That night, I sat on my blankets and thought. I doubted. I doubted myself, and I doubted my actions, but most of all, I doubted my intentions. I doubted my revenge!

They had wronged me. My revenge, then, must consist of two functions: preventing them from wronging me in the future, and a returning of the wrongs they had delivered unto me! Murder was a satisfactory solution that achieved both; in fact, it was the most elegant solution that achieved both.

But was it the correct solution?

After all, murder was not the only way to get revenge. If I destroyed their dantian, I could permanently cripple their cultivation. With Natsuki's power, it was probably even possible to directly destroy their cultivation base. If I did either of those, they would not harass me any further— they would not have the ability to— and the humiliation would serve as the returning of their initial wrongs.

And yet I had murdered. I had murdered Jiang Hanfeng and Chen Mantian, both with hateful vengeance suffuse in my heart, and then seven more, nameless, who, yes, had wronged me, but whom I might have prevented from wronging me. I had killed nine, when I could have destroyed nine dantian, or even only two. That was what I could not justify. That was what I, now, sitting here alone in the dark, felt guilt for.

"Natsuki?" I called out in a whisper, and as soon as the sound formed in my mouth, I saw her leaning against a wall, less present than not present, embraced by the darkness.

"What ails you?"

"I think..." I paused for a moment. "...there were alternatives to killing them."

"Yes. If you had destroyed their mana vectors, that may have sufficiently served as revenge. In fact, in some places, it is thought that crippling and humiliating your enemies is even more vengeful than killing them. But what does it matter?"

"If... if I could have accomplished my revenge without killing them, then wouldn't that have been more just?"

"Chunxue," she said in that voice of hers, that voice at once rasping and smooth like fire burning through knotted oak, "you are not meting out justice. You are carrying out revenge. What does it matter what the most just course of action is? What does it matter whether those you kill are saints or demons?"

"I don't know!" I cried out, burying my head in my hands. "I don't know if it matters. I don't know if I'm wrong, or if it matters that I'm wrong. All I know is that I feel like something isn't right! I feel like I'm doing something I shouldn't! But I don't know... I don't know!"

She sat down behind me and rested her hands on my shoulders. "Even according to the laws of man, what you have done is not wrong," she whispered into my ear. "What is the law here? It is not do not kill, but rather do not stain the sect grounds with blood. And if you kill, that is not a crime, but rather a family or sect dispute. Kill your enemies, and if their families and sects object, kill them as well. Humiliate them and annihilate them. That is the law of this land. All you have to fear is that which is stronger than you. But, Chunxue, as long as I am by your side, no such power exists."

She wrapped her arms around me and embraced me. Her embrace was warm, warm, pleasantly warm, as it is often said an embrace feels. Her hands carried the warmth that blood brings to the skin, her breath carried the warmth that lungs effuse into the night chill. It was a kind, accepting embrace, the kind of embrace which only existed in my memory as story and not as experience, and within this embrace I finally understood that— though my actions may not have been right— they were certainly not wrong.

"It's warm..." I whispered.

"Warm?" She repeated this word flatly. "I have heard the children of man speak this word many times, but I have yet been unable to discern its meaning."

"Oh, well... warmth is like..." I paused for a moment to consider how I would explain the definition to a foreigner. "—the feeling you get when you sit in front of a fireplace, or when you wrap yourself in blankets, or when you sit out in the sun on a late summer's afternoon."

"...I do not see the commonality. Next to a fireplace one feels the flickering brightness of the fire, under blankets one feels a sense of repose, and in the Sun one only feels the poison in its gaze."

—How could that be? Was I describing the sensation incorrectly? Or, perhaps, was she just not able to feel warmth at all? No, no, how could that be? Of course she must be able to feel warmth. After all, she was... Natsuki was...

She was my power.

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She was my justice.

She was—

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I did not leave my house the next day. I wrapped myself in blankets and huddled in a corner, trying to come to terms with my actions. Even if I could justify my actions rationally, it was still difficult to justify them emotionally.

Natsuki sat against another wall, looking off into nothingness, so unmoving that I could not tell if it was truly her or merely an image of her that I saw, except for when I offered a question to her, a question about the meaning of life or death, and she would respond with answers so profoundly cynical that I could not help but feel like all my worries were utterly unfounded.

"Death is no more than the fuel of life. Just as you fell a tree for its wood or slaughter a pig for its meat, so must you slay your fellow humans. If you ever decide not to cut down a tree, it is not because you feel guilt, but only because you wish to preserve the forest."

With her— "encouragement", I suppose— I was able to pull myself together enough that I could leave my house the day after.

The day after, I left half an hour early, taking a long detour to avoid the vegetable patch, and went directly to the Central Theatre. Professor Jibeidi was not there yet, but many disciples had already begun crowding around the plaza, eagerly awaiting her arrival. Today, I heard some people saying, she would be giving a lecture on alchemy, so I pulled out my alchemy notes from my robes.

—Then Long Guoqiang went stomping into the center of the plaza. He cast his gaze around the crowd, and when it landed on me, he hollered, "Bai Chunxue!", and the surprise made me drop my notebook.

"Bai Chunxue, what did you do to Chen Mantian?!"

"Chen Mantian?" I turned to him. "You mean Chen Mantian, the Martial Master-stage inner sect cultivator? I saw her the other day. Did something happen to her?"

"Chen Mantian, Jiang Hanfeng, and seven more of my people disappeared after meeting you! I know you did something to them. If you confess the truth, the Long family might let you off with your corpse in one piece!"

Murmurs began breaking out around the half-filled crowd. "Is there going to be a war between the Long family and the Bai family? Can the Long family even survive that in their current state?"

"If it comes to a fight, the Bai family will just cut off Bai Chunxue's head and present it as apology. You know what their relationship is like."

"Aiii. I feel sorry for Bai Chunxue, what did he ever do?"

I sighed.

"Senior Long, do you know how foolish you sound? I'm just trash without a cultivation base. How could I possibly harm any of your friends, half of whom are in the Foundation Establishment stage? What, do you think I dug a hole in the road and tricked them into falling into it?"

Some giggles broke out among the other disciples.

"Bai Chunxue might be trash, but it's better to be trash than a fool."

"Even civilians have a purpose, but fools can only go and get themselves killed."

The expression on Guoqiang's face grew even more contorted, even more enraged. I suppose that he might consider his own anger to be a righteous sort of anger. But if so, then my murders would be even more righteous.

"If not you, then the one with you, that foreigner—"

"Senior Long," I chided, "if the words you are about to say turn out to be false, and the Imperial Court punishes your family or our sect for your carelessness, can you take responsibility for that?"

He could not reply. He stood there, unsure of what to say next, until someone standing by his side whispered into his ear, and he thrust his finger in my direction.

"Bai Chunxue! I challenge you to a duel. If you win, then the Long family will let this go. If I win, I will have you answer for what you did to my people."

"No thanks," I said with a shrug.

Guoqiang froze. "...What?"

"Senior Long, you are a peak-level Martial Master, an inner sect disciple, and I am trash who hasn't opened even one meridian. And yet you are challenging me to a duel? Have you no shame?"

"Shameless!" "Shameless!" came the jeers from the other disciples.

Yes, this was the weight of status. Precisely because I was weak, precisely because I had not opened even a single meridian, I had the ability to use my power as I wished, and evade any punishment for it. After all, there is nothing more shameful than punishing the powerless— especially for those like Guoqiang who must carry the burden of status. Status is a responsibility! A restriction! And thus, I needed to maintain my current status, the status of utterly powerless, as long as possible, to maintain the greatest freedom to carry out my revenge! I could not accept a duel, no, not now, not yet, not until... not until I had the confidence to bear the responsibility of power on my own shoulders, on these shoulders of mine that could hardly even bear the guilt of power. For now, I would continue to be an ant, scurrying around the earth where giants walked.

"Bai Chunxue, you slimy scum...!" Guoqiang balled up his fist, and I could see qi swirling in a vortex around it. "In that case, I'll beat you right here—"

"Long Guoqiang!" Elder Jiang's voice resounded through the plaza as he passed under the Gate of Glory, with Professor Jibeidi by his side and Natsuki following some distance behind. "You are in the presence of guests!"

—Guoqiang let the qi dissipate from his fist, and sulked back into the crowd.

Natsuki had taught me well. I did not need to question my own actions, my own justice.

"Some of you may already have heard, but today, Doctor Jibeidi will be giving an alchemy lecture for the benefit of everyone in the sect," Elder Jiang announced. "I expect all of you to listen closely. I have even summoned all the inner sect disciples and elders who are not in secluded cultivation, so you outer disciples ought not dare skip this." He stepped back and took a seat by the Gate of Glory, where a few elders also sat. One of those elders seemed to stare directly into my eyes, and the moment I caught a glance of his withered face, I could not help but turn away, though I could not even recognize who it was. Or rather, I knew who it was, but I did not want to be forced to recognize who it was.

"It is not common that we researchers get to speak publicly about our work, so I am very pleased to have this opportunity today," Professor Jibeidi said with a wide smile as she walked to the center of the square. "Today, I would like to teach you all a little bit about some of the research we are doing at the Tower into the fundamental efficiency limitations of arrays. Natsuki here is also familiar with arrays, and she has been so kind as to offer some thoughts based on her experiences abroad, where the theories of array construction are notably different."

I picked up my notebook.