The days that followed were somewhat dull—reading and writing each day, eating and sleeping each day, and each day slipping away for a brief moment with Gao Xining. He would tell her what he’d studied and what he’d eaten; she would tell him about whichever girl from some family she’d heard had a beautiful face.

A young woman of Gao Xining’s background naturally had playmates from households of comparable standing. Several of the instructors’ daughters had practically grown up alongside her, and they visited often.

The girls Gao Xining had been looking into recently were all quite fine, but she’d noticed that Li Diudiu didn’t seem to care in the least. When she pressed him, he would say he was only twelve—what was the rush?

Gao Xining thought: if she couldn’t find anyone Li Chi felt he could get along with, she’d have no choice but to sacrifice one of her own closest friends.

She had four or five girls she was particularly close to. Three of them were daughters of academy instructors, and two were relatives. The closest of all was the daughter of Instructor Yuan at the academy—Yuan Jiabei, the same age as Gao Xining, a girl whose personality was entirely unlike hers.

Yuan Jiabei had a gentle temperament and was slightly shorter than Gao Xining. She already possessed six parts of the air of a refined young lady—that warmth and composure of one who carries her learning naturally within herself, unforced and innate.

“Among flowers and moonlight” is ordinarily a beautiful phrase—but the meetings between Li Diudiu and Gao Xining by the little grove in the back courtyard, night after night, always carried an air somewhere between two mischievous thieves on a caper.

“Jiabei is wonderful. Ten times better than me,” Gao Xining said, steeling herself.

Li Diudiu said idly: “You’re ten parts bad, she’s ten times better than you, so she’s one part bad. Not much to boast about.”

Gao Xining kicked Li Diudiu in the backside. Li Diudiu, in the middle of a horse stance, didn’t shift so much as a hair. His stance held solid as a boulder.

Gao Xining startled. She thought about how perky Li Diudiu’s backside was, and how springy it had felt underfoot just now—probably because he always practiced horse stances. Her cheeks went faintly pink as she scolded herself for letting her mind wander when they were in the middle of a serious conversation about his future. What was she doing thinking about Li Diudiu’s backside right now?

Then the thought crossed her mind: maybe she should start doing horse stances every day too?

Her face went a shade pinker.

Li Diudiu noticed her odd expression and couldn’t help asking: “Do you need to use the outhouse? Go on, hurry.”

Gao Xining’s foot connected again. When she kicked Li Diudiu, she never really put any force into it—and even if she did, it probably wouldn’t have done much.

“You’re the one who needs to use the outhouse!”

Li Diudiu said: “You sure? Your face is going red. Probably constipated—when I’m backed up, I look exactly the same, my face goes red as a monkey’s rear end… hmm? ‘Backed up as a monkey’s rear end’—there’s a rhythm to that somehow.”

Gao Xining took a deep breath. Another deep breath. She told herself this foolish boy was someone she had promised to help find a wife—she had taken on this duty herself. This was entirely her own fault. She couldn’t be angry at herself, could she?

After giving herself seven or eight rounds of this reasoning, Gao Xining felt somewhat better—because on the sixth round she hadn’t been able to hold back and had given Li Diudiu another kick in the backside.

Gao Xining said fiercely: “You scoundrel. Always thinking about rear ends.”

Li Diudiu said puzzled: “When did I ever think about rear ends?”

Gao Xining said: “Just now.”

Li Diudiu: “No I didn’t… I really didn’t.”

Gao Xining couldn’t be bothered to argue with him. After a brief silence she said: “Practice your cultivation on your own. I’m heading back.”

Li Diudiu waved: “See you.”

Gao Xining turned and walked back in irritation. Li Diudiu was a blockhead of the first order, but he had his methods—he could see that when Gao Xining turned and walked away, her ponytail hadn’t swung. Things had gone slightly wrong.

So Li Diudiu asked: “Tomorrow I’m going to the Yunyun Tea House. On the way back I’ll bring you some of Yue’s pastries—how about that?”

Gao Xining said without turning: “What’s so good about Yue’s pastries?”

Li Diudiu said: “Then… what about a sachet from the Wenxiang House next door?”

Gao Xining said: “What’s so special about that?”

Li Diudiu said: “I’ve come up with a new tune. Tomorrow I’ll play it for you first—help me critique it, would you?”

Gao Xining finally stopped walking. She turned around and looked at Li Diudiu. “I don’t listen to tunes for free. And if you want me to critique it, that’ll cost more. Can you afford it?”

Li Diudiu asked: “How much?”

Gao Xining raised her hand and waggled her fingers: “At minimum—one portion of Yue’s flaky lotus-paste pastry. One embroidered butterfly sachet from the Wenxiang House.”

Li Diudiu immediately said: “The Wenxiang House also has an embroidered deer sachet that’s quite nice. Shall I add one of those too?”

Gao Xining nodded, turned, and walked away.

Li Diudiu smiled.

Because he could see Gao Xining’s ponytail swinging again.

Those things weren’t things Gao Xining was short of—they weren’t especially expensive or rare. She simply knew very clearly when it was right to give Li Chi a way out, and when it was right to let that foolish boy feel he had managed to win her over.

But Gao Xining had never really been angry. She kept thinking that if she had truly been angry, she likely wouldn’t have wanted to see Li Chi at all anymore.

The little gifts Li Chi had given her—she hadn’t used a single one. In her room there was a small wooden box, and she kept each one in it, perfectly preserved, thinking that when the day came that the silly fellow had a girl he fancied, she would take them all and give them away on his behalf as the matchmaker.

Gao Xining thought that as a matchmaker, she was doing a job so devoted it was practically worthy of the word *great*.

That fellow had so little money—she couldn’t let any of this go to waste. Better to save every bit she could, coax one girl after another…

Li Diudiu watched Gao Xining leave. After squatting in the horse stance for a while longer, he straightened up and looked at the sky—fully dark now, overcast with only a faint moon. A fine night for plundering the rich on behalf of those in need.

He changed into his night-gear—seven-tenths sleeves, seven-tenths trousers—put on the black-faced white-toothed mask, and slipped out of the academy like a wraith.

On the rooftop of the Banyue Pavilion, Li Diudiu sat astride the roof ridge watching the street below. He’d been waiting for nearly an hour. Apparently there would be no business tonight either.

Xiahou Zuo sat beside him drinking wine and said: “The urgency in your eyes tells me you’re very disappointed that no business has come along tonight.”

Li Diudiu said: “Which means that was a pointless observation.”

Xiahou Zuo said: “Opportunities aren’t waited for—they’re sought out. You sit here on this Banyue Pavilion rooftop for an hour every night until the ridge has been polished smooth by your backside, and you expect business to come?”

Li Diudiu asked curiously: “Why are you and Gao Xining both so interested in my backside today?”

Xiahou Zuo: “I’m saying you’re lazy.”

Li Diudiu said: “It’s because I can’t go on patrol.”

“Why not?”

“Walking too much burns energy. Burning too much energy makes you hungry.”

“Then eat when you’re hungry!”

“Three meals a day are covered by the academy—free. A midnight snack obviously comes out of my own pocket—not acceptable.”

After saying this, Li Diudiu looked at Xiahou Zuo. Xiahou Zuo immediately looked away. “I’m not treating.”

Li Diudiu let out a sigh. “Child labor. Such is the hardship. Every day of a young laborer working for a living—a chapter written in blood and tears.”

Xiahou Zuo: “You’ve eaten nine out of ten nights’ midnight snacks on my tab. Where are your blood and tears? Which night did you ever pay for your own? Have you no conscience?”

Li Diudiu said: “One night missed—a real loss.”

Just then Xiahou Zuo’s eyes suddenly flew wide open, because he spotted a burst of fireworks blazing to life in the distant sky. On this night with so little moonlight, the fireworks were startlingly vivid.

“Move!” Xiahou Zuo shouted. “Something’s happened.”

Li Diudiu understood too—that was the distress signal of the Azure Ranks. Anyone in the Azure Ranks who saw those fireworks explode was required to converge on the location as quickly as possible.

The two of them vaulted one after another across the rooftops. Xiahou Zuo’s long robe fluttered with considerable flair; Li Diudiu’s seven-tenths sleeves and seven-tenths trousers left nothing much to be said.

After leaping across three or four rows of rooftops, Xiahou Zuo made a signal to stop. Not far away, a horse carriage sat still on the street, its lantern still lit, several figures lying motionless outside.

“I’ll go first. You provide cover from the shadows.”

Xiahou Zuo exchanged a brief word, and Li Diudiu nodded slightly, unclipping the repeating crossbow from his belt.

Xiahou Zuo dropped from the roof and walked steadily toward the carriage, left hand forward, right hand raised to grip the hilt of the long blade strapped diagonally across his back, the sword drawn an inch or two from its sheath—a faint glint of cold light visible.

“A Gate Commander?!”

Xiahou Zuo suddenly let out a low cry and quickened his pace. He jogged to the carriage, crouched beside it, and turned over one of the figures to examine it.

The dead man was one of the four Gate Commanders of the Azure Ranks.

Even among members of the Azure Ranks themselves, those below the rank of five-bond did not know the true identities of the Gate Commanders. Xiahou Zuo was four-bond, but his circumstances were unusual—it went without saying.

The leader of the Azure Ranks was Military Governor Zeng Ling. Of the four Gate Commanders, two were fifth-rank officers under Zeng Ling’s command, both originally from Zeng Ling’s personal guard who had been dispatched to command their own troops after arriving in Jizhou. The other two were skilled fighters from the jianghu, both holding quite impressive identities in the open world. Were their identities as Gate Commanders of the Azure Ranks ever exposed, the jianghu forces of Jizhou City would be shaken to the core.

The Gate Commander now lying on the ground was one of Zeng Ling’s fifth-rank officers: Lei Yuan.

He had left the Banyue Pavilion area only a short while ago—not even a quarter of an hour had passed—and yet he now lay dead in the street.

Li Diudiu swept out of the shadows and came to stand beside Xiahou Zuo. “Checked the surroundings. No one in sight.”

He had barely finished speaking before Azure Ranks members came charging in from every direction. When they saw that a Gate Commander had fallen, every face darkened with grief and fury.

“There’s writing on the carriage.”

Li Diudiu suddenly noticed that someone had left a line of characters on the carriage exterior in blood. The writing was small, and with the lantern on the carriage being dim, no one had noticed until now.

*Gate One—sent to the west; Gate Two—why the hurry?*

Twelve characters. A blood inscription.

The blood, naturally, was Lei Yuan’s.

“Take the Gate Commander back.”

Xiahou Zuo stood and gave the order. He looked at Li Diudiu seriously and said: “Now go back to the academy. Tomorrow night, the night after—until this matter has a resolution, you don’t need to come out. Stay in the academy and behave yourself.”

Li Diudiu looked at Xiahou Zuo. Xiahou Zuo felt his words had just gone in one ear and out the other.

“Hey!”

At that moment, a voice came from a rooftop across the way.

Li Diudiu and Xiahou Zuo immediately looked up. On that rooftop sat a dark figure—perhaps newly arrived, or perhaps there all along, without a trace of presence to be detected.

“How was the writing I left—those dozen or so characters?”

The dark figure spoke. “I modeled it on Instructor Songming’s calligraphy style. I even made it rhyme.”

The figure slowly rose, walked to the edge of the eaves, and swept a gaze across the people below, then gave a small laugh. “My name is Yao Wuhen—honest with young and old alike. I’m here to kill your four Gate Commanders. You should all remember this person, because I am a god in the trade of killing…”

He trailed off and let out a sound of mild surprise, then murmured to himself:

“That rhymed again.”

—