The first thing I sensed when I left City Hall was not the breeze on my face, nor the crowds middling along the streets, but rather a dull weight holding down my legs. It was the weight of not knowing where to go. No, I knew where the Bai manor was, and I knew where to find Bailian's carriage, but I nonetheless did not know where to go. I did not know where I ought to go. I knew my options, but I did not know my decision! Given a choice, the simple choice of where to let my feet take me, I could not make it!

—From the corner of my eye I spotted Bailian waving to me. The choice disappeared, and so I had no issue in going up to her, where she was standing by her carriage.

"Come, Senior. We have many things to discuss." She scrambled up into the carriage proper, and I followed her.

She closed the door behind us, and the carriage began moving. Then she put a hand to her chin and lost herself in thought. I could not tell just what she was thinking about.

"So... how have things been with the Long family recently?" I asked carefully.

"Oh, you mean about my brother?" She raised her eyebrows. "It wasn't you who killed him, was it?"

"No. Or— rather— he, uh..." Unsure how to word this, I paused for a few seconds, then shrugged. I did not need to hold my tongue. "He died earlier than I had expected. Far earlier. I think someone from the Long family killed him."

Bailian nodded. "I think so too. And because of it, the whole inheritance thing has become a bit messier. The elders who had supported my brother have quickly switched over to supporting a distant cousin of my father. He has little talent, and he is unsuited to be the next head, but of all the failures of the last two generations, he is the most impressive. Compared to grasshoppers, after all, even a newborn calf is tall."

"...I wonder if the Magistrate knew this would happen."

There was a moment of silence as Bailian pitched her head forward, her eyes narrowing as she did.

"—The Magistrate knew that First Brother Guoqiang would die? Is that what you are implying?"

"I mean, remember how Wang Wujiu said she would leave secluded cultivation only when Long Guoqiang dies? At that point in time, I can't imagine that anyone could have predicted his death— other than the Magistrate, who can see the future."

Bailian put a hand to her head. "She can't actually see the future, but... yeah. That just might be it. Truly... that Sima Rui..." She turned her gaze onto me. "Senior, do you know the story of how the Magistrate entered Foundation Establishment?"

"No, I... don't think I've heard it."

"Then listen well. It is said that, as a Qi Condensation cultivator, Sima Rui found a treasure of the Laughing Buddha and was subsequently targeted by a Core Formation cultivator. This cultivator went to kill her, and naturally, there was no way for her to fight back. So instead, she used the pretense of a duel to trick him into destroying a divine statue of the Jade Emperor— who sent down heavenly lightning to punish him, immediately killing him. From there, she refined his corpse into a pill and used it to break through to Foundation Establishment."

"That's..." Finding myself unable to put word to my thoughts, I put a hand to my mouth. If nothing else, that was the kind of thing Sima Rui would do under her philosophy of a civilian bureaucrat. She would make use of the world's laws where they benefited her, and trample over them where they did not. The truest mastery of the world, after all, is not to be found in breaking it between one's hands, but rather bending it to the shape of one's palm.

"Sima Rui doesn't fight," Bailian chuckled. "Everyone who tries to fight her simply trips over their own feet and shatters their own skull. Almost like some she's some Buddha."

"Like Guanyin, maybe."

"Very much like Guanyin, 𝕒𝕤 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕤𝕒𝕪."

As the words left her mouth, her tone cooled. When the words had left her mouth, she sat up straight and leaned forward, a deathly expression wrapped like plaster over her face. It seemed as though the very air in the cabin had frozen solid, and the walls and windows seemed so afraid of Bailian's imposing presence that they could not even shudder enough to give form to the howling echoes that always accompanied her voice.

"𝕊𝕖𝕟𝕚𝕠𝕣, there is something far more important that we must discuss. Tell me— what happened to the Bai family?"

Her voice was sharp and precise, but that alone did not explain why it was so deeply unsettling to my ears. Perhaps— perhaps it was that her voice was directed at me, at me, at me!, in a way that I was not sure I had ever felt before. Her voice was directed not at the bearer of the secret cultivation manual, nor was it directed at the powerless trash of the Phantom Orchid Sect, but rather it was directed at me, at my experiences, at my memories, at my person and not at my title! How strange, how heavy, how imposing a sound it was!

I moved to speak, but my tongue was leaden in my mouth under the weight of her penetrating gaze, and truly, I was not even sure what I ought to say. I opened my mouth, but no words escaped, not under the weight of that gaze, not under the weight of the expectations imposed less upon my name than upon my very body.

"𝕊𝕖𝕟𝕚𝕠𝕣, is my question unclear? Yesterday evening, someone went into the Bai family manor and threatened to kill everyone there. Nobody knows what happened after that. Some people went to find out, but there is a very old barrier cast over the Bai manor— as there is over every cultivator's home— and it is next to impossible to pass through such a barrier without a family token or an invitation. Not even the servants can get back in. But 𝕪𝕠𝕦 have a token. 𝕐𝕠𝕦 must know."

In step with the cadence of her words her eyes opened wide, so wide that I feared I would not be able to hide my soul from their probing gaze. And how could I know how when I had no such experience? How rare was it that someone would try to see inside my mind! Who had ever looked into my eyes, seeking knowledge of all things?

It is said that the self can only be recognized in the reflection of other's gazes. Here, under the cold and blinding light of Bailian's gaze—

"𝕐𝕠𝕦 must know."

Her words, trenchant and punctuated like the wounds of a knife, cut open a space somewhere in the depths of my consciousness, buffeted sore by the freezing air, stagnant though it was, within the cabin.

You.

I. I knew. I knew. Natsuki had told me, therefore I knew. I knew, therefore I—

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Sighing forcefully to push out all such distracting thoughts, I shook my head, then leaned back against the carriage seat and met Bailian's eyes.

"They're all dead."

Bailian blinked, but did not flinch.

"All of them?"

"Yes."

"Even Bai Fei?"

"Yes."

"I have heard there is a false immortal among the senior leadership of the Bai family. Is he dead as well?"

"Yes."

She collapsed back into her seat and turned her gaze away. I let out a breath that I did not know I had been holding in.

There was a moment of silence, and in it I wondered if this was what friendship meant. To recognize and be recognized, on grounds that could justly be said to be equal— was this was it meant? It was stressful. But— it was better than the alternative. It was better than not being recognized at all.

"Did you do it?"

"No." This time, the words flowed smoothly from my mouth. "It was my sister."

Bailian rolled her head back on her seat.

"As far as I know, you have no sisters who could possibly be strong enough to do this."

"Ah, you don't know her. She's not from the Bai family."

Looking off out through the window, Bailian breathed out slowly through her nose.

"I see. So she's the real culprit behind these recent events."

"I... suppose."

She let out a long sigh.

"Well, I suppose if we draw things slightly further back, then that secret foreign cultivation manual of yours might really be what's to blame. I'm not sure if you knew this, but Chen Mantian had her eyes set on it too. Whoever was managing your sect's Treasure Pavilion and gave that thing to you was really sick in the head. And since you tied your life-thread around it, anyone who wanted it would have to kill you for it. That was definitely a blunder on your part."

"In my defense, it's not a foreign cultivation manual. It's just a book on comparative linguistics. I don't know where this talk about a foreign cultivation manual came from."

"Really? I've heard there's something about a so-called Mute Barbarian's Longsword Technique in that book. I've also heard that the Mute Barbarian's Longsword is a technique from a small tribe on the northwestern border of Nalantuo, tens of thousands of miles from the farthest reaches of Wei, that by the force of this technique alone managed to avoid being swallowed up by Nalantuo's imperial expansion." Her voice swelled with something like excitement. "Between Mount Austrivea at the southern extremity of the Continent and the Dragonreaches farther north than the North Pole itself, this technique alone is what stands in the way of Nalantuo's imperial ambitions, their millenia-long yearning to bring all eight winds of the world under one roof!" With a chuckle, she calmed herself. "—That is likely why people think it is a foreign cultivation manual, and a valuable one at that."

"I mean— I suppose there are some parts about historical foreign martial techniques, but—" I sighed and rubbed the side of my face. "Well, I suppose it hardly matters what it really is. Either way, I really regret tying my life-thread to that book."

"At the least, Wang Wujiu would not have tried to kill you for it had your life-thread not been entangled with it. She knew very well how to pick her objectives, so she would have let her followers do as they wished, and she herself would not have bothered with you. Too bad she did not know how to pick her enemies."

And if Wujiu had not killed me, then I would not have missed Pill Distribution, and I would not have offended Jiang Hanfeng, and I would not have killed Chen Mantian, and I would not have dueled Long Guoqiang. It was a quaint sort of alternate history, one in which my revenge would simply never have taken place.

"Actually, no, that's not why. It's more so because... I feel like it was wrong of me to value a mere book so highly. I mean, it didn't even have any emotional value to it. It was just the only thing I could get from the sect's Treasure Pavilion, and so for a long time it was the most valuable thing I had to my name. But..."

From my robes I pulled out the sword-hilt that Natsuki had once offered me. I could no longer light its blade, so there was no reason to hang it in a sheath at my hip. Now, it only served as a memory. It was a memory so precious that, if I had the choice now, I would tie my life-thread around it.

I had never looked particularly closely at this sword-hilt. I had held it, and as I had held it I had felt against my fingers the odd texture of the hilt's striated leather that folded triangles over itself like the shape of the greater pectoralis, and the cold sensation against my palm of the golden decoration poking through the wide rhomboid gaps in the leather on both sides of the hilt. I raised the hilt up to my eyes and took a closer look at the decoration. It seemed to be in the shape of— a vajra, the divine caller of thunder, a symbol that I only knew of from my study of the Buddhist traditions on Huoshanlong Archipelago.

"Oh, I remember that hilt. It was really quite strange. None of us had seen a hilt like that before, not even our elders who had travelled all Xili during the wars at the end of the old Han dynasty. At the least, that hilt is not from anywhere east of A'erjin-Shan. Despite the vajra, it is not even from Huoshanlong. Perhaps it is from Nalantuo, but their armies are too large to have such nice weaponry."

"That's right. It's from the other end of the world. Natsuki gave it to me," I said as I turned the hilt in the afternoon light flitting through the carriage's windows. As I turned it, the shape of a bell glowed edge-by-edge upon the hilt-guard, shifting back and forth with such force that I could almost hear it ringing. I suppose I should have said that it was my sister who gave it to me, but I had not yet realigned all my memories with my newfound life.

"Na Cikui? Who is that? Is it a foreign name?"

The bell ceased to move. In that moment I felt like all the blood in my body would turn and flow backwards.

"You... haven't heard of her? The foreigner? The rakshasa?"

"No. If a foreigner or a demon had come to this city I would've learned of it. But I haven't heard any such news recently."

Natsuki had never met Bailian, that much I could assume. But it should have been impossible for Bailian, the heir of one of the most powerful local families, not to know Natsuki's name by now. Was it just a coincidence of sorts that the story of Natsuki's visit had not reached Bailian's ears?

"—Then I'll introduce you to her sometime."

With an expression of light consternation upon her face, Bailian ran a finger over her chin. "I think I'll be heading back to Anyang within a few weeks, now that my business in Kangtian is more-or-less finished. And I think you need to leave for the Capital sooner than that if you want to make it in time for the civil service exams or the Imperial University entrance exams, though I can't say I know the dates. What's your schedule like?"

I frowned. How could I have forgotten my dream? I would go to the Imperial University, and then I would become a scholar. Considering the time I had spent holed up in the Alchemist's Tower, there wasn't much time left for me to stay in Kangtian.

Suddenly, my eyes opened wide. I understood now why Sima Rui had called upon me. Given the short timeline I had, there was no way for me to deal with managing the Bai family and attending the Imperial University at the same time. If I did not put the Bai properties in trust with the government immediately, then either they would be repossessed or I would not have time to go to the Imperial University this year. Though I had hated my surname for a long time, I needed to preserve it for the sake of my dream. The meritocracy was not open to commoners, and there was little route for advancement in the imperial bureaucracy that did not require wealth and prestige. With the name of Bai, I could go far as my ability would take me, but without it, I would not even be able to become a scholar. Sima Rui had summoned me to offer me a way out of the predicament I had not even known I was in.

"I'll send you an invitation in the next few days," I said carefully. "I'll probably leave by next week."

Looking off into the distance with a somewhat perturbed expression, Bailian only muttered, "Alright. Let's go with that."