At the wide-open city gate, Zhou Yinzhi’s body, which had gradually stopped bleeding, lay collapsed in the road. Amidst the swirling yellow dust clouds, it faintly opened a bloody curtain.

Yan Lin waved his hand, and the great army entered the city.

As Jiang Xuening walked from outside the city gate to inside, those familiar streets appeared before her eyes once again. From her previous life to this one, they remained vaguely the same. But there wasn’t a single shop that was open—either doors were tightly shut, or buildings were broken down and desolate. Where was the prosperous scene of this former dynastic capital?

Long ago, it was on this very long street that Yan Lin, full of high spirits, had galloped with her through the lantern festival on horseback; where You Fangying, clumsy and awkward, wanting to look at a pouch, had knocked over someone’s stall; where when Shen Zhiyi went to marry into the Tatar lands, that procession that seemed joyful but was truly sorrowful had wound its way through the city; where Xie Ju’an had still been biding his time, walking from his residence with hands behind his back to the Youhuang Pavilion to find Lü Xian for a qin string or some good wood…

Everything began here, and would ultimately end here.

She had thought that killing Zhou Yinzhi and avenging herself would feel very satisfying.

But it didn’t seem to be the case.

Standing on this long street, watching those rows upon rows of soldiers marching forward, what arose in Jiang Xuening’s heart was actually a sense of emptiness, as if she suddenly didn’t know what to do next or where to go.

Xie Wei stood right beside her, accompanying her as they watched, but he didn’t say a word.

Jiang Xuening suddenly asked him: “What about you?”

Xie Wei turned back: “What?”

Jiang Xuening said: “After you’ve finished avenging yourself, what will you do?”

Xie Wei looked at her for a long time without answering.

Over twenty years of heavy obsession, the blood feud of an overturned life story—if it were avenged one day, would he feel gratification?

Or perhaps, like that feeling that came over her so suddenly…

Jiang Xuening truly couldn’t fathom it.

Deep autumn leaves were swept by the wind and scattered across corners of the long street. The sound of marching footsteps extended all the way to the end of the street. Scouts rode swift horses ahead to gather intelligence, while at the other end, Lü Xian frowned as he spoke with Yan Lin about something. From the far end of the long street, a young monk in blue robes came running hurriedly, only to be stopped by soldiers along the way. He struggled to explain something until he suddenly spotted Xie Wei at the other end, then pointed with his hand, his eyes brightening…

Xie Wei suddenly felt a moment of disorientation.

He said to Dao Qin beside him: “Let him come over.”

Dao Qin complied, walked over, spoke to the soldiers there, and brought the young monk over.

Jiang Xuening watched with some curiosity.

The young monk was clearly somewhat fearful of Xie Wei, but when he reached him, he still very politely pressed his palms together and bowed his head before saying: “Some days ago, a patron surnamed Meng came seeking refuge, covered in blood. After the abbot inquired, he said to inform Benefactor Xie. Hearing that the Xinzhou Army has entered the city, he specially sent this young monk to report.”

Xie Wei knew whom he was referring to. He only lowered his eyes slightly and said: “Thank you for your trouble.”

Jiang Xuening looked at this monk with much confusion.

But Xie Wei suddenly turned to her and asked: “Have you been to White Pagoda Temple?”

Jiang Xuening’s heart suddenly trembled.

She had heard the name White Pagoda Temple before, but had never been there.

The words caught in her throat, too bitter to emerge.

But Xie Wei took her hand and smiled: “There’s an old acquaintance there whom you also know. I need to make a trip. Will you come with me?”

Jiang Xuening couldn’t say words of refusal.

So Xie Wei pulled her onto the horse, directly circling her in his embrace, and rode away. They passed through several streets and soon saw from afar a white pagoda built tall.

The desolate city was filled with bleakness everywhere.

The ground had originally been covered with fallen leaves, with no one to sweep them. In the marketplace, not a single common citizen could be seen. Even if some people hadn’t left the city, at this time they all kept their house doors tightly shut, hiding from calamity.

However, the road ahead was actually clean and tidy.

On the ancient stone slabs covered with moss, fresh marks left by broom strokes remained, without a single fallen leaf. At the end stood an ancient and secluded temple. The maple leaves in the temple had long since turned red, and in this deep autumn season, there was a bit of brilliant splendor like rosy clouds.

Xie Wei reined in his horse here.

He extended his hand to Jiang Xuening again, helping her dismount.

In front of the temple gate, a young monk was just coming out carrying a water basin, sprinkling water on the ground that had just been swept. He seemed not to have expected anyone would come to worship Buddha at this time. When he first saw the two of them, his eyes revealed some surprise.

However, when he saw Xie Wei, his eyes instantly widened.

Xie Wei knew the monk had recognized him, but he didn’t waste words, only asking: “Where is Abbot Wangchen?”

The young monk began to stammer. After standing there for a long while, he quickly set down the water basin in his hands at the corner of the nearby wall and said: “The abbot is meditating in the meditation room. This young monk will go inform him right away!”

Having said this, he ran inside very quickly.

Xie Wei didn’t mind him and only led Jiang Xuening together into the temple.

Under the wall grew quite a few bodhi trees.

The abbot’s meditation room was further back, an ordinary, simple, small structure.

When they reached the front, Xie Wei said to her: “Wait here for me a moment.”

Jiang Xuening nodded.

Xie Wei walked straight inside. His figure was in the blink of an eye blocked by the door panel. From within the meditation room with its yellowed paper windows came the sound of a Buddhist chant, followed by calm conversational voices.

Everyone knew that although Xie Wei was in the court, he both read Daoist scriptures and understood Buddhist teachings, which was why he could get along well with scholars and also match wits with the former Imperial Preceptor, the monk Yuanji.

However, this was the first time she had seen him truly have any connection with a temple.

A patron surnamed Meng, whom she also knew…

Was it Meng Yang?

Thinking about it, Jiang Xuening found that she didn’t seem particularly curious about this. She only raised her eyes to survey her surroundings, and then saw that stone pavilion not far ahead.

At that moment, she clearly hadn’t seen the name of this stone pavilion, yet mysteriously, there was a strange sensation that made her heart suddenly pound. So she lifted her feet and walked toward it.

When she drew near, she could see it clearly.

It truly was the Chaoyin Pavilion.

Seven stone steps raised the pavilion higher. Inside was placed an old wooden table, with an incense burner resting on the table. It seemed incense had been burned just this morning. Though there was no wafting incense smoke now, one could vaguely smell from the empty air the faint scent of agarwood that had already dissipated.

Beside this stone pavilion was a vast forest of stone steles.

Each one was six feet tall and one foot wide.

Names upon names were carved on them.

Further back, some didn’t even have names.

One could see they had stood here for a very long time. The edge of each bore traces of wind and rain erosion, even covered with dust and grime.

Jiang Xuening slowly walked among them to look. Zhao, Qian, Sun, Li—all surnames were present. Some had full given names and surnames, completely intact. Some, however, seemed to not yet have formal names, with only a childhood name carved on the stele. Further back, there were quite a few without any names at all…

The tomb of three hundred righteous children.

In her previous life, she had never seen it, because it had seemed after all to be something unrelated to her. If it hadn’t been for later hearing You Fangying mention it when under house arrest in Kunning Palace, she might never have known that the ultimate upheaval of her previous life’s fate was actually tied to this bloody event from over twenty years ago.

Today she finally saw it.

She didn’t look quickly. Each time she saw a name, she would pause for a moment, as if wanting them to leave some trace in her memory.

However, when she walked to the corner in the southeast, Jiang Xuening suddenly stopped for a very long time and didn’t continue forward.

Before her eyes was also a stone stele.

But it was especially different from those around it.

On other steles, either clear names and surnames were carved, or there were no characters at all. But on this one, a name and surname had originally been carved, but it seemed not to have been completed before being forcibly scraped away by someone, leaving only a few mottled indentations and several chaotic carved marks.

A voice suddenly sounded from behind her: “This one is me.”

Jiang Xuening turned around.

Xie Wei had at some point already emerged from the meditation room. In the distance by the steps below the Chaoyin Pavilion stood an old monk, with Meng Yang standing beside him with a pale face, but they only watched and didn’t come over.

At first, Jiang Xuening didn’t understand what Xie Wei meant.

But he came to her side.

The dust accumulated on the dark stone stele was gently brushed away by his extended hand.

Xie Wei looked at her and smiled: “Originally, a name and surname were to be carved here as well, but she refused to believe no matter what that that pile of withered bones and filth after the snow melted was me. When the craftsman was carving the name on it, she snatched away the carving knife and destroyed the name carved on it. Then she told others that her child might not necessarily be dead, and even if misfortune had already befallen him and he was to be buried in the earth, he should no longer bear the surname Xiao.”

These were clearly words spoken with a smile.

But for some reason, as Jiang Xuening listened, her eyes grew hot with moisture, and she felt a choking sensation in her throat.

But Xie Wei said quietly: “I was originally someone who should have died over twenty years ago.”

Jiang Xuening reached out to grasp his hand and shook her head at him: “No, you’re not.”

Her palm was sweaty and even trembling.

So Xie Wei smiled: “What are you afraid of?”

Jiang Xuening couldn’t tell him. She only said: “No matter what, she hoped you would live.”

Xie Wei’s Adam’s apple moved slightly. For a long time he said nothing, his fingers hanging at his side clenched tightly. In the end, he didn’t respond to her words, only saying: “Don’t come here alone in the future. It’s time to go.”

He pulled her toward the exit.

As they passed beneath the Chaoyin Pavilion, Meng Yang glanced at them, while Abbot Wangchen pressed his palms together and recited a Buddhist chant to them: “Amitabha, all dharmas are empty of characteristics!”

Jiang Xuening had no Buddhist enlightenment and couldn’t understand.

Xie Wei didn’t respond.

He led Jiang Xuening out of White Pagoda Temple again. Outside the gate, Yan Lin led a mass of soldiers waiting quietly. Lü Xian stood at the bottom of the steps. Seeing them emerge, he first glanced at Jiang Xuening, then walked forward.

Xie Wei stopped.

Lü Xian came up and said something to him in a low voice.

Xie Wei seemed rather unconcerned: “Let her come. No need to stop her.”

Lü Xian gazed at him for a long time and asked: “Do you truly still want to win?”

Xie Wei said: “I do.”

So Lü Xian said: “But if what you want changes, your winning will be losing to others.”

Xie Wei said flatly: “I won’t lose.”

He didn’t speak further with Lü Xian.

During the time he was in White Pagoda Temple, Yan Lin and the others had already led troops to investigate the situation in the city. After the Heavenly Teaching’s righteous army entered the city, they had clearly encountered a long-premeditated ambush. Throughout the western and southern districts of the city, there was flowing blood everywhere, spreading all the way along Chang’an Street to the Forbidden City.

Fallen by the roadside were some from the Heavenly Teaching, some from the court.

There were even those who were wounded but hadn’t yet died.

When the Xinzhou Army passed by along the blood-stained road, they cried out and pleaded: “Save us, save us…”

Most people who saw this felt sympathy in their hearts.

However, when Xie Wei’s gaze swept over them, it only stirred up memories of the past. He didn’t linger long, and continued all the way with Yan Lin and the others straight toward that excessively quiet Forbidden City ahead.

The palace gates had long been broken through by the Heavenly Teaching.

Corpses that hadn’t yet been collected could be seen everywhere.

The originally brilliant golden Hall of Supreme Harmony had now been covered with a layer of blood red.

Wan Xiuzi surveyed his surroundings, almost unable to believe it.

Following at his side were now only a few thousand残兵 (remnant soldiers), each with bloodshot eyes and wounds on their bodies. Even on his own waist and abdomen was stuck a feathered arrow that hadn’t yet been removed. Only the arrow shaft had been broken off; the arrowhead still remained in his body, but he temporarily didn’t dare extract it.

The situation before the great hall was hardly any better.

Several thousand elite troops were arrayed before the hall, guarding the Emperor in their midst. But with Shen Lang’s disheveled hair and bare feet, how could he still look like the ruler of a nation?

He laughed in a neurotic manner.

All the civil and military officials of the court—those who hadn’t defected to the enemy, hadn’t fled, who remained loyal to their monarch—now all sat paralyzed in the great hall, trembling with fear, looking with lingering dread at the Heavenly Teaching righteous army that had pressed forward to before the hall and now faced them in confrontation.

Prince Linzi Shen Jie, Duke Dingguo Xiao Yuan, Minister of Justice Gu Chunfang, Vice Minister of Revenue Jiang Boyou, and even Xiao Dingfei was mixed among them…

Only Zhang Zhe was nowhere to be seen.

Xiao Shu, who had already attained the rank of Imperial Noble Consort, stood at this moment in a corner, watching the laughing Shen Lang, feeling only an icy coldness throughout her body and utter bleakness in her heart.

If judging only by cunning, Shen Lang was undoubtedly a qualified emperor.

He had actually deliberately withdrawn troops from the city gates and instead had people lie in ambush at the narrow passages of the marketplace. When the Heavenly Teaching thought they had achieved victory, he dealt them a head-on devastating blow, truly catching the enemy completely off guard.

Fighting all the way, they had actually won miserably by a narrow margin!

Though now people had fought their way into the imperial palace, he showed not a trace of panic, and even had an indescribable sense of satisfaction, making people suspect: Did this emperor still have other cards up his sleeve?

Wan Xiuzi’s gaze looked toward him darkly. For a moment, he actually couldn’t quite make up his mind.

Regardless of what came after, that dragon throne sat there at the heights of the Hall of Supreme Harmony.

Over twenty years ago, he had been only one step away from this position. It was only a pity that Prince Pingnan had been entangled in imperial family grudges, insisting on exterminating the Shen bloodline completely, ultimately leading to the arrival of reinforcements and falling short at the last moment!

Over twenty years later, he once again stood beneath this dragon throne!

Before the Hall of Supreme Harmony, the sunlight blazed intensely. Over ten thousand people on both sides faced each other in confrontation, yet among the formations only the sound of the wind howling past could be heard. Not a single person dared make the slightest sound.

So the sounds from afar became clear.

It was the orderly footsteps of many people, striking one by one on the solid stone-paved ground of the imperial palace, gradually drawing nearer, as if each step trod upon people’s hearts, controlling the beating of their hearts!

Both the Heavenly Teaching and the court sides showed a commotion.

Shen Lang and Wan Xiuzi both looked toward the palace gate.

When they saw from afar the raised banner of the Xinzhou Army, the remnant soldiers on the Heavenly Teaching side only felt a wave of panic, while among the officials on the court side, a small portion almost immediately became energized, even with a flavor of weeping tears of joy!

“It’s Minister-Tutor Xie and Prince Yan’s Xinzhou Army!”

“They’ve finally arrived!”

“An army serving the monarch! Heaven aids our dynasty! These Heavenly Teaching rebels will certainly meet their end here today!”

…

However, in contrast, Shen Lang’s face suddenly turned ashen.

Wan Xiuzi even seemed to have heard the greatest joke in the world. He raised his hand pointing at these foolish incompetents and laughed loudly: “Rescue troops, you still think rescue troops have arrived! Hahaha…”

Xie Wei, in his snow-white Daoist robes unstained by dust, slowly approached in the fiercely blowing wind.

Almost everyone’s gaze turned toward him.

Jiang Xuening at his side, looking at this scene of tragic confrontation before her eyes, felt the entire world turn pale and experienced a strange dizzying sensation.

The great army in overwhelming force, black and dense like tidewater, arrayed itself before the Hall of Supreme Harmony, almost surrounding everyone.

Those people in the court, hearing Wan Xiuzi’s great laughter, became noisy with confusion.

Wan Xiuzi only thought himself already pitiful and tragic, yet had never imagined that in this world there were people even more tragic and pitiful than himself. He laughed even more wildly, actually raising his hand to point at Xie Wei and shouting loudly: “He’s served as an official in the court for seven or eight years! Right under your noses! Yet you actually didn’t recognize him! This is hardly the Prince’s Junior Tutor who devoted himself wholeheartedly to your court—this is clearly a demon who at any moment will demand your lives and make you repay your blood debt!”

Xiao Dingfei, hidden in the crowd, sighed softly, thinking to himself: My days of swindling food and drink are finally coming to an end…

Xie Wei walked up the steps without speaking.

Duke Dingguo Xiao Yuan looked at him, then at Wan Xiuzi, suddenly thinking of something. An indescribable terror suddenly spread through his heart!

Immediately after, that ominous premonition was confirmed.

Under the anxious and uneasy gazes of everyone, Wan Xiuzi’s voice, carrying boundless malice and even a bit of smugness, rang out before this vast Hall of Supreme Harmony, yet it carried an extremely sinister flavor: “If we go back over twenty years, at that time and place, he wasn’t called Xie Ju’an—he should be called—Xiao Dingfei!”

Many people in court and countryside immediately heard a “buzz” in their heads.

But Xie Wei only stood still, looking at everyone with extraordinary calm, and said indifferently: “With such liveliness, it seems I’ve arrived a bit late.”