On the ninth day of the month, before the fourth watch of the night, Xi Ping woke with a start.

He forgot what he had been dreaming about as soon as he opened his eyes. He stared blankly at the birthday jade hanging from the bed curtain for a moment, saw “fourth month, ninth day” carved into it jade, and thought: Jiangli’s birthday.

He rolled over and wearily closed his eyes, vaguely pondering: Should I get her something?

Lately the quality of southern pearl strings had been good, though they were rather big and looked ridiculous on thin people; a gold filigree enamel pocket watch with an inlaid peacock design was a little gaudy, but young women didn’t mind gaudiness; there were also Magu’s¹ birthday greeting crafts which, while the quality of the jade wasn’t the best, had carvings of the goddess that at a glance had quite a bit of Jiangli’s charm, and a “birthday greeting” was both suitable for the occasion and auspicious. He could…

Suddenly, Xi Ping's eyes flew open.

He had remembered. He couldn’t give her anything.

It turned out that this matter had been silently fermenting in his chest for several days and had only now swelled to a sufficient size to block his excessively spacious cavity.

This was Xi Ping’s first time experiencing the death of someone close to him. The impression may not have been deep, but the aftereffects were prolonged.

He dressed and got out of bed, then wrote half a stanza of a lament for a deceased wife… He couldn’t force out a second half. Reading back over it, he felt involuntary sadness welling up, because his great work was truly rubbish, no better than the trees’ “skin condition” in the Blissful Village.

The House of Overflowing Splendor had silently disappeared, and for a time, the Jinping social scene had dimmed. Xi Ping had suddenly decided that those places of feminine charms were all very boring. A couple of days ago, a drinking buddy of his had obtained a “steam carriage” that didn’t need a horse to pull it and had asked him to come out for a drive, and he, disinterested, had refused.

During the day, he either listened to opera with his grandmother or posed for his mother’s drawings, and at night he slept in his grandmother’s courtyard. When the old lady went to sleep, he studied on his own.

Even though he was always knocked down within two pages, it was still studying.

In a little while, he was even planning to obey the Marquis and go to the “young masters’ training camp” to make up for his deficiencies, then get married and have children, lead an ordinary life.

But an immortal’s light-hearted joke could rewrite a mortal’s destiny.

Xuanyin’s selection card arrived at the Marquis Manor when the Marquis was taking a day off.

In the first mark of the Hour of the Dragon, apart from the old lady, who was getting on in years, the whole household was sleeping in. An immortal crane flew elegantly into the Marquis Manor and waited on the roof for a full mark, until sunrise, but it saw no one living.

It had its orders. There was nothing it could do. It had to trespass into the rear courtyard.

The old lady was watering her flowers. Startled by this auspicious vision, she thought she had reached the end of her lifespan and this immortal crane had come to carry her into the West. She was so scared she dropped her watering can.

Xi Ping heard his grandmother’s servant girl cry out in alarm and thought a thief had broken into the house. Without even opening his eyes, he ran out with a sword, ready for a fight. He looked around fiercely and couldn’t find the thief. He was completely bewildered when a big bird handed him a wooden tablet… and a letter.

He couldn’t tell what kind of wood the tablet was made of. Xi Ping yawned and drew in a chilling breath of costus root. The costus root scent put you in mind of soughing pines and bamboo forests that had been silent for hundreds of thousands of years amid cold morning mists. When a breath of it poured into his lungs, his head cleared.

On the front of the wooden tablet was carved a cluster of bamboo beside the word “Selection.” On the reverse side was a line of small writing: Viscount of Yongning Xi Ping, on the fourth month, fifteenth day, to enter the Latent Cultivation Temple.

One mark later, the dreaming Yongning Marquis Manor was boiling—there was red rain coming from the sky, this was no time to sleep!

The wastrel their joke of a Marquis Manor had bred had actually received a selection card for Xuanyin’s Grand Selection!

How wonderful! He hadn’t even worked out how to be a man yet, and now he was qualified to become an immortal!

Even the Marquis was stupefied. He checked the gold seals of Xuanyin and Heaven’s Design Pavilion on the envelope several times before he dared to open it.

The contents of the letter were clear and concise. It only said that provisional disciple Xi Ping was to come at such a time to such a place to do obeisance to the sage at the altar at Heaven’s Design Pavilion, then travel to the Latent Cultivation Temple to cultivate for a period of one year.

Attached was a list of sect rules three chi long.

As for other trifles—for example, how they would travel, what to bring and what traveling clothes to wear and things like that—they weren't mentioned. Xuanyin’s Grand Selection was confined to the circle of the children of nobility. All of them understood the rules.

When the shock was past, the whole family looked at each other in dismay.

A selection card could make Jinping’s wealthy and influential lose their minds, but when this unique family encountered pie falling out of the sky, once they recovered, there was no sign of happiness on their faces.

The Marquis read the letter several times and gravely gave a servant a quiet order to go notify Prince Zhuang.

The old lady, meanwhile, using a silk cushion to pick it up, found a brocade box suitable to hold the wooden tablet and muttered in confusion, “The Xuanyin Immortal Sect… sent my baby a selection card?”

The Marquis of Yongning’s wife Madam Cui frowned. “Our family never thought… But I’ve already sent someone to find a potential daughter-in-law, what am I supposed to say?”

The old lady asserted: “The immortal sect must have expanded its admissions this year.”

Madam Cui became more and more anxious. “Why would the immortal sect expand its admissions out of nowhere? Is there going to be unrest?”

Madam Cui was skilled at painting and calligraphy and had a lively imagination. She was the only member of the family who could coherently explain scenes of beauty—the rest could only act as “scenes of beauty,” shut their mouths, and let her explain. These were the talents she had once used to entrap the Marquis. But people with overly sensitive minds were often prone to melancholy and thinking of the worst outcomes whenever anything happened.

The old lady knew what she was like and quickly consoled her daughter-in-law: “No matter what, this is still a good thing.”

Then she lovingly patted Xi Ping on the head. “Your grandfather was a good-for-nothing. It took him eight years to pass the county examination, and half his life to pass the provincial examination. His parents paid for him to become a petty official. If he found out that my baby was making so much of himself, I think he’d laugh so hard he’d pick up his teeth and climb out of the ancestral tomb!”

Xi Ping: “…”

Really, there was no need to disturb the old fellow.

The old lady sighed. “But the mountain is timeless. If you happen to get chosen to enter the inner sect while you’re at the Latent Cultivation Temple, by the time you’ve transformed and come down from the mountains, your grandmother will long ago have raced off to the next life. I won’t get to see my baby again.”

Madam Cui heard this, and a new anxiety was added to her existing fears. Tears swam in her eyes.

The Marquis was thinking to himself, You two ladies are worrying over nothing. The inner sect… Does the inner sect accept scraps?

Then he heard Xi Ping say, categorically, “That’s not possible. At most I’ll stay at the Latent Cultivation Temple for a year, then come home. Mom, if you want to look for a bride, then go ahead and keep looking. I’ll get married when I get back. There won’t be any delay.”

Hearing this rubbish, the Marquis of Yongning immediately wanted to shake his mustache once more. But before he could let out his anger, it was forced back by his mother and his wife speaking in unison: “Heaven bless us, that would be wonderful.”

He had no voice in this family. There was nothing the Marquis could do. He had to put all his strength into glaring at Xi Ping. He felt very oppressed.

Xi Ping could just as well have done without this. In fact, he didn’t especially want to go, but it would have seemed pretty shameless to say that. He quickly got over it. While it sounded pretty miserable to be shut up in a mountain valley, luckily it was only for a year, and if he happened to do well, he might get into Heaven’s Design Pavilion when he got back.

Heaven’s Design Pavilion!

The most undistinguished of teenage boys was still a teenage boy and could admire strength. The image of Pang Jian’s back as he drew his bow in the rainy night had branded a yearning into Xi Ping’s mind. Time would tell what he’d make of himself once he got to the Latent Cultivation Temple, but for now, at any rate, he was determined to work hard.

His unexpected selection threw off the whole family’s relaxed pace.

The old lady and Madam Cui asked around and learned that when you went to the Latent Cultivation Temple for a year, you couldn’t leave the mountains, you weren’t allowed to contact your family, there were no servants to look after you, and even the luggage you could bring was limited. They both turned pale, feeling that their darling was being banished to penal servitude.

His grandmother and mother gave him repeated exhortations, and Xi Ping patiently accepted them all without question.

This was the outcome of the Marquis teaching by example since Xi Ping was little: even a beast knew to retract its claws when it returned to its den. If you had a temper to work off, you went and did it outside. Once you came home, you absolutely couldn’t make your mother and wife mind your moods. So Xi Ping was used to being pulled this way and that by the two ladies.

But in spite of this, this time it was still a little too much for him to digest—Madam Cui may have thought that you had to abstain from food when you entered the immortal mountains; she did her best to feed him a year’s worth of food in advance, three meals a day with six snacks. She fed Xi Ping so much his spine nearly grew a hump.

Xi Ping got serious indigestion. For several days in a row, there was always acid coming back up his throat. And at night he had one wild dream after another. He kept thinking there was someone humming that Soul Calling Melody into his ear.

When Xi Ping could barely stand it at home any longer, the date of his departure was at last at hand. Before he left, he went to Prince Zhuang Manor to say goodbye to his san-ge.

Prince Zhuang seemed to know that he had been tormented by all kinds of exhortations, or perhaps the warming temperatures had sapped his vigor. He was unusually reticent, only told him in brief roughly who had been selected. Before Xi Ping left, he gave him a big two-layered brocade box.

Normally, whenever Prince Zhuang got hold of any good tea or good wine, he always gave him some to take back to the Marquis Manor. Xi Ping was used to this. He took it and left. The upshot was that when he got home and opened it, he took one look and was astounded: this box didn’t contain any tea or pastries; it contained a “downgraded immortal tool!”

An “immortal tool”—this was a tool that only an immortal could use.

Immortal tools had different grades. A master could use a low-grade immortal tool, but not the other way around. For example, even if an open-eyed half-immortal got hold of Xuanyin’s divine tool of the mountains, it would be like giving a saber to a baby. They wouldn't be able to operate it.

Mortals with their obstructed spiritual sense naturally couldn’t command immortal tools, but after Moon Plated Gold had entered the mortal world, in recent decades, humanity’s steam technology had improved by leaps and bounds and had in turn influenced the immortal sect. A toolmaking master had tried adding mechanical works to some low level immortal tools, making them operate on the basis of spiritual stones with a supplement of oil, making “downgraded immortal tools” that mortals could also use.

Though there was still some dispute among the immortal sects over downgraded immortal tools—it was said that the conservative old Kunlun Sect had forbidden these things.

Xuanyin, however, was far more relaxed. After all, Lin Chi, the inventor of the Gold Imitation Technique and downgrading immortal tools, belonged to it.

But despite this, downgraded immortal tools were still very rare. For one thing, once the immortal tool was downgraded, its functions would be greatly simplified from the original version, placing many limits on its usefulness, while the inner mechanical workings were technologically complex and extremely costly to produce. It was no easier to reequip a downgraded immortal tool than it was to forge a proper high level immortal tool. The masters who created these tools were all proud and arrogant, and usually didn’t feel like spending so much time for the sake of mortals.

Also, in addition to burning oil, downgraded immortal tools also burned spiritual stones.

Among spiritual stones, the most inferior and most impure “green ore” still cost one liang of gold per one liang of ore.

Low grade “jade stamps” had a market price of ten liang of gold. You could exchange a jade stamp bead the size of a finger pad for a good horse.

Middle grade “blue jades” started at forty gold each—the Marquis of Yongning’s entire annual salary, no more or less, was equal to one liang of blue stones.

As for the highest grade “white spirits,” that went without saying. A “white spirit” bead that was up to quality standards cost a hundred gold, enough to buy a presentable house in the capital city, where land was extremely costly.

The spiritual stones burned by downgraded immortal tools couldn’t have too many impurities; they had to be at least jade stamp stones. The pickier ones even needed to burn blue jades, or else it would lessen the lifespan of the tool. Who could afford that?

In the double-layered brocade box Prince Zhuang had given him, the upper layer contained a pair of white jade boards edged with Moon Plated Gold, as well as a few small amulets for exorcism and protection.

The lower layer, meanwhile, was packed full of “blue jade” spiritual stone beads.

As soon as the box was opened, the spiritual energy became oppressive. All the air in the study cleared. There was enough to power a downgraded immortal tool for several years.

Xi Ping was nearly blinded by the blue light. He blurted out, “Damn it, my san-ge hasn’t even had a daughter yet, and he’s already giving me her dowry?”

The Marquis glared at him.

“I thought it was food again,” Xi Ping said. “If I’d known it was this, I wouldn’t have taken it.”

The Marquis said, “This is a mark of His Highness’s affection for you. He gave it to you, so take it. It’s something you can use. Our family won’t be the ones to say that His Highness’s means are straitened.”

Then the Marquis removed one of the white jade boards. “Take one of these boards and give the other one to your grandmother.”

“What is it?” Xi Ping picked up a white board and scrutinized it. The white jade was nearly flawless, and there was a small brocade carp engraved in Moon Plated Gold in the upper right corner, looking extremely lively. “A chopping board…? Hey, dad, wait, can’t we talk it over like civilized people, why do you always have to start getting physical?! If I get out of the way too quickly and you throw out your back like last time, I’ll be the unfilial one again.”

“This is called a proximal.”² The Marquis withdrew his swift kick and lifted his chin, motioning for Xi Ping to put the jade board down.

He put a blue jade bead in the groove on the underside of each jade board, and a gentle fluorescence flashed over them.

The Marquis picked up a brush and demonstrated to Xi Ping how to use the jade boards. He wrote “Xi” on one of them. Fluorescence rippled over the other jade board, and an identical “Xi” appeared in the same place.

“As long as there are spiritual stones in both proximals, no matter how far apart they are, you can use them to communicate. The Latent Cultivation Temple doesn’t allow disciples to write to their families, but it doesn’t prohibit or intercept messages sent via immortal tools. It must be tacit permission for you to bring them,” the Marquis said. “Your mom and I are all right, but the old lady is getting on in years. She doesn’t say it, but in fact she can’t bear to see you leave. Even if you have nothing to say, just don’t forget to let her know you’re safe and sound every day.”

“All right,” said Xi Ping.

The Marquis pressed down on the Moon Plated Gold brocade carp on the jade board, and the fish seemed to come alive. It flapped its tail energetically and moved over the jade board following the Marquis’s finger. Wherever it went, the handwriting there turned to steam and was wiped clean. “Sit there, and sit properly. I have a few more things to say to you.”

Xi Ping uncrossed his legs and sat up straight as the shaft of a brush, awaiting his father’s admonitions.

The Marquis said, “I didn’t expect you to receive a selection card, or else I would have said this to you before. Our family line contains nothing but mortals. You’ll have no protection in the immortal sect. If you make trouble the same way you do in Jinping, no one will clean up after you.”

“To hear you talk, you’d think I was a walking calamity,” Xi Ping protested.

“What else are you supposed to be?” said the Marquis.

Xi Ping was about to retort when he heard his father continue coldly: “The Xi family can’t reach the immortal sect’s threshold. You’re going on account of the Her Ladyship the Imperial Consort and His Highness Prince Zhuang. You can try getting yourself killed, but don’t get them involved!”

“…All right,” said Xi Ping.

But at this point the Marquis remembered something, and his thoughts wandered a little as he looked out the study window.

It was already very late. The swaying shadows of trees fell on the profile that had for a time been the most handsome in Jinping, turning the grey temples black once more and deepening the ravines at the corners of his eyes.

Time had never spared the feelings of mortals when it began to wear them down.

Out of nowhere, Xi Ping thought that the Marquis wasn’t at all happy about him receiving a selection card, not the pure unease of his grandmother and mother, but a kind of… more profound anxiety.

Then he looked at the pair of white jade proximals and felt increasingly suspicious—since he was little, the Marquis had told him that mortals and immortals moved in separate spheres; they had to be respectful yet distant when it came to immortal families. So their family was different from others: they only made offerings to their ancestors, never burned incense or worshipped deities. There were no talisman papers, inscriptions, or anything like that in the house… So why did the Marquis himself seem so familiar with this downgraded immortal tool?

Just then, the Marquis came back to himself and added, “Whether it’s the immortals teaching at the Latent Cultivation Temple or your schoolmates, just don’t be in a hurry to offend any of them. We don't want any meteoric success, and we have no need for you to curry favor with those ‘heavenly’ people. Have you got that? Also…”

The words “don’t enter the inner sect” came right up to the Marquis’s lips, but when he looked up and saw his wretched son, he swallowed them.

One provisional disciple out of each class being able to enter the inner sect was already a good ratio. There were so many imperial kinsmen who hadn’t measured up; what connection could the inner sect have with their family’s great treasure? It would have seemed completely clueless to say these words, like exhorting a warty toad not to go marrying Chang’e.

“…Just tone down your frivolous nature when you’re at the Latent Cultivation Temple. Be safe, and return safe a year from now. Don’t make your mom and your grandmother worry.”

“Dad,” said Xi Ping, “if you can’t bear to let me go, just say so. Why keep using them as cover? Your face gets thinner and thinner the older you get.”

The Marquis: “…”

Little whelp!

The old father was too embarrassed to admit it and was forced to roll up his sleeves and fend off his unfilial son.

Early the next morning, Xi Ping was dressed by servants for the last time. When they were finished with him, he said goodbye to his grandmother and his parents and went to Heaven’s Design Pavilion.

Four streets around Heaven’s Design Pavilion were sealed off. Emperor Taiming came in person. In fur coat and ceremonial headgear, leading the three lords and nine ministers, he arrived at the start of the Hour of the Dragon at the altar of Heaven’s Design Pavilion

The provisional disciples lined up and knelt to listen respectfully to the imperial address.

This year’s imperial address was unusually short. His Majesty only said a few brief words along the lines of “cultivate your bodies and minds, protect the nation.” He didn’t seem at all as talkative as hearsay made him out to be.

It was said that the immortal envoy overseeing the Grand Selection came very late each time, and the higher their cultivation was, the more airs they put on; it was awkward to just stand there waiting, so it was up to His Majesty to play for time. Each time, His Majesty was obliged to have a very long speech prepared, wanting nothing more than to become a stutterer so he could draw it out longer and longer still.

This year, an ascended spirit peak master had come, and everyone had thought that they would have to wait until the sun began to set. But instead, General Zhi presented himself punctually during the first mark of the Hour of the Dragon.

Zhi Xiu did not arrive flying a sword, nor was he preceded by an immortal crane. He had changed into a light grey gown with hidden inscriptions, absolutely proper, neither sumptuous nor shabby. If not for all the Heaven’s Design Pavilion half-immortals stationed in the capital rising to welcome him, looking from a distance, you almost might have taken him for a mortal.

General Zhi had been cultivating for centuries, but he still seemed to remember the duties of a courtier of Great Wan. He politely saluted His Majesty and joined him in offering sacrifices to heaven and earth, giving ample consequence to the mortal world’s sovereign.

At two marks past the Hour of the Horse, thirty one carriages stopped at the gates of Heaven’s Design Pavilion. Part-time workers had already stowed the disciples’ luggage. The carriages were drawn by a set of white horses, so white they reflected the light. Their eyes displayed the blue-green light peculiar to jade stamp spiritual stones… Likely they weren’t living creatures but a kind of immortal tool.

The head office of Heaven’s Design Pavilion and the seven Azure Dragon Towers in the city rang their bells three times. Emperor Taiming saw the immortal envoy to the western gate. General Zhi stepped on Zhaoting and went back to the immortal sect to report.

Then all the disciples bid farewell to the imperial patriarch.

Xi Ping, mixed in among the crowd, joined in the salute. He snuck a glance at the emperor.

As a child, he had seen Emperor Taiming, Zhou Kun, at the palace. His memory of the “imperial countenance” was already blurred. Xi Ping only vaguely recalled that His Majesty had seemed as tall as Southern Sage Mountain, with very thick, large hands; he spoke very kindly to children and often had treats.

Only now did he find that His Majesty wasn’t as tall as a mountain; he wasn’t even as tall as Xi Ping himself.

Emperor Taiming had the sun at his back, obscuring his expression. He was weighed down by his ceremonial robes, so solemn he looked almost melancholy. On the coiled dragon column behind him were two dragons with furious expressions. Out of nowhere, it put Xi Ping in mind of the furious dragon in Tai Sui’s shadow.

The ceremony over, the disciples, under the protection of Heaven’s Design Pavilion, proceeded to the Latent Cultivation Temple.