Ripple after ripple rose in the calm lotus pond. The lotuses were white, and the big round lotus leaves were also white. The flowers had neither pistil nor stamen, and there were no lotus seeds to be found. There was also no silt underwater. It was extremely clear. Dark red lotus roots and long stalks coiled in the crystalline water, all the more startling in comparison to the snow-white leaves, like internal organs laid bare to the light of day. 

When the man in the lotus pond opened his eyes, all the lotuses in the pond curled up into buds. 

This man who was the “shame of flowers¹” had a very shocking countenance—not only did he have no hair, he didn’t even have eyebrows. His willow leaf eyes, placed slightly low, seemed to sit in the middle of his face. A red-lipped mouth had been drawn in cinnabar on his forehead, so it was impossible to tell at a glance whether his head was right-side up or upside-down. 

The ripples in the lotus pond rolled out to the edge of the pond and suddenly stopped at a pair of snow-white feet. When white-haired Elder Xuanwu appeared out of nowhere, the ripples immediately dispersed. The ripples on the pond stood unnaturally still all of a sudden. 

Apropos of nothing, Xuanwu asked the person in the pond, “What did you see?” 

The “shame of flowers” in the pond said, “One wedding and one funeral. The imperial grandson is taking a wife, and the emperor’s son-in-law is bereaved of his. Festive occasions both red and white.” 

As he spoke, the “shame of flowers” turned and looked at Elder Xuanwu with his head whose top and bottom were almost indistinguishable. He asked, “Elder Xuanwu, can you guess whether my head is right-side up today?” 

Xuanwu ignored him. The features drawn on his mask normally changed every moment, but facing the person in the pond, he maintained an oddly neutral expression, making him suddenly seem not so strange. 

“Take a look at the future state of affairs in Tao County for me.” 

“I’m not looking. Some place on the border where even birds don’t shit, what’s there worth looking at?” The bald head of the shame of flowers in the pond pushed apart the lotuses, and he swam towards Elder Xuanwu at the edge of the pond like a water ghoul. “Elder—shizun, can you guess whether my head is right-side up today?” 

It was only when he moved that you noticed what was wrong: this person had no legs. 

His lower body grew into the dark red lotus roots. It was hard to say whether he was a freak who had grown out of the lotuses, or whether there were flowers growing all over a freak’s body. 

“It is of utmost importance,” Xuanwu said, pulling a long face…a long mask. “Zhuoming, don’t joke.” 

This deranged “freak” was actually the master of Sanyue’s East Peak, High Elder Xuanwu’s only direct disciple. His name was Zhuoming. He had no surname.  

The smaller mountains of Sanyue stood like trees in a forest, packed with the sons of powerful officials who spent money like water. But while these people could be said to belong to the “inner sect,” they had no say within the inner sect. 

In Sanyue’s inner sect, only the three Principal Peaks, East, Central, and West, had the authority to speak. 

Among them, the West Peak had the most people and was the busiest. It was overseen by a shed skin elder, who had originally had sixteen ascended spirits under his command… Presently only eleven remained. Four had died at the hands of the great monster Qiu Sha, and another had been seriously wounded in the battle in Tao County. His boundary had fallen, and his cultivation had been destroyed. Each of these eleven ascended spirits had a crowd of disciples, a mixture of established foundations, half-immortals, and even mortals. Only their bloodline was pure—on the West Peak, everyone was surnamed Xiang. 

The Central Peak, meanwhile, was the location of Sanyue’s sect leader. It was said that the sect leader was the person in the current age closest to a full moon position. He was always in seclusion pursuing the moon. The routine responsibilities of the Central Peak were shared by his four ascended spirit disciples. The Central Peak’s bloodline may not have been pure, but its threshold for entry was high. It accepted only established foundations with exceptional natural endowments. To enter the Central Peak, you had to pass layer upon layer of assessments. The more impressive the endowments, the more relaxed the requirements for birth became—it was said that when the legendary Hui Xiangjun had been at Sanyue, she had been part of the Central Peak. 

The East Peak was the most special: the Silver Moon was there. 

The sect leader didn’t attend to business, and the West Peak’s elder was responsible for the descendants of the Xiang clan and was unavoidably biased, so the East Peak’s Xuanwu had become the true wielder of power in the Sanyue Sect. 

Unlike the West Peak, which saw as much traffic as a marketplace, the East Peak, where the Silver Moon was kept, was a forbidden area within the inner sect. Apart from the sect leader, no one could enter or exit at will. And in thousands of years, Zhuoming was the only disciple Elder Xuanwu had taken. 

No one knew where he had picked up Zhuoming. Rumor had it that he was a bastard of the Xiang clan, but his birth mother was unknown. Before opening his spiritual eyes, he hadn’t been a “barren land,” but his limbs had been paralyzed. He had come to the spiritual mountains lying down. In the three hundred years since he had entered the East Peak, no one had seen him again. Many of the old people had practically forgotten that such a person existed, and established foundations with shorter records hadn’t even heard of him. 

“How is it of utmost importance? Is Tao County a strategically important place that some military commander needs to win?” Zhuoming shot a dark look out of the water. “The population is small, their specialty product is evil cultivators, and before, when a map in Dongheng left the place off, it took most of a century before anyone noticed. It didn’t bother you then.” 

“Inept government is neglect on the part of the court in Dongheng. Immortal sects do not attend to ordinary affairs,” Xuanwu said gravely. “At present, Tao County is under the control of the Law Breaker, whose whereabouts are unknown. It has become an ‘unbound’ place. The spiritual mountains cannot see into it. Over time, it is sure to come to harbor all manner of evil. Wasn’t the disaster of Southern Wan’s Impassable Sea a lesson?” 

“There are many places the spiritual mountains cannot see into. Aren’t there two right here on the East Peak? Oh…I know, shizun thinks we’re dirty. I keep telling you to toss some silt cleaning fish into the lotus pond.” Zhuoming began to laugh. His laughter was like the aftermath of a stroke. Once the “haha”s started, there was no end to them. He wouldn’t stop. At last it was impossible to tell whether he was crying, laughing, or crowing. 

Xuanwu, used to this, tossed a pill into the spirit on his forehead. A breath of clear air instantly spread throughout the whole lotus pond. Zhuoming’s bizarre laughter came to an abrupt halt. 

He closed his eyes, and the lotuses opened, a string of heartless white lotuses like river lanterns to mourn the dead. 

After a moment, Zhuoming said in a flat voice: “There’s a murmur behind the Law Breaker’s axiom, as if tens of thousands of people are speaking at the same time. It’s too noisy. I can’t discern what the axiom is.” 

The features on Xuanwu’s mask twisted. “That Yu Chang is still half a step from an ascended spirit. Can he really hide from your observation?” 

Zhuoming’s eyes moved beneath his eyelids. He didn’t answer. 

Xuanwu continued, “Where is Yu Chang? Can you see his destiny clearly?” 

“If shizun cannot find him, naturally he has already gone north over the Slumbering Dragon Sea. Why ask me?” Zhuoming said. “His destiny is entangled with the fog brought by the Law Breaker. It is hard to say where he will end up.” 

“Is there a means of resolving Tao County’s present predicament?” 

“There are only two ways to remove the Law Breaker. Either the axiom breaks, or the axiom is realized—when everywhere on earth is like Tao County, without spiritual mountains, without cultivators. When both immortals and demons have perished—then perhaps the axiom in the Law Breaker will be realized,” Zhuoming said coldly. “Shizun, don’t worry.” 

“What are you saying?!” said Xuanwu. 

The corners of both of Zhuoming’s mouths, above and below, turned up. “Heaven and earth can hardly last forever, so is it worth speaking of the immortal mountains? Southern Wan’s Bell of Tribulation has tolled several times, the Silver Moon has shone upon the Xia River, the Late-Autumn Red from eight centuries ago dyed the mid-autumn moon blood red, and the Law Breaker and the Riverward, those demonic tools, have both reappeared. How far are we from the fire in the Unbound Furnace rekindling? Shizun, do you know the kind of festering sore that, once it erupts, will spread over the whole body? A terminal illness with no cure. Tao County is that open sore.” 

Without a word, Xuanwu turned and was about to disappear where he stood. 

“Shizun,” Zhuoming suddenly called him back. “I’m very bored. If there’s any kind of wedding or funeral in the inner sect, could I go over representing the East Peak to get in on the fun?” 

Xuanwu stopped in his tracks. Having heard him mention weddings twice, he involuntarily took it to heart. His consciousness swept through the three Principal Peaks and saw that there really was a wedding coming up—a mortal disciple of the West Peak was about to marry the young mistress of the main bloodline of Southern Wan’s Zhao family. 

Eight hundred weddings between a mortal and a half-immortal couldn’t interest High Elder Xuanwu, but the bride’s background gave him pause… Southern Wan’s Zhao family, coming from Yu Family Bend, and this Young Mistress Zhao had previously met Yu Chang. 

Xuanwu asked, “Is there a problem with the daughter of the Zhao clan?” 

“A big problem. She’s…” Zhuoming heaved a loud, slow sigh. “She’s a jinx on her husband.” 

Xuanwu: “…” 

Zhuoming seemed to want to laugh again, but his face seemed to have been fixed in place by that pill from earlier. His features, unmoving, trembled incessantly. He couldn’t laugh. 

Xuanwu took no more notice of his ravings. He left with a wave of his sleeve, putting him out of sight and out of mind. 

Zhuoming shook all over, sounds of chortling coming from his throat. All the ripples in the pond once again began to tremble. 

He only calmed down after a long moment. Speaking to himself, he said, “Shizun, shizun, can you guess whether my head is right-side up today?” 

Xuanwu was gone. No one answered. 

“Well, you’ve guessed wrong again,” Zhuoming said. The mouth drawn on his forehead slowly opened and stuck out a tongue, spitting out the pill Xuanwu had shot into his “spirit” whole. Then his head rotated slowly on his neck, turning over. The two mouths switched places. He reached out a hand and pulled off his nose, turned it over, and put it back. 

“The bride is unlucky, the bride will be a jinx later, the bride is all made of paper. The bride is missing something, the bride has something extra… Hee-hee, the bride is here for the Unbound Furnace.” Saying so, he abruptly opened his eyes. His gaze shot swiftly through the sky like a blade of frost, as if it wanted to pierce the horizon. 

“Don’t you agree, the ungovernable way’s Misty Willow…Reincarnation Wood?” 

Xu Rucheng, impersonating Zhao Qindan, suddenly gave a start, for no reason waking from meditation, his heart beating like thunder. 

At the same time, Xi Ping, repeatedly practicing talismans in the Law Breaker, felt his spiritual sense touched, as if a pail of ice water had been thrown right into his face. Out of nowhere, a chill went through his whole body. 

Xi Ping was alone inside the Law Breaker. On the night of the second day of the ninth month, after shifu had said “There is a storm coming,” his consciousness had disappeared, and he hadn’t returned. Xi Ping didn’t know whether this was a good thing or a bad thing. He was only afraid that Zhi Xiu was at a critical moment in his seclusion and didn’t dare to rashly speak to disturb him. All he could do was worry and ask Lin Chi to keep a constant eye on what was happening at Flying Jade Peak for him. He would have loved to shove Xu Rucheng right into Sanyue for the wedding ceremony. 

Xi Ping dismissed his preoccupations and focused on meditation, but that strange sensation went as quickly as it had come. He couldn’t seize on its source. He tried to divine it for a while, awkwardly imitating the text Zhi Xiu had left for him by rote, but he couldn’t divine anything… The “craftsmanship” of the Dignitary of Fate’s lineage seemed to be done for, each generation worse than the one before. 

“Senior,” Xu Rucheng called to him through the reincarnation wood, “suddenly I don’t feel so well.” 

Xi Ping focused. “This journey may involve twists and turns. It’s a warning for you to be careful. Although, if a master really did notice there was something wrong with you, with your half-immortal’s cultivation, you wouldn’t feel anything before you died.” 

“That’s true.” Xu Rucheng was silent a moment. “Senior, these last few days, a bunch of the Zhao family’s old women have been coming over in groups every day to torment me, openly and implicitly giving instructions about all kinds of…tricks, you know, for after marriage. They must want to get me in before the New Year.” 

Xi Ping’s mind moved. 

The imperial grandson’s wedding ought to have involved a good deal of unnecessary pomp, but the Zhao family had been infiltrated by spies, leading to the assassination of Her Highness Princess Qiyang, and the assassins had disappeared right out from under the noses of Sanyue’s ascended spirit masters. 

This unforeseen event had shaken Dongheng’s court and its people, and it had led to two outcomes: 

First, Princess Qiyang was the aunt of Zhao Qindan’s fiancé. The Zhao family couldn’t avoid blame in connection with her death. That Prince Qing Manor hadn’t fallen out with them could be counted as acting for the sake of the bigger picture. But the Dragon and Phoenix Symbolizing Prosperity stamp had already been completed. The marriage was set whether anyone liked it or not. On the bride’s side especially, the Zhao family had no opportunity for regrets. So it suddenly became uncertain whether the young mistress’s status would be as principal wife or not… At present, the two sides were still bargaining. It would depend on whether the Zhao family was willing to bear the exorbitant price Prince Qing Manor was asking for the sake of this daughter—no matter what, a grand wedding was no longer possible. Though this matter was sickening, it was a good thing for Xi Ping. There was no more need to wait for an “auspicious date,” greatly cutting down on the time it would take. 

Second, on hearing the news, the Marquis of Qulong had flown his sword through the night to return to Dongheng. So racked with grief he wished he were dead, he proclaimed that his spiritual bones were complete and his Way of the Heart fixed, and he “could not live under the same sky as those who had killed his wife.” He would hunt down his enemies to the ends of the earth to carry out vengeance. 

A few days later, the Marquis of Qulong spilled his blood on a specially made token—the token had been privately designed by Lin Chi, using a special type of spiritual beast skin, with every pore in the skin inlaid with miniature inscriptions or small arrays. When the blood poured into them, it activated a specially positioned array, and through the array conducted the blood to a reincarnation wood tree far in Tao County. If a cultivator didn’t spill blood on it and tried to tear the token apart by force, the array would be destroyed. Then the Marquis of Qulong’s consciousness entered the Law Breaker’s hidden realm, where he had a friendly meeting with Zhou Ying, the power behind the Luwu. 

The two of them had a night’s worth of private discussion. The next day, the Marquis of Qulong went in person to Tao County with a team of bodyguards, and, swiftly and decisively, carried out a series of punishments against the garrisoned troops. 

The Marquis invited the Qilin Guard, who didn’t dare to enter Tao County without a reason, to come observe the ceremony as he stripped or changed the ranks of a crowd of officers under his command and loftily promulgated twenty-three articles of military rules prohibiting the harassment of civilians and, as an example, beheaded a batch of army ruffians on the lookout for an opportunity to make trouble, leaving a few of his close confidants to take over Tao County. He also announced that Tao County’s disaster relief provisions for the autumn and winter would be conveyed by the garrisoned troops themselves, guaranteeing that not one grain would be missing, asking the village elders and townspeople to set their minds at ease. The trees had been cut down for the sake of repairing the roads. In the future, better trees would be planted, and there would be no more instances of soldiers trespassing into private residences. 

The deaf and blind Qilin Guardsmen observed the “happy and harmonious relations between soldiers and civilians” in bewilderment. On leaving, according to protocol, they sent full detailed reports to the spiritual mountains, feeling that no sooner had the Marquis of Qulong attained his freedom than he had been unable to hold back from a major undertaking. 

Like this, with the Qilin Guard bearing witness, in a place unobserved by the spiritual mountains, Tao County “openly and honestly” changed its name to Zhou. 

Give him a crack, and Zhou Ying would use it to pry the spiritual mountains open, never mind Tao County, where all cultivators “couldn’t see their hands in front of their faces.” Xi Ping felt that san-ge was like a mouse fallen into a jar of rice, preening and showing off, scolding him for no reason… Of course, he didn’t dare to say that in front of san-ge. 

But for this winter, Tao County was all taken care of. This tribulation had passed. 

This patch of earth that had been repeatedly trampled by evildoers and treated as an abandoned child by the immortal mountains finally got a season to recuperate. The hundred thousand white spirits that had silently dispersed through the veins of the earth nurtured the fish in the water and the grass on the banks. The results were instantly visible. The migratory birds flying down from Northern Li set up housekeeping there. After Zhao Qindan was “arrested” and released by the garrisoned troops, as was only to be expected, she was accepted by the people around her. Utterly confused, she became “one of ours” in Tao County. Someone inadvertently saw her teaching Wei Chengxiang Chu writing, and, with two strings of cured meat as tuition fees, requested that she teach their children to read and write. After this, word got around quickly, and Zhao Qindan soon had more work than she could handle. She had no more time to feel at a loss about what to do. 

At this point, the good and evil initiated by Qiu Sha had temporarily come to a close. Wei Chengxiang had cleared the accounts of her conscience and was prepared to return to the Land of Turmoil—the young mistress no longer needed her to look after her, and she had people in the Land of Turmoil. Moreover, however superbly made her artificial hand was, in Tao County, where spiritual energy couldn’t be used, it could still only act as an ornament. It was truly inconvenient. 

Xi Ping considered: In order to assassinate the princess, many of the Luwu who went with Xu Rucheng exposed their identities, and with the Xiang family giving them the cold shoulder like this, it’s unlikely they’ll allow “Zhao Qindan” to bring her family into the Sanyue Mountains. While there are all kinds of people mixed up in Sanyue, some, after all, have real skill. The masters won’t be interested in giving a little half-immortal like Xu Rucheng a second look, so perhaps it won’t be difficult for him to infiltrate, but looking for clues about the Unbound Furnace will be as difficult as ascending to the heavens… Can my true body really not leave Tao County? 

Xi Ping always acted on a thought as soon as he had it. He remembered the good and not the bad. With a thought, his consciousness had gone to Xuanyin’s Moon Plated Peak.