…because I have no idea what else to do, I sing the song, not even needing to read the lyrics on the paper in my hand.

~Fly me to the moon~

~Let me play among the stars~

“I don’t understand,” Magistrate Qin says, his confusion clear. “Is that the language she wrote in?”

I blink at him, realizing that I’m singing in English to someone who has no idea what language that is.

Someone whose expressed desire is to understand these words.

Idiot.

I sigh, then nod. “Yeah. It’s a song,” I say again. “From a…” I hesitate.

How much should I tell him?

I mean, they already know about other universes here, Meng Yi proved that. Plus, what would hiding it even achieve?

Nobody has any reason to suspect that I’m from an alternate reality, and honestly, wouldn’t it help feed into the belief that I ate a celestial plum if I actually know where this is from?

“From where?” Magistrate Qin asks, looking desperate for any bit of information like a man in the desert on the search for water.

“From a different world,” I admit finally.

Magistrate Qin’s eyes widen. “You’ve seen this world?”

Yeah, this is getting closer than I’m comfortable with.

Besides, the effect of the celestial plum is supposed to have long worn off by now, and, on top of that, my whole lie here is that it left me with huge gaps in my memory.

Can’t go around knowing too much about anything; certainly not otherworldly stuff.

“I think so,” I say finally, trying to sound like there’s a memory that won’t come to me. “I don’t know. But I know this song’s from there.”

Time to distract him.

“I can translate it for you if you want.”

The Magistrate certainly wants.

Much like with its counterpart back on Earth, English and the Chinese-y language of this world are very different, and I’m not musically talented enough to translate the lyrics in a manner that matches the rhythm of Mr. Sinatra’s masterpiece.

In light of that, I give up on the tune entirely and simply read out the words like a poem.

“Fly me to the moon. Let me play among the stars. Let me see what spring is like on…”

He has no idea what Jupiter and Mars are.

Thinking quickly, I edit the lines just a bit.

“…the planets way up high.”

Not the best, I’m sure, but there’s a reason I never had any dreams of being the next Beyoncé.

“In other words: hold my hand. In other words: baby, kiss me. Fill my heart with song. And let me sing for ever more. You are all I long for. All I worship and adore.

“In other words: please, be true. In other words,” I sigh, the power of the words getting to me, especially knowing that this is a goodbye.

Magistrate Qin had called this woman, Ming, his best friend, but clearly, either her, or more likely the both of them, felt more for each other than just friends.

Meeting the teary eyes of the old man before me, I deliver the final words of his dead love, just friends or not.

“I love you.”

The effect of the words are as pronounced as if I’d stabbed a lance through The Magistrate.

His face clenches in something like pain, and he curls in on himself, hand going to his chest.

Between his reaction and his age, my first thought is that Magistrate Qin is having a heart attack. But when his qi swells, shudders, dips, then swells again in a familiar pattern, my panic turns into annoyance and disbelief.

Seriously!? Again!?

And that’s when a veritable tsunami of qi blasts out of The Magistrate and quite literally drowns me.

And for lack of anything else to do, I inhale.

—❈—

The Emperor gazed upon the blighted forest, the rot set in so deep that nothing could be saved.

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He had given this forest life, fed it with his warmth, but then he’d looked away, and the disease had crept in.

Now, there was only one thing left to do.

His crown of solar fire flared a brilliant orange-gold, and the same warmth that had fed this forest life became a scorching heat that brought only death.

In the blink of an eye, everything was ash, but no matter, for his crown cooled and radiated warmth again, and from the ash life sprung anew.

—❈—

I know something about me is different even before I open my eyes. I feel fuller somehow. More.

Wait.

I turn my qi sense inwards, letting it pick up the nuances of my own energy instead of the world around me.

Ah. That’s what that is. I’ve advanced.

I, Xian Qigang, am now a proud second layer of the Weaving phase.

Yay!

Now, if only I can figure out how that happened.

I open my eyes to the familiar ceiling of my bedroom.

And also how I got here.

“You know, Young Master, if you keep making every powerful cultivator you converse with undergo forced advancement, very soon we will have people lining up at the gates seeking breakthroughs,” Meng Yi says from my bedside.

I turn to her.

She looks the same as she always does, but I notice immediately that her clothes are different from what I last saw her in.

“How long has it been?” I ask.

“Three days,” she says, then adds; “Congratulations on your advancement.”

I blink at her, not knowing whether to focus more on the fact that I’ve been unconscious for three days, or on the matter of my mysterious advancement.

Like she can read my mind, Meng Yi demystifies the matter for me.

“You have The Magistrate to thank for your advancement,” she says. “His control over his qi must be impeccable, because he somehow used the runoff qi from his advancement to feed your cultivation instead of burning it.”

“That was a possibility?” I ask, throat tightening.

Meng Yi nods. “In the first two phases of Qi Realm, a cultivator’s qi is incredibly caustic when uncontrolled, like upon death or advancement.”

I swallow. “Why didn’t you tell me this before I went in there?” I ask.

Meng Yi gives me a long look. “Because someone told me that; ‘what happened with Vice Commander Xiuying was a fluke. Lightning doesn’t strike twice in the same place. If Magistrate Qin wants me to help him advance, he’s in for disappointment.’ And, I don’t know, Young Master, I suppose he was quite convincing, because I believed him.”

I blush, scratching my neck awkwardly. “Right. I did say all of that, didn’t I?”

“You did. And then you proceeded to make a man who’s been bottlenecked in his cultivation since before my mother was born advance.”

Meng Yi doesn’t say the words in a manner that chastises. In fact, both her tone and the look she gives me seem more impressed than anything else.

“It was an accident,” I say.

“There seem to be a lot of accidents happening around you, Young Master,” Meng Yi points out.

“It’s true,” I insist. “He showed me something, a letter a friend of his gave him.” I look her in the eyes.

“Meng Yi, his friend ate a celestial plum.”

The young woman’s face runs through a gamut of expressions in record time.

After a moment, it settles on cautious optimism. “There’s more,” she says, in a tone that makes it sound like she’s really saying is; ‘there has to be more’.

I nod. “Apparently, they stole it. And when his friend ate it, enlightenment showed her how screwed they were, stealing from someone that powerful, so she knocked him out and left to make the person they stole it from think she acted alone.

“She died. But before she left, she wrote him a letter, and in that letter is a song. Meng Yi, it’s a song from my world. I think the celestial plum somehow made her able to… see my world!

“Do you know what this means?”

“No,” Meng Yi says. “And neither do you, not really.”

I look at her like she’s crazy. “Meng Yi, if I can get my hands on a celestial plum—”

“How?” she cuts in. “Their rarity is legendary for a reason. So, unless you can pull one out of whatever mysterious place you keep pulling out things you have no business being in possession of…” she actually pauses for a moment here, as though half expecting me to shut her up by pulling a celestial plum out of thin air.

When I don’t, she continues; “…then, all you can do is speculate. And the fact that you’re speculating at all, is a clear sign that you have no idea what can or will happen.

“Maybe all a celestial plum does is feed you knowledge from across realities, or maybe it doesn’t even do that. Maybe The Magistrate’s friend was like you, someone trapped here from your world.”

My eyes widen as I hadn’t actually considered that.

“Or maybe your hope is right. Maybe it does take you back. But this time whatever fortune that kept you from being corrupted by the wild qi between realms fails, and you return to your world an abomination that no one can stop because they have no cultivators.”

I hadn’t considered that either.

Meng Yi sighs, her intensity bleeding off.

She takes my hands. “I’m sorry that this has happened to you,” she says sincerely. “And I promise that, if you ever find a way to go back home I… I won’t interfere. But, not every light that moves in the night sky is a shooting star.”

I let out a long breath.

She’s right. I have no idea if a celestial plum will help me contact or return home, I have no idea what consequences would arise from such an action, and I certainly have no idea where or how to go about getting a celestial plum.

This is a long term plan at best. Getting excited about it now is kind of silly when I really think about it.

Looking at Meng Yi, I nod. “Yeah, you’re right, I—”

Someone knocks on my bedroom door.

“Who’s that?” I ask Meng Yi, and she calls out; “Enter.”

Fan Si walks in, bowing low.

“Manager Meng. Young Master Xian. Vice Commander Xiuying is at the door. Shall I let her in?”

Meng Yi tsks. “This troublesome woman,” she mutters. “She’s been trying since the day before yesterday.”

“What does she want?” I ask.

“My guess is she’s finally found her manners and wants to thank you properly,” Meng Yi says.

“Oh. I don’t really want thanks, but I suppose it would be rude to not see her.”

Meng Yi nods. “Let her in,” she tells Fan Si. “The Young Master will see her after a good long bath.”

I shake my head. At some point Meng Yi is going to have to tell me just what the deal is between her and Xiuying.