The Tantai Imperial Princess felt that something was different about Qingyi. When she came out of this meditation session, Ah Qing seemed to have something on her mind.

“What are you thinking about?” She watched Qingyi lying there chewing on a wild grass stalk with a distant, distracted look, and couldn’t help asking.

Qingyi looked up at her dreamily. “Ah Yue — everyone has a name. Why don’t I?”

Lang Jiuchuan — the name of that little girl she’d found wandering in spirit form had sounded beautiful the moment it entered her ears and found its way into her heart. It felt as though the name ought to have been her own. Jiuchuan — Nine Rivers. Such a grand, sweeping name. She liked it immensely.

The Tantai Imperial Princess was taken aback. “Qingyi isn’t your…”

She suddenly fell silent.

Qingyi was both a name and a Daoist title — a title she had given herself. Before that, what had she been called?

“Little Nine.” The Tantai Imperial Princess suddenly remembered. “When you were choosing your title, Master always called you Little Nine — don’t you remember?”

Qingyi’s phoenix eyes brightened slightly. “Because they found me on the ninth day of the fourth month, and so I was Little Nine.”

As she said it, her eyes dimmed a little. Everyone else had a full name and a family name. She had none. From birth she had been left on the steps of a mountain shrine, and it was Master who had picked her up and raised her.

But she was not the sort of person who wallows in things. She smiled at the Tantai Imperial Princess. “Ah Yue, the name I want from now on — I’ll call myself Jiuchuan. Like the rivers and mountains — vast and sweeping, full of life and vitality. What do you think?”

The Tantai Imperial Princess found it strange. “Why the sudden desire to take a name?”

Qingyi only smiled and said nothing.

The Tantai Imperial Princess thought nothing more of it. Odd, unexpected ideas were always springing into that head of hers.

“Ah Yue — did the Da Dan Empire ever have a great clan with the family name Min?”

Min Qingfeng had looked like he had been dead a good while. If what he said was true, it would have to be from quite long ago. And he had spoken of a hundred years of family fortune — this was no minor clan then, but one with a long history. It would be something from the past.

The Tantai Imperial Princess frowned, giving her a strange look. What had come over her?

Qingyi caught herself and said with a sheepish laugh, “I forgot — you and I grew up side by side, inseparable, and we have read all the same books.”

Although — she read fast and absorbed quickly, so she had in fact read more than Ah Yue.

“Never mind, I’ll go ask Master when the time comes.”

The Tantai Imperial Princess watched her bound off ahead, and pressed her lips together softly. Growing up truly was not so good. It seemed Ah Qing had suddenly acquired worries.

On Mount Cang.

The National Preceptor watched the two small figures approaching — one with a face of incomparable beauty, the other bright and lively. The faint spiritual energy hovering around both of them gave their bearing an otherworldly quality that surpassed the finest noble maidens throughout the realm.

Especially Qingyi, walking in front. His gaze settled on her, and his expression grew complex — both gratified and proud, yet carrying some indescribable emotion, something that seemed tinged with a shadow of worry. In the end, all of it receded and was replaced by stillness, becoming calm.

“Master.” The two girls arrived before him and bowed deeply.

The National Preceptor acknowledged them with a sound and looked at Qingyi, extending his hand.

A placating smile hovered on Qingyi’s face; she seemed about to say something — but in the end, under Master’s calm, all-knowing gaze, she reached behind her back and produced the peachwood Eight Trigrams formation disc, offering it up with both hands.

Beside her, the Tantai Imperial Princess lowered her eyes slightly, her expression entirely unsurprised, long since accustomed to the unspoken understanding that passed between Master and Qingyi with a single look.

“Was the Nine-Spirit Bird good?” The National Preceptor did not take the formation disc. He asked mildly.

Qingyi mumbled, “The meat was a bit lean. Not tender enough.”

The Tantai Imperial Princess, her face a mask of composed beauty: “…”

She truly just said that.

The National Preceptor laughed despite himself. “A thousand-year-old ritual implement — you used it to snare a bird. I will say nothing about that. But the fact that you managed to blow up the formation disc in the process of snaring a mere bird shows that your learning is not yet refined enough…”

“Your disciple submits to whatever punishment Master deems fit.” Qingyi obediently supplied the end of his sentence for him.

“Then re-forge the formation disc. I will give you one month.” The National Preceptor’s tone held no room for discussion, no invitation for her opinion — only the delivery of his will.

The Tantai Imperial Princess was suddenly alarmed. She looked at the shattered formation disc. Re-forging a formation disc from nothing — who could imagine how much spiritual power and vital energy that would require, to say nothing of the time limit of one month. And Ah Qing was only ten years old. Even if she somehow succeeded against all odds, it would leave her vitally depleted.

Master was strict, but this punishment was too heavy.

“Master…” The Tantai Imperial Princess had barely begun when the National Preceptor’s eyes turned toward her, carrying a clear warning and displeasure.

“Your disciple obediently accepts Master’s will.” Qingyi cut off the Tantai Imperial Princess’s words and smiled at her, hoisting the formation disc. “That means this month, I won’t be able to cultivate alongside Ah Yue.”

And with that, she took her leave first.

The Tantai Imperial Princess slowly knelt down and extended both hands.

This time, however, the National Preceptor did not punish her. He said mildly, “Do you know where the difference lies between you and her? It lies in the fact that she dares to do what others cannot. You believe a task cannot be completed by a child of ten — but that is your own potential being limited by your age. In truth, it is you who have bound yourself.”

The Tantai Imperial Princess went snow-white in the face and prostrated herself on the ground.

The National Preceptor looked down at her from where he stood. “Ah Qing possesses gifts rare in all the world. She is a natural vessel of the Dao. I do not expect you to stand as her equal — but you have both received the same teaching in the five-elements Daoist arts. You are also the blood of my Tantai lineage. Narrowing that gap as much as possible — that is the least that one bearing Tantai blood owes.”

“Yes.” The Tantai Imperial Princess’s voice trembled, her eyes reddening at the corners.

The National Preceptor turned and departed, leaving behind one final sentence: “In the days while she re-forges the formation disc, you will draw five Five-Thunder Talismans.”

“Yes.” The Tantai Imperial Princess listened to his footsteps recede into the distance, her body trembling faintly. It was a long while before she raised her head. The tears that had welled up in those beautiful eyes were forced back.

In the distance, Qingyi watched this scene, and sighed quietly, then headed off to the storage room.

Re-forging a formation disc from scratch — not so easy, but not impossible either. The key lay in inscribing the formation characters. She would need to prepare certain materials. But before going to the storage room, she first turned into the library tower and leafed through several books.

Once she had gone, the National Preceptor appeared, picked up the books she had been looking at, and flipped through them himself. His gaze landed on a comprehensive history of the great clans. His expression grew thoughtful.

That small child had suddenly acquired worries. What were they?

In those days of seclusion, who had she encountered?

The National Preceptor’s fingertip tapped lightly against the thick tome, his eyes narrowing, filled with puzzlement — until more than half a month later, when he destroyed a vengeful wraith that had come seeking revenge. That wraith was a death-spirit of the Min Clan, and it was from his ranting that the National Preceptor learned that Qingyi had had dealings with him — and the color drained from his face.

What had she heard? What had she come to know? And she had not said a single word, had not asked him one question.

The ordinarily composed National Preceptor could not help but feel a prickling unease — so much so that when the one-month deadline arrived and Qingyi came trotting up, eyes ringed with dark shadows, looking enormously pleased with herself, presenting a brand-new Five-Elements Eight-Trigrams formation disc with both hands — he felt no pleasure at all. Instead, an unaccountable wariness stirred in him.

She had grown up. And she had learned to keep things hidden.

“Ah Qing — is there nothing you wish to ask me? Nothing you wish to say to me?” The National Preceptor looked at his most prized disciple, whose head was now level with his chest, his expression serene.

Qingyi showed a puzzled look.