CHAPTER

39

Six, Violet

I

“What do you want to know?” Lan Yue asked, straightening her back. She didn’t seem reserved or guarded, like she had been around him for a while now. Instead, she had her eyes slightly narrowed, a look of uncertainty on her face, as if she wasn’t quite sure what to think of him.

Well, Hao Zhen would take confusion over suspicion any day.

“You’re already familiar with Du Qing, right? Or you’ve interacted with him before?”

Tian Jin also perked up at that question. This was something Hao Zhen knew the other boy had also been curious about for a while.

Lan Yue knit her brow. “You can say that, yes.” There was some tightness to her voice. “Du Qing, he…” She trailed off, then shook her head. “No, before that, you should know that Bao Yun is my best friend.”

“Oh. Oh.” Hao Zhen widened his eyes. He was fairly certain he knew what was going on, but he remained silent, letting Lan Yue speak while he pondered the implications—and the possibilities.

“Wait, but how do you—” Tian Jin shot Lan Yue a look of surprise, before cutting himself off. “Oh. You’re the sect leader’s daughter. You grew up in the Inner Court?”

“Exactly,” Lan Yue said, giving Hao Zhen a brief glance before turning to Tian Jin. “Bao Yun, as Elder Bao’s daughter, was also raised in the Inner Court. None of the other prime elders had daughters our age, and Elder Bao is quite close with my grandfather, so as a child, we often had lessons and played together. We are childhood friends.”

“But didn’t we meet Bao Yun in the Central Light Square? Why didn’t she— She doesn’t know who you really are?” Tian Jin asked.

“To her, and pretty much everyone that isn’t family, I’m currently in secluded cultivation,” Lan Yue said, shaking her head. “It was part of the deal with my father. Bao Yun is pretty good at keeping secrets, but I didn’t want to risk it.”

That got Hao Zhen thinking back to their encounter with Bao Yun and Du Qing in the Central Light Square. He was pretty sure he could remember Bao Yun glaring hostilely at Lan Yue, probably under the impression that the other girl was a love rival. His lips quirked up a little at that.

Although he was fairly certain that Lan Yue was intended, according to Tian Jin’s Weave, to be a love interest, she hadn’t shown any signs of falling for the other boy so far. Considering Lan Yue was Unweavable, it didn’t seem like the Weave could force her into falling in love, either. At the very most, it could only manipulate the surrounding Woven to create situations conducive to her developing feelings for Tian Jin.

“Anyway,” Lan Yue said, waving her hand. “Du Qing is the son of an outer elder of the sect, so we didn’t interact much growing up. A couple of years ago, however, he took the sect’s entrance examinations and ended up catching the eye of Elder Bao, who took him as his first apprentice. It was only after that Du Qing and Bao Yun met, and a few days after that, Bao Yun introduced him to me.”

Lan Yue’s expression darkened. “That was three years ago. Bao Yun and I were thirteen at the time, and Du Qing was sixteen. At first, he seemed… nice, though I always had a feeling there was something off about him. Then I started noticing the way he looked at Bao Yun and acted around her, and I decided there was definitely more to him than met the eye. I tried to look into him, but I could never find any proof of his wrongdoings. I did try to tell Bao Yun about my suspicions, but she always dismissed them, as she really respects him. And I think he knows I’m onto him, because he also started sending sharp, knowing looks my way. But since I had no proof…” She gritted her teeth.

“Hmmm.” Hao Zhen tipped his head at Lan Yue. The situation was about what he had imagined, though what Lan Yue had said about Bao Yun not putting any stock in her suspicions concerned him. If that was because of Tian Jin’s Weave… then he’d have to reconsider some of the plans he had been thinking of. This was really something he’d have to consider—just to which extent they could deviate from the Weave, and whether it’d adapt to their actions.

“All right,” Hao Zhen said. “That might come in handy later on. For the time being, regarding the matter with Du Qing… Hmmm. He can’t track us right now, so he shouldn’t be able to send anyone after us.” He nodded at Lan Yue. “I believe you also said, previously, that there’s no way he can come to the Outer Forest himself. Is that right?”

Lan Yue nodded her head. “I’m certain.”

“All right, it seems like at least until the end of the Glistening Stone Hunt, he won’t be able to bother us. We should still keep our guards up—he might be able to get in touch with another one of the inner elders overseeing the Outer Forest and have them track us down. But if he had another inner elder working with him, he’d have sent them after us instead of the inner disciple, so we’re probably safe on that front.”

Hao Zhen spent a few moments organizing his thoughts, then continued, “He’d definitely try something once we return to the sect, though. But we’ve already determined what we’ll do if he tries to pin the disappearance of the inner elder and the inner disciple on us. In fact, even if he doesn’t try that, we should consider presenting this matter to the elders of the sect ourselves and telling them the entire truth. We should have enough evidence”—he tipped his head toward Tian Jin, before turning to Lan Yue—“and authority to pull that off now, even without relying on your identity.”

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

“What about Elder Bao?” Tian Jin asked. “He’s the one who gave me the spatial ring. Do you think…”

“Elder Bao isn’t involved in this,” Lan Yue said, shaking her head. “Trust me, he’s like an uncle to me. Even if he were,” she said, frowning, “my grandfather would certainly intervene in this matter. Grandfather thinks highly of him, and if he were to discover Elder Bao is involved in some nefarious scheme… it won’t end well for him.” She didn’t seem to quite like that idea, however.

“I’m not so sure about Elder Bao’s innocence,” Hao Zhen said. Lan Yue shot him an affronted look, but he ignored her. “But there’s definitely a chance he has nothing to do with this. Du Qing could have had a number of opportunities to inscribe the tracking matrix on the ring without Elder Bao noticing it. I don’t think we need to concern ourselves with that, for the time being.”

Tian Jin’s expression became one of relief. “All right. That’s good.”

“Well,” Hao Zhen said, clapping his hands. “This should be about it.” He glanced at Lan Yue and paused. It occurred to him that there was still a question he had to ask her.

There were still some things about her he was curious about, such as why she wasn’t blood-related to her grandfather, but none of them were pressing issues—except one. There was one thing he needed to know right now, or at least before they went back into the forest.

“Do you have a spiritual skill?” Before, Lan Yue had said she didn’t have one, but that was because she had been pretending to be Duo Lan.

Lan Yue stilled, her eyes narrowing. Her expression turned guarded, and she regarded him warily.

Hao Zhen blinked at her, taken aback by her reaction. It pretty much confirmed that she had a spiritual skill, but at the same time… he couldn’t see why she’d react this way. Having a spiritual skill wasn’t that big of a deal. Considering everything she had already told them so far, he couldn’t see how that question would get such a reaction out of her. “Lan Yue?”

“I…” Lan Yue hesitated, then sighed. “I do,” she said.

“Right,” Hao Zhen said, slowly, looking at her closely, trying to think of reasons why she was acting this way. “What is it called? What can it do?”

Again, Lan Yue’s expression turned hesitant. Hao Zhen glanced at Tian Jin, wondering if the other boy was also confused by the change in Lan Yue’s behavior. To his surprise, however, Tian Jin was looking at Lan Yue with intensity, giving her a contemplative look. It was clear that he was thinking of something—that he had drawn some sort of conclusion.

Just what in the world was going on now?

“My spiritual skill is called Viridescent Poisonous Aura,” Lan Yue finally said after much deliberation. “The first form is called Weakening Poisonous Area. It generates a red aura around me, and those that come into contact with it are sapped of their strength.”

A weakening skill. Hao Zhen nodded to himself. That could be fairly useful, though it wasn’t what he had been expecting. Back when Lan Yue was guiding them around the forest, he had thought that she might have been using a spiritual skill to help her find the right direction, but he couldn’t see how Viridescent Poison Aura could be used that way.

In any case, it wasn’t a spiritual skill he had ever heard of. Most members of the sect so far had one of the sect’s signature skills. That thought gave him a pause. Now that he thought about it, the inner disciple and inner elder they had killed both had spiritual skills, and from what he understood, it should have been expelled from their body when they died, so it was probably in their clothes.

He made a mental note to search for the two skill seeds later, before focusing again on the matter of Lan Yue’s spiritual skill, trying to think what exactly about it could explain her reaction. He could just ask her, but it’d probably be better—

Hao Zhen froze. Lan Yue’s spiritual skill wasn’t one of the sect’s signature skills. Where—or rather, how—exactly did she get it?

“Lan Yue,” Hao Zhen said. She looked at him, still a little tense. “Where is your spiritual skill from?”

Lan Yue’s entire expression tightened, and Hao Zhen’s heart skipped a beat. This was definitely where the problem lay. Out of the corner of his eye, he glanced at Tian Jin and saw the other boy’s expression similarly becoming tense.

Now that he thought about it, he had never asked Tian Jin the origin of his spiritual skill, either. Oh boy. Oh boy. Something was up, no doubt about it.

Lan Yue regarded him silently for a few moments, staring straight into his eyes, before turning her attention to Tian Jin and giving him a similar look. Finally, she closed her eyes and let out a deep breath. “Before, I mentioned that people always overlooked certain… oddities about me, right?”

Hao Zhen nodded his head.

“There’s a pill graysouls can take,” Lan Yue said. “It allows them to feel their soul, for a few moments, as if they had spiritual sense. It’s mostly used so that children from magical families can get used to sensing their souls before they turn sixteen, so once they start cultivating, they’ll have an easier time learning to control their spiritual power. The first time I took that pill… I sensed my soul, and I realized that it… wasn’t empty.”

“You were born with it?” Hao Zhen asked. Again he stole a glance in Tian Jin’s direction, and sure enough, he was giving Lan Yue his most intense look yet.

“Yes,” she said. “I… when I noticed it, I tried to ask my grandfather about it. He… It was as if he couldn’t hear me. He’d just look at me blankly, then talk about something else. I also tried asking my brother about it, but he had the same reaction. I have no idea why I was born with it, and—”

“An innate skill seed,” Tian Jin suddenly said, and they both turned to look at him. “That’s what it’s called. My master told me about it. It’s usually something you inherit from your bloodline, but some people are also randomly born with one.” He narrowed his eyes at Lan Yue. “But there’s not just one skill seed inside your soul, is there?”

Lan Yue almost jumped, her eyes going wide. “How did you—”

“There are six, aren’t there?” Tian Jin said, leaning forward. He seemed absolutely certain of it. “There are six skill seeds inside your soul.”

Hao Zhen narrowed his eyes at Tian Jin. Could it be…

Lan Yue was now wearing a look of utter shock. “How— What—”

“And their color?” Tian Jin pressed on.

Lan Yue closed her mouth.

Tian Jin slowly breathed out. “They’re all violet, aren’t they?” Although he was asking that question, his expression made it clear that he already knew the answer.

That completely snapped Hao Zhen out of his musings, and he gave Tian Jin an incredulous look. All violet? Violet? The highest realm of cultivation, violet? And six of them?

Lan Yue stared blankly at Tian Jin for another few moments, before a look of realization dawned on her. “Don’t tell me. You also…”

Tian Jin only nodded his head. “Six violet innate skill seeds,” he said, plainly.

Hao Zhen swallowed.

It seemed like there was still quite a lot they still needed to discuss.