Yan Shirong looked over his notes for what felt like the thousandth time. Finally, he admitted to himself what he’d been avoiding for the better part of a week now. He was at an impasse. Whoever was behind He Yu’s trouble with the sect jobs, they were good at covering their tracks.

Leaning back in his chair, Yan Shirong swallowed down the last of his wine. Lamplight flickered, casting a warm glow over the scrolls, loose scraps of paper, and the pieces of half-finished constructs that littered his desk. He drummed his fingers on the wood and went over the facts once more.

It was clearly sabotage. Deliberate and targeted. That was the first lead he’d chased down. It hadn’t taken long to figure out that nobody else was having similar problems. One possibility crossed off, no matter how remote, was a step closer to the truth. A method he’d learned from his father. Any possibilities that can be easily confirmed or denied ought to be investigated first. Narrow down the range as to better focus your efforts. From there, he’d systematically crossed off one lead after the other.

His next instinct told him it was Mo Zhiqiang. He certainly had both the motivation and the means to conduct such a campaign. He Yu had taken his arm, after all, and the Mo were fabulously wealthy. There was also precedent in place. Mo Zhiqiang had been the one funding all those duels that had more or less thrown half the inner sect’s wealth at He Yu last year. Yan Shirong pushed aside his envy at that memory.

It would have been nice if he’d been able to gain even a portion of that, but who was he kidding? He wouldn’t have won half those duels that He Yu had simply crushed. His own talents lay elsewhere, anyway.

Although he hadn’t thought Da Ning would be behind it either, Yan Shirong had followed up on that possibility, regardless. It was always best to be thorough, and it was good practice besides. Unsurprisingly, Da Ning had mostly concerned himself with rebuilding his reputation. His association with Sha Xiang had ended with her leaving the sect in disgrace, and Da Ning’s standing had suffered as a result. Yan Shirong crossed him off the list, too.

Cui Bao was likewise gone from the sect, so that wasn’t it, either. In the end, he had nothing left. He had learned nothing new, nothing beyond what He Yu had told him. A few targeted inquiries, and he’d confirmed that the clerk He Yu mentioned was feeding information to someone. Who? Who knew. Certainly not Yan Shirong.

A quick glance outside told him it was time. He stood and extinguished his lantern with a gesture and a pulse of qi. He stepped out into the night.

It was a new moon—not that it mattered for visibility, given the constant blanket of mist that covered the Shrouded Peaks. It mattered for him though, visibility or not. The flows of darkness and shadow were strongest on nights like this. He reached out with his presence, and the shadows rushed to answer his summons. His command.

Darkness billowed up around him. He felt himself become less tangible, less substantial. He hadn’t expected the Darkwalker Shroud to advance this rapidly, especially without a Wayborn Seed yet. Between the presence training, his renewed focus on his Way, and the rather intense training regimen Senior Sister Yi had subjected him to, he was advancing his family art—the Thousand Shadows Play—faster than anyone in recent memory.

He activated the Umbral Puppetmaster, and tendrils of living shadow reached for him from the darkness. They lifted him into the air and carried him over the outer wall of his home. He passed through the paths and trees and gates of the inner sect, carried upon limbs of darkness. Only the faintest whisper of qi marked his passing.

Touching down outside the inner sect assignment hall, he briefly checked for any observers. Finding none, he knelt next to the base of the building, at one of its corners. Tucked behind a low flowering bush, a formation stone hummed with a faint flow of qi. Yan Shirong disrupted the formation—not enough to break it, nor destroy it. If he wanted to ensure he remained undetected, he’d have to restore it before he left.

A few moments later, he was inside, softly closing the door behind him. His senses were already far sharper than any mortals, being at the peak of the Third Realm, but he could see better in the dark than other cultivators of his advancement. With a presence consisting entirely of shadow qi, the gloom may as well have been full daylight to him. It had taken some getting used to—navigating the colorless world of shadows that was open to him in these quiet moments of lightless night, but that was a small adjustment in the grand scheme of things.

Yan Shirong made his way behind the main job counter. He didn’t expect to find much here tonight. None of his other forays into the hall had turned anything up. But his constructs had been following the clerk He Yu had mentioned for weeks now, and he’d not met with anyone outside his normal social routines.

Shuffling through the stacks of papers and scrolls, he turned up nothing new. There was nothing that implicated any one culprit. Not even a hint nor a suggestion of such. He could feel the frustration mounting. To ward it off, he focused on method. On procedure. How would his father handle something like this? His brothers?

Constructs, shadows, and informants—all the tools the Ministry of Information had at its disposal. Yan Shirong had only a fraction of the full capabilities that his family arts promised. That the Ministry could bring to bear. He’d just have to make do.

Spending another quarter hour shuffling through records, checking missives, searching for anything, he turned up nothing. He left. Making sure to first reset the lock on the assignment hall behind him, and then restore the formation, he rose above the trees and walls and footpaths once more, and turned back towards his home.

Then, one of the myriad threads of qi that connected him to his constructs trembled. He stopped, focusing his attention on the faint vibration that traveled along his Puppeteer’s Legion technique. It wasn’t yet advanced enough to get much more than vague impressions, but vague impressions were all he needed. He could follow up himself.

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Someone new had called on the clerk. That it was late already was suspicious enough, but Yan Shirong had also learned the assignment hall clerk who’d tipped his hand to He Yu was the predictable sort. He followed routines. Kept the same company. For weeks Yan Shirong had either observed him directly or done so via constructs. He’d quickly learned the clerk’s habits, and this was the first deviation.

Cloaked in shadow, Yan Shirong sailed through the night, carried by tendrils of the same. He alighted atop the outer wall of the clerk’s home. Under the boughs of a red pine, he wrapped himself in a partial activation of the Darkwalker Shroud and faded to near insubstantiality.

The now-familiar figure of the clerk looked to be finishing up the normal sort of social niceties with a pair of cultivators that Yan Shirong didn’t recognize. They were quite the unlikely pair, in his estimation.

The first, and the one who was doing most of the talking, was quite obviously of noble status. Or at the very least, a man of means. He was well-dressed and kept up with the current fashions. His hair fell around his shoulder and down his back, held by an intricate crown hairpin. His clothing was of superior quality, and his features refined. Quite the handsome figure, all things considered.

His companion looked half a bandit. His clothes reminded Yan Shirong more of a soldier than a proper cultivator. He even wore a soldier’s cap rather than leave his hair free. His features were rough and fierce. But like his companion, he exuded the air of ease and confidence that only came with the advancement of one’s cultivation.

“To business, then?” the clerk asked.

The more refined of the guests motioned to his companion. The soldier-looking one tossed a pouch on the table before him. A couple of spirit stones tumbled out.

“Keep us informed,” the refined one said. “There’s your cut for this month.”

“How much longer do you think he’ll last?” the clerk asked.

The refined one shrugged. “Does it matter? Or are you having second thoughts?”

“No, no second thoughts,” the clerk answered too-quickly. “It’s just, what if the more senior disciples find out? This isn’t strictly against the rules, but it’s against the spirit. You know how Senior Sister Yi is about these things.” The clerk made a show of spreading his hands.

Interesting. The power imbalance here was obvious to anyone who had eyes. The clerk might benefit from this arrangement, but he wasn’t an equal partner. He may not even be a willing one, now that Yan Shirong reflected on it further.

Something in his spirit quivered the moment the thought crossed his mind. It was a passing sensation, but some deeper instinct told him it was important. But that was all. He’d have to examine it later, as the conversation below continued with or without his attention focused on it.

“Don’t worry about Senior Sister Yi. If it comes to it, my brother and I can smooth things over with her.”

Brother? They didn’t look like they were related. Sworn brothers, then?

Another quiver. It was distracting. Mostly because Yan Shirong’s instincts screamed at him that whatever was going on with his spirit was something he needed to pay attention to. But another part of him knew this conversation was the key to learning what was going on with He Yu.

“Just continue doing your job,” the soldier-looking one said. His voice matched his mien. Rough and uncultured. But there was a hint of something more that lurked in his tone.

“Should we require your opinion on things, we shall ask for it.”

“Of course,” the clerk said, bowing over a salute. “Sect Brother Wang, Sect Brother Xin. I look forward to a profitable future.”

The meeting broke up, and Yan Shirong flitted away, moving from shadow to shadow. Wang and Xin. Not names he was familiar with, but that was an insignificant obstacle compared to the one he’d just overcome. It was only a matter of time.

As he made his way back to his home, he reviewed everything he’d spoken to He Yu about since they’d entered the inner sect together. These two didn’t seem like they’d be members of that Sunset Court organization. As far as he could tell, Sha Xiang was the one who’d spearheaded that little incursion, and he’d never seen those two in her company.

No, they’d clearly been in the inner sect for some time. They knew how it worked, and seemed to have more than a passing familiarity with Yi Xiurong, the sect’s first disciple. That suggested they were fairly high-ranked and familiar with the pecking order.

Then there was their advancement. They’d kept their presences restrained during the meeting, but Yan Shirong had come to know the other inner disciples who remained in the Third Realm. Those two weren’t among them. Fourth Realm, then—probably.

As he touched down in his courtyard and headed back inside his home, one last little tidbit bubbled up from a half-recalled conversation. He Yu had mentioned that Zhang Lifen had collected a fair number of enemies before she’d been promoted to core disciple. She’d warned He Yu that some might carry their grudges over to him, as they were unable to strike at her directly. The pieces finally fell into place, and Yan Shirong smiled to himself.

Those two were old rivals of Zhang Lifen’s most like. They’d paid off the clerk to keep them informed of He Yu’s jobs so they could deprive him of resources. Their advancement was likely high enough, then, that they couldn’t move against him directly, lest they lose face for bullying a junior. Which also explained how they could easily clean up the jobs before He Yu could even get to them, and with such overwhelming strength.

Possessed of information, the most valuable of currencies, Yan Shirong made his way to his desk.

Something in his spirit caused him to stop. Something snapped into place—like those quivers he’d felt as he’d been putting the pieces together through his observations. It had happened in that moment of idle thought, when he’d been congratulating himself for sussing out the secrets behind He Yu’s trouble.

Another quiver, but this time, he focused on it. What was it? The mystery? No. The thrill of discovery? No, but not entirely wrong.

He thought on what he’d been doing. Gaining knowledge. Closer, but knowledge for its own sake had never motivated him. But he had been learning something. Unraveling a mystery.

No, not a mystery.

Something forbidden?

Not quite.

Something hidden. Something… secret.

He fell to the ground, assuming a cycling position. The insights flooded him. All the things he knew. All the things he kept from others.

All his secrets.

Not just his secrets. The secrets that ought to belong only to others, but that he’d uncovered for himself. Like the meeting tonight. A secret meeting that concealed a conspiracy. Thing not meant for his ears, but that he’d heard, regardless.

Yan Shirong was not a mere puppet master, performing a shadow play for the amusement of others. He was the one who listened at closed doors. Who stood by unnoticed, and thus noticed things others missed. He’d always thought that he would carve out his place in the sect as an information broker.

But how does one become such a broker?

By learning secrets, of course. Yan Shirong smiled to himself as, finally, a Wayborn Seed took root within his spirit. He was a knower of secrets. A collector of things other wanted hidden, forgotten, and unseen. It was who he’d always been. It was why he’d gone on that expedition to the western wilds, foolish as he’d thought it then. Why he’d performed that divination, despite knowing full well how dangerous it was. Why he’d kept unraveling this question He Yu had set before him, despite not seeing any real personal gain in it.

His Way had never been wealth. It hadn’t been knowledge, at least not of the normal sort. It had ever been the things only whispered. Things sought by plumbing the forgotten depths of memory. Secret things that once obtained belonged to him and him alone.