The greatest distance in the world is not the distance between life and death, nor the distance of being separated by all of heaven and earth — but standing right before you, yet you do not know that I love you.

He Bang did not know where the National Rite’s ritual temple was, but Yugu had lived in the mortal world for more than a decade, and if she didn’t know the road, she at least knew how to ask. The two of them traveled along asking and walking — counting the time He Bang stopped to eat and drink along the way, plus the time it took Yugu to determine their direction while He Bang used water-travel — they were on the road for six full days.

Six days later, Yugu asked for directions again, only to find that He Bang had overshot her destination. The two of them turned back and walked for another three days.

Nine days later — their destination. The surroundings were a sea of people: soldiers in armor with swords at their sides, distinguished visitors invited to observe the National Rite, and ordinary folk who had come to enjoy the spectacle.

He Bang wandered about the area, and in an unprecedented departure from her usual habits, did not look for food. The weather was hot, and Yugu held a parasol for her and bought her iced water. As the Emperor himself had come in person, the ritual temple was heavily guarded. Even those who had come to watch the ceremony could only observe from a distance.

He Bang pressed her way through the crowd with Yugu in tow, and drew many a gaze in her wake without making a sound. There were naturally also many would-be rogues who tried to take advantage. When it came to this kind of man, Yugu was experienced: “Mis—” Remembering that the word “mistress” would sound a little strange out in public, she changed course without missing a beat: “Young lady — be careful not to let them rub up against you!”

He Bang was still entirely unconcerned: “Why?”

Right as she spoke, someone deliberately rubbed their arm forcefully against hers. He Bang, never having had her person taken advantage of before, was just puzzling over it, when another hand stretched out, about to grab at her! She openly deployed a water-pattern barrier around herself, and only then did Yugu manage to explain: “It’s when a man sees a beautiful woman and wants to…”

He Bang heard this, and simply withdrew the water barrier — and squeezed her way forward through the crowd. Yugu couldn’t hold her back. Before long the two of them had made it to the front. Both were drenched in perspiration. He Bang drank a mouthful of iced water, looked up, and saw Rong Chen Zi wearing a nine-jade cloud crown, dressed in fish-scale immortal robes, belted with a floating-wind precious sash, and shod in cloud-ascending immortal shoes — his bearing commanding and awe-inspiring, too bright to look directly at.

But He Bang dared to look directly at him!

She gave a cheer, spread both arms wide, and lunged forward: “Zhiguan!”

It happened to be the moment of presenting the memorial to Heaven. Rong Chen Zi was holding his ritual tablet, forming hand seals, and preparing to open the altar, when he suddenly turned and looked toward the crowd. Both Zhuang Shaoqin and Ye Tian knew this was not good. Though the crowd was boisterous and dense, He Bang’s bright yellow outfit was impossible to miss — the three of them spotted her in nearly the same instant.

Ye Tian was quite startled: “She… she was still being good and staying in the temple when I left — how did she end up here?”

He Bang was fighting her way forward. Without her shell she was remarkably slippery, and in a short while had squeezed free of the crowd. The crowd stirred with commotion, and soldiers naturally stepped forward to block her path. Seeing how unusually beautiful she was, they refrained from using force — they only shouted: “Step back! No causing a disturbance!”

The moment He Bang caught sight of Rong Chen Zi, her grievances all came pouring out at once: “Zhiguan! Wuu, wuu — the old man wouldn’t give me food, and he was mean to me… wuu, wuu, wuu…”

The weather was hot and she had been squeezed in the crowd — drenched in sweat as she was, weeping like this she looked truly pitiable. Rong Chen Zi’s composure shattered instantly. Even the Emperor on the imperial chair noticed something was amiss: “What is happening?”

Zhuang Shaoqin by his side quickly answered: “Nothing of concern. A village woman is causing a disturbance and making a scene — this one will go and investigate.”

He walked rapidly down the ceremonial steps, signaling to Rong Chen Zi without pause to open the altar.

Rong Chen Zi looked toward He Bang in the crowd — she was still crying and making a fuss, and the surrounding soldiers were menacing her with their weapons raised. He was terrified the blades might harm her, but fortunately Zhuang Shaoqin had already arrived at a quick pace. Rong Chen Zi collected himself and opened the altar. The great river clam, seeing that he was not going to put down everything and come hold her, burst into even more heartbroken weeping.

With the Emperor beside him, Zhuang Shaoqin dared not say much to her, and only whispered urgently to Yugu: “There is a guesthouse called Tongyuan Inn on the south side of the city. Take her there, give my name, and someone will see to your accommodations properly. Come to speak with me in the evening for more details.”

“Zhiguan!” He Bang called out through her tears. On the altar, Rong Chen Zi was presenting offerings to the five directions, and did not turn his head — as though he and she were complete strangers.

Yugu tugged at the sleeve of He Bang’s robe and coaxed her softly: “Miss, let us go first. It is hot, and there are too many people here.”

He Bang’s large eyes were brimming with shimmering water. Zhuang Shaoqin instructed the soldiers beside him: “There is to be no disrespect before the sacred altar — escort them out and that is all.”

The soldiers bowed in response. They refrained from pushing or shoving, and escorted the two of them out of the crowd. Rong Chen Zi continued with the ceremony. Only when Zhuang Shaoqin returned did he look over at him, and Zhuang Shaoqin gave a slight nod — a signal that all was well.

But in actuality, Rong Chen Zi spent the entire afternoon unable to feel at ease. He forced himself to hold on until the evening’s ceremony ended, only to find that the Emperor then wanted to discuss the Dao with him further. His mind was a tangle, and he had no composure whatsoever to discuss anything.

Zhuang Shaoqin could naturally see this, though his own considerations at this point were different. Taking advantage of the moment when Rong Chen Zi was changing his robes, he managed to speak with him privately: “Senior martial brother, you cannot go right now, and neither can I. Only in the evening can we ask junior martial sister to go. Whatever has happened — she made it here in one piece, and there is no need to worry. The political situation at court is shifting by the moment. This is a golden opportunity to bring glory to Qingxu Temple, but if word gets out that you sneaked away to see her, it would very likely backfire. You know I am right.”

How could Rong Chen Zi not understand the reasoning? Yet he simply could not be at peace. Zhuang Shaoqin had no choice but to keep reassuring him: “She is, after all, a great demon who has already attained the Way — senior martial brother, you need not worry yourself too much. There are people from my household at Tongyuan Inn who will look after her well. And once junior martial sister goes over in the evening, you will have even less to worry about.”

Rong Chen Zi let out a sigh: “Go quickly — her nature is playful, and I fear she will not simply go to the inn and stay put.”

Zhuang Shaoqin naturally agreed: “Senior martial brother, please go pay your respects to the Emperor — I will go find junior martial sister right now.”

Rong Chen Zi was with the Emperor until well into the night. Naturally, Zhuang Shaoqin also had to remain in attendance, and Ye Tian had gone and not yet returned. Rong Chen Zi’s heart was as though roasting over a slow flame, but fortunately Zhuang Shaoqin was there to carry the weight of things, so his preoccupation went unnoticed.

Well past midnight, Ye Tian returned in a rush and went first to Zhuang Shaoqin: “She never went to Tongyuan Inn at all.”

Zhuang Shaoqin immediately called in all his connections and had a thorough search made all across the city. The last person to see He Bang turned out to be the proprietor of a grilled mutton skewer stall.

Neither of them dared tell Rong Chen Zi. Ye Tian urged Zhuang Shaoqin to go and search again, and Zhuang Shaoqin was also rather helpless: “With her water-travel — she covers a thousand li in the blink of an eye. Even if I mobilized everyone at my disposal to search for her, I doubt there would be any news. The most urgent thing right now is that this absolutely cannot reach senior martial brother’s ears — letting him concentrate on the National Rite is what matters.”

The following day, something else happened in the capital. Several men’s hands first developed what looked like water blisters — but within the space of two quarter-hours they began to swell. Then the entire hand swelled until it was translucent. Among those affected were also men from wealthy households, and every renowned physician in the capital was consulted, yet not one of them could prescribe a remedy. Zhuang Shaoqin heard of it, suspected an epidemic, but when he gathered the dozen or so patients together, he discovered that all of them were men, and that the afflicted part in every case was the hand — though left or right hand varied from person to person. The ailment was strange, yet showed no sign whatsoever of spreading or contagion. He tested it with talisman water and saw no reaction. Only by that same afternoon, the skin on the hands of all twelve or so men began to peel away, with clear water seeping out, revealing beneath it the flesh, pale and puckered as though thoroughly waterlogged.

After much investigation, someone finally stammered out a shameless confession: “…At this point this one dare not conceal it from the national preceptor any longer. Yesterday during the National Rite, this one saw a young woman in yellow and, momentarily losing all sense, could not help but… this one swears on his life, he only touched her once. At the time there was only an itch in the hand, and then after returning home the ailment began…”

Once this one started talking, the rest all confessed as well. Zhuang Shaoqin was both furious and amused, and had no desire to deal with any of them. He sent two words up in a memorial to the Emperor — Divine Retribution.

On the third day after He Bang’s disappearance, Rong Chen Zi found out — he had always been uneasy, and seized an opportunity when Ye Tian falsely claimed to be keeping company with He Bang to request that she speak to He Bang through a message-transmitting talisman.

Zhuang Shaoqin had never imagined he could conceal it for long. His only concern had been that if Rong Chen Zi learned of He Bang’s disappearance, he would be unable to keep his mind on the National Rite. Unexpectedly, learning of it, Rong Chen Zi showed none of the anxiety Zhuang Shaoqin had anticipated: “I once placed a Shared-Heart Cinnabar mark on her. Following the energy, I will certainly be able to find her. I will soul-travel tonight to look for her.”

The Shared-Heart Cinnabar was a Daoist technique used between those who were closest — a means of tracking by sound and keeping in communication. Zhuang Shaoqin let out a breath of relief: “Senior martial brother, why didn’t you say so sooner — you nearly scared me to death for nothing.”

Ye Tian also felt greatly reassured: “Now that I think about it, I also bear some responsibility. Knowing that Yuyan Zhenren had no great affection for her, I still left her alone at the temple.”

Rong Chen Zi waved a hand: “This is not your fault — get some rest. I’ll go look for her.”

With the Shared-Heart Cinnabar to track the energy, Rong Chen Zi located the disobedient creature with surprising speed. The capital had a moat, and the moat had a tributary flowing eastward — winding through the rocky formations to the east, it formed a tranquil, water-lush, idyllic spot. It was a place popular with young couples on outings.

Around it there were naturally many small stalls and vendors, with all manner of food available. Since the weather was hot and He Bang disliked walking, she had made herself a small cavern in the rocks beneath the clear pool, beneath the water — cool, quiet, and near food. She found it wonderfully comfortable and planned to stay until autumn came and the heat eased before moving on.

By the time Rong Chen Zi arrived, Yugu had just settled He Bang to sleep. At the sight of Rong Chen Zi, she was still apprehensive, and only bowed her head and said: “Zhiguan.”

Rong Chen Zi naturally had no intention of making things difficult for her — in front of He Bang she was nothing but a rabbit, and there was no stopping He Bang from doing whatever He Bang decided to do. The stone cavern was not large, but it could comfortably house three or four people. Rong Chen Zi made his way inside to find nothing but a large round table, and beside it a particularly lush clump of water weeds.

He Bang had burrowed inside this clump of water weeds with her shell shut and was sleeping soundly. Rong Chen Zi shook his head helplessly. Since he had come here only in soul form, he performed a technique and slipped inside He Bang’s shell as well.

Inside the shell, a soft pearlescent light diffused gently. The river clam within was very small — perhaps a foot or more — and Rong Chen Zi took her soft little hand and lay down beside her, also letting out a quiet sigh: “Why have you gone wandering off again?”

He Bang first thought she was dreaming. After a while she blinked hard several times, and then saw that Rong Chen Zi was truly and genuinely beside her. She immediately felt aggrieved: “If you don’t want to be with me, why have you come looking for me now?!”

Rong Chen Zi took her snow-white wrist and slowly drew her into his arms. The arts of the Daoist tradition were remarkable — though he had come only in his spirit form, he felt entirely solid and real: “When have I not wanted to be with you? It is only that the National Rite is no trivial matter, and there is absolutely no room for recklessness. Be good and behave, and in a few days once the ceremony is over I will take you back.”

He Bang’s pink, tender mouth was pouted out. She rolled over and over for a long while before finally turning onto her side with her back to him: “I’m not going back. I’m never going back.”

Rong Chen Zi only held her small hand pressed against his chest and said nothing more, drawing her close and sleeping.

The next morning, when He Bang woke, Rong Chen Zi was already gone. She suspected she had dreamed it all, and it was only when Yugu brought in food and told her that Rong Chen Zi had returned to the ritual temple — saying he would come back again in the evening — that she believed it.

He Bang’s resentment had not yet fully subsided: “Who needs him coming? When the weather isn’t hot anymore, I’ll go back to the East Sea!”

Yugu said quietly: “Mistress, are you truly not going to follow Zhiguan anymore?”

He Bang pouted, thought about it for a while, and then stuffed another piece of slow-cooked soft and tender braised beef tendon into her mouth: “But an inner cultivator’s position is too low — it will be very pitiful in the future.”

She had, after all, lived as a great demon for several thousand years, and had weathered enough storms to see things in the long view. In truth, the bitterness or sweetness of any situation was ultimately something one brought upon oneself. It really wasn’t worth giving up decades of happiness for the sake of a bleak and desolate ending.

With the mistress holding such thoughts, what could Yugu possibly say? She could only make sure the food was plentiful and He Bang was well-fed and well-rested.

The following night, Rong Chen Zi kept his word — the moment the day’s ceremony was over, he came again in soul form. He entered the stone cavern without a word, and simply picked up He Bang — who had just finished eating and was settling in for sleep — and carried her. He Bang, curled in her shell and on the verge of sleep, was not at all happy about being disturbed. But before she had time to react, she found herself outside in the open air. The moon was bright and the stars sparse, a gentle breeze drifting in — cool and refreshing.

The people of the capital had a far richer array of entertainments than the folk of Lingxia Town, and there was no curfew — the night hours were lively and full of life. Rong Chen Zi took He Bang to see shadow puppet theater. The theater hall had vendors moving through the crowd selling tea, sweets, red dates, and sunflower seeds. Rong Chen Zi spread a soft length of silk on the table and carefully placed He Bang in the center of it. Their seats were near the front. He Bang opened her shell and watched the stage. Rong Chen Zi fed her grapes, red dates, and sunflower seed kernels as the performance went on, and with snacks to eat and the show to watch, her sleepiness gradually faded.

Her shell swiveled to track the angles of the shadow puppets’ movements on the stage. After a while she turned it back around to look at Rong Chen Zi. He hadn’t been watching the performance much at all — his clean, slender hands had been shelling piles of sunflower seeds and peanuts and heaping up the kernels, and at this moment he was cracking open several walnuts and picking out the walnut meat, shelling it thoroughly clean.

Feeling He Bang watching him, he also fed her a walnut kernel.

He Bang watched the show happily for a while, then decided that the peanuts and sunflower seeds weren’t sweet enough. Shortly afterward, a vendor selling sugar-glazed peanuts appeared beside the table, working his way through the audience offering the snack to those watching the show. He Bang, eyeing that dish of peanuts each coated in a gleaming caramel crust, and seeing no one paying attention, couldn’t help stretching out her soft foot-mantle to reach into the basket and roll some toward herself.

The theater hall’s lighting was dim. The vendor was busy making sales and hadn’t noticed. He Bang, having gotten away with it, simply stopped eating the sunflower seeds Rong Chen Zi kept trying to feed her.

Some time later, a wealthy man’s concubine seated somewhere nearby suddenly let out a shriek: “Heavens! That river clam is stealing peanuts by dipping them in sugar!”

The second night, a martial arts practitioner had set up a fighting platform — a tournament to find his daughter a husband. Rong Chen Zi brought He Bang along to watch the excitement. He Bang had already been eagerly looking forward to him coming back to take her out, and having eaten her fill she had not slept. Rong Chen Zi held her hand as they walked through the street market, buying her a lotus lantern, which she carried about shining it here and there, delighted beyond measure. When they reached the fighting platform, she caught the smell of steamed buns. Rong Chen Zi had to go buy some, and while she stood by the platform, the gentle night breeze stirred her long yellow skirt sideways, lifting her hem and sleeves — she was lighter than a fallen petal, and the flower lantern she held swayed in the breeze. She looked like an immortal descended from the Jade Pool.

People all around assumed she was the young lady from the fighting platform whose hand was being offered in marriage. The crowd erupted in noise, the spirits of the assembled heroes soaring — they jostled forward to shower compliments on her, each swearing to spill blood for the sake of this beauty!

Rong Chen Zi returned with the steamed buns and brought her to sit at a nearby tea stall. In his robes of an ordained Daoist, there were people who suspected he was some unscrupulous fortune-teller who had lured a beautiful young woman away to sell. During the time it took to drink a pot of tea, more than ten men came over one by one, each acting shifty-eyed and trying to chat him up, then roundabout-ly asking about the price. Several sides began to argue with each other, the price they mentioned climbing higher and higher, until finally it came to outright blows.

To his credit, Daoists had always placed the greatest emphasis on self-cultivation and the tempering of character — otherwise, Rong Chen Zi might well have been smashing their heads in with his horsetail whisk long before now.

On the third night, Rong Chen Zi brought He Bang to see the capital’s Bell Tower. This was the tallest building in the capital — its body rising over twelve zhang high, shaped like a pagoda, with a great bronze bell suspended from its topmost story. Rong Chen Zi held He Bang close as they stood at the tower’s jeweled peak. Below them lay ten thousand households’ worth of lantern light, those points of brightness swirling and scattering, lustrous and dazzling, as though the entire river of stars had been spread out at their feet.

A cool breeze drifted in. He Bang spread her arms wide to meet it, her hair and the hem of her robe fluttering and dancing. The full moon rose behind her, the night sky a deep blue like a solid slab of sapphire. He Bang closed her eyes and gave herself to the caress of the wind, and after a long while said: “Standing here — it feels like standing in the sky.”

Rong Chen Zi smiled faintly and settled with her on the glazed roof tiles at the tower’s peak. He had come here only in soul form, and could not smell the fragrance of immortal flesh. But He Bang felt the fullness overflowing in her heart — sitting here like this for a whole lifetime would not seem so bad at all. Rong Chen Zi let her lean against him, and after a long while said: “After a hundred years — will you come with me to the heavens?”

He Bang suddenly turned to touch the tower’s gilded golden dome: “This looks like a candied hawthorn stick!”

Rong Chen Zi had no wish to press her, and simply took her hand: “Come — we will go down and buy candied hawthorn.”

On the fourth night, when Rong Chen Zi came again, He Bang was unwilling to go out with him. Soul-travel consumed an enormous amount of energy, and Rong Chen Zi — in a mortal body — was already exhausted from a full day of the National Rite ceremonies. Coming here in soul form at night on top of that and then taking her out to play, day after day without rest, was more than even a Daoist of his caliber could sustain.

He never mentioned it, enduring it on the strength of his cultivation. But He Bang had the sensitivity that came with inner cultivation, and she could feel his fatigue. And so she had Yugu turn him away at the entrance that evening, and curled up in her shell herself to sleep.

Yugu kept watch at the cavern entrance. He Bang had passed some water-control methods on to her, and she practiced them in her spare time. Because she had the foundation Chunyu Lin had built in her, plus a drop of the keel-serpent’s serpent blood, the learning came to her without much difficulty. But He Bang was a lazy teacher and had imparted very little.

At the third watch of the night, strange sounds suddenly came from outside. Yugu was wide awake in an instant. She looked up — and nearly disbelieved her own eyes. Through the clear, bright water came a figure, walking step by step with that unmistakable grace — red robes rippling like light on water, black hair flowing, beauty unsurpassed in the world.

Her entire body went rigid and taut. After a long moment she called out in a trembling voice: “Master?”

The arrival looked mildly surprised to see her here, and said casually and softly: “You are here too.”

That voice was exactly as warm and gentle as always. Yugu’s eyes grew hot with tears: “Master — you’re alive!” She rushed forward and wrapped both arms around that slender waist, her tears streaming: “You’re still alive!”

The arrival was unmistakably Chunyu Lin. His refined and beautiful face slowly curved into a smile, and he patted Yugu gently on the back: “Of course I am alive. There is no need to grieve.”

Yugu wept for a good while, then at last remembered: “I must go tell Mistress!”

Chunyu Lin gave a slight nod, his feet continuing to move forward, and followed her into He Bang’s stone cavern.

Yugu woke the sleeping He Bang. He Bang opened her shell and looked at him — those red robes seemed to set a reflection burning in her eyes. But there was not a trace of warmth on her face: “What are you here for?”

The overjoyed Yugu hadn’t expected such coldness, and was momentarily at a loss. Chunyu Lin settled himself at the stone table of his own accord, his voice clear and bright: “The weather is hot, and I was worried, seeing that Your Majesty had been lingering here without leaving. I naturally had to come and check.”

He Bang looked steadily at his eyes, soft as water: “Have you looked?”

Chunyu Lin’s expression flickered: “Yes—” He Bang immediately showed him out: “Then go.”

“Mistress…” Yugu called out in a low, subdued voice, but did not dare go against He Bang’s wishes. Chunyu Lin’s right hand reached out, producing a box from seemingly nowhere, and passed it to Yugu: “Inside are sweets that Your Majesty enjoys. I will take my leave now. Her constitution is delicate — take good care of her.”

Yugu looked after him with reluctance she could not conceal, but also dared not see him to the door. She could only take the food box and watch him leave.

“Mistress.” She turned back, wanting to speak with He Bang, but He Bang stopped her with a single cold sentence: “If you wish to go with him, you may leave now.”

Yugu paled in shock, kneeling immediately: “This servant would not dare — this servant will serve Mistress faithfully for this life and the next!”

He Bang closed her shell. After a long silence, she gave Yugu one observation: “Chunyu Lin had only three hundred-some years of cultivation. The keel-serpent was a fierce creature of no less than ten thousand years. Even if the two merged as one, who do you think would be the one who survived?”

Yugu’s eyes welled with tears again: “So he…”

She did not go on. She knew she should believe He Bang’s words — with her own current capabilities, He Bang had no reason to deceive her. But she still held on to something close to a desperate hope — those features, that gaze, that manner of speech and bearing: where was any of it not Chunyu Lin?

The truth may well have been that moving in an actual physical body was genuinely inconvenient, for all river clams were exceedingly lazy by nature. Even a great river clam who had cultivated for more than four thousand years could not overcome this inborn quality. And so, when food was adequately supplied, He Bang was actually quite well-behaved — she rarely went anywhere, eating her fill and then sleeping.

Rong Chen Zi would come by to check on her whenever he could finish the day’s ritual ceremony, and seeing her sleeping, never disturbed her. Chunyu Lin also came by from time to time, bringing food. Yugu was always afraid the two of them would run into each other, but the two seemed to have made some unspoken arrangement — they never coincided.

She was dimly aware that Chunyu Lin now was indeed very different from before. She always felt, vaguely, that an uneasy, demon-tinged aura permeated him now, filling her with a nameless dread. And yet thinking it through carefully, she could not locate the source of this oppressive feeling. He still spoke to her with the same gentleness as before — still no intimacy in his gestures — but each time he spoke, even his eyes carried the same warm and gentle light as always.

Whether day or night, beneath the deep pool all was eternally quiet and still. The corners the light did not reach lay in pitch darkness. Only the cold light of the luminous pearls lit the stone cavern. He Bang jolted awake with a cry. Yugu heard the sound and hurried to attend her. Seeing her after the shock of just waking from a nightmare, she dared not ask what she had dreamed, and only mixed up some sweetened water for her.

He Bang drank a bowl of sweet water and curled back into her shell, closing her eyes again. Her heart felt hollow and empty, and she began to think of Rong Chen Zi with no particular reason. She had lived for more than four thousand years and had never known what longing was. But it was from this period of separation since Rong Chen Zi began overseeing the National Rite that she began, slowly, to taste something of it.

Lying inside her shell, turning restlessly in the dark, she could not help but think of Rong Chen Zi’s broad, warm chest, his strong and steady arms, his palms with their faint calluses, and the intoxicatingly delicious smell of his flesh…

But she also knew this was not the time to ask Rong Chen Zi to come. Ever since she had run from Qingxu Temple all the way here, Rong Chen Zi had been extraordinarily indulgent toward her — clearly, he felt guilty and remorseful about the hardship she had suffered in the temple. If she spoke, Rong Chen Zi would certainly come in the night and stay with her until dawn — but he still had things to tend to the following day, and it would leave him overly exhausted.

She tossed and turned, gradually drifting off to a vague and hazy sleep. When she opened her eyes, Rong Chen Zi’s face was barely two or three inches from hers. His warm lips had touched her cheek. He Bang rubbed her eyes: “Zhiguan, why have you come?”

The Rong Chen Zi beside her smiled softly but said nothing, only slowly kissed her lips, then her chin, then down to her throat. He Bang hummed contentedly. Suddenly, from the back of Rong Chen Zi’s neck, a ferocious serpent head lunged forward!

He Bang’s heart lurched, and she jolted wide awake — she had had another nightmare.

The forty-nine days of the National Rite were not so long, yet not so short. On this particular day, He Bang opened her shell to find Ye Tian and Zhuang Shaoqin and the others all present. She rubbed her eyes and said in her languid, drowsy tone: “Yugu, why didn’t you wake me?”

Everyone laughed. Yugu hurried to help her up: “I called for half an hour and you wouldn’t wake…”

Everyone had worked hard during the National Rite, and this meal was naturally a reward for their stomachs. Zhuang Shaoqin knew the area well and brought them to a small green-painted building with an unusual name — Goats Trampled the Vegetable Garden.

He Bang had just woken up and was still being carried in Ye Tian’s arms, the two of them walking along whispering into each other’s ears. But the moment she entered the garden she was furious — a waiter blocked the party at the entrance, and seeing their noble bearing, was still relatively polite: “Ah, all you esteemed guests — our establishment does not allow you to bring your own ingredients. This river clam…”

He had probably never seen a river clam of quite this size. He reached out a finger to poke it — and He Bang bit down with tremendous force, nearly taking his finger clean off.

While the dishes were being brought up, He Bang was still lodging a complaint to Ye Tian, recounting Yuyan Zhenren’s “crimes” one by one. Everyone normally regarded Yuyan Zhenren as an elder and would never have dared criticize him. Now, listening to her embellish and dramatize the account with great satisfaction, they all secretly laughed while pretending not to listen.

It was Rong Chen Zi who drew her to his side and spoke a low, firm word of reproach: “Do not speak irresponsibly!”

Yugu had been standing in attendance to the side, but now that everyone was seated, she was left standing alone with nothing to help with — Rong Chen Zi was at He Bang’s side feeding her soup. He gave a subtle tilt of his chin: “Sit — I will take care of this.”

Yugu didn’t dare, then looked at He Bang — He Bang only cared about being fed, regardless of who was doing it. She sat down beside Qingxuan and Qingsu.

The whole group then began eating.

He Bang very quickly discovered that the name Goats Trampled the Vegetable Garden was entirely misleading: “There are absolutely no goats here! Not even a single strand of goat wool!”

Everyone laughed. Rong Chen Zi fed her a piece of delicate bean skin: “This establishment serves only vegetarian food. I have already asked the staff to prepare something else separately — come, try this bean skin first…”

While they were on their end enjoying a warm and lively meal, a Daoist page boy came rushing urgently from outside. Without waiting for anyone to speak, he bent to Zhuang Shaoqin’s ear and began whispering rapidly. With every sentence he heard, Zhuang Shaoqin’s brow drew tighter, until it had knotted into a single crease. He looked toward Rong Chen Zi, and after a long while said: “Something has happened at the palace.”

Even He Bang, in the middle of eating a flower mushroom, turned her shell to look over.

Zhuang Shaoqin brought his people into the palace, and naturally encountered no resistance. Yet the path the group walked was not the one leading to the main hall. A small eunuch in the lead guided everyone through a small back gate at the rear of the palace. Rong Chen Zi held He Bang and walked side by side with Zhuang Shaoqin.

Ahead was the imperial gardens. Turning through an archway, they came to a side hall. Its furnishings suggested it was not used as living quarters — yet it was kept immaculately clean.

Rong Chen Zi was about to ask when the eunuch glanced at Zhuang Shaoqin and, trembling, turned a wall sconce left and right. After a moment, one wall emitted a faint sound — and then a small door, the height of a man, was revealed. The door was cast in bronze, and the eunuch produced a key to unlock it. Inside — it was a secret chamber. Zhuang Shaoqin went down the steps first, his voice perfectly even: “This is the palace dungeon.”

Rong Chen Zi gave an understanding nod. The palace had its share of things that could not be seen by daylight — a secret dungeon came as no surprise.

There were around twenty steps, but every step was fitted with mechanical traps. Anyone entering without permission who triggered them would find themselves in midair with very little hope of survival.

He Bang in his arms let out a yawn. Rong Chen Zi gave her shell a pat, but his words were for Zhuang Shaoqin: “Judging by what I can sense here, I suspect this is not merely a dungeon, is it?”

Zhuang Shaoqin glanced at him. Rong Chen Zi immediately understood: “The dragon vein?”

It was a matter of great importance, and Zhuang Shaoqin dared not say more. He could only keep walking forward.

Though the place was underground, it was not cramped or narrow. Blue flagstones paved the main passage, with cells on either side sealed behind thick bronze doors, each with a small opening the size of a palm at eye level to monitor the prisoners within. At the bottom of each door was a bowl-sized hole — presumably for passing in food and water.

After walking some distance, they passed through another iron gate. The eunuch turned right and brought them into a stone chamber. Inside were several stone beds with six or seven corpses lying on them, each covered from head to foot in white cloth — even the feet were covered. On the door was a talisman for restraining corpses that Zhuang Shaoqin recognized as his own handiwork, and he already knew the news was grim.

But when the eunuch lifted the white cloth from the rightmost body, Zhuang Shaoqin’s face changed abruptly — the corpse’s head had been severed and lay bloody beside its neck, and from the body cavity protruded unmistakably a stretch of black-and-yellow-patterned serpent’s body!

Everyone froze in shock: “The keel-serpent is still alive?”

Zhuang Shaoqin’s expression was grave: “This is Counselor Wen.”

The eunuch nodded with a trembling: “At dawn today, Counselor Wen was found murdered in his home under unknown circumstances. His household was already frightened out of their wits — and then, when they were preparing the body, they found a great serpent inside his body cavity! The serpent’s head is still lodged in the skull. His Majesty has ordered the body placed here, and has been waiting for the national preceptor to come and deal with it. This servant was nearly frightened to death…”

Zhuang Shaoqin had no patience for his rambling: “I have heard enough. You may withdraw.”

Rong Chen Zi was also examining the body. He passed He Bang to Ye Tian and bent down to study the corpse. This Counselor Wen — his full name was Wen Congshu — Rong Chen Zi had in fact met him once before. He held the position of Vice Chancellor, a senior second-rank official. He had always been known as a clean and upright official, with a good reputation.

Rong Chen Zi put on the gloves that lay nearby and, paying no mind to the gore, dragged the serpent body from inside the man’s cavity. The serpent’s body was approximately the thickness of a wrist, black with yellow markings. Zhuang Shaoqin used his sword to cut into the flesh — and after prolonged effort had barely broken the skin.

He stood: “It is indeed the keel-serpent. But Counselor Wen was apparently one of the keel-serpent’s serpent eggs, transformed by borrowing energy.” He could not make sense of it: “Could it be that the real Counselor Wen was killed and this creature took his place?”

Rong Chen Zi was looking at the bloody severed head: “And who killed it? I see no other wounds on the body, and no sign of it having broken out through the skin. Who saw through its true form? And how could it be killed so easily?”

The group was still puzzling over this, when Ye Tian stepped forward: “I will go to Counselor Wen’s house to take a look.” Rong Chen Zi nodded. He Bang suddenly gripped Ye Tian’s clothing: “Sweetie — I’m hungry, I want to go back to that vegetable garden place.”

Ye Tian was afraid of letting her go hungry, and quickly told Yugu: “Then go back to Goats Trampled the Vegetable Garden first — once we have dealt with this, the rest of us will come join you.”

Yugu acknowledged the instruction, took He Bang into her arms and bowed to everyone, then left the stone chamber. A small eunuch led them out of the palace. Coming through the palace gate, Yugu carried He Bang and made her way in the direction of Goats Trampled the Vegetable Garden. Halfway there, He Bang suddenly said in a muffled voice: “Which direction is Lingxia Mountain?”

Yugu was startled. She pointed out the direction — then suddenly a flash passed before her eyes and a slashing pain raked across her whole body. She was still holding tight to He Bang. When she opened her eyes she was dumbfounded: “Wha— wha— wha—”

All around her was green mountain and clear water, birdsong and the scent of flowers — unmistakably Lingxia Mountain. He Bang’s voice, for once, was heavy with gravity: “Go to Jiuding Palace.”

Yugu’s new body was actually quite sturdy, and she carried He Bang rapidly to Jiuding Palace. The disciples on guard outside saw the two of them approach and began questioning them. He Bang didn’t bother with explanations — she simply slipped through the gate directly.

The first to notice them was Yuyang Zhenren. He stood with his sword drawn, his expression fierce: “Who dares enter without permission?!”

Yugu didn’t know how to answer. It was He Bang who transformed into human form, sparing all the polite preambles: “Where is Xingzhi Zhenren at this moment?”

Yuyang Zhenren naturally recognized her, and sheathed his sword, though his manner remained unfriendly: “What is the meaning of this, Your Majesty the Sea Clan King?”

At that moment Xingzhi Zhenren was in seclusion. The floor of the sealed chamber bore a great Eight Trigrams pattern at its center, and he sat cross-legged at the center of the Eight Trigrams like an old monk in deep meditative stillness, his hair pinned with a silver hairpiece, his Daoist robes neat and fresh as though newly put on.

After a moment, he suddenly opened his eyes. All he could see was the corner of a red garment at the edge of his vision. Slowly he raised his head — his pupils contracted to pinpoints. It had been too long — he found he had completely lost the habit of addressing him as he once had, so many years before. He only said calmly: “So you truly are still alive.”

The arrival was none other than Chunyu Lin, whose body had been taken over by the keel-serpent. His graceful fingers pinched a sprig of milfoil stem from the table before Xingzhi Zhenren — the sort used for divination. Though his laugh was gentle, his eyes harbored dark and dangerous currents: “Having spent so many years as a human being, you have even learned how to betray your master.”

Xingzhi Zhenren remained seated cross-legged, and the shock and fear in his eyes gradually faded away, replaced by a quiet, settled calm: “From the day I decided to remain at Jiuding Palace, I knew this day would come. All these years I have lived in dread and unease — yet in this moment, I find my heart at peace.”

Chunyu Lin’s fingers tightened slightly. The milfoil stem in his palm was crushed to dust: “Then return to me what I gave you.”

He reached out his graceful, slender fingers. Xingzhi Zhenren still sat without moving, but slowly closed his eyes.

“The great Way has no form, yet it gave birth to heaven and earth; the great Way has no feeling, yet it moves the sun and moon…” The breath of death drew near, yet it was not so terrible as he had imagined. He recited the Scripture of Clarity and Stillness, and felt his mind become luminous and clear.

“If—” Those cool fingers touched his face, slick as a poisonous snake’s scales. “If I gave you the chance to live again — you would not want it?”

“There is no need. What I owe you… please take it back.” Xingzhi Zhenren opened his eyes. His own power was not great, but the keel-serpent within Chunyu Lin’s body suddenly found that this small snake, once as lowly as a worm, was no longer as insignificant as dust.

A flicker of confusion passed through those beautiful eyes. Xingzhi Zhenren understood his bewilderment, and smiled quietly, his expression serene: “It was not that I meant to betray — only that I fell in love with the feeling of being human… I can be weak, but I will never be contemptible.”

“Then I will fulfill your wish.” Chunyu Lin’s fingers curved slightly, one hand closing around his neck.

That hand never snapped Xingzhi Zhenren’s neck.

He Bang was now turning it over in her palm, examining it carefully. Chunyu Lin’s voice, strangely, had lost its sinister undertone: “What is Your Majesty looking at?”

He Bang stroked the lines that spread across her palm and after a long while said softly: “I am grieving. These hands — I spent more than three hundred years teaching them the Blazing Yang Technique, I found the most learned scholars in all the East Sea to teach them to write, and they can prepare the most delicious food in the entire sea.” She finally lifted her gaze from the tangled lines of those fingers: “And you have used them to tear unborn children from the womb, to dig out others’ hearts and lungs, and to snap others’ necks.”

Chunyu Lin breathed a soft sigh — when he sighed, it seemed as though even the brilliant sun lost its radiance, darkening and brightening with his mood: “Your Majesty lingers in the past, yet the past is already past.”

He Bang quietly released his hand, but used the opportunity to slip Xingzhi Zhenren unobtrusively behind her: “Is your power now sufficient to stand against the Daozong?”

Chunyu Lin’s voice held a smile: “The Daozong — what is there to fear? Though I would say Your Majesty, in your distinguished station, would do best to stay well away.”

He Bang also laughed: “If I refuse to allow you to kill him — are we to come to blows here today, you and I?”

Chunyu Lin raised an eyebrow with a trace of helplessness, and curved his lips: “Your Majesty ought not to have interfered in these matters. But since these are Your Majesty’s wishes, I have no choice but to comply.”

And he truly turned and walked away. Yugu called after him softly: “Master.”

He looked back with a smile — his features luminous and brilliant, every gesture speaking of effortless grace.

After he had gone, He Bang fixed her gaze on Yugu and suddenly said quietly: “Follow him, and tell him that the dragon vein of this dynasty is beneath the imperial gardens, beyond the dungeon.”

Yugu was deeply uncertain. She was beginning to share the same bewilderment that had once plagued the three-eyed serpent who had impersonated her — Mistress, which side are we exactly on?

But she dared not disobey He Bang’s words, and immediately set off after him.

Left alone in the chamber, Xingzhi Zhenren came back to his senses. His voice had returned to its usual calm: “How did Your Majesty know that I was a keel-serpent transformed by borrowing energy?”

He Bang settled onto his meditation cushion: “You had many inconsistencies. Every time there was a keel-serpent to catch, you would drag your feet. Whenever Zhuang Shaoqin and Chunyu Lin were together with you, not a single three-eyed serpent was ever caught.”

Xingzhi Zhenren’s pupils contracted slightly: “Just from those things, you concluded I was the keel-serpent?”

“Oh — not from those alone.” He Bang shook her head, her expression becoming nearly impish: “When the keel-serpent signed a sacred contract with me, I happened to use the Dream Chasing Grass and casually looked through it — and I saw the contract between you and it. There was no expiration date, either.”

Yugu came back in, still caught in the lingering grief of the moment — and at these words nearly stumbled: How was it that after being trapped in the mountain for several thousand years, the creature could still be so catastrophically careless with something so important…

He Bang’s lunch had originally been the subject of Yuyang Zhenren’s magnanimous gesture — after all, He Bang had just saved his senior martial brother. He Bang sat happily at the table and waited a full quarter of an hour, and then when the dishes arrived and she looked at them — the greater the hope, the greater the disappointment. She began to wail: “Wuuu — I want to go back to that vegetable garden place! Xingzhi, you miser, you stinking keel-serpent! I’m going to tell Zhiguan on you! I’ll stew you and drink your snake gallbladder… wuuu…”

Yuyang Zhenren was scratching his head raw, unable to find any way to console her. In the end it was Yugu who pulled out two fried chicken wings: “All right, all right — let’s go back, there will certainly be good things to eat over there.”

Yuyang Zhenren still had no idea where he had gone wrong. Yugu cradled the great grey river clam in her arms, and wasn’t sure whether to laugh or not: “Er… my mistress doesn’t eat vegetarian food.”

By the time person and clam returned to Goats Trampled the Vegetable Garden, Ye Tian and Rong Chen Zi’s party had already been waiting a long while. Rong Chen Zi took He Bang from Yugu’s arms, also a little puzzled: “Where did you go?”

He was aware that the Shared-Heart Cinnabar could track her whereabouts, and simply assumed she had gone wandering about out of curiosity. He made no further inquiry. On this side, He Bang was quite anxious, and called out from inside her shell: “Yugu, quick, get a bowl!”

Yugu passed a bowl in, and from the shell He Bang produced grilled mutton skewers, scallion flatbread crepes, peanut candy — and even a piece of glutinous rice cake! Yugu was utterly dumbfounded: “I… I only carried you through the street past the stalls…”

Ye Tian was between exasperation and laughter, and gave He Bang’s shell a slap: “No stealing! You little thieving clam!”

After the meal, Rong Chen Zi had been planning to take He Bang out to play. But He Bang had traveled by windstorm and water travel all day today and was exhausted — now that she had eaten her fill, she wanted to sleep. Zhuang Shaoqin was still troubled about Counselor Wen’s death, and was reluctant to let Rong Chen Zi and the others go far from him. Naturally, he arranged for them all to stay at his own private residence in the capital.

His residence had far less of the ostentatious display common to men of high power, but was fitted with countless formations — all of them experiments he had worked on in his spare time. The successful ones he could remove. What remained was this collection of failures, and the more skilled you were, the less likely you were to find your way out — failed formations, after all — who knew where the eye of the array might be?

The group vaulted over rooftops and walls, sneaked their way into the rear courtyard, and naturally Rong Chen Zi and He Bang shared a room. Yugu had made a habit of cleaning He Bang’s shell before bed, but was stopped by Ye Tian, who had thought ahead: “The two of them have been apart for so long — that sort of thing… best left to senior martial brother.”

Yugu, though she had remained unmarried in her former life, understood something of these matters, and turned immediately red to her ears.

Once Rong Chen Zi had finished cleaning He Bang’s shell and saw her sleeping soundly, he had no wish to disturb her, and lay down beside her to close his eyes and rest. He Bang woke up, turned her little head from side to side, saw Rong Chen Zi sleeping beside her, and couldn’t help feeling a playful impulse. Her soft, tender little hand reached out and began wandering across Rong Chen Zi’s body.

Rong Chen Zi let her carry on, eyes closed, not moving and saying nothing. She touched and touched, and grew more and more improper, advancing toward more significant territory. Rong Chen Zi’s body began to grow taut.

This river clam and Rong Chen Zi, having been together for some time, had shared a number of pleasures. But Rong Chen Zi was a conservative person — even in bed he was perfectly proper and measured, and tended to conduct himself under cover of darkness. The people, events, and things He Bang was allowed contact with in everyday life were all very pure and wholesome, leaving her in a state of partial understanding at best. To this day her resentment over the revelation of Heaven’s Dao remained profound, leaving the Way of Heaven nursing a grievance it could not voice.

Now, thinking Rong Chen Zi was asleep, she could not resist going to look at the thing that was always asserting its authority over her. Her small hand touched it, then shrank back as though scorched, her little face full of delight. Rong Chen Zi, hardly accustomed to this kind of stimulation, was tempted to seize her mischievous hand — yet seeing her enjoying herself so thoroughly, found himself hesitating. To his consternation, she was getting bolder — she was about to use her mouth!

Rong Chen Zi gripped her by both shoulders and hoisted her up to his chest: “Stop fooling around.”

He Bang pouted: “Such a rigid old Daoist.”

Having said that, she sprawled onto his chest like a little cat and licked about vigorously. Rong Chen Zi tipped her beneath him and pressed her flat, his breathing deepening: “This old Daoist is rigid and set in his ways, and can’t handle anything too exciting.” He gently kissed He Bang on the tip of her nose, his movements tender: “So you must be good and well-behaved, and not startle this old Daoist.”

“But I’ve been missing you so much.” He Bang had her arms around his neck, licking away enthusiastically — and in the middle of all that licking, her eyes began to well with tears: “Every single day I miss you.”

“Mm.” Rong Chen Zi reached up and wiped the glimmer from the corner of her eye, pricked his index finger, and fed the wounded spot to her lips. After a long while he said quietly: “I know.”

The delicious taste circled and lingered between her lips and teeth without fading. He Bang suckled and suckled and grew sleepy: “So we’re going to sleep now?”

Rong Chen Zi said softly: “In half an hour we will sleep.”

He Bang was already very drowsy: “What are we doing?”

Rong Chen Zi’s tone was light, yet his face had taken on a faint blush: “Doing something… not particularly vigorous, and yet something that both this old Daoist and this little demon would enjoy…”

The next morning, while the sky was still dark, someone knocked at the door: “Zhiguan? Your Majesty the Sea Clan King?”

Rong Chen Zi recognized the voice as Xingzhi Zhenren’s, and quickly straightened his robes. He seemed to have made some decision: “I have a matter I would like to discuss privately with Your Majesty the Sea Clan King.”

Though Rong Chen Zi did not quite understand, he was concerned about something else: “Zhenren — the sky is still dark. She is always one to sleep late…”

Xingzhi Zhenren was evidently too urgent to wait: “Zhiguan — it is a matter of life and death.”

Rong Chen Zi could only invite him inside. He Bang was fast asleep on the daybed, the gauze canopy hanging low. Xingzhi Zhenren stopped at the bedside, barely concealing his urgency: “Your Majesty? Your Majesty the Sea Clan King?”

He Bang was the sort who could sleep for a very long time, and last night had already worn her out entirely. Someone was murmuring incessantly beside her ear, making it impossible to sleep properly — and she let out a string of false sobbing sounds. Rong Chen Zi quickly led Xingzhi Zhenren out of the room.

“She… has the heart of a child, and if she doesn’t sleep well she will certainly carry on for some time. Let us wait one more hour — let her wake first. As for whatever Zhenren is referring to — if there is truly danger to someone’s life, why not bring them here first? With all of us assembled here, ensuring their safety should not be difficult.”

Xingzhi Zhenren hesitated for a long while, then at last produced a name list from his sleeve: “Zhiguan, would you be able to bring all these people to this location — but please, ask nothing yet.”

Rong Chen Zi took the list and indeed asked no questions, setting off immediately to find Zhuang Shaoqin.

He Bang slept until the Hour of the Dragon. Yugu had been waiting for a long while. The moment she woke she came in to wash her hands and face and feed her a thick, rich bone broth soup.

Only then did He Bang make her unhurried way out.

Xingzhi Zhenren had had very little contact with He Bang and did not know her temperament. With her holding something over him now, he had no choice but to endure her haughtiness and speak to her kindly: “Your Majesty — in the past, the keel-serpent tribe did have many who drifted into the mortal world. They only wished to live peacefully as humans and had no intention of harming anyone. But now that the master has broken free, furious at those of the tribe who refused to break his seal, it is slaughtering them without mercy. Your Majesty—” His expression grew grave. He seemed about to kneel: “I never intended to deceive the Daozong — only, the Daozong holds the keel-serpent tribe in great disdain, and if I had revealed the truth, I feared they would have hunted them down and destroyed the entire tribe. I beg Your Majesty to save my people.”

He Bang let him kneel, and made no move to help him up: “Your master has gone completely mad — how am I to save them?”

Xingzhi Zhenren gritted his teeth: “Yuyan Zhenren has already shown intentions of withdrawal. The Daozong’s leadership rests in Zhiguan’s hands. Please convey my request on our behalf — the keel-serpent tribe would be eternally grateful.”

He Bang’s smile suddenly turned peculiar: “Xingzhi — the keel-serpent tribe does not need the Daozong.” Xingzhi Zhenren looked up in astonishment. He Bang leaned close to his ear and said softly: “What you need is a king.”

Xingzhi Zhenren’s eyes filled with pain. Many years ago the keel-serpent tribe had lived under the rule of two serpent kings, both brutal and bloodthirsty. They had at last been sealed by those who championed righteousness beneath Changgang Mountain in a place of eternal imprisonment. The great majority of the keel-serpents had perished in that catastrophe. A small portion who refused to follow them had seized the chance to escape. Now, the keel-serpent tribe had long been without a king.

He Bang looked steadily at him, as though seeing into his very heart: “The king of the keel-serpent tribe — will be born very soon.”

Xingzhi Zhenren’s voice was carefully probing: “Did the Way of Heaven… reveal this?”

He Bang only smiled and said nothing more.

Though no one knew why Xingzhi Zhenren had suddenly asked them to protect the people on the list, Zhuang Shaoqin brought them all together regardless — over a hundred and sixty people in total: merchants, government officials, and even farmers.

Zhuang Shaoqin was quite at a loss: “Zhenren, at least give me a reason — suddenly bringing this many people together…”

Xingzhi Zhenren wanted to speak but stopped himself. In the end he bowed deeply: “National Preceptor — Xingzhi has a difficulty he cannot speak of. Please, National Preceptor, understand.”

One day passed uneventfully. That evening at the dinner table, He Bang was eating plump boiled shrimp while Yugu helped peel the shells. Rong Chen Zi and the others were still trying to work out the mystery of Counselor Wen. Ye Tian had investigated the Counselor’s household — his family reported that he had a mild temperament and few enemies. There had been no unusual changes in his behavior in recent days, and a house servant had brought him tea in his study a full quarter-hour before his death and found him reading at the time.

Everyone found this hard to comprehend: “Could Counselor Wen have always been a three-eyed serpent?”

Xingzhi Zhenren continued to sit without speaking. He himself did not know why He Bang still had not told everyone the situation, and could only hold his silence. With no heads or tails to go on, and no clues beyond the corpse of Counselor Wen, everyone was at an impasse — who was the killer? What was the motive? And how was Counselor Wen a three-eyed serpent to begin with?

He Bang had nothing to do with any of this. She had eaten her fill, and naturally wished to sleep soundly and beautifully.

And so, by the time Rong Chen Zi returned to the room, she was already asleep. The height of midsummer — even the nighttime air was hot. For all that Yugu had provided her with an ice pillow, faint beads of perspiration still gathered at her temples. Rong Chen Zi therefore took a fan and waved it over her. She, half-lost in sleep, felt the cooler air on Rong Chen Zi’s side and rolled toward him — curling against him like a little cat, and went on sleeping.

Rong Chen Zi stroked her slightly cool hair, and all at once understood why a beloved wife was called a precious wife.

The next morning, He Bang was woken by the sound of a suona horn. Outside, Counselor Wen was being taken to his burial — though his body had been brought to the palace, his family still prepared a coffin with his belongings and conducted the burial rites. He Bang stood at the doorway and watched the coffin being carried past. Counselor Wen had always been well-liked in his lifetime, and there were many mourners now weeping as he was laid to rest. Looking out along the full length of the street, it was blanketed in white paper banners, filling even the passing onlookers with a quiet sense of sorrow. Rong Chen Zi and Zhuang Shaoqin and the others also stood at the roadside. Seeing He Bang come out, Rong Chen Zi drew her to his side.

He Bang, in an unusual moment of quiet, gazed at the grief-stricken procession, then suddenly rose on her tiptoes and tilted her head to look at Rong Chen Zi: “Zhiguan — if you were to die, you would leave me an inheritance, wouldn’t you?”

Rong Chen Zi was speechless.

Back at the residence, Yugu set out breakfast. Zhuang Shaoqin discreetly passed Rong Chen Zi a small malachite rouge case — delicately and finely made: “A tribute item. Quite rare.”

Rong Chen Zi raised an eyebrow: “What is the occasion?”

Zhuang Shaoqin shook his head: “Winning a beautiful person’s favor, of course — it’s not as though I’m keeping it to secretly dab on my own face, is it?”

Rong Chen Zi understood: “She is right here at the table — just give it to her yourself.”

Zhuang Shaoqin looked up in sincere admiration: “Senior martial brother, how on earth did you win a beautiful person’s heart? I’m only doing you a favor in passing.”

Rong Chen Zi slipped the rouge case into his sleeve and simply said: “Her temperament is like a child’s, and she has no great fondness for rouge or powder. I will pass it along.”

Zhuang Shaoqin pressed a hand to his forehead — in this world, beautiful people truly must all have gone blind…

Before his dissatisfaction had run its course, a Daoist page arrived to report: “National Preceptor — His Majesty requests that you attend the palace at once.”

Zhuang Shaoqin’s brow furrowed slightly: “What is the matter?”

“The eunuch who delivered the message said…” The page bowed his head and lowered his voice. “His Majesty had an inauspicious dream last night.” Zhuang Shaoqin understood at once: “Senior martial brother, Xingzhi Zhenren — all of you come with me to pay our respects to His Majesty.”

He Bang was immediately displeased: “What about me? And me, me, me!”

Zhuang Shaoqin was rather helpless, and could only look to Rong Chen Zi. What could Rong Chen Zi do? He only cautioned her: “The palace is not like other places — no causing trouble.”

He Bang brightened up at that, wrapped her arms around Rong Chen Zi’s neck and gave his chin a forceful kiss: “Hmph — when have I ever caused trouble?!”

The group entered the palace and naturally met no obstruction at any point. But the path they walked was not the one leading toward the main audience hall. A young eunuch in the lead brought them in through a small gate at the rear of the palace. Rong Chen Zi carried He Bang and walked alongside Zhuang Shaoqin.

Ahead lay the imperial gardens. Passing through another archway, they came to an out-of-the-way hall that by its furnishings appeared not to serve as living quarters, yet was kept spotlessly clean.

Rong Chen Zi was about to ask a question when the eunuch glanced at Zhuang Shaoqin and, trembling, rotated a wall sconce back and forth. A moment later, one of the walls produced a faint sound. Dust sifted down from all sides, and after a long while the stone wall began slowly to rise. A surge of spiritual energy rushed outward — even Rong Chen Zi could not help saying: “This dragon’s spiritual energy is overwhelming — it appears the foreign intrusion has not yet done too much damage.”

Zhuang Shaoqin dared not delay and quickly urged everyone forward: “To prevent the earth’s energy from leaking out, this gate cannot remain open long — let us hurry.”

The group moved forward one by one. He Bang suddenly spread her arm out to stop Yugu, who was following close behind her. Under the guise of retrieving dried meat from Yugu’s bag, she leaned close and said quietly: “Go to Changgang Mountain. Find someone there, and bring them here.”

Yugu was in considerable difficulty: “Mistress, Changgang Mountain is several days’ journey from here — I…”

He Bang slapped her own forehead: “I forgot to teach you the distant-travel technique. Even Rong Chen Zi doesn’t teach it — hmph!” She reached into the front of her garment and pulled out the shark-silk cloth, handing it to Yugu: “This will take you there.”

Yugu took the shark-silk cloth. She still had a question: “Mistress — who exactly is this person? Changgang Mountain is rather large. How am I to find them?”

He Bang was entirely unperturbed: “Just stand at the highest point on Changgang Mountain, and shout ‘you fool’ as loudly as you can. Whoever answers you is the one.”

Yugu moved to the rear. Rong Chen Zi noticed at once: “What is it?”

He Bang was pushing Yugu away while explaining: “Sending her back to fetch some dried meat for me!”

Rong Chen Zi took He Bang’s hand, his tone mildly reproachful: “No meddling.” He then glanced again at the situation and added: “But the situation inside is unclear — better for Yugu to go back first.” Yugu, not daring to say more, nodded repeatedly and turned to leave the passage. He Bang was already musing: “I’ve never seen anyone quite so foolish.”

Rong Chen Zi gave her head a firm pat: “No insulting people.”

He Bang reached into his universe-pouch for some dried grapes: “I wasn’t insulting her.”

About ten steps past the stone wall, the eunuch leading them stopped following. What lay ahead appeared to be an underground river of unfathomable depth. Iron chain bridges had originally been strung above it, but the wooden boards of the bridge had been stripped away, leaving only several iron chains — and even these were heavily corroded.

Fortunately, everyone in the group was more than capable — they crossed quickly, the spiritual energy growing stronger with every step. Zhuang Shaoqin, walking at the front, suddenly halted. He Bang poked her head out from behind Rong Chen Zi’s back and couldn’t help being a little taken aback as well. The group had been walking for some time and should by now have traveled well beyond the palace grounds. Yet before them stood an entire mountain, with a shallow bend of clear water at its base. The surrounding mountain terrain framed it perfectly — the configuration of a thirsty dragon drinking from water.

“Could this be… the present dynasty’s imperial tombs?” Zhuang Shaoqin led the group forward. The mountain path was narrow and winding, and everywhere ghostly blue-green flames flickered. Besides the sound of flowing water, there was no other sound.

Rong Chen Zi held He Bang’s hand. Even with all his wide experience he was somewhat astonished: “Who could have imagined that the imperial tombs of this dynasty would have been built in a place like this — there is truly nothing in this world that is not astonishing.”

Everyone was moved by the sight. This mountain and these stones, on a land of auspicious geomantic energy, with spiritual energy gathered by human craft, and the pool before the mountain drawn upon to replenish the earth’s vital energy as it was lost — whatever genius had designed these tombs was beyond imagining.

He Bang was thinking of something else: “Why would the Emperor so readily allow so many of us to enter a place like this? Isn’t he afraid of the secret leaking out?”

Xingzhi Zhenren was visibly tense: “It would be best to find the cause of the dragon energy leak as quickly as possible and leave.”

Even as he spoke, the group had reached the approach road, the divine avenue on either side lined with jade spirit beast sculptures. Through the deep green glow of the ghostly flames, stone steles loomed faintly in the distance. Rong Chen Zi took the rouge case Zhuang Shaoqin had given He Bang from his sleeve, opened it with a light gesture, and blew — the fine-grained powder dispersed into the air, drifting and floating.

After a moment, Rong Chen Zi passed the remaining powder to He Bang: “The spiritual energy flows normally and the terrain itself is sound. It seems we will need to look beneath the water.”

No one spoke. Everyone was looking at He Bang. He Bang, tucked behind Rong Chen Zi’s back, was deeply put out: “Is there something wrong with all of you? You can still see me even when I’m hiding back here.”

Rong Chen Zi smiled faintly: “I will go in — you stay here and don’t cause trouble.”

He Bang held him back: “Oh, fine. Hmph!”

Rong Chen Zi was still studying the surrounding terrain. He Bang went ahead and began taking off her clothes to go into the water on her own. That snow-white, crystal-fair skin, beneath the eerie dark-green glow of ghostly fire, looked even more satiny and lustrous than usual. The assembled Daoists around her stood with their mouths hanging open. Zhuang Shaoqin’s eyes went round as a frog’s. Rong Chen Zi turned back — and his face went greener than the ghostly flames. He snatched up the outer robe from the ground and wrapped He Bang in it, giving her a firm slap on the head: “No taking your clothes off without cause.”

He Bang, grumbling under her breath, went into the water — then to her surprise found the pool beneath was fathomlessly deep. Having no genuine desire to go searching, she grumbled and floated around in a desultory circle, then slowly climbed back out: “Nothing — there’s nothing down there.”

The assembled Daoists stared at her without expression. She felt their gazes weighing on her and began to grow uneasy: “What? How dare you suspect me?”

In the end, it was Qingxuan who said quietly: “Mistress — look behind you.”

He Bang turned around, and there stood a person — red-robed, black-haired, brilliantly beautiful and faintly sinister, who was at this moment watching her with an expression somewhere between amusement and something else. He Bang narrowed her eyes and struggled to look innocent: “I didn’t see him — he was behind me, and I don’t have eyes in the back of my head, do I?”

Rong Chen Zi drew her over and placed her behind him. From the universe-pouch, in the midst of everything else, he produced an apple and plugged it into her mouth. Zhuang Shaoqin raised an eyebrow: “Chunyu Lin? No… you are the keel-serpent? You have a great deal of nerve — you dare to absorb dragon energy! Are you not afraid of bringing down divine lightning upon yourself?”

Chunyu Lin’s gaze was on He Bang. He seemed to have no interest whatsoever in taking this group of Daoists seriously: “You overestimate my nerve. That you have all come here to throw your lives away so readily — your nerve is also considerable.” He moved forward slowly, and then extended a hand toward He Bang: “Though — why bring my Majesty along?”

He Bang remained tucked behind Rong Chen Zi, still eating her apple. Rong Chen Zi stood before her, still as a mountain. He Bang’s courage was bolstered considerably: “You stay back. You all have great nerve — I have very little. Since you’ve run into each other here, there will no doubt inevitably be a good fight. You all go ahead and have at it — I won’t get in the way.”

The words were blunt, but they were also essentially accurate. The assembled Daoists raised their ritual implements. Chunyu Lin formed a hand seal with his right hand: “Very well — I will send all of you off first.”

Just as a great battle seemed about to erupt, He Bang spat out her apple core and said suddenly: “Wait!”

Everyone turned toward her — even Chunyu Lin paused his incantation. He Bang wiped her hand on Xingzhi Zhenren: “I think we are missing a step. What step? Ah yes — at moments like this, isn’t there supposed to be a debate between good and evil, establishing the correct claims of each side, to demonstrate that righteousness prevails over evil — and then combat begins?”

The Daoists were silent. Qingxuan finally edged over: “Mistress — everyone on our side is a person of great dignity and renown. None of us is particularly gifted at verbal sparring. Besides, the other party is a serpent — don’t you find it beneath the dignity of a group of Daoist holy masters to verbally spar with a serpent? Furthermore, right now we outnumber them — victory is uncertain — and if in the course of the argument our side says something too absolute, and then Chunyu Lin turns the tide on us, wouldn’t we lose considerable face?”

He Bang was still unsatisfied: “And why doesn’t the keel-serpent say anything?”

Chunyu Lin looked at her with gentle warmth, and after a long while said: “I was afraid Your Majesty might find it difficult to keep a straight face at such a solemn and tense moment.”

He Bang was still unwilling to let it go: “Then before this great battle begins, everyone should certainly make their last wishes known. No — the very best thing would be for each person to write a final testament, put their affairs in order — that would at least have a proper beginning and ending.”

Even Chunyu Lin could now see through it: “Your Majesty is stalling for time — who is it you are waiting for?”

He looked carefully over those present, his expression genuinely puzzled: “I truly cannot think of anyone in the Daozong today that Your Majesty could still be counting on.”

He Bang was also quite helpless: “If you’re truly curious… wait with me!”

Chunyu Lin’s smile had not yet faded, and his voice remained gentle: “Since Your Majesty is waiting, whoever is to come will arrive sooner or later. Why wait in vain?”

The words had barely left his lips when he began to recite his incantation. The ghostly flames all over the mountain blazed up in a sudden surge of brilliance. The pool before the mountain churned and rolled as though it had been brought to a boil. Every piece of iron and stone was heated to glowing red.

Xingzhi Zhenren gave a furious shout and was the first to charge forward. Zhuang Shaoqin consecrated a silver talisman and followed. Rong Chen Zi touched He Bang’s head, murmured a word of caution, and raised his sword.

He Bang had both the Sky Wind spiritual essence and the Sky Water spiritual essence within her, and quickly pressed the temperature down. The keel-serpent was after all a primeval creature of ten thousand years — though last time had left it badly injured, the dragon energy it had since absorbed had brought its power back rapidly. At this moment it possessed seven-tenths of its power at its height, and reckoned it was more than capable of dispatching these mortal-bodied Daozong practitioners without effort. He Bang alone, with her extraordinary cultivation and the wind and water spiritual essences, was not to be underestimated. But it would not allow the others to trouble it overmuch.

He Bang sat on a stone stele, controlling the water — doing nothing to help. This place was within the imperial tombs. Dragon energy permeated every inch of it. Chunyu Lin could absorb freely — but she could not. Absorbing dragon energy was a theft of the nation’s vitality, and anything that affected the nation’s destiny meant affecting the lives of countless millions of people — a matter far more serious than a natural disaster. It was not something to be trifled with.

Ordinarily, demons whose cultivation was insufficient could not even draw near members of the imperial family, let alone here — they would be injured by the dragon energy itself. While those of greater cultivation would generally avoid the dragon energy so as not to bring heavenly retribution upon themselves.

He Bang had long since ceased to fear the dragon energy, but trapped here as she was, Chunyu Lin could draw on dragon energy as a supplement while she sat surrounded by limitless spiritual energy she did not dare touch. All she had at her disposal was this single pool of water, leaving her at a serious disadvantage. And the keel-serpent was a primeval creature by nature, with ten thousand years of cultivation — if she had not been carrying the wind and water spiritual essences, she truly would not have been sufficient.

She called the fool every name she could think of, then at last pulled out a conch from her bosom and blew into it softly. Chunyu Lin in the center of the battle seemed to remember something, and suddenly became extremely angry. Disregarding the Daoists around him, he leapt directly toward He Bang.

Fortunately, Rong Chen Zi had never stopped keeping watch over He Bang. He immediately brought his spirit talisman to bear, using it as a momentary barrier to snatch He Bang out of the way. He Bang also took the opportunity to reach into his universe-pouch and steal a few pieces of candy.

With candy in her mouth, she couldn’t blow the conch. Chunyu Lin seemed to calm down as well. When the candy was finished, He Bang blew the conch again. He turned sharply around and came clambering across the iron chains, moving as though he had no bones at all. He Bang put the conch away and slowly backed up: “Chunyu Lin.”

He struggled to shake his head, then suddenly seized a Daoist and tore him in two. A shower of blood spattered everywhere. The metallic smell of blood goaded him, and he bore down on Xingzhi Zhenren, striking him with a single palm that sent him plummeting into the water. Ye Tian cried out in alarm. Rong Chen Zi turned his sword to attempt a rescue — but Chunyu Lin also suddenly plunged into the water.

He Bang, who had been watching from the sidelines all this time, suddenly stood up, clicked her tongue, and said: “Oh dear — Xingzhi can’t die.”

She dove into the water. Chunyu Lin’s five fingers had barely reached Xingzhi when the center of the pool suddenly surged with a wave. He looked toward He Bang, his smile tender as water. He Bang’s heart gave a sudden lurch — and he leapt upward. He Bang had just pulled Xingzhi to her side when the entire pool froze solid in an instant.

Chunyu Lin stood on the ice and reached through it to touch her: “Your Majesty — the Sky Wind spiritual essence and the Sky Water spiritual essence are formidable, it is true, but both require movement to function. In the deep sea, perhaps, no one could match you in controlling the water. But in a lake or pool — never allow yourself to be trapped in the water. You have controlled the waters for a thousand years, yet you do not understand this principle.”

Rong Chen Zi and the others, seeing her unharmed, first breathed a sigh of relief — and then could only watch anxiously with no way to help. Chunyu Lin was preoccupied with Rong Chen Zi, absolutely bent on killing him this time. Zhuang Shaoqin was doing everything he could to intervene. Ye Tian’s cultivation was not equal to the other two, and she could only stand by in frantic anxiety. The others — Qingxuan, Zhuang Haotian — were even less capable, barely having any combat effectiveness at all.

Rong Chen Zi found dealing with him a struggle. He was after all now in a mortal body — in terms of sheer power he was dealing with decades at most, and the strength disparity was simply too great. Chunyu Lin pressed closer step by step, his voice cutting with mockery: “A man like you — what has Your Majesty seen in you, beyond a body of delicious flesh…”

Rong Chen Zi consecrated a silver talisman and thrust it forward, buying himself space to continue the battle. At the bottom of the ice, He Bang struggled without ceasing and couldn’t move at all. Desperate tears began to fall: “Zhiguan! I’m pinned in the ice and it hurts so much — wuu, wuu…”

Rong Chen Zi could not hear her cry and remain unmoved. He shoved Chunyu Lin back with a burst of palm energy and dropped onto the ice surface, striking it with precisely the right force — an extremely fine crack appeared in the ice around He Bang. Chunyu Lin seized the moment, sending a palm down onto Rong Chen Zi’s back. Rong Chen Zi suppressed a mouthful of blood by force, and struck the ice again with another palm. The crack spread outward. Chunyu Lin struck again — and a mouthful of blood sprayed across the ice surface.

Chunyu Lin’s gaze was that of someone watching a dying plaything: “What right do you have to remain by her side?”

Rong Chen Zi’s lips still carried the fresh blood — yet hearing this, he smiled faintly: “You may have existed for ten thousand years, yet you are nothing but a beast that walks the mortal world. How could you ever understand human emotion?”

The crack was extremely thin, but for He Bang even that tiny space was enough. She used wind-splitting to shatter the ice, and at tremendous cost managed to drag Xingzhi Zhenren out from the crack as well. She was still complaining as she worked: “Zhiguan — I’m still a river clam… this is exhausting — don’t discriminate against animals.”

Seeing she was all right, Rong Chen Zi’s lips curved slightly: “Mm.”

Chunyu Lin seemed quite unperturbed, and actually offered He Bang consolation: “Your Majesty need not be angry — in a short while he will be a corpse. And at that point, whether animal or human, or immortal — what difference does it make?”

He Bang sat panting at the edge of the ice crevasse: “There is a difference — Zhiguan would certainly taste better than others.”

Chunyu Lin’s smile grew even more tender: “Then at that time, I will make of him cured salted meat, and offer it to Your Majesty.”

He Bang’s spine suddenly straightened: “You foul serpent — dare to hit my Zhiguan one more time and I will stew you!”

Ye Tian was frantic: “Of all moments, you’re still joking?!”

He Bang spread her hands: “I was wrong — I shouldn’t have trusted that fool.” Zhuang Shaoqin’s supply of talismans had been steadily depleted, and now with his energy waning he was still fighting to hold Chunyu Lin back and reduce the pressure on Rong Chen Zi.

He Bang leapt to Rong Chen Zi’s side, reached out and pressed a finger to his Heavenly Sudden acupoint. Rong Chen Zi’s expression flickered with surprise, then his internal spiritual energy began to circulate at greatly accelerated speed. After a moment, he adjusted his breath — and felt his body flooded with overflowing spiritual power. He turned to look — He Bang was already standing behind Zhuang Shaoqin.

Chunyu Lin’s voice was a quiet sigh: “Even at a moment like this, you will not change your stance — will you, Your Majesty?”

He Bang let out a cold snort: “Stop trying to deceive me, you foul serpent. Chunyu Lin has been dead a long time — right now you hate me to the bone, and you’re only waiting to kill all of them before you come for me!”

Chunyu Lin looked at her with a smile like a flower in bloom, and after a long while said: “Is that truly what you have always thought, Your Majesty?”

“No matter how many lovely words you may speak, I will not believe a single one of them. Hmph!” He Bang stood behind Rong Chen Zi. Rong Chen Zi, even in the thick of battle, managed to fish a piece of candy from his universe-pouch and pop it into her mouth. She held it in her cheek as Chunyu Lin’s right hand began to glow faintly with red light: “Then… I must briefly inconvenience Your Majesty.”

His experience was far vaster than He Bang’s, and he knew precisely which method was most effective against her. He Bang began to back away slowly. Rong Chen Zi placed himself before her, his figure steady as a mountain. He Bang’s courage surged: “I’m not afraid of you, you foul serpent! Where is that fool, why hasn’t it come yet…”

She was still muttering her curses when from outside came a sound of rapid footsteps, and a voice already calling from far off: “Your Majesty? Your Majesty? Heh heh heh — I’m back, Your Majesty!”

He Bang heard it and immediately erupted: “You fool — it took you the better part of a year to absorb the Sky Fire spiritual essence!”

Everyone looked up — and a serpent came winding its cheerful way inside. It was now as thick around as a barrel, green with black markings, and for all its bulk, remarkably nimble. This was unmistakably the little three-eyed serpent that had once lent its life to He Bang. It wriggled up to He Bang’s side, rubbing against her with great affection: “Your Majesty! Heh heh — Your Majesty, I’ve missed you to death! Long time no see, Your Majesty — you are still as beautiful as an immortal, as striking as a peach blossom, as plump as two people…”

He Bang’s fury erupted, and she aimed a kick right at it: “You’re the one who’s plump as two people — your whole family is plump as two people! You useless serpent, stinking serpent, rotten serpent… get in there and fight!”

At the sight of Chunyu Lin, the creature also lost some of its bluster: “C-c-c… Your Majesty, I’m still a little scared of him, what do I do?”

He Bang gave it a real kick this time: “Then go die!”

Yugu came running up behind it, gasping for breath, covered in dust, her clothes disheveled and wretched: “Mistress, you were right — this really is a fool… I said we should use the shark-silk cloth to come back, it insisted on carrying me. And dropped me six times on the way…”

Wrong as the timing was, the scene was genuinely laughable.

Chunyu Lin took a slow step back, his expression uncertain: “Impossible — once my body died, the Sky Fire spiritual essence should have destroyed itself. How could it possibly…”

He Bang was quite pleased with herself: “It was originally going to destroy itself — but when I dove into your Celestial Eye, I discovered that the spiritual energy of the Sky Water and Sky Wind essences could nourish it and keep it alive temporarily. As it happened, I had also promised this serpent a human form within fifty years — so it got the benefit of that arrangement. As a three-eyed serpent alone, it would not have been sufficient to absorb the Sky Fire spiritual essence, but with your physical body to feed on, survival was possible.”

Chunyu Lin’s understanding clicked into place: “You concealed it all along — to use against me.”

He Bang leaned back against Rong Chen Zi’s shoulder, reaching into his universe-pouch for a snack: “I was burned in my immortal body by the Sky Fire spiritual essence, and it took months to recover. During that time, if its existence had been revealed, others would certainly have come to seize it, and it would not have survived. As for using it against you… it was nothing more than preparing a weapon. I never particularly meant to use it against anyone. But I told you once to leave — you refused, and so I naturally had to find you a proper resting place.”

Chunyu Lin lowered his gaze, his voice a feather’s weight: “A place of burial?”

He Bang stuffed a piece of dried fruit into her mouth and after a long while said: “Something like that.”

With this three-eyed serpent having absorbed the keel-serpent king’s physical body and also gained the Sky Fire spiritual essence, it possessed at minimum four-tenths of the keel-serpent at its height of power — combined with He Bang and Rong Chen Zi and the others, the keel-serpent now had absolutely no hope of winning.

Rong Chen Zi breathed a sigh of relief, reached into his universe-pouch for an injury medicine, and popped it into his mouth — only to find it was a candy pill.

With the three-eyed serpent now in play, the battle turned in an instant. But He Bang’s thoughts had moved elsewhere: “If there were one more protective divine creature added here, it would certainly extend the nation’s destiny.” She looked at Chunyu Lin, her gaze deep and unfathomable: “After a hundred years or more, the sinister energy in your body will be dissolved and absorbed by the dragon energy. By that time I will find you somewhere else to go.”

Chunyu Lin suddenly went frantic: “No! I would rather die!”

Rong Chen Zi murmured quietly: “You were terrified by the sealing. Yet every cause brings its effect — this too is a consequence of the evil you yourself created.”

“No — you will never! ” His voice turned shrill, and he pivoted and hurled himself at Rong Chen Zi, each strike aimed to kill. Rong Chen Zi’s cultivation was no match for his, yet his movement was measured and composed — neither advancing nor retreating too far, and his opponent could not pin him down. The little three-eyed serpent drove him toward the cracked ice. The Sky Fire spiritual essence within him instantly melted the ice surface, and the water flowed freely again.

Driven into the water, Chunyu Lin was pursued by He Bang, who followed without urgency. Rong Chen Zi led the way forward: “The nation’s destiny is constantly drawing on the dragon energy, and once the dragon energy is exhausted, an entire dynasty will collapse. Somewhere in this place there must be a point of deepest connection with the earth’s vital energy — if we can trap it within that point, this cave will quickly drain its power. As a primeval creature, it will keep the nation’s destiny safe for fifty years without question.”

Beneath the spring, all was darkness. He Bang produced a luminous pearl for light. The group pressed Chunyu Lin deeper into the mountain’s base, and came at last to a place where the water surged and churned. The smooth surface of the pool was like a vast drain in the sea, endlessly swallowing everything around it.

The three-eyed serpent was just about to drive Chunyu Lin inside when suddenly the water shifted violently. He Bang, as a water creature, was acutely sensitive in water. She listened for a moment, then suddenly said: “The surface above is shifting.”

Everyone turned involuntarily to look at her. She lifted her head to look upward: “Something is wrong — this place is sinking.”

Zhuang Shaoqin’s face changed immediately and he moved to go and investigate. The three-eyed serpent also panicked: “Your Majesty — then what about him?”

He Bang began to tremble faintly: “Something is wrong here — everyone get out, now!”

Rong Chen Zi took her hand. Zhuang Shaoqin protected Ye Tian. Even the little keel-serpent, in the chaos, scooped Yugu onto its back. The group broke through the surface of the water above — and the surface was perfectly still. Not a ripple. Rong Chen Zi looked at He Bang: “A false alarm?”

He Bang transformed into her original form, submerged into the pool and returned to human shape: “No — this place is truly sinking!!”

The group fled toward the exit. But the surroundings were growing hotter by the moment, and the water began to boil. He Bang controlled it to lower the temperature, but the heat was still beyond what ordinary people could endure. He Bang could sense the water currents. She looked all around: “Lava.”

At the word, everyone’s face changed: “There is a volcano here?”

He Bang shook her head: “It must be man-made. When a living creature is trapped when the tomb descends, it will trigger this mechanism. The scale is not great — but it would be more than sufficient to kill every living creature inside. The mechanism certainly won’t destroy the tomb — so right now we can escape to the tomb grounds above and not die immediately. But we don’t know when the tomb will rise again, and we have no idea how many years we might be trapped here. Nor do we know what other mechanical traps are inside.”

The surroundings were growing hotter. From every direction, red lava could be seen beginning to flow down.

Everyone was drenched in sweat, when suddenly someone cried out. He Bang turned — and saw that the iron chain under Ye Tian’s feet had suddenly snapped. Chunyu Lin had been pursuing them. He used the Solar Ring in his hand to cut through the iron chain, and his right hand’s Lunar Ring swept directly at Ye Tian.

Ye Tian was no match for him, and caught off guard in that instant, plummeted straight down. He Bang moved on instinct — her hand shot out and gripped Ye Tian’s wrist tight. Her right hand formed a seal to block the Lunar Ring that tore through the air. It was a rushed maneuver, and she could only form a single layer of water-pattern barrier. The ring hit with a resonant crash, shattering the water-pattern — and her right hand immediately showed blood. She gritted her teeth and kept her grip on Ye Tian’s wrist absolutely tight. That one brief moment was all Rong Chen Zi and Zhuang Shaoqin needed to reach them. He Bang’s physical body was inherently fragile, and the effort of barely holding onto Ye Tian with her left hand alone produced a crisp sound of bone snapping. Ye Tian looked up in shock and found He Bang biting down on her lip, both hands locked on hers in a grip as though she would crush the bones of her wrist.

Behind her, Yugu urgently threw out the shark-silk cloth. Ye Tian gripped it with her right hand, and Yugu hauled her up. He Bang bit down and endured it. Rong Chen Zi held her hand and ran forward without stopping. The red lava was rising with every passing moment, drawing ever closer to the iron chains.

Even the group’s nimble, fleet-footed movement felt like enormous weight upon the corroded chains.

He Bang gathered every drop of water within her body, using water-travel to convey everyone at once toward the exit. But at the exit, they found the passage covered entirely by lava — there was no way out.

He Bang had no further water to use in lowering the temperature. Rong Chen Zi and Zhuang Shaoqin had no time to pursue Chunyu Lin. Rong Chen Zi sheltered her in his arms: “This is not the exit — otherwise this tomb could never open again. Could it be rotating as it sinks?”

Xingzhi Zhenren’s expression was deeply serious: “Then the exit has been rotated somewhere else? But how do we find it?”

He Bang had no sense of direction, and in the current chaos had even less. Lava was flowing in greater quantities from all sides, coming ever closer to the chains. Steam billowed upward. The others in the group were all mortals — the fact that they were still conscious was already a feat. He Bang used water travel in three directions — east, west, south — and found nothing. She gasped for breath, even her internal water reserves being exhausted: “Run north.”

The temperature was too high. The others in the group were all ordinary mortals, and that any of them remained conscious was already remarkable. The little keel-serpent — its cultivation belonging to the fire element — bore it best. It carried everyone on its back and charged toward the north. The scene was beyond all imagination of excitement, terrifying enough that no one could afford even to faint. Even Xingzhi Zhenren let out an involuntary scream.

The exit to the north came into view. No lava had reached this side. The temperature inside was already extremely high — so high that everyone thought the door before them was a hallucination. The little keel-serpent, its cultivation fire-natured, could still endure. It carried Xingzhi Zhenren, Yugu, Qingxuan and the others and drove them all to the passage entrance.

Xingzhi Zhenren had already been injured, and was now very weak. Rong Chen Zi sent him to the passage entrance first. Zhuang Shaoqin moved Ye Tian and the disciples up.

Rong Chen Zi turned back and extended his hand toward He Bang. He Bang unconsciously raised her hand back to him — and then a violent surge of pain shot through her elbow. Her strength failed all at once, and she fell straight down. Rong Chen Zi was so frightened his soul nearly left his body: “He Pan!”

He Bang was terrified too. She tried to call on wind-travel, but suddenly something tight closed around her waist, catching her. Rong Chen Zi, who had lunged forward, found himself instantly pulling back — he didn’t dare make a move: “Don’t hurt her!”

He Bang turned her head — and saw Chunyu Lin. His hair was loose and wild, his appearance disheveled. But he was still smiling faintly: “How is it you are so careless, Your Majesty?”

He Bang opened her mouth and began to wail, loud and uninhibited. The passage exit was right there in front of her, yet she could not reach it. Rong Chen Zi was frantic: “Whatever it is you want — name it. But come out first!”

Chunyu Lin stood at the passage entrance, the lava surging and seething all around. Chunyu Lin looked tenderly at He Bang and gently wiped the tears from her face: “Don’t cry.”

Beneath their feet the lava was boiling and roiling. He Bang did not dare make the slightest movement. Chunyu Lin turned back into the depths, his voice gentle: “What you said was right — against the Daozong now, I have no hope of winning. But in a desolate ancient tomb, with endless ages before us — if Your Majesty were to keep me company, it would not be so lonely.”

He Bang wept aloud: “Zhiguan — Zhiguan, save me! I don’t want to be locked up here — there is nothing to eat here!”

Rong Chen Zi’s grip on his sword was shaking: “Release her. Whatever condition you name, I will agree to it.”

Chunyu Lin’s steps continued without pause: “I no longer want anything. This world has always been the strong preying on the weak — having become the weak, what is there left to ask?”

He Bang’s physical constitution was far too delicate. At this range, no one dared move. She cried softly in Chunyu Lin’s arms. Rong Chen Zi was trembling throughout his body. Suddenly his Baihui acupoint gathered a column of golden light — the golden light shot straight at Chunyu Lin.

Before Chunyu Lin could react, his entire body went numb in an instant, losing all sensation. At the passage entrance, the onlookers only saw him stiffen with He Bang in his arms and fall straight downward. The little three-eyed serpent rushed forward and caught them both, carrying them to the passage entrance. Zhuang Shaoqin’s eyes flickered for a single moment with grief — every person versed in the Daoist tradition knew that of all spiritual energies, dragon energy was the most potent. All other spiritual energies were devoured and dissolved in its presence.

And a soul’s essence was one of the most fragile forms of spiritual energy. Once the soul separated from the body within the dragon energy, it would be dissolved and obliterated within moments.

Rong Chen Zi, his movements stiff and wooden, placed He Bang down at the passage entrance and gently moved close to her: “The land of the realm is divided into nine provinces, one cauldron for each, and the nine cauldrons together constitute the realm. And so the so-called sacred vessel — it means something very precious, very precious, heavier than life itself.”

The imperial tomb sank. The lava swallowed everything, and from that field of view only a vast expanse of steaming crimson remained. Before them, Chunyu Lin’s sight gradually cleared. In the instant his consciousness returned, the three-eyed serpent swept He Bang away with a blow of its tail, and spat a jet of fire that drove him back once more toward the entrance and the molten lava. Zhuang Shaoqin pressed step by step closer with his talismans. Ye Tian steadied Rong Chen Zi, her face drained of all color with terror: “Senior martial brother!”

Rong Chen Zi’s expression was blank — he seemed to have no awareness of or feeling for anything around him. Xingzhi Zhenren was naturally most concerned about the keel-serpent king, and said, puzzled: “His cultivation element is water, his arts belong to fire — logically water and fire are incompatible. How is it possible that he now has both water and fire working in harmony without conflict?”

He Bang stood in a daze, as though she herself had lost her soul. Xingzhi Zhenren took her shoulders: “Your Majesty? Your Majesty? This is not the time for grief — the serpent king must be eliminated. If it escapes this place, once its power recovers, the Daozong’s efforts will all have been for nothing!”

He Bang looked blankly at Rong Chen Zi. Ye Tian’s weeping was enough to break anyone’s heart. He Bang suddenly tugged faintly at the corners of her lips — and actually smiled: “So what if it escapes? So what if all our efforts were for nothing? I don’t fear heaven’s destruction and earth’s collapse — why would I fear a demon that plagues the world?” She looked toward Rong Chen Zi, her voice dropping lower and lower: “I only feared one word from you, light and offhand, that would lock me away for a thousand, ten thousand years, and from that time on, I would never find my way back to my deep sea.”

“Your Majesty the Sea Clan King.” Xingzhi Zhenren let out a long, quiet sigh. “Please set aside your grief for the moment. Rong Chen Zi must not have sacrificed himself for nothing.”

He Bang finally looked at him. Those perpetually bright and lively eyes had taken on the cold of winter: “Your sacrifice, your entire family’s sacrifice — your entire household registration booklet’s sacrifice.”

Xingzhi Zhenren was terrified she would lose her reason in this state and mistake friend for foe, and hurried to console her: “This poor one’s words were wrong, entirely wrong… and yet…”

Before he could continue, He Bang said softly: “And yet you have a point. The heavens and earth are endless, and the passage of time is long — there is infinite time still ahead for grief. No need to rush in this moment.”

Chunyu Lin had been struck by Rong Chen Zi’s soul essence and had also been injured by the dragon energy. But against just the three-eyed serpent and Zhuang Shaoqin alone, he still had the strength to fight back.

He Bang’s right hand slowly closed into a fist. An ice spike formed gradually in midair. Chunyu Lin, fighting off Zhuang Shaoqin and the three-eyed serpent simultaneously, still had enough presence of mind to laugh faintly: “Does Your Majesty intend to kill me?”

Within the ice spike He Bang had placed a blood pearl. She gave no answer, only raised her hand of white jade with an unhurried motion, and the ice spike, riding the wind, came toward him with the force of rolling thunder. Chunyu Lin used the water current to deflect it, and after a moment he gripped it in his hand and crushed it to pieces: “Rong Chen Zi was only bringing death upon himself. Why should Your Majesty trouble yourself? With his soul now gone, this Daozong will not be able to tolerate Your Majesty any longer. Come back to my side.”

He Bang looked steadily at him, then all at once smiled faintly. Her red lips parted, her voice clear: “Keel-serpent — Chunyu Lin never truly loved He Pan.”

The always elegant and gentle Chunyu Lin suddenly became frantic. He Bang’s gaze was heavy with deep compassion: “He was only under the effect of my technique.”

“No!” Chunyu Lin showed a sudden and unspeakable anguish. Water-type arts could not coexist with a fire-element body — he only relied on the remnants of Chunyu Lin’s consciousness to control the water and maintain the balance between the two. Now Chunyu Lin’s consciousness was on the verge of complete collapse, and the suffering was unbearable. Taking a sword blow from Zhuang Shaoqin, he threw himself at He Bang with reckless abandon: “Wretched woman — I will kill you, kill you!”

He Bang did not dodge or retreat. A second ice spike formed in her right hand and drove straight through his heart. Its force carried him back several steps. Fire and water clashed inside him, the pain excruciating: “You woman — I will kill you, kill you!!”

He Bang formed a third ice spike and aimed it: “How could I have ever fallen in love with a physical form cultivated specifically for you? I only feared that the path ahead held too many uncertainties — so I kept him wholeheartedly devoted to me. If ever the day came when we became enemies, whatever the outcome, at least I would always have a way to survive.”

Chunyu Lin let out a howl. His blood began to burn. Flames scorched through his body, light scattering in all directions. He Bang pressed her lips together. A third ice spike drove through his body. The three-eyed serpent spat another jet of fire. He staggered and could no longer stand, and fell into the lava.

He Bang’s vision went suddenly blurred. She stepped quickly forward and seized Chunyu Lin’s hand. The temperature of that hand was frighteningly hot. Drops of water fell one after another onto his wrist, his cheek. Chunyu Lin raised his head. His whole body was blazing with blood and fire: “You are crying?”

He Bang’s dislocated arm had long since lost all feeling. Her heart had lost feeling too. She only knew to hold on tight like this, and her face even carried three parts of a smile: “Yes — but my tears come cheap. I cry eight times a day, half a catty each time — I’ve long since gotten used to it.”

Chunyu Lin was still smiling: “That may be so, and yet — I cannot say why — your tears… ahem… are even more scalding than my blood.”

The temperature was too extreme. The blood pearl within him burst apart with a detonation, and the whole of him blazed into a dazzling column of flame. He Bang still held that hand, and that hand remained soft and slender. In the sound of Yugu’s weeping, Zhuang Shaoqin came running and forced He Bang’s five fingers apart — and so even that hand fell into the rolling lava. He Bang slowly curled her fingers closed. What remained in her palm was a burning, heart-tearing warmth.

The passage trembled. The three-eyed serpent took Rong Chen Zi in its mouth, carrying Yugu and Ye Tian and the others and racing as fast as it could toward the exit. Zhuang Shaoqin kept hold of He Bang and did not dare stop for a single step. He Bang looked back at that vast expanse of crimson lava — something was being pulled from her heart like this, raw and bleeding, left behind in what was now past.

The passage slowly sank. He… he also became part of the past.