While Lang Jiuchuan lay in deep sleep, several groups of people came to visit her. Even Lang Zhengping made a trip — and given the obvious fluctuations in her breath and vital signs, had her condition been less apparent, he likely would have stationed himself at her bedside without leaving.

It was not until the apricot blossoms were already blooming, the top scholar’s name had been posted, and the grand parade had wound through the streets, that Lang Jiuchuan finally roused herself from sleep.

She sat up, took in the room around her, and found she was not in the Kaiping Marquis Estate, nor in the room at the Wanshi Pavilion — it was the wing room she had stayed in before at Tongtiange.

Lang Jiuchuan blinked. She thought of what she had glimpsed in her hazy half-consciousness and spread both hands open. She looked at her wrists — smooth and flawless as jade — and dispelled all the techniques she had been maintaining to keep herself walking normally.

At her wrists, barely visible even to the eye, were two faint marks. She could move and turn them without difficulty — which meant that what she had seen had not been a hallucination. Someone had reconnected the severed tendons in her wrists.

Lang Jiuchuan then looked down at her ankles. Her heart leapt. She climbed out of bed and took a step forward.

Thud.

Her knees hit the floor. Both hands instinctively shot out to brace her against the ground.

Having lain unconscious in bed for so many days had left her body somewhat weak — even walking made her legs unsteady. Yet she could feel that something was different. This unsteadiness was not the boneless collapse of someone whose tendons had been severed — it was only the weakness and stiffness of not moving for too long.

Lang Jiuchuan looked down at herself. The bone chime was gone. She scanned the room quickly and found it sitting on the small table beside the bed — but the three-inch sinew that had been hanging from it had disappeared entirely.

She immediately pressed both hands into a seal and directed her spiritual energy to flow into her heavenly eye — and the moment she did, both surprise and delight surged through her.

She had pushed herself to the very limit in her battle against Zhengyang Zi. Her spiritual energy had dried up completely, and both her vital energy and primordial essence had taken heavy damage — there was no underestimating how much she had lost. Yet now, not only was her spiritual energy abundant, but her physical body too felt somewhat stronger than before.

She used her nascent soul to look inward at the meridians throughout her body. The meridian channels were indeed fuller of blood and energy than before — stronger and more resilient. At both her wrists and her ankles, small sections of three-inch sinew connected what had been severed — white and translucent, emitting a faint luminescence, nourishing the newly reconnected tendons and fusing with them into a single whole.

Such miraculous skill.

Lang Jiuchuan breathed out in quiet wonder, and then simply settled into guiding the five elemental energies of heaven and earth through her entire network of meridians, turning her attention to the Daoist and Buddhist resonances she had witnessed before.

Spiritual energy curled around her without dispersing.

The water spirit crept out from the bone chime and nestled against her knee, drawing in and exhaling that drifting energy.

As the water spirit breathed it in and out, the pure, crystalline water-element energy it released flowed back toward Lang Jiuchuan — through her five senses and into her skin, until she felt as though she were submerged in clear, faintly luminous mist.

What had been meant as a single great cycle of circulation became three before she finally opened her eyes from her state of inner contemplation. The sky outside had already begun to pale. Her body carried a faint, subtle scent.

Lang Jiuchuan cast a purification talisman on herself, then dressed and gathered herself. She picked up the bone chime and said to the water spirit: “You were in the bone chime the whole time — did you see the person who reconnected my tendons?”

The water spirit recalled the terrifying man and gave a nervous little bounce. “I saw him. Briefly.”

Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes lit up. “What did he look like?”

“Very frightening.” The water spirit said, its voice tinged with lingering unease. “I only glanced once before I fled. I was afraid he might make me disappear.”

The aura that man carried was terrifying.

Running away may have been shameful, but knowing when to retreat was wisdom — it had only been protecting itself.

Lang Jiuchuan’s face darkened. “You fled?”

“Yes.”

“So you just left him to do whatever he pleased with me?”

The water spirit went silent for a moment.

You want to think about what you just said? Given what you look like, do you really think a man who seemed to have descended from the heavens would bother doing whatever he pleased with you?

“I don’t mean to underestimate you,” the water spirit said with a dismissive sniff, “but even if you’d been wide awake with your full strength, he could still have done whatever he pleased.”

Lang Jiuchuan raised an eyebrow. “He’s that powerful?”

“Very.” The water spirit stretched its little sphere into a line. “But there was something slightly strange about him.”

“Strange how?”

“Even though he’s very powerful, it was as though he didn’t quite belong here — like he was out of place with everything around him. I can’t quite describe the feeling.”

Lang Jiuchuan tapped the table, her expression thoughtful.

She picked up the bone chime and walked out. She came to the door of deep crimson and pushed it open, stepping over the threshold. What greeted her was a wing room furnished simply and with refined taste — but she did not take another step forward. Instead she simply stood there and looked into the room, as though seeing through the illusion before her to the person concealed behind the barrier within.

She pressed lightly on the ache that pulsed in her chest and said softly: “The time has not yet come. I understand. I will wait for you. And — thank you.”

She gave a solemn bow toward the room within, then turned and walked back out. The crimson door shut itself behind her, sealing everything away — and so she did not know that beyond the barrier, a man in robes with dark gold-trimmed inner lining had also been silently watching her.

The ghost general appeared without a sound at Feng Ya’s back. “My lord — you cannot keep allowing yourself these indulgences.”

Every time he moved his soul force like this — was it not the same as trading his life?

“I owe it to her from a past life.” Feng Ya let out a quiet sigh, turned, and settled back before the Seven Star Soul Lamp. Two words fell from his lips — barely a murmur.

Almost.

The ghost general turned those two words over in his mind. Did they mean he would soon see her — or that the soul lamp was nearly finished with its purpose?

Watching his lord’s soul force grow ever fainter, the ghost general silently lit two soul incense sticks.

The moment Lang Jiuchuan stepped out through the crimson door, she found A’Piao standing there looking like he had seen a ghost — he rushed toward her at once and demanded: “You went in there?”

“I did. Paid the pavilion master my respects,” Lang Jiuchuan said cheerfully.

“You actually saw him—” A’Piao started, and then fell silent mid-sentence under Lang Jiuchuan’s knowing half-smile. This little schemer was working her angles on him again.

He said through gritted teeth: “You know, you are genuinely only tolerable and pleasant to be around when you’re lying in bed at death’s door with depleted vital energy.”

When she had eyes open, she was a demon with several hundred more schemes than any ordinary person needed.

“You flatter me too much, Proprietor A’Piao.” Lang Jiuchuan gave him a polite little bow. “I am grateful to you and the pavilion master for taking care of me during this time. But — why am I here rather than at the Wanshi Pavilion? And where is Jiangche?”

“He’s playing guardian spirit at the Lang Family estate.”

Lang Jiuchuan frowned. “What does that mean?”

A’Piao’s expression sobered. “You seem to have forgotten what Zhengyang Zi’s position in the Rong Family actually was. The Ren Estate affair stirred up considerable trouble — the Rong Family found themselves knee-deep in scandal, and on top of that, they lost an elder who ranked in the top five and was on the verge of Foundation Establishment. You really think they won’t be furious?”

He folded his arms, his voice cool and unhurried: “The small-time operatives the Rong Family sent before — they probably would not have made much of their loss. But now, a top-ranking elder on the cusp of Foundation Establishment is dead. That is the equivalent of having their right arm cut off. They will absolutely not let this go.”

“Do they know it was me?”

“No concrete evidence yet. But do they actually need evidence? Whether it was you or not — better to kill the wrong person than let one escape. And you were their target long before this. Without needing any new justification at all—” A’Piao’s tone carried a certain schadenfreude — “you are the first thorn they will want removed when they need something to strike at. To prevent the Rong Family from lashing out in a frenzy and harming everyone around you, Jiangche is naturally stationed there to protect the Lang Family — and to keep you safe from assassination while you’re sleeping and recovering. That’s why you were moved here.”

Lang Jiuchuan turned and walked back toward the wing room. “Sit down and tell me what happened while I was unconscious.”