Ten days later.

Within one of the secret studies of the Mu Household, Bai Xiulan, Eldest Madame of the Mu Family and the Sect Master of the Sacred Snow Hear Sect, sat behind an ornately decorated desk of pure marble.

Her beautiful white hair, reminiscent of the cool rays of moonlight falling upon the earth during a warm summer night, draped her head in the shape of a crown. Her resplendently exquisite face was locked in an expressionless gaze as she read the papers on the desk.

“You look tired,” a voice suddenly said.

Bai Xiulan did not remove her gaze from her reading task and replied softly, “I am tired.”

“Perhaps, you should rest?” asked the voice.

“Perhaps, I should,” replied Eldest Madame.

A silence came over the secret study. Neither of the speakers spoke and only the sound of pages turning and paper rustling was heard.

“You don’t have to do this, you know,” began the voice; tender affection and immense longing coated its words. “You deserve the life of a queen. A life filled with the luxury of being waited upon; wealth to purchase anything that you desire and dream; and love that is reciprocated only to you!”

Bai Xiulan stopped her task. She raised her head and stared into a floating glow cloud pulsating with strange and wonderful colours. This cloud was the origin of that other voice.

“You are crossing the line, Aurelius. You forget that I am a married woman,” warned Bai Xiulan. “It is improper of you to speak such words to me.”

“Married? Hah! Is that what you call this sham?” snorted Aurelius. “More like being a captive.”

BANG! Bai Xiulan slammed the marble desk with her fist. “This is my final warning, Aurelius! Deliver what you have to deliver and leave.”

The cloud kept quiet for a moment. Then, a heavy sigh left its pulsating body. “The Heavenly Spirit Empire is not happy with ‘Son of the Heavens’ Mu Yuelong’s performance in the South Aislan Continent. Also, the Heavenly Spirit Tower heavily condemns the fact that the Son of the Heavens is practising the [Sacrifice Path]. They are asking for an answer.”

“Hah!” Bai Xiulan snorted at his words. “Answer? More like compensation for keeping their filthy mouths shut.”

Aurelius kept quiet.

“Tell the Heavenly Emperor that if he is so disappointed by my son’s performance, then he is welcome to withdraw the marriage agreement and annul the engagement. I’ve never liked that two-faced daughter of his anyway,” said Bai Xiulan, eliciting a shocked gasp from the cloud.

“And to those old corpses hiding inside the Heavenly Spirit Tower, tell them this,” she took a deep breath and stated, “My son will practice whatever Path that he wants to practice. And if those shrivelled eunuchs have a problem with that, they are welcome to pay us a visit and tell that to us to our faces.”

For a moment, Aurelius could not believe the words that he had just heard. He shrieked, “Are you mad!? If I tell them this, it would mean war!”

Bai Xiulan laughed. “So what if it means war? Do you think that we are afraid of it?” Her eyes narrowed into sharp slits as she reminded him, “Don’t forget. Just like how the Heavenly Spirit Empire has its Elven Inheritance, we possess our Draconic Inheritance too. They want to threaten us? Well, too bad. We are not threatened by a group of pansies.”

“You!” Aurelius choked. “You… have changed.”

“And you have remained the coward that you always were, Aurelius,” said the Eldest Madame. “Perhaps, if you’d had a little more nerve back then, I might’ve given you a chance.”

The pulsating cloud froze at her words.

“I… see,” said Aurelius with profound sadness. “I suppose a coward like me does not have the right to possess the most beautiful woman in the world.”

After a long moment, he continued, “I have received your reply. I shall leave now. Please… take care of yourself.” The cloud then turned around and disappeared from sight.

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Once he was gone, the Eldest Madame’s straight back relaxed causing her to tiredly fall onto her desk. A weary look of exhaustion appeared in her eyes as profound exhaustion taxed her spirit.

She was tired. Very, very tired.

“I want to rest,” she quietly murmured. “I want to put down his burden and roam the Absolute Ice Plains of the North.”

Closing her eyes, Bai Xiulan quietly hummed a soft song. It was an old lullaby that her late mother always used to sing for her, whenever she was unable to fall asleep. Bai Xiulan hummed the old lullaby repeatedly; yet, the sleep she desperately craved did not arrive.

At this time, a knock resounded on the door to her secret study. Bai Xiulan sighed quietly before getting up and rubbing her tired eyes.

“You may enter,” she said, after tiding herself.

The door opened and a man appeared inside her study. He gave her a graceful bow and started to speak.

“Reporting to Eldest Madame, Young Master Yuelong woke up from his coma last night. The family’s physicians saw to him immediately and reported that the young master was mostly fine."

"Mostly!?" the Eldest Madame's heart lurched. Instantly, her mind began conjuring the worst of possibilities.

"As a sequela of having used the [Sacrifice Path], it appears that Young Master Yuelong has lost his ability to hear sounds."

Bai Xiulan's heart stilled for a moment. Her son had become deaf. While it wasn't the worst thing that she had imagined, it certainly wasn't something that could be easily sidelined either. After a moment of tense silence, she asked, "Is the sequela permanent? Where is my son? What is he doing right now?"

"The family physicians are currently looking into the matter. The methods that they had employed thus far to resolve the issue seem to have had no effect on the injury." The messenger then took a second to gather breath before continuing, "As for Young Master Yuelong, he is currently in the process of preparing himself for the approaching Path Symposium. The young master also stressed that he wasn't to be disturbed during this period."

Bai Xiulan's clenched fists tightened. "So much unnecessary pride. Just like his father." Her thoughts ran hot for a moment before she forcibly cooled herself. "Send a message to the Silver-Needle Medicine Sage under my name and invite him to the Household. Do not mention anything about Yuelong's issue and instead, word the letter as a personal invitation from me."

"Understood, Eldest Madame."

She then shook her head and asked for other information. “Tell me about Wuzhi.”

“After that incident wherein his heart had suddenly stopped beating for a whole thirteen minutes before restarting once again, Young Master Wuzhi had also entered a state of unconsciousness. He did not wake no matter what we did, and strangely, our Path Techniques seemed to have no effect on him.”

“The family’s physicians studied this odd situation and came to the conclusion that he suffers from a mysterious curse that functionally breaks a Path Technique when it approaches his body. They ran a few tests and determined that only those Path Techniques which have a direct effect on his body end up being broken. Should a Path Technique, say invoke a fireball, and then this mysterious curse does not stop the fireball from harming him.”

“So, in effect, he is immune to healing techniques and curses?” asked Bai Xiulan.

The man nodded his head and extended a piece of paper. “And these Paths too.” He then hesitated momentarily before handing over a stack of photographs to Bai Xiulan. “Also, when our physicians were checking up on his body, they discovered something startling.”

Bai Xiulan received the paper and the photographs with a frown and checked the latter first. Almost immediately, she inhaled sharply as shock and horror coloured her face. “Who… would do such a horrible thing!?”

“We do not know,” replied the man. “But the signs suggest that he has been suffering from it for years.”

“Heavens!” gasped Bai Xiulan as she went through the photos. Halfway through, she could not even find the stomach to view the rest of the photos.

“Does Chu Mingxi know about this?” she asked.

The man nodded his head. “Yes. She learnt of this matter six days ago when she arrived at the Household to deliver Young Master Yuelong and retrieve Young Master Wuzhi. She destroyed the entire Medicine Hall and harmed a few physicians. Fortunately, nobody was killed.”

“She then took Young Master Wuzhi and left towards the north.”

Bai Xiulan took a glance at the photographs one more time before looking away. She then asked, “How is the situation with my husband’s parents?”

“Terrible. Their falling out was too sudden for us to react in time. And while we tried our best to contain the news, we are afraid that the news might’ve already spread outside.”

Bai Xiulan sighed. “No one saw this matter coming and therefore, it cannot be blamed on you. Still, instruct the agents to try their best to contain this news or at the very least, distort the truth to deceive the public.”

After a pause, she asked. “How is the progress on the investigation regarding the Third Sister’s wounding?”

“Eldest Madame… about this matter,” the man hesitated. “The Grand Elders have instructed the people of the Investigation Hall to stop looking into this matter.”

“What?” Bai Xiulan eerily questioned. “A wife of the Golden Sovereign was wounded by someone and they want to let this matter go? Have they lost their minds?”

Taking a few deep breaths to calm her anger, she asked, “Which Grand Elder’s order was it?”

The man gulped audibly and quietly replied, “…All of them.”

Bai Xiulan appeared shocked. Never before, in all her years of living in the Household, had she ever come across an instance where all the Grand Elders were in agreement. Even across the history of the Mu Household, the number of times such an event had occurred could be found on one hand.

And while the Eldest Madame sat dumbfounded, the man continued. “After receiving the order, the Hall Head and Elders’ Council of the Investigation Hall protested the order and asked for an explanation.”

“The Grand Elders replied with a single statement: The Devil nests in the Isilda Continent. Practice ignorance, lest you be noticed.”