“Young Master, are you okay?” Meng Yi asks, staring at me oddly.

I sigh, an excuse ready at the tip of my tongue.

But then, right before I say it, I just don’t.

If I really can’t trust Meng Yi with this, then I’m several shades of screwed.

“I’m okay,” I say, “but there’s something I need to tell you.”

—❈—

Meng Yi says nothing until I finish talking, and when I do, she remains quiet for quite a bit after, the deep frown that has sat on her brows since I began not looking like it’s leaving anytime soon. “So, um…” I pause awkwardly. “What do you think?”

Of all the reactions I’d expected Meng Yi to have to this, a silent frown had not really been high on the list.

It’s freaking me out a little bit, to be honest. Did I break her brain? Or is she upset for some reason I hadn’t anticipated?

I look down at the 575-year-old Golden Mango I hold in my hand, suffusing the vault we stand within with its golden light and noble rank qi.

I’d pulled it from my reward space to prove the veracity of my words to Meng Yi, but now I’m wondering if maybe having her in a locked room with a noble rank item isn’t the best idea.

Is it possible the powerful qi of the fruit has stunned her somehow?

The answer to that turns out to be no, because Meng Yi talks just fine, and just like her reaction to my big reveal, her words are entirely unexpected.

“You can’t sell that,” she says, jutting a chin at the fruit in my hand.

“Huh?” I blink at her, my brain taking a moment to find the path hers took to get to that conclusion.

Meng Yi doesn’t wait.

“You plan to sell the rewards from what you bought at The Auction,” she says. “That’s why you went shopping, and that’s why you made the comment to Xiuying about having things you want to put up for sale. But you can’t sell them. People will notice.”

She’s right, I realize.

The family we bought the Golden Mango from, the Hongs, they’re one of the three families that run The Auction. The odds that someone will notice that Xian Qigang bought a beast rank Golden Mango six days before The Auction, only to then put a noble rank one up for sale may not be high, but it isn’t insignificant.

And while that won’t lead anybody to immediately conclude that I have a cheat code to the universe, it draws the kind of suspicion that I could do without.

Honestly, it doesn’t say the most flattering things about me that I needed Meng Yi to point this out to me.

“I guess you’re right,” I say. “Best I don’t draw any prying eyes, considering my situation. Good thing I told you, huh,” I say, making a pitiful attempt at levity. “You’re so much smarter than—”

“Why did you tell me?” Meng Yi asks, actually sounding a little upset.

I blink at that. “I’m sorry, I thought you would want to know,” I say, surprised and a little hurt. The decision to tell her was something that I’d worked up to over time, the thought of her being upset that I’d trusted her enough to share this with her is a sobering one.

Meng Yi sighs. “You’re right, I’m sorry,” she says. “I did want to know; I do want to know. And I’m glad you trust me enough to tell me. I’m simply…” she trails off, looking frustrated.

“Simply what?” I ask.

She looks at me like she can’t believe I have to ask. “Qigang, you created a noble rank cultivation method out of nothing,” she says, the intensity of her gaze deepening with every word. “You can create divine rank items. Do you not understand how… significant this is?”

I open my mouth to respond, only to realise that I don’t really have a response.

Consequently, I pivot. “The odds of me getting anything divine rank is incredibly unlikely and—”

“Qigang,” Meng Yi says.

I pause.

Meng Yi has never called me by my name before, always ‘Young Master this and Young Master that,’ and that, even more than the tone of voice she said it in, tells me how heavy this moment is for her.

And it’s with great surprise that I realise that Meng Yi is scared.

Ever since I’ve known her, she has always been calm; always confident; always competent. Always with an answer to whatever question I may have. It’s made me entirely miss that, at the end of the day, she’s still a person.

A nineteen-year-old person.

Hell, back on Earth, many people her age can barely take care of themselves. I know I couldn’t. Yet, this entire time, Meng Yi has been the one supporting me, assisting me, even consoling me in her own way.

Well, now she needs consoling, and I need to step up in a big way.

Before I can do anything though, Meng Yi closes her eyes and takes a deep, slow breath, then opens them again as she exhales, and just like that, she’s back to being the unflappable woman I’ve known the last… how many days has it been?

“We can make this work,” Meng Yi says, and I don’t know if she really believes that, or is simply trying to convince the both of us.

Regardless, I say with full confidence; “I know.”

She looks at me, knowing I’m full of crap but not wanting to call me out on it.

“I’m sorry I’m putting this on you,” I say, but what I really mean is, ‘I’m sorry I’m here.’

Her life wasn’t perfect before. Far from it. And yes, maybe her working conditions are better now, but the fact remains that, my very presence here puts her in constant danger.

Meng Yi was right when she said I didn’t understand how significant my rolling power is, because I don’t. I’m starting to though.

Meng Yi had told me on my first day here that it is punishable by death to even touch divine rank materials without the permission of The Empress. What then would be the punishment for creating them?

Best case scenario, I’m locked in a gilded cage for the rest of my life and made to roll for stuff.

Worst case, I’m killed in some manner so horrific my soul hurts.

One thing’s for sure though, whatever scenario ends up being my fate, Meng Yi isn’t getting away.

She tied her fate to mine when she chose to help me assume Qigang’s identity. Regardless of whether I share the secret of my power with her or not, Meng Yi is unlikely to survive a scenario where I’m caught.

I can’t get caught.

“It’s okay,” Meng Yi says, expression softening. “It isn’t your fault.”

I shrug. “It doesn’t have to be.”

And to that she has no reply.

“You know, I bet your life would be easier if I was a body snatcher,” I say, remembering the comment she’d made the day we met, about how I had to be something else because otherwise I would have to be the most incompetent body snatcher on the planet.

“If you were a Body Snatcher, I would be dead,” Meng Yi says flatly. “Body Snatchers are demons from Hell who consume the souls of unsuspecting victims and assume their identities. Their one goal is to create Hell on Earth. So, no, Young Master Xian, if you were a Body Snatcher my life would not be easier, it would have ended the moment I made it known I knew you were not Xian Qigang.”

“Oh… uh… guess it’s a good thing I’m not then,” I say lamely.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

“Yes, it is,” Meng Yi says.

She falls into thought for a moment, and I let her, waiting patiently.

After a few moments, she gestures at the Golden Mango still in my hand and asks; “Can you return it to wherever you brought it from?”

Even before I try, I already know I can’t.

Nevertheless, I make the attempt. “No,” I say, when it fails.

Meng Yi looks like she’d expected the answer too. “I think eating it would be best,” she says. “You already have a noble rank item in here—” she gestures to the Path of The Sun Emperor manual that sits with its peasant ranked brethren on the pedestal in the centre of the room “—I don’t know how well this vault could hide another one.”

I suppose.

After all, what better way to hide the existence of a fruit than by eating it?

… Although, I don’t have to be the one to eat it, do I?

I offer the fruit to Meng Yi. “You should eat it,” I say.

She looks at me like I just spoke Klingon or something. “What?”

“You told me that cultivation plants that climb in rank as they age can be eaten by anyone, right? Even Ignition phase cultivators like yourself.”

“Well, yes, but—”

I walk up to her, take her hand in mine, and drop the mango on it.

“But nothing,” I say. “Take the fruit. It cost me nothing.”

Meng Yi looks from the fruit and back to me, almost like she doesn’t know how to accept something this precious.

Finally though, she nods and says, “Thank you.”

I smile at her. “You’re welcome.”

She looks at the fruit again with wide eyes, before focusing back on me. “I’ll have to wait for nightfall,” she says, “when all the servants have gone home.”

“That makes sense,” I agree. “Tonight then.”

Meng Yi nods, then she says, “People are going to notice, you know. This.” She holds up the fruit. “It’s going to have a permanent and visible effect on my cultivation. People won’t miss it.”

“Are you looking for excuses to not eat the fruit?” I ask with feigned suspicion.

Meng Yi is unamused. “It isn’t exactly being careful to have your manager undergo a significant improvement in cultivation overnight,” she says seriously.

I shrug, unbothered. “Haven’t you heard?” I ask rhetorically. “I ate a celestial plum and I’ve been handing out advancement like candy. If there’s one positive to that, it’s that it’ll make people believe almost anything.”

Meng Yi looks like she would very much like to disagree but knows she doesn’t have a good argument to make.

I take the victory with all the grace and decorum of a noble.

“Very well then. Tonight,” Meng Yi says, ignoring my smug look.

She picks up the empty box of qi pills and stashes the Golden Mango within.

As she returns the box to its resting place, I ask curiously, “How much of a difference will it make to your cultivation? The Golden Mango.”

“I don’t know,” Meng Yi says thoughtfully. “Hong Delan said its most outstanding effect is that it sharpens the qi sense, but I imagine at my level it would be impossible to eat it and not advance.”

I hum thoughtfully. “And advancing will put you in the fifth layer of the Ignition phase, so you’ll be needing a cultivation manual,” I say.

Meng Yi’s focus locks onto me. “You can’t give me yours,” she says without preamble.

I roll my eyes at her. “Obviously,” I say, a tad offended. “I’m supposed to have figured it out while high on enlightenment. How will we say you learnt it? I’m giving you the old one. The peasant rank.”

“I know,” Meng Yi says, surprising me. “And you can’t give it to me.”

“Uh, why?” I ask, confused. “Wait, is this another of the many ridiculous rules you guys have in this society? Because you’re not from the ‘right kind’ of family you don’t deserve a peasant rank method or something?”

“Yes,” Meng Yi says with brutal honesty. “Certainly not without proving myself first.”

“Proving yourself?” I ask, finding the idea laughable. “Meng Yi, you’ve more than proven yourself.”

“In what way?” she asks.

I scoff. “You’re good at your job,” I say. “Isn’t that enough?”

“No. I’m supposed to be good at my job. That is the bare minimum required of me.”

“This is ridiculous,” I say. “Okay, then you’re loyal.”

“And can you prove that to your family? The true owners of the manual?” she asks.

“So, that’s what this is really about,” I say. “It’s their property, and they’re elitist jerks.”

“Young Master Xian, for cultivators only two things matter: lineage and ability. I have neither. I know you want to help. I know your heart is in the right place, and believe me, I appreciate it, but if you give me that method, you give us trouble.”

I sigh and run my palms down my face. I hate this. Oh, Heaven, how I hate this.

“So, you’re telling me that they considered someone like Qigang worthy of this method, but not you?”

“If Qigang had the talent to back up his behaviour, he would have been worthy of more,” she says, stating a simple fact of the universe.

I take a deep, long breath. “Very well then. I guess I’m finding you a cultivation method.”

Meng Yi blinks. “Um, what?”

“I’m finding you a cultivation method,” I repeat. “And it’s not going to be beast or peasant rank either. It has to be at least sage.”

Meng Yi’s eyebrows climb at my proclamation. “How will you even find such a thing?” she asks.

True, how will I find… right. “The Auction. They have to have a method or two for sale, right?”

“Unlikely, and even if they do, it will most certainly be beast ranked.”

“Then I’ll roll for it,” I say.

“And if that doesn’t work?” Meng Yi asks.

“Then I’ll find another one.”

“And how will you afford it? You’re rich, Young Master Xian, but you’re not that rich.”

“Simple. I’ll go out of town, buy cheap stuff, roll for them, sell them in a different town.”

Meng Yi opens her mouth to counter only to stop and close it when she realises she has nothing to say.

Finally, she asks a simple question; “Why?”

“Because fuck Qigang,” I say. “And fuck my family too. You’ve earned it. Even if only for putting up with him for two bloody years.”

Silence follows my little outburst, Meng Yi looking like she has no idea how to respond.

Deciding to throw her a bone, I ask; “You said you can get a list of what’s on sale at The Auction this year?”

“Um, yes, I can,” Meng Yi replies, the familiar topic helping her focus as I’d known it would. “Should I do so?”

“Please do. Let’s see if we’ll need to look outside town for this.”

—❈—

Before she sends for the list, Meng Yi makes a final attempt to impress upon me the unlikelihood of them having what I want, while I make another attempt to impress upon her that them not having it won’t change anything.

In the end, considering it was almost evening when we sent for the list, its past sunset when a red and blue parrot delivers it.

Meng Yi and I are having dinner, mostly as an opportunity to while away time while we wait for the list and for the servants to leave.

The parrot flies in through the window, heading directly for Meng Yi.

It perches on the table gently, arranges its feathers neatly, and says in a decidedly not parrot-like voice; “Message for Manager Meng.”

I blink at the creature. The creature that I now notice has beast rank qi.

“Um…”

“It’s a messenger parrot,” Meng Yi says.

“Oh, no, I got that part,” I reply, observing the bird which doesn’t seem the least bit interested in my existence. “So, this is how people send messages here, huh?”

“There are other ways,” Meng Yi says. “But yes, this is the most common among cultivators.”

“Of course it is,” I say, observing the creature both with my eyes and my qi sense.

This is the first qi beast I’ve ever seen, and its qi feels a little weird, different from that of humans.

It makes sense, I suppose, seeing as qi beasts cultivate differently from we do.

They have three Realms like us, though instead of the Formation, Qi, and Domain Realms, they have the Core Condensing, Qi Refining, and Domain Realms, and unlike us, their Realms have no phases, and only twelve layers in each, instead of our fifteen (five from each of the three phases).

Thanks to that difference in cultivation, and also my inexperience with them in general, I can’t tell the cultivation level of the parrot. I know its beast rank, and I know it has to be in the Core Condensing Realm, but the layer… that beats me.

I mean, it feels stronger than Meng Yi, but, no shade to my ever-dependable Manager, that’s not saying much.

Giving up on figuring it out, I forward the query to said ever-dependable Manager.

“The fifth layer of Core Condensing,” she says, unfastening a slim tube laced to the parrot’s back.

“Fifth? Huh. Higher than I thought,” I say idly.

Now free of its burden, which I assume is the message it came to deliver, the bird immediately takes flight back out the window.

“Do we have one of those?” I ask as Meng Yi slides a small scroll out of the tube.

“That was yours,” she replies.

Huh. Okay then.

When Meng Yi had gone to ask for the list, she’d simply walked off and returned some minutes later, and I hadn’t thought to ask her for the particulars of how she sent the message.

Meng Yi hands the scroll over to me and I roll it open.

The first few lines on the scroll are greetings from the writer, one Hong De, a relative, I assume, of Hong Delan of Hong’s Cultivation Emporium, and his words are all assurances that this year’s auction will be unlike any of the previous years.

I skim past.

When I get to the list, the first item I see, written out in larger than normal font like this Hong De really wants to draw attention to it, is NINETY-FIVE-YEAR-OLD GINDE PEPPER.

“What is Ginde Pepper?” I ask Meng Yi, and she frowns.

“I don’t know,” she says, then rises. “A moment, please, I’ll check the library.”

I rise with her. “Let’s go do research,” I say.

It takes us little time to find what we’re looking for, and when we do, Meng Yi’s only response is to look at me and say, “You really do have Heaven’s favour.”

See, to understand just what a Ginde Pepper does, one first has to understand the nature of qi in this world.

Unlike in the xianxia tales of my old life where there was yin and yang, or the five elemental qi natures, this world has none of that.

Over here, qi is simply qi. The energy of all things.

Everything has qi; the living, the dead, and all things that can do neither. Qi is a part of it all.

It does not recognize evil or good or light or dark. It simply is.

The energy of all things. The thing, which I suspect, is holding the atoms of this universe together.

While qi has no natures or yin and yang though, qi does have flavours, these flavours basically being like a supernatural effect that all things that exist leave on the qi in and around them.

For example, a random rock on the road? Rock flavoured qi. A random tree? Tree flavoured qi. That fly in the corner? Fly flavoured qi. Even people have qi flavours, all things do.

The more complex an object, the more qi flavours can be found within its own flavour. And the more powerful an object, the more potent its qi flavour becomes.

An eagle for example will have the flavour of flight, of keen sight, of a hunter’s instinct, of bird, of sharpness, and of a thousand other things.

Ginde Pepper, on the other hand, only has one qi flavour: heat. Pure heat. And when it’s eaten, it introduces that heat qi into the cultivator’s qi network.

For cultivators with a method that synergizes well with heat, Ginde Pepper is a boon. For those without, it could be a literal death sentence.

I guess I understand now why this Hong De put the Ginde Pepper first on the list.

“Even at beast rank, this will be beneficial to your cultivation,” Meng Yi says, stating what we’ve both realised.

I nod. “And if my power cooperates, it won’t be beast rank,” I say.

Going back to the list, I read out item after item, Meng Yi telling me about the ones she knows, and the both of us looking up the ones she doesn’t.

While there’s definitely some good stuff there, none of it interests me all that much. And right when I’m about to accept that maybe the Ginde Pepper is the best thing I’ll find, I note the final item on the list:

Path of the Spider Cultivation Manual (beast rank)

“Well, what do you know?” I say, and when Meng Yi gives me a questioning look, I smile at her and ask; “How would you like to be a spider?”

She honestly doesn’t seem too enthused.