Qian Shanyi was forced off the roof almost immediately. It was nothing anyone else did - but watching the two lovebirds doting on each other, whispering little words of nothing, so sappy she could almost see the love dripping off their lips… It made her feel sick. They had no need for her, either - her time was far better spent on something more productive, such as cataloguing the shape of every rice grain in the house. Or at least drinking tea.

"Shanyi, wait a moment," Linghui Mei's voice sounded behind her, just as she got off the short ladder between the third floor and the roof. Her disciple didn't bother with the steps, and simply hopped down through the trapdoor, landing just a few feet away from Qian Shanyi.

"Shouldn't you be keeping an eye on our guest?" Qian Shanyi said, raising an eyebrow.

Linghhui Mei stopped, glancing back up to the trapdoor, which had slammed shut behind her. "He's…" she paused, before shrugging slightly. "I trust him."

"You trust a ghost?"

Linghui Mei's eyes narrowed. "He's human enough," she said, crossing her arms on her chest.

Qian Shanyi's eyebrow rose higher. When she left to fetch Song Hexiang, Linghui Mei was just about ready to jump out of her own skin at the prospect of being left alone with an accursed ghost. She was only gone for a couple hours. The change was nothing short of astounding.

Then again - all her disciple knew about the ghosts were mere superstitions, and now she came across the real thing. They surely spoke, while Qian Shaniy was away. Was it enough for Linghui Mei to feel compassion?

"He is a ghost," Qian Shanyi said, deciding to see how far she could push her disciple. "Have you never seen a senile man? Even if he acts well now, this may change at any moment - especially when emotions run high."

With how well Zhang Zhuangtian had held together, she doubted the risk was high, and besides, she could feel his spiritual energy up above. If he started to get out of control, she would have felt it. She simply wanted to see how Linghui Mei would react to her bringing it up. Mei's arms got crossed a little tighter, joined by a crease in between her eyebrows.

Very interesting.

This felt more than just a bit of compassion for her fellow man. Zhang Zhuangtian was quite young - not that far off from Linghui Mei's eldest children. Was that the source of it?

Qian Shanyi sighed, putting one hand against her waist, and gesturing loosely with the other. She didn't want to push Linghui Mei to say it out loud, not over something this small. "But very well," she said instead, "What is it you wanted?"

Linghui Mei silently chewed on her lip, her creased forehead slowly smoothing out again. She glanced back up to the roof, before looking back at Qian Shanyi. "I think you should go to the market," she finally said. "You were looking forward to the festival, right? You could see it in person."

Qian Shanyi inclined her head slightly. "You want me to leave you alone?"

Linghui Mei sighed, shaking her head. "No," she admitted. "But… he's scared of you."

"He would be a fool not to. I outright told him I would kill him."

"It's true, but…" Linghui Mei chewed on her lip again. "I don't think that is all. You are a cultivator, and he isn't. With you in the same house, he is always on guard."

Qian Shanyi nodded. It was a familiar enough wariness, but it was good that Linghui Mei noticed it so keenly. "And you don't want him to spend the last hours with his beloved like that."

Another glance up to the roof. With the trap door closed, they spoke quietly enough the two lovebirds could hardly hear them - even with the keener senses of Zhang Zhuangtian's stolen body. "They don't deserve it."

"How nice to see you finally care. What made you change your mind?"

"We talked, while you were away," Linghui Mei said. "He's…" she stopped, looking away. "I don't know. I trust him."

"I see," Qian Shanyi said. She could tell that Linghui Mei didn't want to speak more of it, but that could change. Instead of questioning her further, she simply smiled. "I'll trust your judgement, but please keep an eye on him."

"I will."

"Have fun here," Qian Shanyi said, turning away to head down the stairs. "I'll bring you something nice, mm?"

Returning to the festival after the relative quiet of the tower was like leaping back into an inviting, hot bath. With the midnight fast approaching, the market had lit the crimson lanterns hanging off the pole-ropes, and together with the warmth of furnaces among the food stalls, it looked - and felt - exactly like a fireplace lit right in the middle of the entire town.

Qian Shanyi walked around the place, enjoying the music and the sights. She watched a small performance by a passing troupe, tried to sample a little bit of food from every stall in the market, and watched children play simple carnival games. The games were different from the ones back in Golden Rabbit Bay, and she spent a bit of time puzzling out the ways the hosts were rigging them in their own favor. It was a good little mental challenge, though out of respect for her fellow swindlers, she kept her findings to herself.

But relaxing was not the only thing Qian Shanyi did with her time. She also visited the magistrate, which was, predictably, closed. Even if it wasn't for the festival, midnight was fast approaching - she would have to come back in the morning. Really, this played into her hands. It was as good of an excuse as any for why she failed to report Tian Jisheng's death right away.

In the end, she gave her charges three hours before going back to check on them, bringing some light snacks along with her.

If nothing else, food might distract the two lovers from doting on each other - though it could also make them even more nauseatingly romantic. Fortunately, Qian Shanyi could always flee again.

When she came back to the tower, she felt the absence right away. It made her eyebrows raise, though she couldn't have said it was entirely unexpected.

She didn't want her appearance to be a surprise. That section of the roof was flat enough to sit on, but if someone were to slip in shock, they would fall down three stories and no doubt break their spine. She made sure to make some noise when she headed upstairs, clacking her sandals against the floor a bit harder than necessary. With their enhanced hearing, it was just like ringing a bell to announce her presence, and sure enough, Linghui Mei and Zhang Zhuangtian had met her eyes right as she opened the trapdoor and emerged onto the roof.

"Song Hexiang had left already?" she asked curiously, balancing a small tower of food on her hand as she carefully stepped over to them, probing the roof tiles with her foot before putting her weight down.

Zhang Zhuangtian's eyes were wet and puffy, but his voice held steady. "I made her cry."

"You did not," Linghui Mei said.

"She said she could no longer bear it."

"Mm. It's understandable," Qian Shanyi said, sitting down and placing her tower of food at her side. "Hardly anyone has to make peace with their partner's death twice, so I doubt it had anything to do with you. Do you think she got some closure?"

If Qian Shanyi imagined herself in this position, made to comfort her father or mother who had turned into a ghost… She couldn't say what she would have felt, but she would have sucked it up, put on a brave face and stayed with them until the end. But Song Hexiang was not her. That she came at all was to her credit.

Zhang Zhuangtian did not reply, simply shaking his head. Linghui Mei glanced over at him, pursed her lips, and met Qian Shanyi's eyes. "Maybe," she said, shrugging with a single shoulder.

"Then that's as good of a result as we could have expected," Qian Shanyi concluded, and gestured to the food. "Here, I brought you both something to eat."

She had brought back two dozen dumplings, as well as small lotus cakes, rice buns filled with fruit and even some delicious smelling meatballs. Before she left, she had forgotten to take a look in Tian Jisheng's kitchen to see if he had something she could have used to bring the food back with her - so it was fortunate for her that her plight was far from unique, and the cooks were understanding. The town welcomed many people from the outlying villages for the festival, and many of them wanted to bring some of the food back home with them.

The dumplings were still packed up in their steaming basket - she loaned it from the dumpling stall - while the rest was wrapped up in lotus leaves, to make it easier to carry and keep the meat juice from dripping too much. It was a workable solution, but it felt awkward. The small pyramid of lotus leaf wraps threatened to fall apart at the smallest movement - if she wasn't a cultivator, there was no chance she could have avoided catastrophe.

Back in Golden Rabbit Bay, she owned a special box for this exact purpose, one of beautiful porcelain and lacquered wood. It was split into three separate compartments, one of which even had a hollow porcelain bottom - one that could be filled with steaming water to keep the food warm. She had to set aside a part of her sect allowance for three consecutive months to buy it, and felt proud of her frugality at the time. That was before she realised her sect was frankly undercutting her, before she felt confident enough in her mahjong to gamble and try to make up the difference.

It was a really great box. It was her friend on many sleepless nights, when she was buried up to her neck in sect correspondence. The sect kitchens were great, but they cooked for hundreds of people, and after a while, it got a little repetitive. So she'd send an outer disciple to get her something from the city, and enjoy a little break.

She missed that box.

"Thank you, honorable immortal, but I would rather not," Zhang Zhuangtian said, pulling her back from her ruminations. He didn't even touch the food, simply staring up into the star-filled skies. Perhaps Song Hexiang had stolen his appetite along with his heart.

Qian Shanyi shrugged and tossed one of the lotus leaf wraps to Linghui Mei - the one with the same sort of fruity steam buns she seemed to enjoy so much. She bought them specifically for her - having spent much of the night here, she must have been starving. Linghui Mei caught it easily, and quickly unwrapped it, biting into the pastry.

Qian Shanyi had set her eyes on the dumplings and the meatballs. She brought a pair of chopsticks along, and dug into the meal. It had cooled some on its way, but the taste was still incredible. For a while, the night was quiet but for their chewing.

Once she finished, she set the steaming basket aside, and laid back on the roof, putting her hands behind her head. "Tell me when you are ready to go," she said quietly. She didn't want to rush Zhang Zhuangtian too much - the night was still young - but there was no avoiding that last question hanging above their heads.

Qian Shanyi had expected him to flinch at the reminder, but instead, he simply sighed, his shoulders sagging slightly. Perhaps he already made his peace with it, or perhaps this trouble with Song Hexiang had overshadowed everything else in his mind.

"I have one more request, honorable immortal Xing," Zhang Zhuangtian said, turning to face her.

"Go on."

"Song Hexiang," he said, biting his lips. "It was her one wish, to leave this place. I couldn't make it come true. But your sect…" He paused again, too hesitant to voice his thoughts. "Can you take her on as an outer disciple?"

"Hm," Qian Shanyi said, frowning. Of all the things to ask her. Who pulled her by the tongue when she introduced herself to him?

What would she even do with an outer disciple? They had no compound to take care of, no fields of herbs to farm, not unless Qian Shanyi included Wang Yonghao's inner world - and she simply didn't trust Song Hexiang with a secret of that magnitude.

"Does she know how to read and write?" Qian Shanyi asked after a momentary silence.

"She does," Zhang Zhuangtian said, and fidgeted some under Qian Shanyi's strict gaze. "I taught her."

Qian Shanyi snorted. "So in other words, not well." She shook her head slightly. "I'll think about it. That's as much as I can promise."

She would have been surprised if a man like Song Bo had put much effort into his daughter's education. Perhaps if she had a brother, then it would have been a different story. Even in a large city like Golden Rabbit Bay, plenty of families were still old-fashioned. Literacy was a strict requirement for joining her old sect - but that applied to the disciples, and not to their children or spouses. On occasion, she was asked to bring them up to an acceptable level, among her many other duties.

Zhang Zhuangtian nodded, and slowly stood up. Perhaps he simply didn't want to push her more. "So…" he said, before suddenly losing his courage. "How… What do you need me to do?"

Qian Shanyi stood up as well, dusting her robes off. "Let's head downstairs," she said, quickly picking up what was left of their meal. Plenty of pastries were still left unopened, but they would keep, and she would simply bring them along with her when they headed back home.

Zhang Zhuangtian headed downstairs first, with Qian Shanyi and Linghui Mei following after. His movements were stiff, unnatural, his breathing growing more and more ragged by the second.

It really was no wonder. He was heading to his own execution.

She could have killed him up on the roof, let starlight be the last thing he ever saw. But if someone saw him fall… It was dark out, and the roof had no lights, and was turned away from the town besides - but she didn't want to take any unnecessary risks. If an investigation came knocking, she could explain everything else, even Song Hexiang's brief presence - particularities of his death would be far trickier.

"You really mustn't be so tense," Qian Shanyi said, walking side by side with the man. "We can give you more time, if you need it. You could visit your parents."

Zhang Zhuangtian flinched slightly, but at least his breathing seemed to have grown more even. Knowing that he still held some control over the situation must have been calming - at least it would have been for her. Or perhaps it was something else, a different thought that crossed his mind. Qian Shanyi hardly knew the man, and his poor control of his body made reading him even harder.

"No," Zhang ZHuangtian said, "I've done all that I had to do. I am ready."

"Very well," Qian Shanyi said as they walked back to the second floor. She gestured to the cushions that were laid out alongside one of the walls. "Lie down, and close your eyes. It won't hurt."

While Zhang Zhuangtian headed for the cushions, she gave the room another critical look. The puddle of wine had been gone entirely - Linghui Mei must have cleaned it up while she was gone, though the faint stain still remained. It would fit with their story nicely.

Linghui Mei stepped over to Zhang Zhuangtian, looking over to Qian Shanyi for guidance. It felt surreal, as if she was an empress overseeing the execution of her enemies - only strangely casual as well. Perhaps she should have said something, some final speech, a remark to conclude Zhang Zhuangtian's life - but instead, Qian Shanyi simply waved her hand. Best to get it over with.

Linghui Mei stepped closer, and, for the second time tonight, had ripped a soul out of Tian Jisheng's body, leaving a lifeless husk behind. Only this time, her lips had moved silently as she did it. Qian Shanyi could not tell what was said - but she didn't need to.

She'd already learned to recognise her disciple's prayers.

"Your footsteps sound sullen," Qian Shanyi said, as they headed downstairs. The dumplings tasted incredible, but also made her quite thirsty, and she wanted to drink some tea before making any new plans - and Linghui Mei needed some time to digest her new soul, lest the man remain a ghost. Now that they've dealt with Tian Jisheng and Zhang Zhuangtian, the rest of the evening was entirely theirs. She wanted to spend it well.

"I've just killed a man, and that's what you ask?" Linghui Mei said from behind her. She sounded far more confused than offended, though that slight shuffle in her footsteps had vanished.

Qian Shanyi turned around, walking backwards down the stairs. "Killed?" she said, raising an eyebrow. "You've fulfilled a man's wishes."

"What a way to twist what happened."

Qian Shanyi rolled her eyes. "I've twisted nothing. Besides, he was a ghost."

"So?"

"So killing a ghost is legal," Qian Shanyi said, shrugging casually. "An exception to the fourth imperial edict, rather obviously, among some far less fortunate things." She reached into her bag, and pulled out one of the lotus leaf wraps, quickly pulling it apart, before offering the pastry to Linghui Mei. "Moon cake?"

That turned Linghui Mei's lingering sadness into an angry glare, one she directed first at the pastry and then at Qian Shanyi's unabashed face. "Have you no respect for the dead at all?"

Qian Shanyi rolled her eyes again, biting into the cake herself. "What have the dead ever done for me?"

She was tweaking Linghui Mei's whiskers a bit, but really, her disciple walked into this one. Who was she to tell Qian Shanyi about respect? If it was up to her, Zhang Zhuangtian's body would have been left to rot out in that forest, and he would have never met his beloved. So what if Qian Shanyi didn't feel particularly distraught after the fact? She did her part.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"He deserves to be mourned, not traded for a pastry," Linghui Mei grumbled, though with no real conviction. "He deserves a vigil."

"He had it, if a few days too early. You even prayed over his former body," Qian Shanyi said, dismissing her disciple's concerns with a wave of her hand, before she turned around, and pushed open the door to the kitchens. "I doubt that is why you are sulking."

"I was…" Linghui Mei sighed, sitting down at the table. "I was just thinking."

Qian Shanyi put one hand up against the kettle - it had cooled, while she was away - and she put it into the fireplace again, quickly starting a new fire. "About?"

"You really won't take Song Hexiang?"

"I said I would think about it," Qian Shanyi said, turning back to her disciple and taking her own seat. The kettle would take a while to heat up.

"I think you said that because you didn't want to outright say no."

Qian Shanyi nodded, leaning against the table to rest her chin on the back of her hand. "I am leaning against it. I am not in the business of picking up strays."

Linghui Mei's lips pursed. It didn't seem like that was what she wanted to hear. "You've picked me up."

"You are a jiuweihu," Qian Shanyi said, pointing to Linghui Mei. "You could bring peace across your entire species. Song Hexiang is a poorly educated farmgirl. Me helping her would achieve little and pay only in her gratitude - and I cannot turn gratitude into spirit stones. But perhaps I will think of some use for her come morning. Was that all?"

Linghui Mei shook her head slowly. "When Tang Jisheng held a sword against my throat," she said, picking her words as if she was walking around a field trapped with crystal bombs. "You threatened him with the fourth edict. Was it a bluff?"

Qian Shanyi inclined her head a fraction. "Why would it be?"

"Because you told me you need three accusers. Me and you - it only makes two. One, if a jiuweihu would be rejected."

"Hm. It's true that the ritual would be a bust, at least unless I could convince two others," Qian Shanyi said, tapping her cheek with one finger. "But the law is the law, and the ritual is the ritual."

"I thought the law was there for the ritual."

Qian Shanyi nodded. "In part," she said. "You would have the right of an accuser, if nothing else. But in truth the two have little in common, and I think the ritual itself is rarely performed. If the empire deems it necessary, then it almost surely has enough evidence to slaughter you directly."

The kettle began to whistle behind her, and she got up to finally brew some tea. Linghui Mei accepted a cup as well, and they sat together, drinking quietly.

An errant thought passed through Qian Shanyi's mind. This might be the last time anyone drank tea in this tower, at least for a good long while. Tang Jisheng had no family in town, and even his housekeeper had left, not set to return until a full day after the festival. The empire would surely take possession of the house - at least until his parents could be tracked down. Most likely it would simply be sold off, and they would get some sum out of it. With any luck, another, better healer might find his way to this town in time - and then everyone would be better off.

Everyone, except for Tang Jisheng and Zhang Zhuangtian, at least.

"But enough about the tragedies of the past," Qian Shanyi said partly to herself, putting her cup down once their kettle was empty. She got up, heading for the doors. "We have a festival to enjoy! Come, it's almost midnight. I wish to see the fireworks."

"May I be excused, master?" Linghui Mei said with another long-suffering sigh. "The festival… it is not for me."

"You may not. I've seen some fun carnival games at the market, and I need an assistant."

"You want us to play against ordinary people?" Linghui Mei complained, yet still got up from her chair. "That's not even a little fair. You just want to rip off these villagers."

Qian Shanyi blinked, turning around with her hand already on the door. "So?" she said, baffled that this even needed to be said. "That, too, is a part of your training. Now come along, your master wants to win some trinket."

She'd give those carnival hustlers some face by not revealing their tricks - but outplaying them at their own game was only common sense.

The festival was set to continue for well after midnight, perhaps even until morning. In Golden Rabbit Bay, it sometimes continued for another day afterwards, but even here, out in the countryside, Qian Shanyi was surprised that the crowds had not been dwindling. She would have figured the farmers would have gone to bed early, but perhaps not.

It played into her hands, really. More people meant more cover, more pressure on the mark. The carnies have already been playing for hours - their attention would have begun to wane too. It was a perfect time to strike.

Midnight brought more chill with it, and in response, the market had brought out tall stoves, scattered here and there for people to warm their hands. The small, central square had gotten cleared out, and was now filled with dancers - who sang some famous song about the spirits. Linghui Mei threw a rueful glare at them, and Qian Shanyi slightly elbowed her in the side with a wink.

She was about to make a joke, when Linghui Mei's head suddenly snapped to the side, her entire attention narrowing down to a point like a bloodhound that had caught the trail of a wounded animal - before she forced herself to relax. At that, Qian Shanyi couldn't help but stop, her wink turning into a far more questioning look directed to her apprentice.

"Shanyi, I've…" Linghui Mei coughed slightly, motioning down the street. "Caught sight of our cousin."

Qian Shanyi's lips split in a grin. This evening was only getting better by the minute. "Have you now? Lead the way."

The market was small, so it was only a short walk. Qian Shanyi had her spiritual energy senses stretched to the limit, and so she sensed Wang Yonghao long before she saw him. She remembered the layout of the market well, and so just before they would have rounded a corner and came within view of the man, she caught Linghui Mei by the arm and pulled her closer.

"Oh, and Mei?" she whispered directly into Linghui Mei's ear. The market around them was loud, so she doubted they could be heard more than a couple meters away, even if she spoke normally, but it was the principle of the thing. "Let's keep quiet about the ghost for now, mm? I wouldn't want to ruin Yonghao's mood, not during the festival."

Qian Shanyi waited for a moment, and Linghui Mei gave her a little nod in return. She wanted to break the news gently - if Wang Yonghao heard that an ordinary person had died, he might get some silly ideas about it being his fault again.

The man himself was busy burying his face in a bowl of rice noodles, sitting right in front of one of the many food stalls. She would have called him unobservant, but really, he had no reason to expect any danger - not any more than on any other day. A man couldn't remain on guard for every minute of the day and night. With his ordinary clothes, he was easy to mistake for a simple traveler, at least until you saw his clean, unblemished face.

Still, she'd be a fool to let go of such an opportunity, after she had to abandon her previous mark. She closed her spiritual energy pores, sneaking up on him through the crowds of people passing through the market. "Fellow cultivator, you look ever so lonely," she whispered directly into his ear, throwing one arm around his shoulders. "Are you waiting for someone?"

Just as she expected, Wang Yonghao had almost spilled his noodles in surprise. He also tried to elbow her in the face, and she had to hurriedly reconstitute her spiritual energy shield to cushion the damage. "Shanyi?!" he gasped out, once he turned to face her, "Do you have to keep scaring me like that?"

"It's a moral obligation," Qian Shanyi said, lifting her phoenix mask off her face and rubbing her nose. Even if she pulled back quickly, Wang Yonghao's surprised strike was brutal. Her mask had even cracked slightly. Some of the people around them gave them some looks, but most of them were drunk, and surely heard hardly anything over the noise and the music.

"An amoral one, you mean."

"Once again with these unfair accusations," Qian Shanyi said, putting one of her hands up against her forehead as if she was ready to faint. She turned back to Linghui Mei, who was staring at her intensely, arms crossed on her chest. "Mei, please support me. Tell this rube that I am innocent."

Linghui Mei looked her up from her feet up to her forehead, before turning to Wang Yonghao, and giving him a curt bow. "I am glad to see you safe," she said, "I am not sure I could have survived another month alone with her."

"Even my own disciple betrays me," Qian Shanyi said, gasping in shock - before she instantly smoothed out her expression. "Oh well. I suppose I'll just have to get a new one." She leaned against one of the poles supporting the noodle stall, ignoring the look the chef gave her. She wasn't going to make his stall collapse, he shouldn't have worried. "You look good," she said to Wang Yonghao. "Cheerful, even."

He really did look far better than when she left him, let alone how he looked when she first met him. That haunted, hollow appearance his eyes took on sometimes was still there - but much reduced, and even the despairing curve of his lips, one so easy to mistake for arrogance, seemed to have vanished.

"I felt good as well," Wang Yonghao grumbled, picking his bowl of noodles up again, "at least until you scared me half to death. You are playing a dangerous game - next time I might punch you in the face on instinct."

Qian Shanyi snorted. As if. "You are back a little earlier than I expected," she noted. "When did you get my letter?"

Wang Yonghao brightened up immediately. "I picked it up just over a week ago," he said, gesturing with his chopsticks. "There is so much that happened since we split up, I -"

"Shush," Qian Shanyi said, putting one finger up against her lips. She was excited to hear his stories, but then she would be forced to reciprocate. "We have much to tell as well, but can it wait? Today is the festival. It's no time for business talk."

"Yeah," Wang Yonghao said, still smiling, truly excited to see them. "Yeah, it can wait."

Far above the square, the first firework had exploded, lighting up the night - before shortly being followed by a dozen others, a mirrored starfall that rose instead of falling. They kept rising, and even if it was a pale shadow of what she was used to, it still brought a smile on Qian Shanyi's lips.

"Excellent," Qian Shanyi said, gesturing to the sky. "In that case, finish up your noodles quickly. I know a perfect place to watch the fireworks."

Wang Yonghao nodded, and somewhere deep in her soul, Qian Shanyi had let go of a small worry she still had that he might not return. They were back together now - and so even the Heavens should tremble in fear.

The festival had ended, and Qian Shanyi had gone to bed - yet sleep eluded her. An idea had stuck in her mind, like a burning hot nail, and she simply couldn't make it go away.

They'd partied all the way until four in the morning, with the festival slowly winding down around them - before they decided to retire for the night. Even a short rest was better than nothing. They decided to stay at the Song farm - it would have been suspicious if they left in the middle of the night, after all - while Wang Yonghao had gone off into the forest, to sleep the night away in his inner world.

Linghui Mei had fallen asleep as soon as her head had hit the pillows, but Qian Shanyi was not so lucky. She tried to meditate herself to sleep, or at least stay in bed until her body had no choice but to succumb to her demands - yet even that had helped her little. For the past ten minutes, she had been simply laying awake with her eyes closed.

She sighed and got out of bed, wrapping herself up in her blanket to keep the cold away. She had to work this out or she'd never get any rest.

There was a technique she used sometimes, to help herself think - explaining an idea to someone else, to clarify it in her own mind. Unfortunately, it was the middle of the night, and she did not want to wake Linghui Mei. That meant she had to resort to a lesser listener.

She did win her trinket, in the end, with Linghui Mei's help. Wang Yonghao did not dare to gamble, but he was quite fine watching her do so on her own - and she picked a perfect target. Some small, enterprising merchant made woolen puppets for the festival, and put them up as the prizes for a game of cups and balls - with one of them in the shape of a cute little ghost. He must have made it in just the last few days.

Qian Shanyi found it hilarious, while Linghui Mei thought it was in extremely poor taste, but her opinion hardly mattered. With Qian Shanyi's eyes set on it - and Linghui Mei's helpful, yet covert signals - they won it easily. She grabbed the little toy, and headed over to the balcony, closing the door behind her. She set it down on the railing, and sat down opposite it in a comfortable lounge chair, staring into the puppet's glassy eyes. It was made of black and white wool, different threads spun together in the shape of a person - but where a human would have legs, the puppet had a skirt of strings, like an octopus with a hundred legs.

So, she thought at the puppet. Tell me how this could make sense.

There was no point in speaking aloud - it was, after all, merely a puppet.

Everything about their little adventure made sense to Qian Shanyi. Everything, except for that one cultivator, the one who bought out the sunscythes.

It was entirely natural for Wang Yonghao's luck to raise the temper of the temperamental, to pull a man towards one forest hill and not the other. She could see how it could have taken what was already there, twisted a little tragedy into something far greater. Yet luck was nothing without a foundation. If a man headed into a forest, it could pull him this way and that; but it could hardly force him to leave his house if he was set on staying put. It was limited to pushing on the levers that were already made available.

So what in the Netherworld's name did that cultivator plan to do with the sunscythes?

The puppet stayed silent.

The damnable flowers should have no use, Qian Shanyi thought, gesturing angrily towards the forest in the distance. I sent Linghui Mei to ask the herbalists just to be sure, and they knew nothing. They are utterly, completely, absolutely useless. All their alchemical uses have long been overshadowed by other ingredients. Zhang Zhuangtian only had to resort to them due to his extreme circumstances. So why would someone else need to buy out every last stalk in town?

Qian Shanyi planned to question the herbalists herself, but frankly, she doubted she would find many leads on the mysterious cultivator. Weeks had already passed, and any traces would have long since faded away. It was the entire reason why she chose to hide away in the Five Sealed Hills region, after all - one hardly needed to put any effort into getting lost here.

If he bought the sunscythes, then clearly he had a reason for it, Qian Shanyi imagined the puppet saying. In her own head, she tried to make it sound like a handsome shipwoman she slept with once, and mostly managed it. Maybe there is some alchemical property you just don't know about.

No, Qian Shanyi argued back against herself, That makes no sense.

The sunscythes were cheap and hardly collected because nobody had any use for them. If there was some secret property, then surely the alchemist sects would have already found out about it - and started buying them in bulk, until the prices rose.

Perhaps they don't buy them because they want it to stay secret, the puppet argued. They collect the sunscythes themselves, covertly, or grow them in greenhouses.

If that were true, why buy them out? What, did all their greenhouses burn down at once? Qian Shanyi sneered, tapping a finger against her lips. Besides, sourcing ingredients isn't a job for a cultivator. A sect would have sent an outer disciple. And if he was a loose cultivator - then how would he learn of some mysterious property entirely unknown to the cultivation world at large?

It simply didn't make sense.

He could have gotten lucky. Found a manual from a long-forgotten age.

"Lucky," Qian Shanyi muttered. "Lucky, lucky, lucky."

A loose cultivator simply being absurdly lucky could certainly explain it. Yet even this explanation faced boundless problems.

Wang Yonghao had gotten her letter just over a week ago. The timeline lined up well with that second, fateful time Zhang Zhuangtian had met with Tang Jisheng, with that argument that sent him out into the forest. It made a lot of sense: once Wang Yonghao knew exactly where he was going, his luck's influence could narrow down to that location. It could take an ordinary tragedy, and twist it into something worth his notice. It made sense.

But without that cultivator buying out the sunscythes, this sort of influence would have been dead in the water. And the cultivator passed through town weeks before Wang Yonghao knew where he would be going. Back then, his luck should have been diffuse. It seemed implausible that it could create such a specific coincidence out of thin air.

The only ones who knew where they were - the only ones who could focus Wang Yonghao's luck - were the Heavens. But even if the Heavens had the means and the opportunity, they should have had no idea that Wang Yonghao would be heading to this town. The Heavens could not read, and even if they could, their letters were written in code. Nor did they ever discuss their plans outside of the world fragment. So how could the Heavens know that Wang Yonghao was going to head here, instead of the three of them planning a rendezvous in some other place?

They could have simply guessed, the puppet offered. If they guessed wrong, no skin off their back.

Qian Shanyi grimaced. It felt weak. She could hammer the pieces into place, but they did not want to form a picture.

She raised her hand, and circulated the Crushing Glance of the Netherworld Eyes, drawing a crude diagram in the air. Wang Yonghao's knowledge. The Heavens. Both influenced Wang Yonghao's luck, which, in turn, influenced the events. Two culprits, neither of which fit the evidence all that well.

What was she missing?

The more she looked at this diagram, the more she hated it. It looked ugly. Pathetic scribbles of someone grasping at knowledge far beyond their station, based on more guess than fact - and terrible guesses at that. It looked…

It looked asymmetric.

Moving on instinct, Qian Shanyi let her spiritual energy flow once more, into another rectangle - one mirroring the Heavens. Some other factor, some other power.

Suppose that the Heavens could influence Wang Yonghao's luck. As an inevitable corollary, it meant that Wang Yonghao's luck could be influenced. So what reason did she have to believe exclusively the Heavens possessed the power to do so?

Objectively speaking, none whatsoever. It was merely an assumption, a guess.

Qian Shanyi's mind swam. For all that she knew, there could be dozens of entities that could - and perhaps did - influence Wang Yonghao's luck. It might even explain some of the contradictions in how it tended to manifest. But for now, she might as well condense them down to a singular unknown.

Suppose that some entity - some group, some power, something - out there knew of Wang Yonghao's luck, could somehow divine its effects, predict Wang Yonghao's movements. Suppose that this mysterious sunscythe cultivator belonged to this power. Suppose that he bought out the sunscythes not because of coincidence, but because he sought to force Wang Yonghao's luck to create that ghost, for reasons she could only guess at -

Qian Shanyi cut that line of thinking short. This was all wild conjecture, with absolutely no hard evidence to support it. None except for that cultivator, whose existence could have been explained in a dozen other ways.

She had no evidence to support any of this. Yet she also had no evidence that contradicted it. And there was one other thing…

Despite his many adventures, Wang Yonghao had remained unknown to the world at large. If there was some group of people that actively sought to conceal his existence, erase what few records his movements left behind… It would fit a little better. Just a little - but sometimes, that was all it took.

Qian Shanyi sighed. If she was going to keep fantasizing of such nonsense, then she at least needed a name for it. She looked up into the sky. It was starting to lighten, as the dawn crept ever closer.

Let's call you the Sleepless Night Sect, she thought, for only on a truly sleepless night could I ever think of this.

She got up from her seat, and picked up the puppet. Her little thinking session resolved nothing, and in fact brought about more worries, but she felt a little calmer. Perhaps trying to sleep again would work out a little better.

She returned back to their rooms. While she was out on the balcony Linghui Mei had rolled over in her sleep, taking up both sides of their bed, and Qian Shanyi had to use her foot to push her back to her half, before she could finally crawl onto her own side, still wrapped up in her own blanket. At least her disciple had stopped being grabby as of late.

It was fitful, but the sleep did come for her, in the end.

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