“Chief!”

Yu Jiuling came running in from outside, his footsteps so light and buoyant he looked exactly like a child who had just come home from school — and on one of those rare, triumphant days when he had actually finished all his homework and had the whole evening free to do whatever he pleased.

Li Chi, watching him like that, found himself thinking of what Gao Xining had said not long before — Ninth Sister ought to be someone who is happy.

Some people called him scatterbrained and empty-headed. But that was simply who he was.

“I want to discuss something with you.”

Yu Jiuling said earnestly: “I’m going to hand over—”

Li Chi gave a nod. “Your older brother already told me.”

Yu Jiuling asked: “Chief, you’re not angry, are you?”

Li Chi put on an air of solemn severity and said: “Angry? This goes beyond anger. From now on you won’t be doing anything, yet I’ll still have to pay you that substantial a wage — I feel enormously cheated.”

Yu Jiuling said: “That’s considered a loss?… There are even bigger losses I haven’t told you about yet. Actually, the reason I’m here is to ask about something… Even though I’m stepping down as Grand Commander of the intelligence corps, I’d still like to try and keep the ‘going out on official expenses’ perk under my own umbrella.”

Li Chi: “……”

He smiled and said to Yu Jiuling: “If it weren’t for that particular incentive, I doubt Gui Yuanshu would have agreed so quickly.”

Yu Jiuling said: “Still as sharp as ever, Chief — you can see right through to a man’s heart. So — what do you say I pretended to hand it over, but actually keep all the perks going forward?”

Li Chi curled his lip. “Do you want to drive Gui Yuanshu into becoming a rebel too?!”

Yu Jiuling burst out laughing.

He then said to Li Chi with great sincerity: “Chief — going forward, I’ll just stay by your side. Running errands. That suits me fine.”

Li Chi: “And the pay doesn’t have to stay as high?”

Yu Jiuling nodded: “You don’t even have to pay me at all.”

Li Chi said with a smile: “The pay definitely can’t stay at the old rate. Your brother said there needs to be a change, otherwise it wouldn’t be proper. So if you’re unhappy about it, go take it up with your brother…”

He turned back to the table, picked up a coin pouch, and handed it to Yu Jiuling. “This month’s.”

Yu Jiuling grinned broadly. “Doesn’t matter how much — after all I eat your food and drink your—”

The words died on his lips.

Because the amount of silver in the pouch was considerably more than what he had received each month before.

He looked at Li Chi in bewilderment. Li Chi smiled. “I told you — blame your older brother. She insisted on doubling it, no matter what I said to talk her out of it.”

Yu Jiuling’s face split into a wide grin. “My older brother is the best!”

Li Chi said: “There’s actually something I need you to come with me to handle. We’ll be out for a few days — go back and pack a few changes of clothes.”

Yu Jiuling immediately asked: “Who are we going to go and make trouble for this time?”

Li Chi: “Enough of that… We’re going to the Blue Ox Mountain camp. Tens of thousands of new recruits are training out there — they were all enlisted after the war — and it’s time to go take a look at them.”

“Understood.”

Yu Jiuling answered at once, turned, and ran back out the door.

Meanwhile, about seventy li from Anyang City, there was a mountain the locals called Linjiang Mountain.

At its base ran the Nanping River, and in this stretch the current ran swift and fierce, the channel clearly narrower than elsewhere — so much so that even fishermen steered clear.

Up on the mountain stood a Daoist shrine called the Swaying-Clarity Abbey. Its abbot was an elderly man who appeared to be around sixty years of age, and besides him there were four other Daoist monks — five people in all. The place was peaceful and quiet by day, the five of them living in comfortable ease.

But the abbey was merely a facade. If you left through the abbey’s rear gate and walked approximately seven or eight li of mountain path, you would find, deep within a dense forest, a sprawling compound of considerable scale.

It was large but not grand — nothing more than wooden buildings, every courtyard plain and unadorned.

The people who lived here almost never went out, and had no contact with the outside world. They knew heat and cold but had lost track of the years.

This was the headquarters of the Sacred Blade Sect.

No one would have imagined that the Sacred Blade Sect had established itself in such a hidden location, concealed behind the facade of a small and unassuming Daoist shrine.

The sect master stood in the courtyard with his hands clasped behind his back. He had not moved for what must have been around half an hour.

“Master.”

A man who appeared to be in his mid-to-late twenties came running in from the rear courtyard and bowed respectfully. “Junior-Uncle has recovered enough to get up and move about. He is asking you to come and speak with him.”

The sect master made a sound of acknowledgment, turned, and walked toward the rear of the compound.

It may have been a trick of perception, but everywhere he passed seemed to leave behind a shadow of darkness that lingered long after he was gone. Even the flowers and plants on either side of the path he walked seemed to lose their color the instant he passed by.

In the rear courtyard, Yuan Jianli sat in a rattan chair, tilting his head back to look at the sky. His body was still wrapped in a great deal of bandaging, and getting around required the support of crutches.

But his spirits seemed decent enough, and his complexion was no longer as ashen as it had been.

“Older Brother.”

As the sect master entered, Yuan Jianli asked: “Have you found out who that person is?”

The sect master gave a slight shake of his head. “No. But there is a theory.”

He looked at Yuan Jianli and said: “Within Qingzhou, the people who resented Gan Feng — the various other figures who had been granted lordships there — none of them would have had a martial artist of that caliber under their command. If they had, they would have found a way to eliminate Gan Feng long ago.”

“Gan Feng had previously led his forces against Jizhou, and then that incident occurred. So, weighing it all up, the most likely answer is that it was someone from Prince Ning Li Chi.”

Yuan Jianli spoke in a low voice, but with absolute certainty: “Let me go.”

The sect master shook his head. “Until you are fully healed, you are not going anywhere.”

Yuan Jianli slowly closed his eyes. He had never told his older brother that the reason he had managed to fight his way out of the encirclement was a medicinal pill given to him by an enemy.

The matter had lodged in his heart like a thorn. For him, it represented a double humiliation.

The first was that the person had led him to believe it was Yuan Gan Feng who had wanted him dead — which was why he had charged into the Qingzhou Prince’s residence. This was the first humiliation: being manipulated so completely, led around by the nose.

And then the person had tossed him a medicinal pill, and it was only by relying on that pill that he had been able to hold on long enough to fight his way out of the Qingzhou Prince’s residence.

This was the second humiliation — more difficult to endure, even, than the first.

“I’ll send Jie Yi to Jizhou City first to scout things out.”

The sect master placed a hand on Yuan Jianli’s shoulder. “If word comes back confirming it was someone sent by Prince Ning Li Chi, I will instruct them not to make a move in haste. When you have recovered, you will go to Jizhou yourself and settle the score.”

“Good.”

Yuan Jianli gave a nod, and once more closed his eyes.

“I will not find peace until I have killed him.”

The sect master made a sound of acknowledgment, then turned and looked out toward the open air beyond. “Go and bring Jie Yi.”

His subordinate immediately ran out.

Autumn gave way to winter, and another three months slipped by in a flash. The winter that year seemed especially bitter — barely into the first winter month, and the people of Jizhou had already been forced to dig out their thickest padded coats.

Yu Jiuling was overseeing the tidying of the courtyard when he noticed an uneven patch in the ground. He fetched an iron spade with the intention of leveling it out — and the moment the spade struck the earth, it left a bright white mark and bounced back up in his hands. That was how deeply the ground had frozen.

“Military dispatch!”

An attendant came running in at a brisk pace from outside. Yu Jiuling immediately called out: “Where’s the dispatch from?”

The attendant answered: “Sent from Yuzhou — eight-hundred-li urgent relay, a dispatch from the Great General.”

Yu Jiuling said: “Give it to me.”

He took the dispatch and hurried at a quick pace toward the main building.

Li Chi was in his study reading — a small book Elder Li had left for him, one he had read through many times now.

The book was filled with stories of various kinds, all quite engrossing. Elder Li had given it no title, so Li Chi, based on its contents, had called it the Chronicles of Worthy Ministers.

The book recounted the lives of many people, none of whom Li Chi had ever heard of — evidently all invented by Elder Li. This only deepened Li Chi’s reverence for Elder Li’s extraordinary talent.

For instance, within the book there was a fabricated minister called Wei Zheng, who dared to argue back against the emperor so forcefully that the emperor himself was afraid of him.

Elder Li’s assessment of Wei Zheng was: the greatest contrarian in the world, daring to clash with the emperor so relentlessly — three parts sheer righteousness, seven parts sheer hardheadedness.

Yet Li Chi felt that if such a Chief Censor of the Censorate truly had existed, with a boldness like that, any ruler would have been fortunate indeed to have him.

Yu Jiuling came in carrying the dispatch. “Chief — Old Tang has sent an urgent dispatch.”

Li Chi immediately pulled himself out of his thoughts and reached out to take the dispatch and read it over.

“Good news.”

Li Chi smiled. “A while back, Old Tang clashed with Yang Xuanji, and in three consecutive engagements came out victorious all three times — over seventy thousand enemy casualties. He’s already led his forces to recapture every city that Yang Xuanji had taken, and driven Yang Xuanji back more than a hundred li.”

Yu Jiuling grinned as well. “Old Tang is just incredible.”

Li Chi set the dispatch aside. Besides the military situation, Tang Pidi had added a few other lines — and Li Chi was still mulling over whether to say anything to Yu Jiuling about them.

Tang Pidi was urging Li Chi to lead his forces to Yuzhou after spring arrived the following year, and going forward to use Yuzhou as his main base of operations.

Li Chi had spent many years building up Jizhou, and it would be dishonest to say he felt nothing for it. But Old Tang’s words carried undeniable weight.

Holding Yuzhou as his center, he could truly look out across the whole world — south toward Jingzhou, west toward the reaches of Jingzhou and Liangzhou. With the heartland of the empire as his foundation, the ten thousand li of the Central Plains could be brought within reach.

By comparison, Jizhou was simply too far north.

Seeing Li Chi’s distracted expression, Yu Jiuling asked: “Did Old Tang say something else?”

Li Chi let out a breath and said with a smile: “Go and bring everyone together. We have something important to discuss.”

About half an hour later, in the main hall of Prince Ning’s residence.

Li Chi looked around and saw that everyone had arrived. He stepped forward and said: “Tang Pidi has sent word urging us to move south — to relocate our main base to Yuzhou City.”

Everyone stirred with surprise. The news seemed to have come out of nowhere, yet at the same time felt like something that had always been inevitable.

They all understood — leaving Jizhou was the only path to broader growth, the only way to bring a better life not just to Jizhou’s people but to all the people of the land.

And yet, at the thought of leaving, every heart still carried a thread of reluctance.

“We said we’d discuss it, so speak up.”

Li Chi smiled. “Surely everyone has something to say.”

“We should go.”

Gao Yuanzhang rose to his feet. “Some time ago you told me that no matter what happened in the future, you would always return to the north — because the greatest threats to the Central Plains lie in the north and the northwest. If you hid yourself away in the fertile south among all its splendor, you would lose the edge in your spirit. But that is a choice for later. For now, you must first go and take the south. That land of silk and splendor may not be a place to stay forever — but it must still be yours.”

With Gao Yuanzhang having stated his position, the others voiced their agreement one by one. The reluctance was real, but they all understood that moving south was the only course.

“We can’t all go.”

The Daoist Changmei looked toward Li Chi. “Someone absolutely reliable must stay behind to hold Jizhou. After all, if something unforeseen should happen in the future, and we had to fall back — Jizhou would still be there.”

Yan Qingzhi took a deep breath, rose, and said: “Let me be the one to stay.”

The vast majority would be following Li Chi south. For those who remained, the hardest thing would be the solitude.

The young woman Ruoling looked toward Gao Xining with a gaze tinged with sorrow. “My Lady…”

Gao Xining nodded and took Ruoling’s hand in hers. “I know. If I were you, I would stay too.”

Ruoling’s eyes were going slightly red, on the verge of tears.

“Have Zhuang-ge stay behind as well.”

Yan Qingzhi said: “When you all lead your forces south next year, Lao Zhuang and I will hold this home.”

Though those were the words she said, Zhuang Wudi was out on the eastern front — the two of them remaining in Jizhou wouldn’t mean they would see each other often.

So those who stayed — two solitary people.

Li Chi strode over to the map and pointed to a location. “Here — this is where I want to be, eventually. Yan-shifu, I’d like to ask you to do something for me.”

Yan Qingzhi immediately asked: “What is it?”

Li Chi said: “While we go south to fight, I want you to build us a home here. No need to rush — take your time with it.”

He pressed his finger firmly against that point on the map.

The two characters written there were… Chang’an.

—