Qian Shanyi decided to leave half the work of taking a cultivator census of the sandpiercer to Svarggam Xiaochun. With how much time she had already spent, she was worried about running short - and it would strengthen her argument that Svarggam Xiaochun would make for a good maid. And so Qian Shanyi left her half of the passenger manifest, wrote down a list of basic questions, and headed toward the back of the sandpiercer.

The approach to the former dining car had changed much while she was gone. Where before only a few errant strands of green grew in between the wooden planks, now the floor had gotten completely covered in dark green moss, vines and flowers. Lei Kou's soul was hard at work, it seemed.

Qian Shanyi could only hope that it was self-aware enough to keep the sandpiercer functioning; if it turned one of the wheel axles into turf, the car might well derail entirely.

She wasn't sure how she was supposed to get into the back of the train. Lei Kou implied that she should not disturb him until the two hours have passed, but he didn't say so explicitly - and he did create that dirt path for her. Did he expect her to crawl on the outside of the wagons? Hopefully not. Qian Shanyi wasn't sure that she could keep herself from slipping right off the smooth roof.

With no better ideas, she simply approached the door and raised her hand to knock, betting that Lei Kou's soul would sense her movement. It was in the best position to interpret the man's own thoughts.

Her bet paid off, for she had not been turned to mush on the spot. Instead, whether by an act of his soul or a decision by Lei Kou himself, the door opened smoothly before her knuckles could even touch the wood, and Qian Shanyi stepped inside the former dining cart.

The furious activity that greeted her last time was gone, and in the light of the quickly setting suns, the garden presented a truly breathtaking sight. It was as if Qian Shanyi had stepped directly into a twilight forest and yet everything still possessed a certain practical symmetry to it, from the way the plants were arranged down to the shape of the individual branches, vines dropping down from the ceiling like columns that mingled with the tall bushes below. Qian Shanyi could not even put the full scope of it into words - whenever she focused on any single aspect of the garden, on any single leaf, it seemed no more than a normal leaf - yet taken in its entirety, that leaf fit perfectly, a thread within the tapestry that could be moved neither right nor left without pulling apart the entire thing.

She walked as quietly as she could manage, admiring the sight despite herself. Lei Kou had to die, that much was clear, but she could still admit he had the skills of a true golden core powerhouse.

To speak of the demonic cultivator.

Lei Kou stood motionless, facing the window, with his back turned to the path he stamped into the dirt. His hands were folded behind his back, the fingers of one drumming against the other. Qian Shanyi didn't even dare to look at him directly - his attention could only bring misfortune - and so she hurried past, setting her feet down with measured precision, not letting even a single soft clack announce her presence.

None of it had mattered. As soon as she had moved to step down from the central wooden platform, Lei Kou's spiritual energy simply picked her up like a helpless kitten and turned her around to face the man in question.

"My Lord?" Qian Shanyi said, just as Lei Kou had turned around to face her with a light frown on his face.

She barely kept her voice from cracking. She already had an excuse prepared for everything she did, a false scaffolding built up around the true foundation to her actions - but if Lei Kou snapped her neck before she could even open her mouth, then none of it would matter. The mind of an ancient cultivator was inscrutable. Perhaps she had offended him somehow, in ways she could not even imagine-

"What happened to the suns?" Lei Kou asked instead, and Qian Shanyi immediately wished that she could call down the solar tribulation upon his accursed, obnoxious head. "Why do they set so early? Tell me what the scholars of the modern day say."

The suns?! This is why you picked me up like an errant ant?!

He still did not put her down, holding her up some half a foot above the ground. She frankly wasn't sure if he did it to put her in her place or because he simply wanted to talk, did not care about her opinion on the matter, and proceeded with whatever he saw as the most expedient. Qian Shanyi had to politely fold her feet together, to make it seem as if this way of conversation did not bother her any.

"I could not truly say, my lord," Qian Shanyi replied, her face a perfect mask of servile politeness. "All I know is that the change to the celestial sphere around this region started to happen some seventy years ago, and that the suns will move even faster the closer we get to our destination. If the scholars know why it happened, then I have not heard of it."

The bastard must have sensed that nobody on the sandpiercer had reacted to the early sunset. He truly just wanted to question her.

"Hmpf," Lei Kou scoffed. "Disappointing."

It got up to three sunsets per day, according to the late Zhang Xiaogang, but they were still a good distance away from the Solar Whirligig, and only had to deal with two. Mostly it just meant they burned a few more candles for light.

But if the infuriating Lei Kou wished to know more of it, she could certainly follow along with his wishes. It would even provide her with one of the excuses she dearly needed.

"If my lord desires, I could find someone who might know more, among the other cultivators," Qian Shanyi said, trying to bow in mid air, only to realise that Lei Kou's spiritual energy held her too firmly for her to manage it.

She already knew who would know more - Zhou Xiaoyan, a servant from the ministry of agriculture, who Qian Shanyi hoped would serve as the third and last witness. Back when they spoke about farming, she briefly mentioned the suns, but Qian Shanyi had little interest in the topic. There was already far too much on her mind, from absorbing the culture to memorising the cultivator almanac - and their world fragment had no suns at all, so anything she could learn about them would be entirely useless.

As far as she was concerned, as long as the suns still provided some light they could spin however they wished.

"Very well," Lei Kou said, gesturing dismissively. "Find someone."

Qian Shanyi would have loved to head out and do just that, to flee the man's presence with a task she was already certain she could fulfill. Unfortunately, he still did not put her down. Instead, he simply stared off into space, frowning and stroking his beard.

If he blames me for failing to collect a census because he himself held me up…

Qian Shanyi imagined smashing Lei Kou's face into bloody bits with an enormous hammer, which somewhat helped soothe her mood. She couldn't even tell him to hurry up, not without risking backlash.

"Why don't you show me that cultivation law of yours," Lei Kou suddenly said after wasting another six minutes and thirty four seconds of Qian Shanyi's precious life that she would never, ever get back. She wanted to scream as she counted every single one in her head. At least he finally lowered her down to the ground, his spiritual energy receding and allowing her to move.

Qian Shanyi took a moment to adjust her robes, before bowing deeply before the man. "My lord, I would require my sword for a proper demonstration," she said. "I would fetch it at once."

Mostly she just wanted an excuse to leave the room and catch her bearings.

"A waste of time." Lei Kou waved her off, and in the same gesture, a long saber appeared in his hands. Its sheath flew aside on the currents of his spiritual energy, and began to orbit around Lei Kou, a few handspans away. "Kneel."

Qian Shanyi eyed the sword with a bit of apprehension, but did as instructed. Lei Kou did not seem aggressive, at least not any more than usual, so she doubted that he was about to execute her.

Not that she could do much if he was.

Lei Kou stepped over to her, and suddenly, there was a cut on Qian Shanyi's cheek, and her blood was streaming down the sword's length. She managed to keep herself from flinching. "For services provided to house Lei, this here duke welcomes you into his house," Lei Kou said lazily. He let go of the saber, and it spun around in the air, the handle turning to face Qian Shanyi. "Serve it well until your bones crumble into dust."

House Lei?

The thought flashed through Qian Shanyi's mind before she could process the rest of Lei Kou's words. She didn't recall any such family being mentioned in the research she did so far, so it had surely fallen out of relevance a long time ago - perhaps even perished entirely. Judging by the expression on Lei Kou's face - a certain bored, melancholic regret - he didn't have much hope for his family's continual survival either.

Did he see them perish? Qian Shanyi could imagine herself going into seclusion for months, perhaps even several years if she was at an extremely crucial step in her cultivation - but to abandon everyone she knew for centuries? Lei Kou still spoke the name of his house fondly - so he couldn't have been that much of a recluse, nor an outcast.

She needed time to think of what it meant, but she had none to spare. She had to say something now, before Lei Kou took offence at her accepting such an enormous "privilege" without even a word of thanks. The trick was how to manage that while actually saying nothing of substance - if she promised to repay him, he might pile even more work on her plate. But if she said that she was undeserving, he might take offense in other ways...

"My Lord, this kindness brings light into the life of your humble servant," Qian Shanyi said, kowtowing before the abominable Lei Kou. The saber shifted slightly in front of her, giving her space. "I shall serve your house with utmost dedication."

At least whatever initiation ritual he used was merely performative - Qian Shanyi had not felt any spiritual energy invading her body or her soul. Many of her favourite novels mentioned ancient sects that would use demonic techniques to bind their disciples in far more direct ways. The last thing she needed right now was to get a bomb collar strapped around her neck.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lei Kou glance out the window. "You have the sword, get on with the demonstration," he grumbled. "The suns have set already."

Qian Shanyi could tell that he was pleased to hear her adulations, but no matter how much one enjoyed dumplings, eventually your stomach would get full. She kowtowed again, but only very briefly, and finally rose up and grasped the hilt of the saber.

Now that she wasn't busy worshipping at the accursed murderer's feet, she could properly appreciate the gift for what it was. After months of dealing with Wang Yonghao's treasury, she had gotten used to handling priceless antiques - but her eyes had also gotten sharper at spotting the fine details of craftsmanship, ones that separated a sword made for a sect elder from the swords made for the ordinary disciples. This saber looked far closer to the former, a unique artifact instead of something made to fill out the ranks.

It was long, longer than she was used to. A meter forty, if she had to guess, with a handle suited for two hands - though light enough that she could still easily swing it with one. Its blade was narrow like a fish knife, and was etched with an image of a flowery branch, running down from the tip to the sword guard. The branch continued onto the handle, the smooth and lacquered wood blackened in the shape of roots, lines branching and narrowing down, and reaching towards the pommel - where a gemstone-encrusted family crest shone brightly, of a hill topped with a single tree that oozed sap and blood of traitors.

The Lei house, one must presume.

Qian Shanyi caught the sheath as well, as it passed her on its slow orbit around the unflappable Lei Kou. It was painted with the same flowery branch as the sword, mirroring the etching - and when Qian Shanyi carefully wiped her blood off the blade with the edge of her sleeve and sheathed the saber, she saw the roots of the handle fit the painting exactly.

Grudgingly, she had to admit that the saber was beautifully made, even if she would have never been caught dead with something this flowery before.

But she wasn't here to admire the saber. She was here to satisfy the curiosity of Duke Lei Kou. And so she squared her shoulders and began to pour spiritual energy into her new sword directly through the sheath.

As soon as she did, she felt Lei Kou's spiritual energy retreat, the pressure that was omnipresent for the past three hours having almost vanished. The contrast had almost made her stumble. It was not gone, not even remotely - but where before it was a straightjacket, now it was just a hand upon her shoulders.

Her spiritual energy senses finally returned to her as well, the cilia of her soul surging outwards, until they ran into the wall of Lei Kou's soul - only a couple feet away from her. But to someone who spent hours locked up into a coffin, even a couple feet of extra space would feel like an infinity.

Qian Shanyi glanced at Lei Kou out of the corner of her eye once more, suspicion masked with deep devotion - but he merely looked curious. This was no idle show of grace. He simply didn't want her to do her demonstration blind.

Just how he didn't want her to struggle with an incompatible type of spiritual energy. His own nature was clearly that of wood, but instead of simply letting her deal with an element that would be damaging to her metal constitution, he had set out a pair of treasures a few meters away - a sword and some scroll, surely of fire and earth nature respectively - and channeled his spiritual energy through them, making a converting cycle to saturate the air around Qian Shanyi with something that would help her. For a golden core, keeping spiritual energy from mixing and controlling where it went must have been child's play.

He must have dropped them out of his cosmos ring while she was distracted. They certainly weren't there before.

The assistance was not unwelcome. She hardly wanted to fall flat on her face right in front of a golden core cultivator. It was why she bothered sheathing her new saber - the sheath would stabilize the flow of spiritual energy, and make it a little easier to handle. Back in Wang Yonghao's world fragment, she practiced with all sorts of swords, and her technique worked fine with all of them, but sometimes, it still took her a couple tries to get it right with an unfamiliar blade.

She needn't have bothered. The technique caught easily, the sword sucking her spiritual energy in as greedily as if it was the last cup of water in the middle of a desert. With her spiritual energy senses returned to her, she could tell that all the materials in the sword were metal-natured - perhaps the best choice for her metal constitution, at least until she learned how to work with a water-natured artifact. Its shape was advantageous, too - far closer to a needle than her former sword, if slightly curved.

She did not launch the saber. There was simply no space for such theatrics within the narrow confines of the car. Instead, she let it gently lift out of its sheath, and respectfully bowed to Lei Kou, making her new saber bow right alongside her.

"The technique is complete, my lord," she said, keeping her flow of spiritual energy as smooth as possible. "I hope it is to your satisfaction."

Lei Kou casually circled around her, his piercing eyes boring into her body. "Hmpf," he eloquently grunted. "Your control is atrocious. I suppose that's as much as I can expect out of someone who learned everything from a manual."

"My control, my lord?" Qian Shanyi said, feeling a little hurt despite herself.

It was entirely irrational, given what the abominable Lei Kou had already done - but she held no small amount of pride in her control over spiritual energy. She had spent years honing it, as well as her senses. It required few resources except effort and dedication - and those, she had in spades.

"You are leaking too much from your Cloud Gate, Cubit Marsh and Great Deep Pool acupoints," Lei Kou grumbled. "I don't even need to look at your law to see this." He snapped his fingers in front of her nose. "Well? Fix it."

"Ah, my lord, I do not know your system for labeling the pores -"

"These ones," Lei Kou cut her off, and Qian Shanyi felt his spiritual energy stab her directly into about five hundred different spiritual energy pores, then stab a second time into one tenth of those, telling her where to focus her attention. "Reduce your flow here and increase it everywhere else. Go on, quickly."

Qian Shanyi felt her cheeks flush at such rough handling, but she grit her teeth, closed her eyes, and did as ordered. It only took her a second. This horse-borne bastard had no grounds to call her control poor.

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"Hmpf," Lei Kou said instead of congratulating her on her blistering speed. "You clearly just mirrored what the manual told you to do, without truly adapting it to your body. And you say you are one of the best? Is this the level of cultivation that is considered acceptable these days?" He shook his head and spat out what Qian Shanyi could only assume was some kind of slur. She memorized it just in case it would come in handy. "Zarkaltegir. These acupoints, drop the flow by a third. These ones, increase by half. Here -"

And so it went, stab after stab, correction after correction, as if she was a toddler being wrangled into putting on an unsoiled dress instead of a fully-grown cultivator close to the peak of the refinement stage. It was, frankly, humiliating.

The corrections were quite minor, and some, he made her reverse almost right away. But even if Qian Shanyi's cheeks burned red, she was forced to admit that the abominable Lei Kou's advice was invaluable. The stability of her technique did increase, measurably so, and her overall spiritual energy circulation definitely improved. It was only to be expected - the senses of a golden core cultivator were almost impossibly fine, and their intuition for the flow of spiritual energy had to be unparallelled. He could casually point out errors it would take her years to even notice.

Many cultivators would kill their own mother to receive such personal tutelage. Qian Shanyi wasn't blind to her relative lack of adaptation - but without the senses of a higher realm, it was simply far too time consuming to test all the possible adjustments one could make to her own spiritual energy flow. This sort of help was, at least in theory, something that every master was supposed to do for their direct disciples - but it was also something she had never really received. Even Elder Zhao, bless his kind soul, never really had the time to get into it with her.

And on top of that, Lei Kou was a golden core. Unchained from the restrictions that shackled cultivators of lower realms, his soul produced far more spiritual energy than it consumed. Within his presence, spiritual energy was just as abundant as within Wang Yonghao's inner world - and so she could train as long as she wanted.

"I suppose this can be called tolerable," Lei Kou finally concluded, a good thirty minutes later. "At least without the full manual for me to consult. You will have to write out the recirculation diagrams for me later."

"My lord, I could display them right away," Qian Shanyi said, immediately recirculating the Crushing Glance of the Netherworld Eyes to draw the diagrams in mid air. "I could not stomach making you wait."

Her entire being rebelled against the idea, but frankly, this abrasive man was one of the best cultivation tutors she ever had. The way he treated her made her blood boil, and his orders were rude in the extreme, but they were also very direct and practical. She might as well take him for all that he was worth.

"Then why didn't you do so right away?" Lei Kou said in such a tone as if she served him piss instead of wine. "Did you enjoy wasting my time?"

"My lord, how could this humble servant know you would be interested in these diagrams?" she said, turning her innocent eyes towards the man. "I have merely studied the manual. I had no idea there was more wisdom to be derived from its pages."

That was, of course, a bold-faced lie - but he could hardly call her on it after having berated her for so long.

"Hmpf," Lei Kou said, pursing his lips. "No matter. Let me see this so-called cultivation law…"

By the time Lei Kou deemed her efforts "not entirely shameful" and let her go, the time he gave her to question the cultivators on the sandpiercer was almost up. There was no point in pushing further, and so Qian Shanyi simply went back to Svarggam Xiaochun, and spent the last few minutes going over their collected notes.

Svarggam Xiaochun's progress had been… less than impressive. Qian Shanyi supposed that not everyone could pivot on their feet quite as quickly as she could, and perhaps some allowances had to be made for the woman having watched her brother's brains splatter all across the walls just a few hours ago, but she was still so slow. Taking the sect cultivators Qian Shanyi already talked to into account, only about a third of all the cultivators on the sandpiercer had gotten questioned so far.

It would have to be enough.

Frankly, Qian Shanyi wasn't too worried about the census. Even if they didn't question everyone yet, after memorizing the cultivator almanac, she knew enough about them to bluff her way through - and if even that failed… She still doubted that she would come to harm.

The more she interacted with the irate Lei Kou, especially while he gave her advice on cultivation, the more she felt that she understood him, at least in part. He had some extremely strict standards, but he was, in his own twisted way, a fair man. He wouldn't punish her for failing to fulfill the task he tossed her way simply to give her something to do, especially when he pulled her away from it to satisfy his own curiosity.

What she was worried about was that Lei Kou would dismiss Svarggam Xiaochun out of hand. Qian Shanyi needed him to accept the other woman as a servant, or her plan would simply collapse. It would have been for the best if she could have used her help with the census to justify it - but failing that… she had some other ideas.

The trouble was… she wasn't sure how much she could rely on Svarggam Xiaochun. Qian Shanyi knew she herself could fool Lei Kou, but as for her ally…

Her ally wasn't ready. She could see it in how much she trembled as Qian Shanyi led her back towards Lei Kou's traveling throne room, one hand on her waist to gently keep pushing her forward. Xiaochun was biting her lips so much that they started to bleed, her hands restless.

But ready or not, they had to move forwards. Qian Shanyi would be the one doing most of the talking, and she hoped it would be enough. If nothing else, this state of terror should help to somewhat cover up Xiaochun's natural reactions.

Hopefully she wouldn't completely crack under the pressure. Qian Shanyi hated having to rely on someone else's composure, but there was simply no other way.

"My lord, if this humble servant may request a moment of your august attention?" Qian Shanyi announced, the moment they stepped into the former dining cart. It was redundant, really, but she wanted to start out by showing some deference - even if Lei Kou must have known they were coming.

Sure enough, by the time the wooden dais came into view, they saw Lei Kou, smoking his bone pipe. He sat on the exact opposite side of the dais from where they came in, eyeing them with a mixture of curiosity and mild dissatisfaction.

Qian Shanyi stayed calm, her steps even and measured, but Svarggam Xiaochun's spirit was truly made of lesser stuff. Her tremors only grew as they walked deeper into the cart, and as soon as she laid her eyes on Lei Kou, she drew in a sharp breath, stumbled, and almost fell. Qian Shanyi had to abort her step, so that Svarggam Xiaochun could grab onto her shoulder and steady herself. It seemed like the least bad way to save their shared face.

Sweet mercy, if she ends up being the death of me, I swear that I will haunt her entire family for nine generations onwards.

Once Svarggam Xiaochun had recovered her ability to walk, Qian Shanyi continued on, and knelt on the wooden dais in front of Lei Kou. She had to hold the bottom of her saber's guard to keep it from scratching on the floor - with how long it was, she had no real choice but to wear it on her back, and was still learning to deal with it.

Svarggam Xiaochun followed after, and knelt just behind Qian Shanyi, clasping her hands on her lap and keeping her eyes down. Out of the corner of her eye, Qian Shanyi saw her fingers whiten from how hard she squeezed them together.

"What did you bring before me, mukhya?" Lei Kou said, gesturing towards Qian Shanyi. He didn't even glance at Svarggam Xiaochun.

Qian Shanyi bowed slightly. A full kowtow seemed inappropriate, not when she was being directly asked a question. "I bring information my lord had requested, concerning other cultivators aboard this sandpiercer. I do believe that the time I was granted had elapsed."

"Is that" - Lei Kou pointed to Svarggam Xiaochun with his pipe, still not looking at her, his eyes locked on Qian Shanyi - "information?"

"My lord has graciously given me the title of mukhya," Qian Shanyi said, bowing again. "How could I fulfil my duties if not by finding other servants that could be of service?"

"I do not recall asking for another servant."

"My lord, this humble servant can only apologize if she misunderstood, but I am afraid that you have."

Lei Kou arched his eyebrow at her. He had kept his spiritual energy about a foot away from her body ever since their training, but now it smothered her once more. "Really. Have I?"

It was a little hard to tell, but Qian Shanyi got the distinct impression that he was projecting this severe attitude mostly because in this moment, it amused him. A distant part of her mind noted that she might have done the same in his stead, and was immediately slaughtered by the rest of her mind for so much as comparing herself to this man.

"Have you not asked me to have food prepared, my lord?" Qian Shanyi asked innocently. "Svarggam Xiaochun is an excellent chef - I can attest to her skill myself. If anyone on this small sandpiercer is capable of serving as your head chef, it would be her."

Lei Kou pursed his lips, but his spiritual energy withdrew once more. He only mentioned food in passing, and at her prompting at that, but he could hardly deny he had said it. "A chef? Is that all?"

"She also knows some basic formations," Qian Shanyi continued, hoping she wasn't grossly overestimating Svarggam Xiaochun's actual skills. If Lei Kou questioned her, and she couldn't answer, it would call Qian Shanyi's entire credibility into question. "My lord had complained of disturbances before. Perhaps a noise cancelling formation would be of help?"

"Hmpf," Lei Kou snorted, finally looking at Svarggam Xiaochun. "Many cultivators know formations, yet out of all of them, you pick this one?"

He didn't even seem displeased that Qian Shanyi brought a nascent demonic cultivator into his presence, at least once she had tuned out his usual grumpiness. Mostly, he just seemed like he wanted to know where she was going with this. It was time to make her case.

"My lord, it is said that gardens can only thrive when weeds are plucked, yet what is a weed?" she began. "Is a rose bush not a weed to a rice farmer? Is wheat grass not a weed to one who cultivates rose bushes? Every plant has a use when put into its appropriate place, and can sow chaos when placed wrongly. Is it not the job of us farmers to move them where they can serve our greater purposes?"

"So that is how it is," Lei Kou said, stroking his beard appreciatively. "Such a perspective has its value." He nodded slowly. "Very well, I'll allow this little experiment of yours."

Qian Shanyi breathed out a bit of tension, mostly for Lei Kou's benefit. It would have seemed strange if she was fully confident, when showing this much initiative in front of a golden core cultivator.

"So, little weed," Lei Kou continued, turning to Svarggam Xiaochun. "Are you ready to serve?"

This was the part Qian Shanyi truly worried about, not arguing over philosophy. She tensed internally, focusing all her senses on Svarggam Xiaochun. She couldn't even prepare her properly, not with Lei Kou potentially overhearing their every word.

"I - yes," Svarggam Xiaochun stuttered. She didn't look up from where she was clutching her hands together. "I am ready."

"I suppose you have already served me some," Lei Kou said casually, stroking his beard. "You are the one who took that trash away from here, aren't you?"

Fuck my life.

Svarggam Xiaochun's eyes snapped to Lei Kou's face. Tears were already beginning to flow. "You -" she grimaced, one hand grasping at her robes right in front of her heart. Her voice shook just as much as her body. "You - you've killed - you mur-"

Qian Shanyi's hand snapped over, grabbed Svarggam Xiaochun by the back of the head, and slammed her face directly into the floor, shattering one of the floorboards. Thankfully the impact cut her lethal words just short of killing them both.

"My lord, I must humbly apologize on my junior's behalf," Qian Shanyi deadpanned, holding Svarggam Xiaochun by the hair and pushing her face deeper into the cracked wooden floor, just in case she was about to speak up again. Her distraught ally struggled for a moment, but soon grew still, merely shivering in terror. "It seems that in her great excitement she stumbled over her words. What she meant to say was that she is infinitely grateful for the opportunity to pay back for the nuisance her idiotic brother had caused."

The flatness of the stare Lei Kou leveled at her could only be matched by his tone. "Junior," he said, scratching the inside of his ear as if he was looking for some non-existent wax. "Are you saying my hearing has grown weak with age?"

"How could I dare to even imply that, my lord?"

"Then what is it that she was about to say just now?" Lei Kou squinted at her. "What words of 'gratitude' begin with 'mur'?"

"She must have been trying to say that you have killed the murmurs of childish foolishness that would have no doubt infested this sandpiercer if her brother's disgusting behaviour had been left unaddressed," Qian Shanyi lied without even blinking an eye. "What else could those words have been? I see no other explanation."

Lei Kou raised an eyebrow at her again, but she could see some mirth appear in his eyes. As long as he found her funny, she should have some slack on her side.

"Hmpf," he finally said, glancing back at Svarggam Xiaochun. "Is that really what you were trying to say?"

I swear upon my sword, get yourself together Xiaochun, or I will kill you before you can kill us both!

Qian Shanyi slowly let go of her intrepid ally's head, and Svarggam Xiaochun sat back up. There was some blood on her forehead, which started to drip down onto her collar, but she was reasonably intact.

Her mood, though, was another matter. It took her a full minute before she could quiet down her silent sobs enough to speak. "Y-yes," she said, refusing to look Lei Kou in the eyes. "It was."

This time, the breath of relief Qian Shanyi exhaled was a real one. That was entirely too close for comfort.

"You have quite a dangerous tongue," Lei Kou noted. "You should be grateful to your friend for explaining this to me so straightforwardly. See to it that I don't need such explanations again."

"Of course. M-my lord."

"Hmpf." Lei Kou snorted. "Get on with this formation you prepared. Me and your senior have much to discuss."

With a twist of Lei Kou's spiritual energy, he and Qian Shanyi rose up into the air, hovering near the ceiling. Below them, Svarggam Xiaochun wiped her face, adjusted her robes, and took out the tools with hands that still shook like tree branches in the middle of a storm. Slowly, she began to chart out the formation with a nail and a length of rope directly on the surface of the dais, referring to the diagram Qian Shanyi drew up for her. Qian Shanyi had memorised its exact shape back when she was twelve and made sure to break it up into stages, so it was hardly any trouble.

Qian Shanyi was glad that Lei Kou decided to humour her with, as he called it, her "experiment" - but then again - why shouldn't he humour them? He faced no risk whatsoever. The formation they were going to draw had been commonly used for hundreds of years, known most often as the Four Winds Silencing Formation. He surely either knew it, or could intuit enough about its workings to know it posed no threat. Even if he was fully ignorant, he was golden core - and thus all but impossible to hurt.

Qian Shanyi kept her thoughts to herself, focusing on giving Lei Kou a summary of what she knew of the other cultivators on the sandpiercer, and answering his questions. They got what they wanted. It was pointless to ruminate over what might have happened if they didn't.

The formation had snapped into place without a sound, but for the quieting of the sandpiercer's travel. At first, all sound had vanished entirely - but then most of it came back, as Lei Kou had moderated how much spiritual energy he was feeding into it. A golden core had no need for spirit stones, after all.

Qian Shanyi had made no sign that she had even noticed the change. She told Lei Kou that the formation would quiet sound, he knew that it would quiet sound, and it was exactly what had happened - so why should she bring attention to the obvious?

That none had used it for such a purpose for almost two hundred years was not for Lei Kou to know.

Far, far away from the Solar Whirligig, in caverns dug a mile deep into the bedrock, a spark of light appeared in the darkness.

It was but a pinprick, a single dot on an enormous sculpture of emerald jade - one that looked like an explosion of water frozen in the air, or an anthill cast in metal - pools, strands and streams, all linked together into an abstract spiderweb, and hundreds of droplets hanging just off the side. The sculpture stood alongside six dozen others, each shaped unique, yet similar in nature, arranged in concentric circles around a narrow pedestal of pale ivory.

And on the very peak of the pedestal, carved in miniature, the Four Winds Silencing Formation glistened in never-drying blood.

The floor around the sculptures was covered in ink - formations upon formations, the lines first carved into the floor of void-black obsidian and then filled up with ink until the grooves became flush again, the filigree finer than the tip of the smallest needle, yet so dense that from afar, it all looked completely solid. A mere moment after the pinprick of light had appeared upon the sculptures, more light had spread across the lines of ink, in pulsing waves and ripples, the formation coming alive in stages, arcane mechanisms pulling in more and more power just slowly enough to keep from being torn apart.

As the light spread, it pushed back the darkness - revealing an enormous room, a perfect sphere a hundred meters in diameter. The formation was spread across every single millimeter of it, from the floor and up to the ceiling. And in the exact center of the room, hung a winged lion.

Compared to the room, it seemed small, even insignificant - but in truth, it was more than twenty meters long, its wings easily twice that. Yet no matter how it stretched, it could never reach the walls, for it was tied up in chains. Once a majestic creature made to soar through the skies, now an eternal prisoner - it looked crippled and reduced to a shade of its existence. Its wings were broken and healed wrong, its goat-like hooves, once sharp enough to cut through iron, were ground down, and where once it had a mane of luscious, pale fur its skin was shaved clean, tattooed from maw to hoof with the same precision as the entire room around it.

The only spots left clean of ink were those where the chains that bound it had cut into its body, scars so deep that metal had half-sunk into them many years ago, with hundreds of hooks and spikes piercing deeper still into the flesh.

Unlike its monstrous body, the head was almost human - if giant and too flat, too wide, and deformed further by the chains and bridle jammed into the lion's jaw. A single spike, five meters long and sharpened on both ends, was driven directly through its skull right in between three enormous eyes, a deadly horn gifted to it by the jailers merely to mock - for the other pair of horns on its head had been chopped off.

Yet for all of that, this lion was not dead. It slept, uneasy breaths booming out across the room.

More metal chains, each as thick as the torso of a fully-grown man, glinting with every color of the rainbow, stretched to the lion from all around the room, anchoring it to the exact center of the sphere. The light had slowly crept along the chains, alongside lines of ink and carved symbols, until it reached its enormous body - and spread across the tattooed surface of its skin.

The moment the light had touched the skin, the lion's eyes flew open. It roared - so loud the entire room shook from its agony and rage. And on its belly, three more scarlet eyes had opened up, their malefic light clashing with that of the formations all around it.

This lion was neither dead nor broken. Merely confined, and soon, it would seek revenge on those who put it here.

These roars have not changed any in two hundred years.

The lion roared again, and again, and again, pulling on its chains, its every limb straining against its confinement - yet it was no use. The spikes glowed red with heat, and its old wounds reopened - blood flowing out, yet not a droplet falling, swirling all around the lion in a sphere that only warped slightly from the noise.

Off to the side of the room, through a narrow window of hardened glass a meter thick, a figure looked into the room - one of the very few who had ever heard this lion's echoing roars. It was a man, a human, his narrow face warped only slightly by the thick glass, wearing the robes of an imperial official, in striking rainbow colours. He gave the lion a critical look - checking the chains, the formation, the flow of spiritual energy. He had already done so hundreds of times, and would no doubt do it hundreds more, his vigilance never fading.

But the bindings were made without a single fault, and tested to the breaking point. The lion was still helpless.

The man had stepped away, and left the lion to its torment.

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