The crowd began to disperse. Professor Jibeidi stood with Elder Jiang, discussing something in low tones. Natsuki wandered over to my side, as many sect disciples watched her out of the corner of their eyes.

"It is quite strange," she whispered to me. "You disciples all seem as though you have never seen a foreigner, but is this alchemist here not of Nalantuo? From U.P. at that, I would put money on it."

"Hm? Oh, Professor Jibeidi? Uh, no, not exactly, her parents are from Nalantuo, but she's from here. You can tell by her voice, you know. She doesn't have an accent— well, she has a bit of a coastal accent, I guess."

"I see..." Natsuki tilted her head. "In that case, what sort of accent do I seem to have? I am not that familiar with the specifics of the... current dialect of this language."

"Uh... I guess... you tap your R's, you don't distinguish syllable-final -N from -NG, you sometimes skip the first half of diphthongs, and you use more of a voicing distinction than a aspiration distinction on your consonant pairs. I don't know what kind of accent that constitutes, though. I've read that people from Nalantuo tend to tap their R's, but at the same time, their languages have well-defined voicing and aspiration distinctions."

She sighed. "It is evident even to me that you are exceptionally skilled in the arts. You really ought to be studying philology, not warfare."

For a moment it felt like my brain could not process what I was hearing. Praise? Was it praise? Was it even possible for someone to offer me praise? Me, who was nothing but talentless trash? If only the Bai family would offer me this praise! If only they would recognize me rather than scorn me! Then... then!...—

Someone brushed past me, and only then did I let out the breath that had been collecting in my chest.

"...I know. If I had the right to choose, I wouldn't choose to be here."

Elder Jiang beckoned for Natsuki. With a dull smile, she said to me, "Well, I'm going to go have a chat with them. If you have need of me, then call my name, and I will be by your side."

She went and followed Elder Jiang, and I wandered back towards the fields to go do work.

—I had not taken twenty steps down the stairs from the Central Theatre when an elbow struck me in the side of my ribcage and sent me crashing into the rocks bordering the stairs. A hand tightened around my arm with more force than a cobra and pinned me against the rocks.

I opened my eyes. It was Guoqiang, the person I hated most in the sect, and second most in the world.

With nostrils flaring, he growled, "You piece of trash, what kind of game do you think you're playing here?!"

"I— kghh!—" I began to speak, but he slammed an elbow into my sternum, crushing my breath.

"If it weren't against sect rules to kill outside of the Public Area, I'd crush your throat right here. Do you understand?"

"Y-yes," I coughed.

"Because of you and that foreigner, I lost face in front of the entire sect. For that, I should kill you. I should bleed you out like a pig and kill you. What do you think about it, huh? I'm sure the Bai family wouldn't mind."

"P-please... d—"

"Oy, Guoqiang." I looked over Guoqiang's shoulder and saw Wujiu standing there, looking bored. "I have business with Bai Chunxue. A good dog doesn't block the road, so would you kindly back the fuck off?"

"Huuuuhh?" Guoqiang turned to Wujiu with a fierce glare in his eyes. "Can't you see I'm busy here? Why don't you sit down and wait your damn turn?"

Wujiu shrugged. "I don't think that's for you to decide." She turned her gaze to me. "Bai Chunxue, who you talk to is your decision. So, Bai Chunxue, tell us: who do you have business with?"

I looked into Wujiu's eyes. There was, somehow, no hatred in them.

"...I think I have urgent business with Senior Wang," I managed to mutter.

Guoqiang squeezed down tighter on my arm, and I let out a pained grunt. "You fucker!" he shouted. "I'm not done talking with—"

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

—Wujiu's eyes flashed, and she threw a punch faster than a waterfall's cascade at Guoqiang's shoulder. He instinctively raised a hand to catch her fist, but at the last moment she redirected the path of her punch downwards, smashing into and breaking through first his ulna, then his radius, and finally his humerus before he went crashing and tumbling forty meters down the stairs. The rest of the students cleared the way, so only Wujiu and Guoqiang stood upon the stairs.

Wujiu shook her hand back and forth, as if she had just gotten it wet. "Still up for crushing my dantian, Guoqiang? Why don't we do it now? We don't need to go to the Public Area for this. As long as the guests don't see, we can do it right here."

Guoqiang rubbed his broken arm, trying to restore its qi flow. He would need to heal it quickly if he wanted to fight her. He glared at Wujiu, though he could find no words to direct at her.

"How did Lady Wang overpower Senior Long so easily?" someone asked in half a whisper.

"Lady Wang is the princess of Xichuan, Senior Long is just a young master who won't even inherit his family despite being the first son. Of course Lady Wang can beat him."

"But they're both in the Martial Master stage of Foundation Establishment, right? There shouldn't be this much of a difference."

"When did I ever say I was in Foundation Establishment, you fools?" laughed Wujiu.

Guoqiang's eyes opened wide. "What? You broke through to the Core Formation realm?! How could you break through when I— when I've been stuck in Foundation Establishment for so long?!"

Wujiu snorted, then, as if she was reciting a poem, she said, "It is said that one must train the legs for the Foundation Establishment realm, and the shoulders for the Core Formation realm. What do you think this means?"

More disciples gathered, all murmuring, though none of them had the confidence to answer Wujiu's question. So after a few seconds, she answered it herself.

"—With one's legs one holds up one's own body, and with one's shoulders one holds up the rest of the world. I carry the future of all Xichuan on my shoulders. What do your shoulders carry but your own bloated neck, Guoqiang?"

"I— the Long— Long—" Guoqiang groaned in pain and frustration, though he could not form a response.

Wujiu pointed down and shouted in a voice loud enough to reach the heavens, "The early, middle, and peak stages of Foundation Establishment are commonly called Martial Apprentice, Martial Warrior, and Martial Master. The early, middle, and peak stages of Core Formation are commonly called Martial General, Martial Lord, and Martial Emperor. What is it that generals, lords, and emperors have in common? What differentiates them from warriors and masters? Let me tell you: they are leaders, those who hold in their hands tens of thousands of lives! They are those who carry the weight of the world on their backs! Someone who does not understand that weight could not possibly break through to the Core Formation stage!"

The crowd went silent. Guoqiang collapsed to the ground under the weight of her words. Many disciples immediately sat down and began meditating. Were her words so insightful that they could serve as a source of enlightenment for a breakthrough? As someone who had no qi flowing through my body, who could not feel the way that qi fluttered when enlightened, I could not tell. All I could feel was awe. Awe, for her ambition.

Wujiu walked off into a nearby copse of trees. I followed her.

She leaned back against a tree, one foot pressed against the floor and the other knee raised and bent back so the foot pressed against the bark. Draping over her raised knee, her skirt exposed a few inches of her tights above her boots, which I saw were embroidered with little depictions of the White Tiger, the old symbol of the western provinces before they had fallen.

"Bai Chunxue..."

She looked at me, then turned her gaze away and sighed.

"I think there's room for us to come to an agreement."

An agreement? How could we possibly come to an agreement when I had yet to take my revenge? I swore it— I would take revenge on all of those who wronged me! That was the only reason for which I yet drew breath! So how could I come to an agreement with one of the people I hated most, one of the people who had wronged me most, the person who had killed me?

"An... agreement, you said?" I whispered.

"Yes. I'll have my people stop harassing you, and I'll even compensate you if you like. In exchange, I want you to allow me to hire that friend of yours."

There was no vitriol in her words. Not anymore.

"You... don't want my book anymore?"

"I do. But that foreigner is worth far more than a book. You know the last time we have records of an archipelagan making it all the way here, east of A'erjin-Shan? It was before the curtain of fog fell." She groaned and scratched at her head. "Look, I don't know why someone so important is with you, and I won't ask. But I won't be here much longer. I need to go back west and rebuild Xichuan. Ultimately, I'm only here to collect talent and resources. And your friend— well, even a goose feather from afar is worth more than a block of gold from one's garden."

I looked up at Wujiu— in profile, since she was still looking off to the side. I hated her, sure; I hated her with every fiber of my being, so much so that my blood rushed to my fingers when I thought of killing her just as I had Hanfeng, but her ambition struck in me only awe. I wish I could hate her ambition as much as I could hate her. She would one day unify the western provinces that had been shattered by Meng Huo's rebellions. What could I say to such ambition? What could anyone say? One day in the future, the Emperor of Wei would bow down and thank her for her work in re-establishing the trade routes with Nalantuo. That was the kind of person she was.

"If you don't trust me, I'll swear a contract under the Emperor's name."

And yet, I would— with these hands, with these trembling hands, I would—

"—I have to ask Natsuki about this."

I ran away, with my hands shaking and my legs perfectly steady.