Chapter 2 – Daughter of Zhengyi

  They were back in the room where they had found the heavenly arte. Diyuan left the body of the Gu clan member outside. He would need to think fast on how to arrange the scene to make it look like a battle.

  He looked at Yunya. She now looked much younger than her 16-year-old self. She was holding onto the jade tablet tight enough that her fingers were turning white. Her mouth was slightly parted as she looked to him as her protector. He suddenly felt a wave of guilt of his own.

  If he killed her, he would be breaking his word for the first time. Should he go through with his murder, he would kneel before her father and take responsibility for her death. After that was done, he would then take his own life for both his failure to protect her as he said he would, and for being the knife that killed her. Even if he didn’t take his own life like a coward, his cultivation path would forever be locked.

  Was there another option?

  “I’m sorry…” she squeaked out. “What do we do?”

  He paced as he thought. He took out a talisman from his ring and tossed it in the air. It burned and activated, creating a bubble around them to keep any sound from leaking out. That was something he could have done from the start when they entered this room, which would had prevented their current predicament. His fault. They had some time, since Mugong had somehow convinced the others to hold some form of battle tournament to unevenly split the spirit stones.

  “Our goal is to make sure no one finds out about the heavenly jade tablet.” Diyuan walked up to Yunya and held out his hand. She quickly gave it, as if she wanted nothing more to do with it. He tried to pour some of his energy inside but was blocked, as expected, from everything about it except its name. He held the pink jade tablet out again for her to take.

  “No, I don’t want it,” Yunya said as she took a step back.

  “Unfortunately, that’s not a choice you can make anymore. This one binds on pickup, so you’re the only person who can learn and use its arte.”

  Her eyes lit up as she took it. “Oh! Isn’t that a good thing? Even if we lose our storage rings and this arte, they can’t do anything about it.”

  Diyuan shook his head. “Even them knowing about it is a massive problem. It might be possible that if you die, then the tablet opens up for anyone to learn from it again. So you could expect assassination attempts for the rest of your life after we leave this place.” Diyuan started to pace again. If the Gu clan ended up getting their storage rings and the heavenly arte, would they really settle for something so simple? “No, actually, if it’s the Gu clan, they wouldn’t send assassins against you. They would instead assassinate one of their own clan members, claim it was done by us and that we ended up stealing the tablet back, which would then unite all the clans together in an attempt to wipe us out.”

  He thought through some solutions, but found out each as problematic as the next. If they simply hid the tablet, it didn’t guarantee that it wouldn’t be found rather easily later. Pocket worlds tended to have weird quirks and sometimes acted alive—rearranging objects and refurbishing destroyed things between each cycle. And if someone found the tablet and saw that it had already bound to someone, it would cause a wide hunt, potentially wiping out every cultivator that had ever stepped foot in the Administrator’s Archive for the past thousand years.

  After all, it was, indeed, a tablet that would win the final war.

  Making the tablet disappear, rather than hiding it, was the more realistic option. Destroying tablets were possible, but not at the Foundation level. Which meant it would have to be destroyed outside the pocket world, but none of the other clan elders waiting out there would allow that.

  “Is this arte really that good?” Yunya mumbled to herself.

  Diyuan responded, taking a break from his thoughts. “It’s a heavenly arte. Skills with those types of renegade words can only exist with the permission of the heavens, which isn’t possible anymore.”

  “And that’s…good?”

  He gave her an example rather than a long lesson. “Take my arte for instance. My Yuhan family uses the Benediction Balm internal arte; it lets me heal passively a little, or a lot if I close-doors meditate. Combine that with Mugong’s internal arte, a defensive arte that spreads damage, similar to black cold steel, and you have a recipe for an immortal body. Speaking of which…”

  Diyuan took out a dagger and began to rip and tear at his robes. Yunya watched in confusion until he started to cut himself.

  “What are you doing!?” Yunya exclaimed.

  “Don’t worry, it’ll heal quickly enough. Just staging the scene.” His blood started to seep into his clothes. His cuts weren’t deep and he could see it already start to heal.

  “Should I also cut myself?” She asked, making a knife appear from her storage ring. “I think that might help convince them that it was just self-defense.”

  He raised his eyebrow at her. Unlike Diyuan, she wouldn’t heal as quickly.

  “Well, I mean…” Yunya looked embarrassed. “I don’t want you to get hurt anymore because of me.”

  Diyuan turned away and waved his hand dismissively, feeling the guilt creep up again. He looked around the room and spread some parts of the wall with his blood. It was convincing enough. He’ll have to do the hallways next. But then he realized he was delaying his decision on how to handle Yunya.

  His mind churned. The same thought came again; the simplest solution: kill Yunya and blame it on the Gu clan. A grim thought also came, as if from someone who had no dice in the game: and someone more competent could learn the arte instead if she was dead.

  A quieter thought then came, more out of desperation than anything else. The tablet could disappear if Yunya absorbed the arte now, like he’d done with his double arte tablet. That would work—if only she had the space. That option would solve everything, but there was a resounding problem with it: it would require an open slot in the Foundation core to learn. And since Yunya just reached level 3 Foundation recently…

  “Do you have an open slot in your Foundation core to add an arte there?” Diyuan asked, a dumb question he already knew the answer to.

  “No,” Yunya said, stiff as a statue, like she thought twitching might break his focus. “My level 3 arte slot is called the Flashblind Thrust—it makes my sword glow brightly so I can hit them when they can’t see.”

  Her first real arte isn’t an internal arte? Diyuan resisted the urge to express his disbelief. But the more annoyed he was with her, the more pity and reluctance he felt.

  “I might not have room, but can’t I just remove the arte from my core and then add this one in?” She asked innocently.

  Diyuan scratched his head. That was that, then. He had no other options. He had to kill her. “Removing an arte forcefully shatters your core, disabling your cultivation path permanently. You wouldn’t be able to absorb the arte and it won’t vanish.”

  “But isn’t that only true if you’re trying to remove an internal arte?” She asked. “The arte I have for my level 3 Foundation core spot is an external one. I can remove it safely—well, not safely, it’ll still hurt me internally, but that’s not all that big of a deal, right?”

  Diyuan spun to her in shock. That had not even crossed his mind since no one in the world would ever slot their first real arte to be anything but an internal arte.

  He ran up to her and shook her by the shoulders, his own tension releasing with each shake. “Are you secretly intelligent!? Did you absorb an external arte first on purpose?”

  She waited for him to stop. “I mean, yeah? I’m not from a real cultivation family,” she said, taken aback by the sudden shift in attitude. “I didn’t have an internal arte lined up, so I decided to wait before learning which one is good for me.” A great deal of stiffness could be seen leaving her body, relaxing, as it seems like they came to an answer they wanted.

  He was about to express his joy when his face darkened with a thought. Yunya caught on to the change.

  “What’s wrong?” Yunya asked, suddenly nervous again.

  Diyuan stepped away, pacing again. This did technically solve the problem, but there was another, more long term, problem that needed to be addressed.

  There were many stories and examples of people with power that shouldn’t have them—how it would twist them or destroy those around them by their unassuming actions. Yunya would fit that bill. She wasn’t from a real cultivation family that understood what was expected of them. But that’s not all, she was from a merchant family. While they had been loyal to Zhengyi for generations, who’s to say that this couldn’t call forth greed and betrayal?

  “Yunya,” Diyuan started seriously, “do you know why I’m famous in the Zhengyi clan?”

  “Uh…your talent?”

  He gave her a look but didn’t answer. They both knew the real answer.

  “…Because you executed your brother,” she finally said, wincing at her own response.

  It didn’t sting. If anything, his actions six years ago felt like a fog had lifted from his mind, where he knew the decision he made was the right one, even if it wasn’t the desired one. He had even received a reward for his actions, though it had remained unused up until now.

  “There’s a reason why we, the Zhengyi, are called the strongest. If the other four clans hit us together, we’re can decide which half of them dies before we get wiped out.” He thought on how to word what he wanted to say. “That’s from sacrifice. We have traditions you don’t need to participate in. Resource restrictions. Spirit artifact taxes. Cultivation families bear it. And yeah, sometimes we need to cut off our own arm for the sake of everyone.” He looked at her. “Even if that arm is your family.”

  He ultimately needed Yunya to understand that the life she planned would no longer exist. Her ties to the Zhengyi clan would need to be greater than any ties to her blood family. She did not grow up with their traditions. If not for Diyuan following those traditions, the Yuhan family may have split from the Zhengyi clan, resulting in a major power dynamic shift in the world.

  A hum broke his thoughts.

  “Hold the line,” a voice echoed, soft but firm.

  Diyuan’s eyes focused. Yunya held a silver locket, open, its runes glinting faintly. She closed the locket and opened it again. “Hold the line,” the voice echoed again. Not Yunya’s, but someone more mature.

  “This voice is the last thing I’ve heard my mother say,” Yunya said softly. She closed and opened the locket again, which made it repeat its phrase.

  Diyuan knew about her mother. She had died inside a pocket world during one of their merchant expeditions.

  “That’s the motto of the merchant families. Hold the line.” Yunya opened and closed the locket again. She closed her eyes and let the mature voice wash over her. “It can mean anything we want it to mean. The trade is bad? Decline it because holding the line means we protect our bottom line.” She closed and opened the locket. “Our neighbor needs help so we offer a deal that doesn’t give us profit? Holding the line means we remember to prioritize relationships.” Open and close. “Spending time with the family instead of focusing on the business? Holding the line means we don’t forget why we’re doing what we’re doing.”

  She finally opened her eyes and looked at the locket. Her face then became fierce as she flexed her hand onto the locket. Snap! A puff of energy pulsed out before vanishing. Yunya opened her hand and let the broken locket fall to the ground. Diyuan stretched out his hand as if to catch it. To shatter the final voice of her mother wasn’t something he expected her to do.

  She met Diyuan’s eyes—her own watery. Her lips trembled slightly as she spoke. “I am not the daughter of the merchant family anymore. I am the daughter of the Zhengyi clan. I will become what I must, even if I need to break the line.”

  Her voice was firm and full of resolve, though the tear sliding down her face reflected the pain of her decision. Diyuan took a deep breath and nodded. Truth be told, that was enough for him. Her heart showed the same resolve he had when he made his decision to kill his brother.

  She sat in a lotus position and closed her eyes to focus, beginning the process of removing Flashblind Thrust from her core.

  A small tug appeared on his lips. “You know, being miserable is a long road. If you want a guide, I’ll be here to answer any questions. Humor tends to work.”

  “I did hear miserable people liked other miserable people for company,” Yunya said without opening her eyes, “but I at least thought I could pick my companions. I’m feeling even more miserable already.”

  “Aw, don’t say that, Yun Yun. We’re basically friends already. Two peas in a pod. The thunder and the lightning. The fart and the…well, you know.”

  Her eyes snapped open. “Did you just call me Yun Yun? I hate that nickname.”

  He smirked, feeling oddly light now that the heavy turmoil passed. “Beat me once in a spar and I’ll stop calling you that.”

  She closed her eyes again. “Deal. And for the record, I’m the fart and you’re the…” She opened her eyes slowly and looked at him with disgust, like he had betrayed her.

  “Farts pair well with a candle fragrance. Thanks for taking the undesirable smell.”

  “Let’s pretend this conversation never happened.”

  They shared a brief moment of silence before they both burst out laughing. “You’re so stupid,” she said playfully, a fresh set of tears going down her face. He couldn’t tell if that was from the laughter or her earlier pain. “Anyways, stop talking. I’m trying to concentrate.”

  She closed her eyes and focused on what she needed to do. Diyuan breathed in deeply, letting the air linger inside, then let out a long exhale. His mindset shifted—it was now time to prepare for what was to come.

  He went outside the room and began preparing the scene to look more like a battle than a straight kill. Diyuan cleaned the blood that dragged with the body when he moved the Gu clan member using tools within his storage ring. The goal now was to make the heavenly tablet disappear before anyone discovered they had it. That way when they gave up their rings, no one would be the wiser.

  Diyuan also checked in on the spirit room using heightened hearing senses. The last time he checked in, he heard them talking about a combat tournament, but now it was…Gambit?

  From a distance, Mugong’s voice rang out, laced with mockery. “Hmm, indeed we’re playing the game gambit, but your move was a curious gambit indeed. If this is your way of tossing spirit stones my way, I’m not one to say no.”

  Diyuan didn’t understand why they were gambling away their spirit stones, but it gave him time. He returned back to the hallway outside the room Yunya was in, who was still focusing on her own task. He flipped the Gu clan member’s body so he would be face down, then added additional wounds so that it wouldn’t look like he died in a single strike.

  Diyuan cut himself again and smeared blood where he could to make it look convincing enough, before focusing his internal arte to heal his own fresh wounds.

  Once his wounds were closed off, he double checked the scene he made and nodded in satisfaction. Now that Diyuan felt he had prepared everything he needed to put on the show he wanted, he finally focused on the new arte he absorbed but never had a chance to figure out. Emperor’s Rule and Mesmer’s Echo. For now, since he didn’t understand Mesmer’s Echo, he would hone in on Emperor’s Rule.

  After absorbing the arte into his core through the jade tablet, he knew how to use the skill instinctively. The way it worked was to carve out a space in front of him, like a tunnel, and his body should follow the path he made. Diyuan first imagined the spot he wanted to go and let the skill—

  As he was thinking it, the arte activated and Diyuan’s vision warped. The air blurred. The scene melted into each other. Everything snapped back to normal. The arte was instantaneous, ending with a sharp, reverberating beat that sliced through the air, followed by a humming noise that lingered.

  It was the pain that he felt that took his attention, however. Prickling pain covered his body. It also felt as if someone’s hand gripped his core momentarily—which then vanished as soon as it came. When all was said and done, all the pain was gone and everything went back to normal.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Diyuan looked back at the path he travelled and couldn’t help but wonder if he actually teleported. A few more practices and he learned that he could only teleport a second time after the pain disappeared entirely. That brief period would be its recharge time, where the arte simply couldn’t be used until the exhaustion lifted. Though, no other arte made Diyuan feel the prickling pain or the strange hand on his core.

  He then decided to try and slow the arte and seemingly nothing happened. Or rather, he felt like a barrier of empty space was around him. But he sensed he could tug at it and move it.

  When he tried, he found that he could. He felt more than saw a tunnel being carved out before him, shaped to fit his body alone. He felt a small pressure on his core, but nothing like the gripping sensation he felt earlier. There didn’t seem to be a restriction on how far he could make the tunnel except for a new coil-like sensation. It seemed to be tightening and demanded to be released the longer the tunnel carved.

  Diyuan let the coil snap. His vision blurred and warped for a brief second, then he found himself at the end of the tunnel he carved. No pain and no prickling sensation. Seemed like this slower version was at a level his body could handle.

  He tested it out a few more times. While the instantaneous teleport, the one that caused pain, required time to recharge, he could use the coil-like version as many times as he wanted, back-to-back, though the carving of the tunnel was slow. It could only carve out at a walking speed. And it partially required him to stay still in order to create the path he would travel through; he could walk while the arte was in the middle of building the tunnel, it was just that the end of the teleportation tunnel couldn’t advance, as the space he was walking was the new carved path. If he ran, the tunnel would collapse.

  He decided to give each version a name. The slower version that required prep time would be called “warp.” The faster, instant version, he would call “teleport.” It was the same arte, but much like how a blade beam attack could have different levels of power put into it, that was essentially what Diyuan was doing here. He could prep a warp into another prep of a warp, or warp into a teleport, but once he teleported, the arte entered an exhaustion period, temporarily disabling it entirely. Something he would need to keep in mind.

  Normally, artes wouldn’t see this level of complexity until higher levels. Diyuan suspected it may be because the “full power” version, the teleport, was not it’s actual true power and was limited due to his cultivation level—hence the pain.

  It was also interesting that he didn’t feel any air when he travelled through the tunnel, which was what he expected to feel when using any movement arte. Whenever he landed at the desired destination, a strange noise reverberated out, pulsing out air when it did so. He considered if it was indeed a true teleportation arte, but he figured quickly it wasn’t when he couldn’t travel through walls; the warp tunnel just wouldn’t go further, and the instant teleport wouldn’t work at all.

  He did another check-in with the spirit stone room. This time it was…an alchemy competition? It had gone from a battle tournament, to a gambit tournament, and now finishing with alchemy? He shook his head and went back.

  Diyuan spent the rest of his time practicing and seeing how he could combo a few things. A warp tunnel could be prepared ahead of time, then he’d uncoil and throw his Wind’s Edge then teleport right after—use that confusion to turn the spirit artifact mid-air to strike a foe unaware. As far as he was aware, that level of movement might be similar to those at the higher Spiritweave levels, but he wouldn’t know until he saw more of them in action.

  Though, if he was honest with himself, part of him wanted to say that the speed was comparative to those at the Dharma great realm. But he couldn’t judge properly. At the Foundation realm, he was just an ant.

  Footsteps down the corridor.

  Diyuan sprung to action. He checked in on Yunya, who was visibly sweating now. He didn’t know how much more time she needed but he was going to give her as much as possible. Diyuan positioned himself so that they would have to pass him to be able to see inside. He checked his own clothes and confirmed how it was torn and bloody in certain locations; the self-inflicted wounds were effectively all healed. The face-down body of the Gu clan member was on the floor with blood smeared here and there. It was showtime.

  Mugong and the other seven walked into view. When they saw the dead body a few of them flinched and halted. Mugong tilted his head in confusion and gave Diyuan a look that simply said huh? Which was fair.

  Mugong collected himself and began fanning himself lazily. “Fel Diyuan, you do have a certain…flair for the dramatic, don’t you?” He walked up and peered down on his clan member. “Poor Lushen. Quite a statement you’ve made by killing him. I’d applaud, but my hands are rather occupied mourning the loss.”

  Diyuan recognized that Mugong wasn’t as overly dramatic with his movements as he normally would be. It was a sign that told him Mugong was ready to strike—one hand using the fan as the distraction, and the other hand in position to throw a hidden dagger if need be. Mugong may act uninterested, but his guard was fully up.

  “You make it sound like I did that,” Diyuan said. He scratched his ear and then nonchalantly crossed him arms. A few people looked disbelievingly at his bloodied outfit.

  “Oh? Are we to believe he sprung a trap while no one else was looking? Tsk tsk, you know how the treaty looks at these types of situations,” Mugong said. “No one was around to see the truth.”

  Diyuan shrugged. “I’m also aware that it talks about forceful suicides. A lone clan member meeting another clan member on purpose, then he mysteriously dies? An easy act to make the true victims give up their storage rings at the low cost of an outcast clan member.”

  “Your words wound me,” Mugong said. “Lusho was a very prominent member of my Gu clan.”

  “Didn’t you call him Lushen earlier?” Diyuan raised his eyebrow. The longer this conversation went, and the longer they didn’t ask where Yunya was, the better.

  Mugong flipped his fan about. “Oh, you know, a nickname. Lushen Lusho Lushump. What does it matter?” He turned to the other six people with him. “I’ll give ten thousand spirit stones to anyone who can correctly state why Lushron did not commit suicide.”

  Now that Mugong brought attention to them, Diyuan realized that each of the tournaments that took place earlier were to the other clan’s strengths.

  The Celing clan were known for their scholarly minds and strategic combat styles. They dressed the part by wearing form-fitting robes in deep blue and silver, with a high neckline and narrow sleeves. They tended to deal with formations and sophisticated needle work. When it came to the game of gambit, the Celing clan should have had an advantage over everyone.

  The Lianhua clan was once renowned for their history and connection with the upper world, but now they were only known for their alchemy. Their robes were mostly soft pastels, embroidered with lotus and peony flowers. They should have been the ones with the advantage in the alchemy competition.

  Lastly, the Honglie clan was a combat focused clan. Their style was almost animalistic, mirroring aspects of demonic beasts in some ways. Their robes were sleeveless and dyed in deep crimson and black. They had visible markings inscribed on their skin, similar to how one would write on a talisman paper. They had artes that would allow them to use those tattoos and strengthen themselves based on it. According to the markings that Diyuan saw, the two Honglie members had artes related to a viper and some beast-like creature; when it came to tournaments, they should be the ones to win.

  If they each decided to participate in these events that Mugong set in the spirit stone room, them having an advantage could explain why they might have accepted. And yet, looking at their faces shine at the simple offer of ten thousand spirit stones made Diyuan wonder if any of them actually ended up winning. They should have significantly more than that now, but the look in their eyes said otherwise.

  A member of the Celing clan stepped forward. “It couldn’t be a suicide.” He strutted forward with his hands behind his back, as if teaching in a classroom. He glanced at the face-down body. Cuts that had seeped, and a pool of blood below the head. “Even if we ignore the obvious makings of battle—the blood on the wall and the evidence of wounds on Fel Diyuan—you can see the blood from Lu…Lush… The man from the Gu clan has wounds that are not fresh. Notice the blood oozing, rather than spilling? The cuts were applied a period after the body stopped producing blood.”

  The Celing member walked back and held up his storage ring hand, to which Mugong held up his own. A brief glow was all the evidence that existed which showed the spirit stone transfer took place right then.

  Diyuan played along and nodded and then raised his hand. “Ah, but teacher, could there be another reason to explain the oozing blood? But maybe that question is better asked to someone from the Lianhua clan.”

  But before the two Lianhua clan members could respond, the same Celing guy snapped back. “Are you saying my assessment is wrong? We of the Celing clan know full well how the body works. Our needle techniques should be more than enough for you to know that much.”

  Diyuan scrunched his face in thought. “Hmm, I don’t disagree. It’s more like I’m looking for an opinion from someone who didn’t take money from the clan member of the guy who is on trial to determine if he is a victim or a perpetrator.” What a mouthful.

  “You would accuse me of accepting a bribe!?”

  “All I’m saying is I want an opinion from the clan known for their alchemy skills, if the oozing blood can be explained by something other than cutting a body after prolonged death.” Diyuan shrugged. “I’m sure someone from the fair Celing clan knows a good rebuttal helps cement the truth.”

  “O-of course! The Celing clan knows this better than anyone. Had anyone doubted my assessment, I would naturally have suggested if any of the Lianhua clan members had a different opinion.”

  Mugong stayed in the back, still prepared for action if needed, but also interested in seeing how everything played out. Diyuan and Mugong shared a brief look—this look said I know you’re lying, and I know you know I know you’re lying, but let’s see what happens.

  The two Lianhua clan members were on the smaller side. If Diyuan recalled correctly, the slightly taller one—though still shorter than Diyuan—should be around 19 years old, but still only level 3 Foundation. The younger one might be 14 years old, but Diyuan wasn’t sure if he formed a Foundation core yet or not. It was the Zhengyi’s clan rules to not allow their clan members into pocket worlds until level 3 Foundation, but that didn’t mean other clans did the same.

  That being said, the Lianhua clan tended to have an expectant protection on them, where no one would purposefully target them without an actual treasure being the prize. After all, Lianhua made business with all the other clans. Like their trademark pills, which always had a fragrance of the lotus flowers. Those pills were known to have greater potency than anywhere else. Risking a trade grudge against the Lianhua clan could cause a slight tip in power.

  Even with his Fel title, Diyuan decided he wouldn’t target Lianhua clan members purposefully.

  The taller Lianhua clan member stepped forward. A glimpse at the dead body below made him a little squeamish. “Well…it is possible to do with a pill. The Blood Weeping Pill, actually. It disrupts circulation, causing it to weep even from minor cuts.”

  Diyuan faked a gasp. “A poison!”

  Mugong rolled his eyes.

  “Yes,” the Lianhua clan member continued, “but we can find out right away if that’s what happened. I have some Shade Dusk Powder that’ll react if I dust some of it.”

  Diyuan silently clicked his tongue, which Mugong noticed and let out a chuckle.

  After a moment, the Lianhua clan member sprinkled a red powder-like substance on the oozing blood. He waited for a moment but nothing happened.

  “I don’t think it was poison,” he smiled to Diyuan, as if he gave the answer Diyuan wanted to hear. It took a second to realize that it wasn’t, so he quickly retreated to the safety of numbers. Mugong went to them and held up his storage ring, showing he was still giving out the ten thousand spirit stones.

  Mugong stepped forward, the fan held closely to his mouth lowering, show the smile of someone enjoying the show. “My, my, Fel Diyuan, must we exhaust every clan’s wisdom to gild your fiction? Or shall we summon the Honglie next to guide your innocence into being?”

  The Celing clan member spoke up again. “There’s no need for that. You see the pool of blood by the head? That’ll give us more information.”

  Why are you speaking up if you already got your spirit stones? Stupid teacher’s pet. Diyuan followed the Celing member’s actions and squatted down near the head, feet hovering just outside the blood puddle’s edge. The Celing guy tilted the dead man’s head, revealing the wound carved by Diyuan’s Wind’s Edge.

  “This…!” He leaned in closer, eyes widening. “This doesn’t look like a suicide!”

  “Of course not,” Diyuan drawled, his voice casual as if looking at grass grow. “I stabbed him there.”

  The Celing guy’s head snapped up, annoyance flashing across his face. “Then what was the whole point with—”

  In a blur of motion, Diyuan summoned a regular dagger from his storage ring, the blade flashing as he slashed it towards the Celing member’s head. He stopped it a hair’s breadth from the temple, his eyes locked onto the Celing guy’s face with a bored look.

  The Celing flinched, slipping on the blood below, and crab-walked backward in a clumsy scramble, sweat beading down his temple.

  Diyuan stood up and stretched. He spun the dagger between his fingers before vanishing it into his ring. “Much like that, but when Lush-Lush fell, he didn’t stand up again.”

  The Celing guy stood and orientated himself, with an attempt to gain back any dignity he might have. “You are clearly being provocative, not to mention wasting everyone’s time with these false hypotheticals about a fictional suicide!”

  Diyuan shrugged. “I was just helping you with a visual demonstration. But who says the suicide was fictional just because I killed him?”

  The Celing guy, indignant now, let his frustration show. “Oh, I don’t know, by the very definition of the word suicide, maybe?”

  “And here I though the Celing people were intelligent. I suppose it’s time to summon the Honglie clan to guide my innocence into being,” Diyuan said, copying Mugong’s phrasing. Truth be told, he found this play to be more amusing than he thought it’d be. Maybe that was why Mugong was always so theatrical. They could form a troupe if they wanted.

  The bigger of the two Honglie clan members stepped forward. His frame was the greatest here and Diyuan counted him as the biggest threat after Mugong. He was also a level 5 Foundation cultivator, though he was a little bit older than Mugong by being the age of 22.

  “I’d like to see how you’d try to make me stumble like a fool,” Honglie guy said. “Hey, Mugong, how much are you willing to pay to have me restrain him for ya to beat up?”

  Mugong fluttered his fan. “Oh, what a delightful proposition, my burly friend. Should you succeed in taming this wild Fel, I shall bestow upon you a princely sum—two hundred thousand spirit stones.” His eyes gleamed with mischief.

  In an instant, all 6 heads turned to look at him in shock. Diyuan didn’t react.

  “Really!?” Honglie guy said in excitement.

  Diyuan said nothing. This would be an easy loophole kill the moment the Honglie guy took a step forward towards him.

  The Honglie guy grinned and positioned himself into a stance that suggested he was about to charge forward. The markings on his sleeveless arms started to glow, which made beast-like claws appear as a silhouette around his hands. “Let’s see why he’s called Fel. Take out those daggers of yours and see how they do against my claws.”

  Mugong leaned forward. “Ah, I neglected to enlighten you, my eager warrior. Though spirit stones await your triumph, I’d counsel caution as it is not a gambit I would do. Our dear Fel Diyuan wields the Yuhan clan’s Stunlock Bind arte, a subtle snare that might bind you the moment you lay hands on him. And oh, your claws do well against daggers, but his expertise isn’t that. Those that survived his cowardly surprise attacks are quick to learn that he is, indeed, a swordsman.”

  Diyuan feigned his own shock by putting a hand to his cheek and then spoke with a tone of mock disbelief. “How surprising! I thought the Honglie brutes could fight their own battles, but it seems Mugong’s become a nursemaid himself. He babysits you better than his own fallen kin.” He tilted his head in a way he thought Mugong would when he wanted to provoke someone.

  The Honglie guy huffed and his chest was visibly reflecting the amount of air he was breathing. Easily riled up, that one.

  Diyuan resumed his normal posture. “Anyway, as members of the Honglie clan, you’re all known to be strong and shouldn’t be underestimated.” Diyuan wasn’t surprised at how quickly they responded to compliments. “I’m sure you’ve probably experienced times when someone wanted to fight against you but it was already a done deal—you knew you’d be able to kill him if you actually fought, and there was no way they didn’t know they would die against you, right?”

  “Of course,” Honglie guy said. His prideful chin was lifted, likely to get the feeling of looking down on Diyuan. “It’s the same thing as suicide, really.”

  Mugong facepalmed.

  “Well then,” Diyuan gave Mugong his own victory look. “I was planning to lead the conversation that way, but you walked into it yourself.” He took a step forward and held out his hands to address everyone. “As you heard, you can commit suicide by using another man’s weapon. Is it still so strange to say that the Gu clan came here alone to purposefully die by my hands? Consider the evidence yourself when—”

  A noise was heard slightly down the hall, in the room where Yunya was at. At that moment, the other clans suddenly remembered that Diyuan wasn’t the only person from the Zhengyi clan—a fact they had forgotten when they stumbled into the unexpected situation.

  Yunya stepped out of the room. Her garments were torn and bloodied, cuts with fresh blood soaking into it from her arms, hands, torso, stomach, and legs. Diyuan froze in shock. The removal of an external arte from the core should only result in internal injuries, so how did she get wounded?

  “Diyuan,” she huffed. “I took the medicine like you instructed, but the wounds didn’t disappear like it was supposed to. The wound is still here.”

  It took another second for Diyuan to comprehend what was going on. She was doing a double-speak, where she said one thing for the public to hear but meant something different for him. Her wounds were self-inflicted. Her claim that her wounds didn’t disappear could only mean one thing.

  “Are you sure you took the medicine properly?” Diyuan said, forcing his panic down.

  “Yes, I am positive. I can feel it.” She put her hand to her stomach gently. “But it didn’t make the wounds disappear.”

  She was saying she had successfully absorbed the heavenly jade arte. But, unlike what should have happened, the jade tablet didn’t disappear.

  The evidence of the Heavenly Fairy Stance arte still existed. The moment they gave up their storage rings, everyone would know about the heavenly arte. It would be a reason for them to unite against the Zhengyi clan—and they would, too, since not uniting would mean an eventual total defeat later.

  The Celing guy came forward with a confused look on his face. “How odd. Her cuts don’t look like it happened a while ago. If anything, it looks like they—”

  A sword appeared in Diyuan’s hands and he spun and pointed it at the group, causing several of them to flinch and step back.

  “Indeed! Indeed, so this is how it is!” He filled his voice with pretend anger, not sure if it was convincing enough. “I was planning to forgive the rest of you as long as Yunya was able to heal properly. But now I see it was all in vain. From the very beginning all the clans decided to team up against us Zhengyi. You didn’t see me complain about all of you keeping us out of the spirit room, did you? And yet, you decided to team up against me for even more spirit stones!” He pointed his blade towards Mugong. “How blind do you think I am by acting in such an obvious manner, Mugong!”

  Mugong raised an eyebrow and had a look that said: this is new, and I’m slightly interested.

  The Honglie brute was fed up, however. “Do you think you can fight all of us? I’d like to see you try.” His claws flared to life once more.

  Diyuan nodded, like he expected this. “Good, no need for you guys to pretend anymore. Step forward and I will slaughter all of you. We’ll give up our storage rings to your elders outside, but then they’d ask why their cute children died over so little treasure. And don’t you worry, I won’t take your storage rings, either. So your elders can wonder double-so as to why you were willing to continue to provoke me even after gaining so much wealth on your own.”

  It was the Lianhua clan that backed out first. The older of the two held up his hands in surrender. “Uh…we’ll leave now, we’re not part of any ambush against the Zhengyi clan…” They stepped back and provided a fist-in-palm salute. “Everyone, we’ll continue to explore the Administrator’s Archive on our own.”

  The Celing clan did the same and backed out, leaving the rest. They were satisfied enough after obtaining their thousands of spirit stones.

  The Honglie guy’s face twitched a bit, seemingly wanting to fight, but decided to continue treasure hunting with his clan partner. At last, it was just Diyuan, Yunya, and Mugong.

  Mugong’s fan unfolded. “Dearest Fel Diyuan, what a tapestry of deceit you’ve woven. I’m wounded! Yet, this new attitude for you is delightful. But in case you get the wrong idea, we both know what would happen if we fought in earnest.” His fan snapped shut, his gaze narrowed. “If we were to dance right here, both of us would walk out alive—but not your ward. I am quite curious to see how this ends.”

  Diyuan made his sword disappear, but he was still on guard in case Mugong launched his own surprise attack. “Poor Mugong, if only your clan member had a fan-shield, too. I don’t need any props to keep Yunya safe. Do try to stay alive before we meet outside.”

  Mugong smiled and stepped back to give them room to walk by. “If you were in that much need of spirit stones, a humble plea could have spared this farce. Unlike some, I am willing to provide aid to those I consider my brother.” He made sure to throw the final jab about Diyuan executing his brother. His gaze lingered on Yunya’s bloodied form with a flicker of intrigue as he offered a graceful bow.

  Diyuan and Yunya both left, moving through the hallways and towards the exit of the labyrinth. It would be an untimed exit, so all the elders waiting might take unexpected action. Yunya looked at him but didn’t say anything.

  As far as Diyuan knew, there wouldn’t be a way to avoid giving up their storage rings without things escalating. The punishment for breaking the treaty they could handle, but some enemy elders may force themselves on the two of them to try to peek inside the rings if he was adamant enough to not show them. That must not be allowed to happen at all costs.

  For the first time in 6 years, Diyuan decided he was going to use the reward he was given by the clan for executing his brother. The Royal Decree.