icy waters of winter. Alistair Vance watched helplessly from his window, his legs trembling. This flood would sweep away his lumber mill, his house, and his life.

But just as the deadly torrent was about to engulf the town, a magnificent and unbelievable sight unfolded at the abandoned windmill.

*CRACK… CRACK…*

The enormous windmill’s blades, which had been motionless for thirty years, suddenly began to move. Under Adeline’s adjustment of the pressure gear system, the mill’s main shaft, connected to an ancient underground sluice gate system beneath the river – a system her grandfather had secretly designed years ago to regulate the water but which the authorities had forgotten – was now fully activated.

Instead of turning by wind, the mill was now rotating in the opposite direction, powered by the water of the underground river. The enormous blades spun at breakneck speed, creating immense centrifugal force and pressure beneath the stone foundation.

*BOOM!*

The ground around the mill cracked open. The underground sluice gates swung open, diverting half of the floodwaters and massive icebergs into a desolate, flooded valley behind the mill – a dead, uninhabited land.

The mill acted as a giant ship’s bow, a colossal wave-cutting device, splitting the ice monster in two. Half of the floodwaters diverted safely into the wilderness valley, while the other half lost momentum, its height dropping to less than a meter as it surged into the town—enough to submerge the streets but not enough to destroy the houses.

The people of Blackwood stood on their rooftops, watching the solitary windmill stand firm amidst the raging torrent, its blades spinning wildly to bear the full force of the flood. The ancient stone building groaned, its wood cracking, yet it stood firm like a guardian deity.

—

### Chapter 5: The Terrifying Twist Behind the Curtain of Water

The flood swept through in two hours and then began to recede rapidly. The town of Blackwood was miraculously saved. No

No one was dead, the houses remained intact, except the roads were covered in mud and shards of ice.

As soon as the water receded to knee level, Alistair Vance and the entire town, led by the priest, quietly made their way toward the windmill. Their hearts were filled with regret, shock, and intense curiosity. Now they understood why Adeline never left this place. She wasn’t insane. She was here to protect them.

The windmill’s wooden door had been swept away by the floodwater. Inside, everything was in ruins, submerged in water and mud.

They found Adeline on the top floor. She lay slumped beside the main iron lever, her hands stained with blood, her body utterly exhausted, but her ash-gray eyes were open, staring intently at her mother’s wooden box lying wide open on the floor.

Alistair rushed to her, kneeling beside his daughter. For the first time in his life, this proud man broke down in tears.

“Adeline… I’m sorry… I’m a terrible person! You saved the whole town, you saved my old life…”

But Adeline didn’t look at him. Using her last ounce of strength, she pointed to the wooden box. Inside were not just mechanical tools. There was an old letter, carefully wrapped in waterproof paper.

The priest stepped forward, trembling as he picked up the letter and read it aloud before everyone. It was the handwriting of Adeline’s late mother, written the night before she died nineteen years ago.

> *”My dearest Alistair,*

*If you are reading this letter, it means I am no longer with you. The local fortune teller said this child is cursed, but that’s not true. Before he died, my grandfather left behind a hydrological map of the Blackwood River. He warned that every fifty years, the river would erupt in a devastating flood of ice, and this windmill is the only key to saving the town thanks to the underground dam system he secretly built.*

*I have given birth to a special daughter. She is not mute because of a curse, but because her vocal cords are naturally sensitive to the sound frequencies of the river. She can ‘hear’ the voice of the water. I know she will be the chosen one to operate this windmill when that day comes. Please love her, protect her, for she is your guardian angel, and of this land…”*

The priest’s voice choked as he read the letter. The room fell silent.

Alistair Vance was stunned, as if struck by lightning. It turned out that for the past nineteen years, he had tormented and driven away the only person chosen by fate to save him. Adeline’s silence wasn’t a curse, but a great gift from nature, a silent sacrifice she had carried since birth.

—

### Chapter 6: The River’s New Song

Spring had truly arrived in Blackwood. Warm sunlight bathed the wheat fields in golden hues, and the Blackwood River returned to its gentle, clear, and tranquil flow through the valley.

The old windmill was no longer abandoned. The townspeople had pooled their money and effort to restore it into a magnificent, sturdy fortress of white stone. Its blades, painted a brilliant red, proudly spun in the spring breeze. They named it “Adeline’s Tower of Protection.”

At the Vance family’s lumber mill, Alistair had officially retired. He dedicated most of his fortune to establishing a fund to support children with disabilities and congenital defects in the area. He was no longer a cold tyrant, but a gentle father, personally preparing the finest meals each day to bring to his daughter at the windmill.

One May afternoon, Adeline sat by the newly opened window of the windmill, her hair gently blowing in the breeze. Her hands were healed, and her skin was healthier than before.

“Adeline! It’s time for dinner!”

Alistair’s warm voice called from downstairs. Adeline turned, seeing her father smiling as he ascended the stairs, carrying a plate of warm apple pie.

Adeline couldn’t speak, but she walked over and hugged her father tightly. An embrace that spoke volumes of forgiveness. She looked out the window at the Blackwood River, sparkling in the sunset. She no longer had to listen to the roar of the icy monster. Now, the river seemed to be whispering a different story to her – a story of love, understanding, and a new life filled with happiness that had truly begun.