When Lang Jiuchuan opened her eyes, her vision was filled with white brightness all around. Her long eyelashes, black as a crow’s feathers, fluttered gently as her consciousness slowly gathered itself back. She had apparently been escorting souls just now?

How is that possible?

She bolted upright in agitation — her vision immediately went black, and she crashed back down onto the bed. That hurt.

Her divine soul felt as though it had been shredded apart and stitched back together, the pain making her entire body tremble.

“You have exhausted your spiritual power — stop straining yourself.”

A voice like a cold spring flowed into her ears. Lang Jiuchuan turned her head and saw Gong Tinglan looking at her with an expression of resigned helplessness, while Gong Qi stood at his side.

When her gaze met Gong Qi’s, Lang Jiuchuan felt, for reasons she couldn’t quite explain, an inexplicable pang of guilt. She averted her eyes and said, “What happened to me?”

Gong Qi laughed in exasperated disbelief. “You’re still pretending? I told you not to act rashly, and you refused to listen — you absolutely had to go your own way. What, did you think the imperial family wouldn’t dare touch you? Mm, the Gong Family can protect you — they might let you go. But what about the entire Marquis’s household standing behind you?”

Lang Jiuchuan said weakly, “I didn’t go and break the formation.”

Gong Qi choked on his words.

That was true — she truly hadn’t broken the formation. The array itself was perfectly intact. But every heroic spirit within it had vanished without a trace. It was rather like… a vault that hadn’t been dismantled, yet everything inside had been stolen.

Gong Tinglan said, “When I received Xiao Qi’s transmission, I went and consulted the archived records in our collection. I had only just found something relevant and hadn’t yet had the chance to notify either of you, when Xiao Qi returned with Zixiao Zi in tow. The moment he came back, I knew things had gone badly — and sure enough, you…” He trailed off with a sigh.

Lang Jiuchuan lowered her eyes and slowly sat up. “I genuinely didn’t do anything. I only chanted one round of scripture and struck the soul-summoning bell. I don’t know what came over me in that moment — it was as though my divine soul had stopped listening to me.”

Gong Qi scoffed coldly. “There are no outsiders here, so drop the act.”

“Xiao Qi!” Gong Tinglan frowned and shook his head. “Laying blame after the fact resolves nothing. Don’t waste time.”

Gong Qi said, “I’m saying this for her sake. If this truly implicates the people of the Lang Family, will you actually be at peace with yourself, Lang Jiu?”

Lang Jiuchuan fell silent.

Gong Qi, seeing this, let out a disgruntled huff.

Gong Tinglan said, “Fortunately, this matter has not yet drawn the imperial family’s attention. The formation is also undamaged, and Zixiao Zi is in our hands.”

Lang Jiuchuan finally raised her head to look at Gong Tinglan. “From the young master’s tone, it sounds as though you intend to keep this matter concealed?”

Gong Tinglan’s expression turned uncomfortable. “This formation was laid by the Venerable Tongda, a master of arrays — and time has moved on. The younger generation knows nothing of its existence. Those elders who are privy to this matter are only the clan leaders of each family, and even they do not speak of it openly until the moment of succession.”

Lang Jiuchuan raised an eyebrow and asked, “Oh — so the young master of the Gong Family was also in the dark?”

“Our family’s clan leader is still very much alive, and the time for succession is nowhere near — otherwise, would I still be only the young master? I know this sounds unbelievable to you — truthfully, even I find it nearly impossible to credit.” Gong Tinglan gave a self-deprecating laugh and said, “But that is genuinely the truth of the matter, believe it or not. I only found out by asking the clan leader after Xiao Qi told me.”

Gong Qi snorted. “This isn’t a pleasant thing to have to broadcast. If it spread openly and the faith people have placed in us collapsed — that is not something those old figures would be pleased to see.”

Something so utterly contrary to the righteous path, so flagrantly in defiance of the harmony of Heaven — they would sooner see everyone who knew of it dead and buried, wouldn’t they? Otherwise, where would they put their faces?

He slanted another look at Lang Jiuchuan. “Right now it isn’t the time to debate whether we knew about this formation ahead of time. The question is how to clean up the mess you created. Ha — one glorious moment escorting souls, and a lifetime of regret afterward. What a move.”

Lang Jiuchuan smiled and put on an expression of perfect innocence. “What did I do? I only chanted one round of scripture. You all look at me and see someone at death’s door, about to draw her last breath at any moment — frail and feeble as I appear, there is no way I could be the sort of person capable of undoing the masterwork of the Venerable Tongda, a master of arrays. What virtue or ability could I possibly have?”

Gong Tinglan and Gong Qi stared at her in united silence.

It was bad enough without saying anything — but when she opened her mouth, the words were infuriating. Only chanted one round of scripture?

She had chanted the heroic spirits who were imprisoned in the formation right out of it.

Anyone else wanting to escort those souls would have had to break the formation first — yet she had done it as though reaching through air to take something from across the room.

“In truth,” Lang Jiuchuan said, lowering her lashes to conceal the chill in her eyes, turning her pale, bloodless fingers over idly, her voice cool and remote, “they also should have known that the heroic spirits’ meritorious wish-power was finite — it was never going to replenish itself and nourish the dragon vein forever. Two hundred years is already the limit. Even without anyone escorting them, their souls would eventually have shattered and scattered into nothingness. They may as well use whatever remains of this time to accumulate some hidden virtue for themselves.”

The two of them fell silent.

The reason those souls had managed to endure for two hundred years at all was precisely because of the formation — unlike the solitary wandering ghosts adrift in the mortal world, unworshipped and unremembered, with no one to escort them across into the Yellow Springs, who would dissolve into nothing long before that.

“Furthermore,” Lang Jiuchuan said lightly, “it would be rather farcical if the national fortune of the Great Dang Dynasty were truly dependent on such an underhanded array. A nation’s fortune has never been sustained by formations — least of all formations that violate the harmony of Heaven. It is sustained by those who govern it. So — how do we clean up this mess? There’s no need to clean it up. Leave it as it is and let them investigate. As for Zixiao Zi — leave him to me to handle.”

“What do you mean to do with him — are you still thinking about spilling blood?” Gong Qi fixed his eyes on her.

Lang Jiuchuan lifted her hand, and a cold smile curved her lips. “I have never claimed to walk the righteous path. I am no paragon of virtue — never have been. Kill him? Then I’ll kill him!”

Gong Qi’s eyelid twitched. He looked toward Gong Tinglan. “Uncle, you’d better never call me arrogant again after this. There’s someone here who is far more arrogant than I’ll ever be.”

Gong Tinglan’s head throbbed.

The younger generation these days — every last one of them had a rebellious streak carved right into their bones.

He was just about to speak when — boom — something was flung in through the window from outside.

The three of them startled. When they made out what the bundle was, it turned out to be the already half-dead Zixiao Zi.

Well — not half-dead anymore. He was fully and completely dead.

“Who — who did this?” Gong Qi was instantly on high alert. Was there someone else in this courtyard all along, who might have overheard their conversation?

Fuyi passed directly through the wall. He was wrapped head to toe in a ferocious, bone-chilling yin energy, murky and spectral as something that had crawled out of the deepest reaches of the ghost realm.

Gong Tinglan’s expression grew grave. He had devoured a living soul.

Fuyi swept a cold glance over Gong Tinglan and the others, then looked toward Lang Jiuchuan sitting on the low bed. His gaze softened, and he said, “There is no need to dirty your hands. I will do it.”

She had already done more than enough. Spilling blood — that, he could take care of himself.

Lang Jiuchuan frowned. “Why haven’t you passed on?”

Had the scripture she chanted not been enough to send him on his way as well?

Fuyi said, “The debt of kindness has not yet been repaid. The payment owed has not yet been given. The accounts in the mortal world have not yet been settled. I have things that keep my heart here — I cannot go.”

“You killed him — that is the killing of a ghost, and it carries the stain of a life taken. The moment you have claimed a human life, anyone who slays you can be said to be acting on behalf of Heaven. More importantly: the ledger of merit and transgression will record this against your name, and when you eventually enter the underworld, you will not be able to reincarnate into a good life. It is not worth it.”

Fuyi laughed, open and unguarded. “The young woman exhausted her merit and spiritual power for the sake of those of us under my command — and you ask me whether killing a petty wretch like this is worth it? It is far better than letting you dirty your hands. As for reincarnation — if I do not reincarnate, then I will not. I have never cared about that.”

Lang Jiuchuan fell silent.

Fuyi looked toward Gong Tinglan, his ghost-energy cold and oppressive, and said with a sharp laugh, “My soldiers of the Fu Family Army — it was I who broke through my chains and called upon the Way of Heaven to send them into the underworld. It has nothing to do with anyone else. This man, too, I killed. If you wish to report us — do so. I, Fu Yi, will be here waiting for the Tantai’s people to come and collect me.”