Wei Chengxiang’s first reaction was: How much money can we get for the Law Breaker Bracelet?

No…no, that was wrong. She tossed her head: if they really tried to sell that thing, probably all they’d get for it was a beam of “moonlight.”

She forced herself to be rational, but her heart still began to beat wildly: the space the Law Breaker Bracelet could cover was precisely the size of Tao County, and it could even change the laws of time; couldn’t it change some other things? For example, turning rocks into gold…or spiritual stones. Even if it couldn’t fabricate spiritual stones out of nothing, it should still be possible to set an axiom to remove the Silver Moon’s Moon Shadow, right? Without the Moon Shadow, Tao County’s spiritual energy could begin to circulate again, and they wouldn’t need the spirit-gathering array anymore!

She threw caution to the wind and probed outward with her consciousness like a snake’s tongue, steadily and accurately fixing on the Law Breaker Bracelet’s aura. At the same time, she cut her finger and quickly drew a blood covenant talisman for capturing a magic tool in midair. “Return!”

But before the talisman could take shape, a terrifying scene took place: a deathly pale hand, cut off at the wrist, suddenly reached out from thin air. The calluses and scars on that hand couldn’t have been more familiar to Wei Chengxiang.

The severed hand broke apart the half-talisman and made a grab for her neck.

Wei Chengxiang reacted promptly. Before the gooseflesh even rose on her skin, she had already slid over half a chi away, narrowly dodging the severed hand. But the hand had snatched the mustard seed hanging around her neck.

A mustard seed was a cultivator’s purse and usually had its owner’s prohibition on it. Without the owner’s permission, even a person with stronger cultivation would need the previous owner’s traces to open it. But the hand reached into her mustard seed completely unimpeded as a bracelet flashed indistinctly on its wrist…because this was her own lost left hand!

The severed hand greedily groped around for spiritual stones inside the mustard seed. Though the hand remained bloodless, the skin became smooth and supple.

Wei Chengxiang was stupefied: her own hand was stealing her spiritual stones!

The next moment, the severed hand touched something and suddenly shivered. It dropped the mustard seed on the ground, along with a reincarnation wood amulet—while Senior Tai Sui was forever running at the mouth, his behavior was very characteristically “Wan.” Reasonably speaking, Wei Chengxiang was already a half-immortal; when it was inconvenient to keep it out, naturally she would seal away the reincarnation wood. But despite this, except in a matter of life or death, he virtually never sent his consciousness of his own accord. He sent his consciousness either when she called him, or only after sending word ahead like a letter and receiving her answer.

This actually forced Wei Chengxiang to put away the reincarnation wood when she needed to focus all her attention on something, because the senior couldn’t see what she was doing when he sent her a message, and sometimes his voice would distract her.

In order to draw the array, Wei Chengxiang had temporarily sealed the reincarnation wood in her mustard seed, and now the severed hand had found it. The severed hand seemed to have been stung by the wooden amulet. It dropped her mustard seed, turned tail, and ran from Tao County.

Wei Chengxiang snatched in mid-air to yank back her mustard seed and the reincarnation wood. She gave chase. “Stop!”

Xi Ping’s consciousness, far away in Tao County, had also been disturbed by the severed hand. As soon as the amulet returned to Wei Chengxiang’s hands, he asked across the distance, “A-Xiang, what’s wrong?”

Wei Chengxiang’s consciousness swept through her mustard seed. “My hand stole 4.5 liang of green ore and jade stamps from me!”

Xi Ping had just finished being instructed by his shizun, and his head was buzzing with undigested sword aura. “…huh?”

Had poverty driven her to madness?

“The Law Breaker Bracelet has appeared!” said Wei Chengxiang.

Xi Ping’s voice turned grave. “I’m coming.”

No sooner had he spoken than his consciousness flowed into the reincarnation wood amulet Wei Chengxiang carried.

But the moment his consciousness arrived, the Law Breaker’s aura suddenly disappeared—and in the direction it had disappeared, there just happened to be a person.

Wei Chengxiang stopped in her tracks, leapt up, and fell from mid-air

This person was wearing a hood and close-fitting clothes for easy movement. She was a female open-eyed half-immortal. Murder and robbery were only too common among evil cultivators. Out in the wilderness, when two unacquainted cultivators first encountered each other, it was like a meeting of two tigers. The atmosphere became tense.

For some reason, this female cultivator didn’t even have a mustard seed on her. Her spiritual stones were carried openly in a pouch.

Wei Chengxiang unconsciously glanced toward the place where her spiritual stones were kept, and the female cultivator acutely raised her elbow to shield the spiritual stone pouch, her hand falling on the sword at her waist. The two of them stood some zhang apart, temporarily deadlocked.

Xi Ping gave a cry. “Her?”

Wei Chengxiang asked, “Senior, you know her?”

“The young mistress of the Yuzhou Zhao clan, formerly of Heaven’s Design Pavilion,” Xi Ping said. “She just ran away from home. Perhaps she’s heard of Wild Fox Country and wants to come find some handy immortal tools to use. Don’t bother with her. What’s going on?”

“I think I might have to bother with her.” Keeping her eyes on the female cultivator, Wei Chengxiang explained the Law Breaker Bracelet’s sudden appearance, its stealth attack on her, and how it had stolen her spiritual stones. “I suppose that after all this time, all the spiritual energy in my severed hand has dispersed. Other people’s spiritual stones are all hidden in their mustard seeds, so it had to come to me, and just now it was scared off by the reincarnation wood. But as soon as it turned around, it ran into this blockhead with her spiritual stones hanging out in the open. Senior, I suspect the Law Breaker Bracelet has climbed into her spiritual stone pouch.”

Xi Ping: “…”

Fine. She runs away from home, then loses all her money. What an ill-fated encounter.

“Excuse me…” Wei Chengxiang saw Young Mistress Zhao stooping somewhat unnaturally in her masculine dress and changed what she had been about to say, pretending that she hadn’t noticed anything. “Excuse me, brother, I mean you no harm. I only saw your spiritual stones were hanging out and couldn’t help saying something. Up ahead is Wild Fox Country, where you’ll find all types. You'd better be careful.”

The female cultivator—the runway Zhao Qindan—did indeed want to put her things in a mustard seed, but the problem was that all her stuff had been taken, and the spiritual stones had been given to her by the maid. To Zhao Qindan, the “man” in front of her looked like an obvious specimen of a poor evil cultivator. Never mind the ragged clothes, there was also an eye-opening scar on her face. The scar tugged at the corners of her eye and mouth, spoiling the handsome and regular layout of her features, fixing her face in a “false smile”; at a glance, she didn’t look like any kind of decent person.

Zhao Qindan’s wariness rose another two notches. She nodded without expression. Afraid that her voice would give her away, she didn’t speak. She gave a perfunctory cupped fist salute and was about to continue on her way.

Wei Chengxiang quickly called her to a halt again and put on what she thought was her warmest and most amiable smile. “I actually have some acquaintances in Wild Fox Country. If you don’t object, I could…”

Before she could finish, she heard Xi Ping cry out, “Careful!”

A fierce wind came her way. Wei Chengxiang quickly flew up and retreated. A talisman came chasing after her, exploding three times in a row. Heaven’s Design Pavilion was Heaven’s Design Pavilion, after all. Wei Chengxiang dodged in a desperate flurry, and when she looked again, the female cultivator was gone.

“I was being nice…” Wei Chengxiang was bewildered. “Senior, don’t I look like a nice person?”

“Look in a mirror when you get the chance.” Xi Ping sighed. He focused and spread his consciousness throughout all the reincarnation wood trees in Tao County and quickly caught up with Zhao Qindan, who was fleeing in a panic. Xi Ping told Wei Chengxiang her location, then said, “Keep an eye on her, I’m going to see Lin Chi.”

Among the ascended spirit peak masters of the Xuanyin Mountains, Zhi Xiu was the most popular. He wasn’t on anyone’s side, his temper was good, and he was Xuanyin’s latest ascended spirit, so even slightly senior established foundation disciples were older than him. Because of this, the disciples all impudently called him “little shishu.” The most unfathomable peak master, meanwhile, was Lin Chi. There were no direct disciples on Moon Plated Peak; all cultivators who practiced the way of the toolmaking went on record as his disciples. Only the shed skin elders could send him Heavenly Questions. The people on Moon Plated Peak and the members of the Lin family had about the same chances of seeing Master Lin as anyone else—no one could catch a glimpse of him.

But while Flying Jade Peak was the quietest among the thirty-six peaks, Moon Plated Peak was the noisiest.

Moon Plated Peak was over two hundred li from east to west and had on its roster a hundred fifty established foundation cultivators of the toolmaking way. Each person was in charge of one or more “immortal furnaces.” Each established foundation also had between a few dozen and over a hundred half-immortals under them. Downward of halfway up the mountain, immortal furnaces of all sizes worked nonstop day and night. They were scattered thickly as stars and brightly lit even at night, as resplendent as a city, outdoing even Jinping in midsummer.

Practically all the immortal tools used by Xuanyin’s inner and outer sects came from here.

Upward of halfway up the mountain, it was a completely different story.

This was where the peak master lived, Moon Plated Peak’s forbidden ground.

The lush, dense forest was full of arrays. No one was allowed to fly here but the master, and there was no road up the mountain. There were only a few karma beast statues in the outermost ring of arrays. If disciples or visitors had some business, they stood there and talked to the stones. The karma beast statues would save their voices and images for Master Lin to look at when he had the time. At his most diligent, he would respond with a few notes in three to five months. Sometimes when he was in seclusion, there would be no answer for a year or more.

It was fortunate that the death of an ascended spirit was always an earthshaking event. Otherwise, Lin Chi could have rotted away without anyone knowing.

As soon as Xi Ping’s consciousness stole in, he saw dark clouds massed over Moon Plated Peak. Then a bolt of lightning struck right at him.

The great “evil cultivator” sealed at the bottom of the Impassable Sea had a guilty conscience and thought that the bolt of lightning was meant for him. He nearly ran away. Only when he got a close look did he find that the heavenly lightning had struck Master Lin’s immortal furnace.

Lin Chi, taking it in stride, ducked away from the immortal furnace, avoiding the heavenly tribulation. There was a ball of black smoke in his hand. When his spiritual sense was touched, he raised his head and sighed faintly. “You’re here.”

For an instant, Xi Ping thought he was looking at a sunburnt Riverward. “What is this?”

“A crude imitation.” Staring at the ball of black smoke, Lin Chi shook his head very pessimistically. “She said that the Riverward was like water or smoke, that it would silently blend with all living things and disappear among them… Naturally I can’t make a Riverward. I had wanted to use the principle of the Riverward to make a disguise for the Luwu, that would let their aura blend with that of whoever they were impersonating. This way, their outward appearance, their spiritual image, their speech and mannerisms would all become as much like the original as possible. Even a shed skin wouldn’t easily be able to tell there was anything wrong.”

Nice! Xi Ping’s eyes glowed. This immortal tool had Xu Rucheng’s name on it!

But before he could say anything, Lin Chi lifted his hand and destroyed the just-completed immortal tool.

“Hey, what are…”

The spiritual energy dispersed, and unseasonal flowers bloomed impatiently all over the ground, as if what had been scattered wasn’t an immortal tool but a cultivator of at least established foundation level.

Xi Ping’s guts all twisted together. “Why did you destroy it?” he said mournfully. “You’re…”

…throwing money away!

How many spiritual stones had it taken to make that thing?!

Lin Chi beckoned, and a brocade box fell into his hand, containing a stack of thin, half-transparent masks. He knocked on the lid of the box. In response, a straw child pushed a small cart along some rails, confirmed the number of masks in the brocade box, used spiritual stones to seal the box, then loaded it into the small cart and took it away.

While Xi Ping didn’t especially understand toolmaking, he had the necessary cultivation level and experience. He could see at a glance that those things were about the same as the masks Xu Rucheng and the others had used before. There was nothing new there. The only difference was that immortal tools made by the hand of an ascended spirit master were slightly higher grade; when those marks were worn, it would be hard for an ascended spirit cultivator of the same grade to discover them.

“If a person’s identity, appearance, speech, and mannerisms all change, what do they have left?” Lin Chi said quietly. “The human heart is like water. Whatever the form of the container, that will be the shape of the heart. An established foundation or above, with their Way of the Heart to sustain them, might perhaps hold out for a while, but the Luwu are all half-immortals. It would harm them.”

Xi Ping froze. He didn’t know how many people outside this mountain were looking up and seeing Master Lin working his immortal furnace. With Master Lin making tools for the first time in several hundred years and turning out this kind of thing, even using your foot to think you could imagine how disappointed those people would be.

People would be chewing over the news that “Lin Chi’s creative powers have been exhausted” for a long time.

Hearing this, Lin Chi, shame-faced, said, “My creative powers have been exhausted? Very well, they’re right. What did you want?”

Xi Ping was silent for a moment. When he spoke again, his tone had become a little more respectful in spite of himself. “Peak Master Lin, I want to ask for your advice concerning the Law Breaker Bracelet.”

Lin Chi frowned.

Xi Ping briefly explained the bracelet’s sudden appearance, then asked, “How could an immortal tool that has acknowledged a master rebel like this?”

“While the Law Breaker and the Riverward have no grade limitation and can be used by anyone, they would certainly ‘bully’ a lower-level cultivator.” Lin Chi considered, then said, “While Little Brother Wei is the Law Breaker’s master, apart from activating the Law Breaker’s axiom, it seems he cannot otherwise control her. He had to cut his hand off in a moment of emergency before he could remove the bracelet. That must mean he couldn’t take the bracelet off.”

“…I did say she was just a bracelet rack.” Xi Ping sighed. “Master Lin, how can we get the Law Breaker Bracelet back?”

But Lin Chi hesitated for a long moment. Finally, not answering the question, he said, “It isn’t necessarily a bad thing that the Law Breaker has run away. If you want to use it to remove the Moon Shadow, I advise against it. Haven’t you thought, when the Moon Shadow is so pernicious, why would Sanyue’s Elder Xuanwu not have attempted to remedy it? Isn’t he afraid that his Way of the Heart will be damaged?”

“What do you mean?”

“The Moon Shadow isn’t poison left behind by the Silver Moon. It’s a kind of protection,” Lin Chi said. “The Silver Moon leaves behind an enormous deficit of spiritual energy where it passes. How large the deficit is, presumably you and Little Brother Wei can approximately figure using the spirit-gathering array. Without the Moon Shadow to cut it off, Tao County itself would immediately become an enormous sinkhole ‘pilfering heaven’s order.’ What would happen to the surrounding counties and towns in Chu?”

Xi Ping froze at once, remembering how he had heard that a three-year drought would follow the ringing of the Bell of Tribulation.

“If it is only Tao County, the court can allocate some rice and grain as emergency provisions for a few years. There are evildoers running wild in Tao County, the local yamen is weak. It is a turbulent place to begin with. If other areas were affected, how many people would die in Western Chu? An ascended spirit evil cultivator came into the world, causing great chaos. Two evils cancel each other out, so the Silver Moon emerged in Western Chu. To keep the harm of the Silver Moon at a minimum, they must sacrifice Tao County.” At this point, Lin Chi sighed softly. “The Law Breaker has limits. She can take twenty days from Tao County, but she cannot return twenty days to Tao County. She cannot make spiritual stones out of nothing for you. Also…I don’t know whether you have noticed, but the Law Breaker…the Law Breaker can sometimes be like a flower in a mirror or the moon reflected in water. She is somewhat inauspicious. The more you try to use her to pursue something, the more unattainable it becomes.”

When Wei Chengxiang had lent Qiu Sha the Law Breaker, repaying a debt of gratitude had been one aspect; in fact, she had also wanted to contain the great evildoer, limit her impact as much as possible, keep her from harming innocent people. But in the end, she had nearly removed Tao County from the human world.

Enshrouded by the Law Breaker, Tao County had initially had a hope of achieving fertile soil through the nourishment of the ascended spirit corpses, but instead it had become a putrid land under the Moon Shadow.

Qiu Sha had wanted to use the Law Breaker, but in the end, by an unexpected twist, it was the Law Breaker that had defeated her.

Lin Chi also paused, as if uncertain whether to go on. “Actually…I also wanted to tell you before, you had better abandon the spirit-gathering array, too. The spirit-gathering array needs to disperse a hundred thousand white spirits in an instant to offset Tao County’s Moon Shadow. There is no way such a major working can avoid the gaze of the Sanyue Spiritual Mountains. When that happens, how will you deal with it?”

Xi Ping answered readily: “I’ll offset first and think later. At worst that old monster Xuanwu will pull me up by the roots again.”

“Even Sanyue has abandoned it. Why do you…”

Why do you want to clean up this mess?

Xi Ping knew what he meant, but he didn’t answer.

Because…

Though the people of Tao County had been swept by the Silver Moon and didn’t remember anything, while enveloped by the Law Breaker, those mortals without the strength to truss a chicken had burned the late-autumn red for his sake.

Tao County’s reincarnation wood trees put down their roots beside people’s homes, struggling alongside them in life and in death.

“Also,” said Lin Chi, moving on when he received no response from him, “the Law Breaker’s sudden appearance means that, no matter whose pocket it ends up in, the outcome will be chaos. You must be careful.”