Having heard good news from Gong Qi’s mouth, Lang Jiuchuan’s gaze toward him carried a few traces of warmth and goodwill — the expression of someone thinking, you’re quite good, you’re a fine child.

Gong Qi shuddered. What on earth was with this person’s gaze radiating such tender affection?

“Since your young master has the intention to reform the current flaws within the Xuan Sect, he surely won’t let this opportunity pass, will he?” Lang Jiuchuan smiled with gentle benevolence.

Gong Qi instinctively nodded, but quickly shot her a glare. “What does it have to do with you?”

Lang Jiuchuan didn’t hold his contrariness against him, and said: “Without destruction there can be no reconstruction. The Xuan Clan truly needs to change. They only know how to use the methods of the powerful noble families to consolidate their status and influence, yet neglect to advance their cultivation — this is putting the cart before the horse in the path of cultivation. In the end, they’ll amount to nothing. Not to mention that spiritual energy is scarce these days, cultivation is already no easy task, and yet they still make no effort to improve. Sooner or later, they’ll fall prey to demons, ghosts, and monsters.”

There were demons and ghosts in the world — they merely hid themselves well. If a person single-mindedly devoted themselves to cultivation, amassing great demonic power, would they truly be unable to defeat a Celestial Master?

Lang Jiuchuan thought of A’Piao in Tongtian Pavilion. Xuan Clan members came and went, yet how many of them had seen through the fact that A’Piao was nothing more than a paper figure? And that pavilion master who kept A’Piao from being exposed — just how formidable must they be?

Beyond every mountain lies another mountain. The Xuan Clan couldn’t see this at all, yet remained smug and self-satisfied, believing themselves the mightiest under heaven.

Gong Qi said: “The young master will make this happen.”

Lang Jiuchuan was not surprised. Gong Tinglan was a shrewd one — he knew how to fight for a path forward.

“Your young master is someone who gets things done properly. In your view, how long would it take for this matter to succeed?”

Gong Qi said lazily: “Establishing it would be easy enough. But placing people on the inside — that would require a fight.”

The Imperial Family wouldn’t want to see the other clans grow powerful enough to threaten their own position, so they would naturally proceed with great caution. The people they planted in the Supervisory Bureau would need to be capable fighters. The title might be that of an official, but they likely wouldn’t truly be ordinary officials — after all, their “colleagues” within that bureau would be practitioners of Xuan arts, and sending in ordinary people would do nothing to keep the Xuan Clan members in check.

Meanwhile, the Xuan Clan, unwilling to be constrained and hemmed in at every turn, would likewise not place mediocre individuals in this bureau. So it would become a contest between the Imperial Family and the Xuan Clan.

Lang Jiuchuan raised an eyebrow. “It seems the Imperial Family and the Xuan Clan will have quite the rivalry to look forward to.”

Gong Qi glanced sideways at her. “How is it that from your tone I’m hearing undisguised gloating?”

“You didn’t mishear me. I’m happy to see it happen.”

Gong Qi narrowed his eyes. “Has the Xuan Clan offended you somehow, that you hold such hostility toward us? Wishing for nothing more than to see us fall apart.”

“If I had a grudge against the Xuan Clan, would you want to kill me first?”

The two locked eyes, and sparks seemed to fly between their gazes.

Gong Qi looked away and said: “You — though contrary, you’re not the type to take out your grievances on the innocent. Grievances have their sources, debts have their debtors. Whoever you have a feud with, go find them.”

It’s not as if I have a death wish, charging at someone I can’t beat.

Lang Jiuchuan smiled faintly. Looking at Gong Qi, she suddenly thought of the founding of the Great Dan dynasty — how the Xuan Clan had risen to prominence along with the tide of the times, and how that Eight Trigrams City had been the first place retaken and rebuilt after they rose to power. Did he know what had happened there?

As it happened, she was planning to go take a look at that place anyway. Why not bring him along?

“Since we have nothing better to do, how about you and I travel together through this great land of Great Dan?” Lang Jiuchuan smiled warmly as she extended the invitation.

Gong Qi: “?”

The topic had shifted far too quickly. He didn’t follow — what was she saying about going somewhere?

Oh. Traveling through Great Dan. The kind where you walk the roads of the underworld.

Gong Qi very quickly found himself following a certain troublesome, frail young woman to a stretch of land where the lone smoke of the great desert rose straight into the sky. Yellow sand and dust blasted him full in the face, and he unwittingly swallowed two mouthfuls.

He watched with hollow eyes as that poor wretch of a “guide” — the type who goes in but never comes back — leapt into the underworld road in a desperate flurry, feeling a very strong urge to call out: Don’t go, take me with you.

Lang Jiuchuan gazed at the tall, ancient, weathered city wall before her. It overlapped strangely with a scene she had once witnessed at Fuqi’s side — as though she could see those few thousand soldiers charging past her with torches blazing, charging fearlessly into the enemy lines without a trace of hesitation.

Her eyes turned red.

Lang Jiuchuan brought Fuqi out from within the Small Nine Pagoda.

Gong Qi happened to catch sight of that small pagoda. His eyelids twitched. A Diamond Pagoda — no, wait, she called it the Small Nine Pagoda.

Before he could dwell further on whether the Small Nine Pagoda was or wasn’t a Diamond Pagoda, he was robbed of the capacity to think about it at all — for he saw a wisp of a ghost drift out from within the pagoda. His expression instantly sharpened, and he instinctively gripped the soul-locking whip at his waist.

The moment Fuqi emerged, his gaze went straight to the top of the city gate. Where the characters for “Source City” had once been written, there now stood three deep and sweeping characters: Eight Trigrams City.

The seas had turned to mulberry fields. Two hundred years had passed. This stretch of city wall and city gate had been steeped in the frost and wind of ages.

Returning to a place once known — a long sigh escaped him.

Gong Qi stared intently at Fuqi and gave two heavy coughs. Only when Lang Jiuchuan looked over did he begin frantically signaling with his eyes, mouthing silently: “Who is this?”

“This is General Fuqi.” Lang Jiuchuan introduced them simply, then added: “The General was the first client of my shop. I accepted his commission to resolve what he has entrusted to me.”

Shop. What shop?

Gong Qi was utterly baffled.

Fuqi turned to look over, and his gaze sharpened into something fierce and dangerous. Within the pagoda, Jiangche had already introduced Gong Qi to him — he was a member of the Xuan Clan. And this Eight Trigrams City very likely bore the handiwork of the Xuan Clan. If the reason he and his three thousand Fu Family soldiers could not pass on to the afterlife was due to harm inflicted by them, then that account would need to be settled very carefully indeed.

He made no effort to rein in his killing aura. The hairs on Gong Qi’s body stood on end. He braced himself, gripping his treasured artifact tightly, and cast another glance at Lang Jiuchuan.

She had said she had no grudge against the Xuan Clan. Could it be that she hadn’t — but had dragged him all the way out here so she could use a ghost to kill him and silence him?

He’d been careless!

Lang Jiuchuan read the meaning in his eyes clearly and rolled her eyes at him without any patience. “Great Dan has stood for two hundred years. It was the Xuan Clan that rose to power and enabled Tantai to become the sovereign of this land. As for this Eight Trigrams City — from what I know, it was the first city to be rebuilt after the Xuan Clan reclaimed the lost territories. Do you know whose hand it was built by?”

Gong Qi was momentarily taken aback. Great Dan had stood for two hundred years, and Tantai had ruled this land for quite some time — but all of this was history from two hundred years ago. Why was she suddenly asking about this?

He looked at Eight Trigrams City, his mind automatically sifting through the books and historical records he had read, and said: “The reconstruction of Eight Trigrams City was proposed and overseen by the patriarch of the Tantai clan at the time, Elder Tantai Jing. What of it?”

So it truly was built by the Tantai clan.

Fuqi’s killing aura poured endlessly from his body — black, thick, and dense. The sight of it made Gong Qi’s heart lurch with fear. Was this old ghost about to go dark and become a Ghost King?

Yes — old ghost. He had already seen that the armor Fuqi wore was not the armor of the current dynasty. It was very ancient. So this was a ghost of many, many years?

But the name “General Fuqi” — it sounded somewhat familiar. Where had he heard it before?

The surname Fu…

Gong Qi looked at Eight Trigrams City, his memory reaching back. Wait — this place was Eight Trigrams City. But its predecessor had been… Beacon Pass Source City of the previous dynasty?

And Lang Jiuchuan had brought this person here, which carried all the weight of returning to a place once known.

It came back to him.

“You are Fuqi, the general branded a ruiner of the nation in the previous dynasty?” Gong Qi’s eyes went wide.

Lang Jiuchuan’s eyelid twitched. This wretched child was asking to be hit.

Sure enough, the moment the words left his mouth, Fuqi — wreathed in that chilling, dark killing aura — erupted. His figure flickered, and in an instant he had closed his hand around Gong Qi’s throat.

Gong Qi: “!”

Lang Jiu, that black-hearted schemer — she really did drag a ghost out here to kill him and silence him!