Ziqing had, of course, seen everything inside the Ancient Music Cavern clearly—this trip could be considered a complete success.
Jun Beiyue no longer bothered pressing the Prince of Nanzhao further, nodding to signal his agreement.
Having been anxious about Jun Beiyue’s suspicion of him, the Prince of Nanzhao felt an immense wave of relief upon seeing Jun Beiyue’s nod, hurrying to have the Medicine Clan leader light the way as they all departed, with the Second Beast Young Master escorted along behind them.
At the cavern’s entrance, the Empress of Eastern Qin and the others were still waiting to return to the capital together. Seeing Jun Beiyue and the Prince of Nanzhao walking together, whispering along the way, and then seeing the Second Beast Young Master, blood staining his lips, being escorted out under guard, the Empress of Eastern Qin’s last flicker of hope crumbled entirely.
She had always known Jun Beiyue was no easy opponent, but she’d never imagined that even with her personally taking the field, she’d suffer such a crushing defeat.
If this trip to Nanzhao continued unchecked, even she herself might not escape unscathed.
“Mother, have Shiliang steal Wuzheng in exchange for the antidote!” Xuanyuan Zhaoxi decided at once. Ever since being infected by Jun Beiyue’s “cold,” the welts on her mother’s face had never healed, and they still hadn’t found any antidote.
Coming all this way to Nanzhao and accomplishing nothing at all—surely they couldn’t return home with a face still covered in welts. If Xuanyuan Lige ever found out, wouldn’t he mock her endlessly?
The Empress of Eastern Qin said nothing, watching coldly as Jun Beiyue and Han Ziqing boarded their carriage.
Once everyone had boarded, the Second Beast Young Master was finally loaded onto the prisoner’s cart. Jun Beiyao and Chu Tiange, disguised nearby beside the Empress of Eastern Qin’s carriage, watched this—one with brows knit tight, the other with an expression of deeply mixed feelings.
The moment the Second Beast Young Master was loaded onto the cart, the convoy set off, the prisoner’s cart trailing at the very back. No one noticed that, high atop that cart, the Second Beast Young Master had already opened his eyes, his sharp gaze searching anxiously through the crowd ahead.
After a long while, someone finally turned back to look—right beside Consort Qin’s carriage, disguised in guard’s attire that concealed his otherwise ethereal bearing, a distinctly Nanzhao-style headscarf wrapping tightly around his high-bound silver hair. Those eyes, calm as an untroubled highland lake, needed only a single glance to set the Second Beast Young Master’s heart at ease.
Meanwhile, inside the carriage, Ziqing was impatiently recording everything she’d seen in the Ancient Music Cavern.
Soon, she’d written out a complete musical score. Jun Beiyue didn’t dare disturb her, but his sharp eyes caught sight of a totem symbol within the score, sending a jolt of alarm through him.
“Is this the missing note?” he asked quietly, unable to hold back the question.
Ziqing nodded firmly, offering no further explanation, quickly picking up her brush again to write out a second score—this time using contemporary musical notation, the same notes as those in the Ancient Music Cavern, but rendered in different symbols.
Anyone but the most expert eye would never have been able to tell they matched.
Jun Beiyue studied this second score carefully too, and aside from one blank space, it showed nothing particularly unusual.
“Two scores?” Jun Beiyue asked, puzzled.
“Mm. This first one, with the totem, appeared in the cavern near the Yin altar—it’s the sacred music played at the Prince of Nanzhao’s wedding ceremony, which is also the first ten scrolls of Lishang’s climax. Compared against the Lishang score, it’s missing exactly this one note.”
Ziqing spoke as her finger rested on the totem, the implication clear without needing further words—this totem was, quite simply, a musical note.
“Can you tell which note it is?” Jun Beiyue asked, cutting straight to the heart of the matter.
Ziqing shook her head helplessly. Ancient musical notation came in many forms, with abbreviated notation and gongche notation being the most common, but a system recorded through totems like this was typically unique to a small tribe’s own notation system, or perhaps even an individual’s own personal method of recording.
Figuring out which note it represented, how it should be played—that would be harder than reaching the heavens.
Still, Ziqing had no time to dwell on all of that for now. Discovering the secret of this totem alone was already an enormous breakthrough.
“And this second one? Was it recorded in the cavern near the Yang altar?” Jun Beiyue asked again, already suspecting something.
Two scores in the hidden cavern, and the altar itself divided into Yin and Yang—by all appearances, it seemed quite likely that the missing note came in both a Yin and a Yang variant.
Yet this second score bore no special symbols of any kind.
“This is the score for the sacred music they heard.”
Ziqing spoke, humming a brief passage softly. Jun Beiyue nodded immediately. “That’s exactly the melody I heard too!”
“So it really is the same as the sound of the waves in the sea valley of Qinse!” Ziqing said seriously, explaining the principle behind the sacred music to Jun Beiyue in full. He nodded repeatedly. “So this sacred music also comes from Lishang?”
“No, it’s Lishang that incorporated this sacred music into itself! This is the ten scrolls of the climax section—aside from this one blank space, this score is identical to those same ten scrolls in Lishang,” Ziqing said seriously.
“There are two missing notes—the other one should also be a totem, and… it should be the Yang counterpart of the totem!” Jun Beiyue murmured, his expression deeply serious.
Totems were symbols the Nanzhao peoples were particularly fond of using, even as ancient script, and they frequently came in Yin and Yang pairs.
“This climax section of Lishang must have a Yin and Yang division too. If I can just decipher the meaning of this totem, I could unlock at least fifty scrolls’ worth,” Ziqing said seriously.
Without knowing which note the totem represented, she had no way to insert it into the score—but once she knew, adding it in would be effortless.
At this, Jun Beiyue suddenly grabbed Ziqing’s hand, his expression one of genuine shock, as though something had just occurred to him.
Ziqing looked at him, puzzled, and Jun Beiyue said, “Those twelve ancient musical symbols—could something be missing from those too?”
Ziqing froze for a moment, then suddenly understood. Those twelve ancient symbols that had appeared both at the sea valley of Qinse and on the stone tablet in the Ancient Music Cavern didn’t form a coherent melody, nor did they seem to carry any particular meaning.
But if the note represented by the totem were added in—would they suddenly form a coherent melody? Would they suddenly carry meaning?
Ziqing and Jun Beiyue exchanged a glance—the significance of this totem was immense. Once this symbol was deciphered, they would be that much closer to the truth.
Ziqing instinctively touched her own cheek. She had never once considered whether or not to tell Jun Beiyue the secret on her face.
From the very first moment she’d seen this face, she’d made up her mind, honoring the true Han Ziqing’s promise to Madam Ci—she would never remove the mask, not ever.
Even when the totem had first appeared, she hadn’t hesitated at all—this totem was simply something that happened to be on her face, nothing more than a symbol marking her connection to the Isolated Isle.
None of it seemed to have any real bearing on their search for the Isolated Isle, or the secrets of Lishang.
Whether she told him or not made no difference either way.
But now, she found herself hesitating. If this Yin totem was on her own face, did that mean the Yang totem was quite likely to be found on someone else’s face entirely?
Someone else who also carried the bloodline of the Isolated Isle in their veins?
But the secret on her face was something she’d always avoided facing—something even she herself couldn’t fully accept. How could she possibly bear to, how could she find the courage to let Jun Beiyue accept it, when that man had, more than once, gazed at her and marveled at her beauty?
Just as Ziqing hesitated, the carriage gradually rolled to a stop—they’d arrived at the envoy’s residence, where Shiliang stood waiting at the gate…