A Heaven-and-Earth covenant is established upon the soul. Once sealed, it is subject to the governance of Heaven and Earth, and any who violate it shall be cast out by Heaven and Earth, and destroyed.

Lang Jiuchuan’s proposal caught the White Tiger completely off guard. It studied her for a long while without speaking. To speak of a Heaven-and-Earth covenant so readily — the kind that binds the very soul — what depths did this woman’s mind run to?

But then again, perhaps that was not quite right either. Had she suffered some catastrophic betrayal, to be so guarded and wary?

Lang Jiuchuan looked over and said, “Only if we establish this covenant is there any possibility of sharing a body. Otherwise — let it be a fight to the death.”

The White Tiger hesitated briefly. “Very well. We establish the covenant. But I will be the one to recite its terms.”

It did not trust her, and the feeling was mutual.

“Go ahead. Recite it.” Lang Jiuchuan’s expression betrayed nothing.

Far too agreeable.

The White Tiger had the distinct feeling it had somehow walked into a trap, yet it could not identify what was wrong.

Both it and Lang Jiuchuan knew what a Heaven-and-Earth covenant required. Its consciousness was equivalent to its soul — the same as her spiritual soul — and to establish the covenant, both souls had to be bound into the terms.

Just as Lang Jiuchuan had said, the White Tiger recited the covenant while she wrote it down using the innate talisman brush she held. The White Tiger initially had objections to this, but fell silent once it learned it was the Panguan’s Brush.

The Panguan’s Brush — the most impartial instrument of all.

“Before all heavens, this is proclaimed to the ten thousand spirits: I, Jiangche, do hereby willingly… should any party violate this covenant, let them be destroyed. Therefore, this Heaven-and-Earth covenant is established, and its declaration rises to the Nine Heavens.” As the White Tiger recited, it watched the talisman brush in Lang Jiuchuan’s hand write stroke by stroke in the air. With each mark, both of their souls fell upon the characters and dissolved into golden light, vanishing into the air — a sign that the covenant was drawing near completion.

When the recitation was done, their names stood side by side. The woman and the tiger exchanged a glance, and each sent a thread of their soul-mark across.

Purple-gold light blazed forth, and heavenly thunder cracked.

Quite a few people across the capital heard that thunderclap and gave a start — a thunder strike in the dead of winter, and the second one at that. Could it be an omen of calamity?

After the heavenly thunder passed, both names dissolved from the world. In an instant, the woman and the tiger each felt the bond between them — the tether born of the sealed covenant.

So it had all gone this smoothly.

Jiangche was genuinely astonished. Lang Jiuchuan had just been willing to fight to the death and take both of them down with her rather than allow a shared body — yet now, with a single Heaven-and-Earth covenant, she had agreed without hesitation.

Whatever the case, his turning point was before him. Could he go in now?

“Woman, here I come!” Jiangche rushed toward Lang Jiuchuan’s spiritual core with enthusiasm.

Lang Jiuchuan lowered her gaze, an inscrutable smile playing at the corners of her lips. A Heaven-and-Earth covenant made by a Lang Jiuchuan whose soul was not yet whole. Heh.

She had braced herself, yet when Jiangche entered and took root in the spiritual core, she still reflexively fortified her defenses.

Two souls in one body — whoever gained dominance would be the true master.

She intended to be the dominant one, and as it happened, Jiangche was thinking exactly the same thing — so the two of them began to struggle and split within the spiritual core.

Lang Jiuchuan’s defenses were formidable. For Jiangche to carve out even the smallest foothold, it had to force the issue with votive power, and neither would yield an inch. The result was a fresh round of a mortal struggle.

“The covenant is sealed, so would you open up already!” Jiangche said through gritted teeth. “Do you want to get struck by lightning?”

“Sit yourself in a corner and behave. Stop trying tricks, or soul rejection is inevitable,” Lang Jiuchuan replied.

Jiangche was at a loss for words.

Truly the most humiliating shared-body arrangement in all of history.

Fine — endure the small things, lest one lose sight of the greater scheme. Take root first, then settle the score with her later.

With that, it yielded, retreating to the furthest corner, curling into a small bundle, and in an instant took root there, spinning with delight — entirely unaware of the meaningful smile on Lang Jiuchuan’s face.

What a foolish big cat. One step back leads to step after step back. First lesson: I will teach you what it means to say the human heart is treacherous.

Jiangche did not know the treachery of the human heart, but it felt in very real and immediate terms the benefit of entering this body. It had formed a connection with Lang Jiuchuan, and through that connection sensed her force of destiny — and the consciousness felt as though it had been fed a supreme tonic, growing solid and full.

In that state of ease and contentment, it lost its hold — and the votive power it carried dispersed outward, filling the entire spiritual core with a pale golden light. Lang Jiuchuan’s soul absorbed it greedily.

Mutually sustaining each other.

On this point, Jiangche had not spoken false. With the covenant sealed, the two had formed a bond: a cycle in which its votive power nourished her and her force of destiny brought prosperity to it — each supporting the other.

Only — a full belly breeds idle thoughts. This was a human failing, and a tiger’s failing too.

Once it felt better, it wanted to pry into someone else’s secrets.

Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes snapped open. A flash of coldness crossed them, and her mental force shaped itself into blades of ice and stabbed at Jiangche.

Jiangche yelped and jumped out, snarling resentfully. “What are you doing? Are you trying to break the covenant?”

“Do you know what they say about curiosity? It kills the cat. You were trying to probe my soul — are you looking to die?” Lang Jiuchuan said, ice cold.

Jiangche’s eyes darted away, and it fumbled defensively. “Nothing of the sort. It was all just a misunderstanding.”

“We share a body, and I have not gone after you. You are not to push my limits either. If you do, breaking the covenant is no great difficulty.”

What unbelievable arrogance.

Jiangche looked at her insolent bearing, scratched its nose, and said with some sheepishness, “Understood. What are you talking about, with words like ‘going after’ someone — what kind of phrasing is that?”

Lang Jiuchuan gave a dismissive grunt, then rubbed her two fingertips together and asked, “Is this your true form?”

Hm?

Jiangche looked down at itself — the wispy, scattering consciousness from before had now fully taken on the shape of a tiger, exactly as it had once been.

It was enormous in build, its coat a pure and brilliant white, save for a tuft of golden fur on its forehead shaped like the character for “king.” A pair of golden tiger eyes, when fixed on a person, radiated nothing but aggression and dominance.

When it said nothing, it truly cut an imposing and formidable figure — the bearing of a ruler with genuine authority.

“Well? Impressive, isn’t it? This king is the mightiest, most magnificent, most formidable White Tiger on all of Mount Taiyi — the sovereign of tigers, with countless tigresses who have lost themselves to my splendour and wished to bear my cubs.” Jiangche struck a particularly grand and commanding tiger pose with immense satisfaction.

Lang Jiuchuan looked at that thick and plush coat and asked, “Why are you called Jiangche?”

“We of the White Tiger clan, in the most ancient times, were divine beasts — war deities by nature. My forefather was the war deity Jiangzhan, a divine beast of tremendous and far-reaching divine might…”

“A pity that you bear none of your forebear’s majesty — merely a consciousness that could not even keep its own body, surviving only by sharing with another.”

Jiangche was cut off mid-sentence, and with a roar of fury its white fur bristled from head to tail, its tiger eyes going wide and murderous, a killing aura rolling off of it in waves.

Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes lit up, her fingertips itching in anticipation — but then she took in the enormous size of it and frowned. “This room is not large. You’re blocking my view. Make yourself smaller — about the size of a cat will do.”

“I am the White Tiger King, and I will eventually be a divine beast — I am not a cat!”

Lang Jiuchuan stepped forward and swiftly gave the soft white fur of its luminous form a brisk ruffle, saying, “Alright then, Xiao Bai.”

Jiangche stared blankly.

Xiao Bai. Who was that?

Was she seriously insisting on calling it a cat, and giving it such a feeble name? Did she genuinely think of it as some harmless little white kitten who did nothing but wag its tail at its owner?

Unforgivable!

Jiangche was just about to unleash a tiger’s roar when Lang Jiuchuan gave it a quick flick and sent it vanishing back into the spiritual core.

“Don’t draw attention.”

Her words had barely fallen when there came a knock at the door, and Jian Lan’s voice rose from outside. “Young Miss, the Second Madam requests your presence.”