Meng Ruji emerged from the dream and saw that the sky outside looked much the same as when she had fallen asleep.

She thought that Mo Li’s words were sometimes true and sometimes false, but regarding nightmare techniques, he had never deceived her. The time in dreams was truly under his control – they had chatted for so long in the dream, yet no time had passed outside.

Meng Ruji walked to the window and looked out at the vast sea of clouds.

Mu Sui said he would use fireworks as a signal. She wondered how long it would take him to lure Zhan Ye away, and how long the gold Luo Yingfeng gave him could hold Zhan Ye back…

If Zhan Ye acted differently from their predictions, if he didn’t play by the rules and took the Golden Staff to deal with Mu Sui, or if he had left some other contingency…

“Worried about him?” came a soft voice from the stone in her arms.

Meng Ruji gazed distantly at the clouds. She initially wanted to deny it, but after considering for a moment, she said: “Comrades in battle should be worried about.”

“Is it merely because he’s a comrade in battle?”

“What else?” Meng Ruji asked back. In the end, she inexplicably recalled the sensation from the dream earlier, when Mu Sui’s fingertip had traced across her palm. She rubbed her palm, erasing that strange itch. “He’s taking on the most dangerous tasks – it’s rare for me to stand behind someone else…”

Meng Ruji kept watch at the window for a day and a night, from sunset to starlit sky, then from another window, she watched the sunrise.

A day and a half quietly slipped away. She still hadn’t received Mu Sui’s signal, and it was almost time for Zhan Ye’s promised “three days later.” Meng Ruji grew anxious.

Mo Li kept reassuring her: “I can see that Qianshan Jun is extremely shrewd. You can rest assured about his actions. Without complete certainty, he definitely won’t send that signal lightly. Why don’t you rest a bit? I’ll keep watch for you.”

Just as Meng Ruji was about to refuse, suddenly! From the distant sea of clouds below, a flash of fire broke through the cloud layers and mist, flying into Meng Ruji’s line of sight.

The fireworks flashed brightly but made no sound. In moments, the light dimmed again. In broad daylight, it was quite inconspicuous – if Meng Ruji hadn’t been watching intently, she might have missed it.

“Let’s go!”

Meng Ruji immediately sprang into action. Mu Sui’s words echoed in her mind as if he were guiding her right now—

The west-facing window, in the crevice of the fifth stone wall block below the center… there’s a protruding stone particle…

Meng Ruji felt along the crevice until she found an extremely small protrusion. She pressed it down. In the next instant, wind swirled around her, a formation’s light flashed beneath her feet, and then all the blazing sunlight above the sea of clouds disappeared. Her surroundings suddenly became dark, and she could even hear the squeaking of mice.

Meng Ruji stood up and found herself in an uninhabited residential area.

This place was more dilapidated than she had expected. Spider webs were everywhere, and dust covered the ground.

She didn’t waste time, glanced up through a hole in the roof, used the daylight to quickly determine direction, and immediately felt her way to the southwest corner of the house.

“Under the loose brick wall…” Meng Ruji muttered, tugging at each broken brick wall with her fingers. Finally, she pulled up a wall brick, and beneath it were three round silver pearls.

Grabbing the three silver pearls, Meng Ruji walked out of the dilapidated, uninhabited residence.

Unlike the heights of Zhuliu City’s main hall, this residential area was below the cloud cover. The clouds above were thick, blocking sunlight, making the weather gloomy, and causing the surrounding scenery to appear lifeless.

As Meng Ruji pushed open the broken door, mice and mosquitoes in the alley scattered in all directions. This was like a completely different world from the scenery above.

Thinking of Zhan Ye’s plan to draw Nai River water into the clouds to rain down destruction, Meng Ruji felt that what hung above her head wasn’t cloud and rain, but a murderous blade.

The direction of Zhuliu City’s main hall was easy to identify – the highest point, where pavilions built following the mountain’s contours extended into the thick clouds.

Meng Ruji formed hand seals, used the three silver pieces to cast wind-riding techniques, and headed toward the highest point. As she rode the wind, she spoke to Mo Li in her arms: “When we get up there, I’ll take the Golden Staff and use it to destroy the formation. Then we’ll take the Golden Staff to find Zhan Ye and seal him directly!”

“Good.” Mo Li chuckled. “No delays – saves you from worrying too much about your husband.”

“Your words are really…”

Before she could finish the word “excessive,” Meng Ruji suddenly saw a silver light flash swiftly past her face with a “whoosh.”

What was that?

The next instant, Meng Ruji felt the formation beneath her feet become unstable. Looking down, she saw that the three silver pieces in her hand had completely disappeared!

They were stolen!

Meng Ruji suddenly realized what had happened. Before her wind-riding technique completely failed, she used the last of the technique’s power to propel herself forward, turning herself into an arrow to catch up with the silver light ahead and embrace it.

This maneuver made Mo Li in her arms cry out: “Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

Without silver to power her wind-riding technique, she could fall to her death.

But Meng Ruji couldn’t worry about that now.

She held tightly to the silver light. In mid-air, Meng Ruji couldn’t tell what was within the silver light – she only knew it wasn’t human.

Meng Ruji’s weight made the silver light unable to support itself. It swayed and brought Meng Ruji crashing down into an alley.

The fall was severe. Meng Ruji’s arm was directly dislocated, but she didn’t cry out in pain. She got up and immediately found the three silver pieces that had rolled to the ground, clutching the money tightly in her hand. Only then did she push her dislocated arm against the wall and, enduring the pain, reset her arm with a “crack.”

After completing this series of actions, Meng Ruji looked up at what had stolen her silver light – a straw puppet.

She swept her gaze over it and reached into the puppet’s heart area, pulling out a silver piece. When the silver pearl left the puppet, the puppet completely lost its driving force, fell to the ground, and became a dead object again.

Meng Ruji gripped the four silver pearls: “This Zhuliu City is truly in chaos – even flying in the sky, people come to rob you…”

Before she finished speaking, urgent footsteps came from one end of the alley.

Mo Li said, “Do you need my help?”

“I don’t need you yet.”

As she spoke, she turned around and saw three or four men rushing out. They wore identical clothing, as if they were from the same place.

“Boss! She even stole our money!”

From their words, it was clear that the money-stealing was their scheme. “I’m trying to save you.” Meng Ruji said coldly. “You’d better not interfere with my business.”

“Hmph, save us?” the leader said. “How novel! Save yourself first! Hand over the money!”

Meng Ruji said no more, rotating the silver pearls in her hand. Before she could attack, more footsteps came from behind the alley.

“I saw that person fall this way! She must have money on her!”

Turning around again, another group of people had arrived from behind. Each wore different, ragged clothing, but all looked fierce and menacing.

However, these two groups didn’t seem to know each other. Meeting in the alley, both sides were somewhat wary of each other.

Meng Ruji weighed the situation in her mind, broke half a silver pearl in her arms, and formed a hand seal: “I do have money. Come and take it.”

She tossed the silver pearls skyward. Immediately, the crisp sound of falling pearls rang out. Everyone’s eyes reddened with greed. Some couldn’t restrain themselves and lunged forward. The three on the other side weren’t willing to fall behind, drawing their knives: “It’s all ours! Nobody move!”

“We have more people! Don’t fear them! Attack!”

The two groups each produced their silver money and blade weapons. Meng Ruji also took advantage of the chaos to use silver money techniques to create sword energy, striking one from each side. With injured people on both sides, they became even more heated, entangling in fierce combat.

Meng Ruji didn’t dare use wind-riding at this moment, fearing the battling parties would notice her. She waited for an opening and ran out from the side with fewer people.

Running frantically, she passed several alleys. Inside, people were either stealing things or lying bloodied by the roadside.

In Zhuliu City, the uninhabited residential areas were gray and desolate, but wherever there were people, there was blood and cruelty.

Finally reaching an uninhabited area, Meng Ruji stopped to rest. She looked up at the main hall, now closer than before. Jiētian Pavilion was still above the clouds, its appearance invisible.

“The person trying to save the world gets robbed halfway – who would believe that?” Mo Li’s voice in her arms was somewhat ethereal; whether mocking Meng Ruji or himself was unclear. “Sometimes, I think destroying the world wouldn’t be bad either… It’s completely rotten.”

Meng Ruji fell silent for a moment. She turned and saw a little girl in the corner, curled up with her arms around her legs, hiding in a pile of dry grass. She was weak, helpless, and did not want to be discovered. But because her gaze met Meng Ruji’s, she immediately began trembling with fear, forgetting even to look away.

“Look into her eyes and say that again.” Meng Ruji said.

Mo Li fell silent.

Meng Ruji looked away. Formation light emerged from the three-and-a-half silver pearls in her hand. Unlike Meng Ruji’s previous wind-riding technique, this time she seemed to be accumulating all her power, attempting to soar skyward in one burst.

While waiting, she said: “I’ve only heard that when Mu Sui was City Lord before, Zhuliu City wasn’t like this. What made Zhuliu City become this way was precisely that will to survive that once moved you – it’s just that the environment was different.”

The power finished accumulating. Before Meng Ruji and Mo Li transformed into a light arrow, leaving the ground, Mo Li heard her say—

“Right now, I’m going to twist this environment back.”