The sky shook.
A vast aura pressed down from above, heavy enough to make the Dragon Arbiter Stage groan.
Heavenly Sovereign.
No—two.
Space above the stage rippled like disturbed water. Clouds were sliced apart by invisible dao, revealing a void of blinding radiance. From that void, a middle-aged man in imperial robes stepped out, each of his strides landing on the air as if it were solid jade.
Nine divine rings circled behind his head like a blazing halo, each one inscribed with countless obscure runes, each ring echoing with the will of myriad mortals. His presence was thick with kingly majesty, but deeper than that was the terrifying weight of a cultivator who had survived countless eras of slaughter.
Saint Country's Mortal King—sect master of Furious Immortal Saint Country, Ba Xia's father, Little Sovereign at the peak of Nine Divine Rings.
Beside him, the void tore again.
A tall figure stepped out, demonic qi roaring behind him like an ancient beast waking from hibernation. His eyes burned like twin coals, pupils slit like a predator's. Behind him, faint phantoms of a colossal tiger loomed and vanished with each breath.
Tiger King—old ancestor of Tiger's Howl School, a Heavenly Sovereign demon whose ferocity had once shaken the Hundred Cities.
Gasps rippled through the sea of spectators.
"Heavenly Sovereigns…"
"Two… at once…"
"Saint Country's Mortal King… Tiger King…"
Faces turned pale. Even ancient elders who had lived through past eras of war subconsciously straightened their backs, hearts tightening. In this Difficult Dao Era, Heavenly Sovereigns rarely revealed themselves. Two descending together over the Heavenly Dao Academy was enough to make the entire Hundred Cities tremble.
The Dragon Arbiter Stage was a life-and-death platform; its rules were carved in blood. "Life and death are determined by fate; wealth and honor are in the heavens." Those words along its edge had sent off countless corpses.
Today, those words seemed to glow brighter.
Because now, even Heaven-tier backers had come.
On the stage, Ba Xia lay on his back, chest pinned by Li Shuangyan's jade hand hovering over his heart. Lower Tyrannical Immortal Physique that he had once boasted of now seemed meaningless.
Hu Yue, the proud genius from Tiger's Howl School, knelt with Chen Baojiao's hand clamped vice-like around his neck, demonic aura suppressed to a pathetic flicker.
Both boys—once touted as "top five geniuses" of the Hundred Cities—now hovered between life and death at the mercy of two women they had viciously underestimated.
Under the vast pressure descending from the heavens, even the Dragon Arbiter Stage's ancient formations buzzed, as if ready to awaken.
The Mortal King's gaze swept across the stage.
His eyes locked onto Li Shuangyan's palm poised above his son's chest.
"Enough," he said coldly.
His voice carried a strand of Heavenly Sovereign Dao. The words themselves were soft, but in an instant, countless weaker disciples felt their knees threaten to buckle. Some actually dropped to one knee before forcing themselves upright, faces flushed in humiliation.
Li Shuangyan's slender shoulders trembled once under that pressure.
It was not fear—her Dao Heart forged from countless trials did not collapse so easily—but even she was not immune to the instinctive suppression of a higher realm.
Tiger King's gaze speared toward Chen Baojiao and Hu Yue.
"Junior," he said, demonic voice indifferent yet edged like a blade. "Withdraw your hand now, and this king can treat this as youthful impulsiveness. Persist, and—"
"Yo."
The single syllable cut across his threat like a casual knife.
Ling Feng stepped forward.
He walked onto the Dragon Arbiter Stage as if he were strolling into a tavern, hands in his sleeves, black clothes fluttering lightly in the wind. Compared to the towering auras above, his frame looked small, almost ordinary.
But every step landed on the ancient stone with absolute ease, like this stage had always been his personal living room.
He tipped his chin up and looked at the two figures in the sky.
"Sending Heavenly Sovereigns already?" Ling Feng drawled. "You guys really don't know how to be embarrassed."
His tone was relaxed, almost lazy, but it carried clearly to every corner of the stands.
Many disciples stiffened.
Daring to talk to Heavenly Sovereigns like this—this wasn't arrogance; it was madness echoing in the bones.
The Mortal King's eyes narrowed.
"…You are Ling Feng?" he asked, divine rings behind him flaring faintly.
Ling Feng gave him a pleasant smile.
"Mm," he said. "Depending on who you ask, I'm 'that random junior from nowhere,' 'the arrogant brat,' 'disgrace of the Hundred Cities'… or, my favorite lately, 'walking disaster in human skin.' I'm flexible."
Murmurs rippled through the crowd.
The Mortal King's nine divine rings brightened, overlapping patterns creating a vast Heavenly Sovereign domain. To weaker students, each ring looked like a world, densely layered with grand dao.
"Let go of my son," the Mortal King said, voice dropping in temperature. "Do that, and this king will give you a path to live. Persist, and not even your academy's protection will—"
Ling Feng sighed.
"Old man," he said, tone still light. "You really shouldn't say things like that in front of me. Makes me want to prove you wrong."
Tiger King's demonic aura surged, sweeping over the academy like a tsunami. Behind him, the phantom tiger opened its maw, fangs like mountains, claws scraping against the void.
"You court death," Tiger King snarled. "A mere junior Named Hero dares to—"
He never finished.
Ling Feng moved.
He took one step.
To most spectators, it was as if the world blinked.
One moment he was on the Dragon Arbiter Stage, a small figure framed against the stone. The next, he stood in mid-air in front of the two Heavenly Sovereigns, his black robes snapping in the wind of their Dao, his body tiny before their towering domains.
Between them and the academy below, his silhouette was a thin, dark line.
He slowly lifted both fists.
No ancient treasure appeared. No immortal scripture manifested behind him. He didn't even announce a technique name.
Just two fists, held in a simple, honest stance.
Some elders frowned.
"This junior…"
"Is he insane? Bare fists against Heavenly Sovereigns?"
Inside Ling Feng's body, Chaos-tainted spirit energy roared quietly. The Master Emerald sitting in his Niwan Palace pulsed once, unseen by all, its alien force bullying the local Dao into silence rather than resonating with it.
His right fist drew a short arc and fell toward the Mortal King.
The Heavenly Sovereign's nine divine rings reacted instantly, instinct honed through countless battles snapping into place. The rings spun, forming an incomparably complex formation; grand dao patterns surged out like an ocean, layer upon layer of defense blossoming. Each ring was a fortress formed from the faith of a nation, the accumulation of an era.
To any other cultivator, it would have been an unshakable wall.
Ling Feng's fist looked almost lazy when it touched the first ring.
There was no thunderous explosion.
There was just—
Crack.
Chaos surged.
It didn't push. It didn't simply collide.
It cut.
The first divine ring, forged through millions of worshipers' faith and countless years of cultivation, split like thin porcelain tapped by a hammer. Fine fractures spider-webbed across its surface, each crack filled with a faint, alien crimson light.
The Mortal King's pupils shrank.
"You—"
The second ring shattered.
The third fractured and collapsed. The fourth disintegrated from the point of impact outward, dissolving like sand thrown into a furnace.
It wasn't brute force that destroyed them.
It was a thread of Dao nested within the punch—Chaos that refused acknowledge the Heavenly Sovereign's authority. His rings did not "lose"; they were denied, overwritten, their existence simply crossed out from reality's ledger.
The Mortal King coughed a mouthful of blood. The backlash tore through his Fate Palaces; his Heavenly Sovereign foundation, painstakingly built in a difficult era, screamed as if flayed. His body lurched backward as if struck by a mountain.
Standing far below, disciples watched in horror as the ultimate symbol of a Heavenly Sovereign—the nine divine rings—shattered one after another like decorative glass.
Before the Mortal King could even begin to fall, Ling Feng's left fist had already landed on Tiger King.
The demon ancestor's body was wrapped in a terrifying demonic domain—feral qi took the shape of a colossal tiger, claws crossed over him, fangs bared, countless demonic scripts swirling like a hurricane. His grand dao sought to twist, to evade, to swallow the incoming blow.
Chaos-infused force threaded through Ling Feng's punch, ignoring distance, ignoring the notion of "inside" and "outside." It sunk directly into the core of Tiger King's Dao, like a nail hammered into the heart of a drum.
Tiger King felt something cold and absolute brush against his origin.
You opposed my woman's path.
The thought flashed through his mind—not from Ling Feng's mouth, but from the intent in that fist.
His demonic instinct screamed. This was not a Named Hero's strike. This wasn't even a mere Heavenly Sovereign's technique.
This was an authority that refused to sit beneath the Heaven of this era at all.
Then—
His world turned red.
From below, it all looked deceptively simple.
Two Heavenly Sovereigns.
Two punches.
Two blossoms of blood mist exploding in the sky.
There was no prolonged exchange—no earth-shattering collisions, no contest of a hundred grand daos. Just two impacts… and then two supreme beings of the Hundred Cities turned into drifting red fog.
Silence crashed down over the Heavenly Dao Academy.
Every hall—Grand Era, Zenith Era, Idle Era, Sacred Era, Emperor Era—fell wordless at once. Even the ever-present murmur of distant profound beasts and circulating formations seemed to mute.
Some disciples stared with their mouths open, breath forgotten.
Some older cultivators who had watched Heavenly Sovereigns fight in past eras felt a chill crawl up their spines, forcing themselves to keep their knees from giving out.
A black-clad youth whose realm label still said "junior," whose realm name was "Named Hero," whose fists had just turned Heavenly Sovereigns into nothing.
Ling Feng flexed his fingers lightly, shaking his hands out as if they'd gone a bit stiff from sitting too long.
He looked up at the scattering blood mist, expression almost bored.
"What a waste," he said mildly. "Sending mere Heavenly Sovereigns…"
His gaze slid lazily to the banners of Furious Immortal Saint Country and Tiger's Howl School, still trembling at the edges of the crowd.
"…is an insult," he finished. "Next time, if you want to make it worth my time, push a Virtuous Paragon out here."
The words weren't shouted. They didn't need to be.
Every cultivator on the Dragon Arbiter Stage heard them clearly, as if the stage itself carried his voice to their ears.
No one answered.
No one could.
The Heavenly Sovereign auras were gone. The nine divine rings had shattered. The phantom tiger had been torn apart from the inside. Their blood drifted down as a faint, vanishing drizzle over distant mountains, too high to even stain the stage.
Far above, hidden in the void, old monsters who had been spying with divine sense felt that foreign force and went rigid.
The Dragon Arbiter Stage's archaic formations hummed in uneasy satisfaction, runes along the edges absorbing a portion of that slaughter into their long, bloody history.
Ling Feng turned back toward the platform without a backward glance.
Li Shuangyan and Chen Baojiao still stood where they had been, hands poised to deliver killing blows. Ba Xia and Hu Yue stared up at the sky, faces drained completely white. They had just watched the ultimate backers they were relying on die like insects—no, less than insects.
Ling Feng walked back onto the stone stage, boots clicking lightly.
He came to a stop between his women.
"Continue," he said calmly.
Ba Xia's composure shattered.
"W-wait—"
Chen Baojiao's fingers tightened around Hu Yue's neck.
Li Shuangyan's jade palm lowered.
Somewhere in the stands, a disciple couldn't stop themselves from whispering, voice trembling, "What about… the consequences? Furious Immortal Saint Country… Tiger's Howl School…"
Ling Feng glanced in that direction, eyes half-lidded.
He smiled.
"If they want revenge," he said, voice light, "they can come line up. I'll process them in order. Until then—"
His gaze flicked toward Mei Suyao on the high terrace; the fairy's face was pale but composed, eyes deep with calculation and something like awe.
"—they're just noise," he finished.
The last of the Heavenly Sovereigns' blood mist drifted away on the wind.
Chen Baojiao's fingers closed.
Bones snapped like dry branches in winter. Hu Yue's throat collapsed; his demonic aura scattered in a messy, unwilling surge. His Fate Palaces flickered, then dimmed one by one, going out like candles in a storm.
Li Shuangyan's palm descended.
It was almost gentle, a clean, precise strike.
Ba Xia's chest sank inward with the soft but final sound of breaking ice. His life wheel cracked, the Lower Tyrannical Immortal Physique that had once made him strut now groaning once before completely stilling.
The two "top five geniuses" of the Hundred Cities died on the Dragon Arbiter Stage.
In front of everyone.
Under the Heavenly Dao Academy's rules.
With their Heavenly Sovereign backers' blood still hanging in the air a moment ago.
For a long breath, then two, then ten… no one moved.
Even Ling Feng's own group remained very still, the weight of what had just happened pressing into their bones.
Then he exhaled, dusted his hands off, and broke the tension with a single clap.
"Alright," he said. "That's that."
The sound was oddly sharp in the silence.
He turned first to Li Shuangyan and Chen Baojiao.
On the surface, both of them were calm. Li Shuangyan's veil hid most of her face, leaving only those clear eyes. Chen Baojiao's lips curled in a careless half-smirk.
But Ling Feng could see the strain.
The faint shaking in Chen Baojiao's fingers now that the adrenaline faded. The subtle tightness in Li Shuangyan's spine, the micro-tremor in the aura around her Pure Jade Physique.
He stepped forward and pulled both of them into his arms.
His right hand slid around Li Shuangyan's slender waist, drawing her close in a way that ignored the eyes of a thousand disciples. His left hand hooked around the back of Chen Baojiao's neck, tugging her forward until her forehead rested against his shoulder.
"You two did well," he said quietly.
Chen Baojiao let out a breath that was half-laugh, half-choked.
"If I do any better," she muttered into his chest, "half the Hundred Cities will be gone."
Li Shuangyan slowly relaxed, tension bleeding out of her back. Her fingers—cool and exquisite—curled into his robe, as if anchoring herself there.
"The Tiger's Howl School and Furious Immortal Saint Country…" she said softly, voice carrying the clear tone of someone who understood the scale of what they had just done.
"Are both uppity and don't know their place," Ling Feng replied, tone still light, but steel hidden under the casual words.
He leaned back enough to look at them properly.
"Let them hate," he said. "Let them plot. That's their hobby, not ours. Your job is to walk further. I'll handle whatever comes."
Xu Pei stepped closer, storm-like qi subdued around her, eyes complicated.
"Young Noble Feng," she said quietly. "Furious Immortal Saint Country and Tiger's Howl will not forget today."
"Good," he said. "If they forget, I'll have to remind them."
Bai Jianzhen's gaze lingered on the blood staining the Dragon Arbiter Stage, then on Ling Feng.
"…You are making more enemies," she said bluntly.
Ling Feng shrugged.
"If I worried about that kind of thing," he said, "we'd still be hiding in some backwater village watching other clowns act amazing."
He turned his head.
Chi Xiaodie and Bing Yuxia were approaching, their steps measured, eyes full of conflicting emotions.
Chi Xiaodie stopped a few steps away.
Her royal composure had cracks in it now. Raised as Lion's Roar's princess, she understood very clearly what it meant to kill Heavenly Sovereigns and top geniuses in public. It was not a small matter.
"…Our Lion's Roar…" she began, then faltered. "The storm that will follow—"
Ling Feng smiled at her, softer now.
"Princess," he said, voice gentle. "Didn't we agree? You run your country. I deal with the noisy ones."
Her throat worked.
"You killed their Heavenly Sovereigns," she said quietly. "That is beyond 'noise.' This will ripple through the Hundred Cities… through the Ancient Kingdoms. They will not sit still."
"Then they'll learn faster," he said. "Better than letting them creep around your borders, forcing marriages and whispering threats, right?"
His gaze gentled.
"You said you would be greedy," he reminded her. "So be greedy. Take the peace I'm buying you, and use it. Strengthen Lion's Roar. Walk your path."
Chi Xiaodie's fingers tightened around the hilt of her saber before slowly easing.
She looked at him, then at the distant banners of various powers, then back at him again.
Her lips pressed together.
After a moment, she bowed.
Not as a princess bestowing favor.
As a woman acknowledging the shield someone had thrown over her home.
"…Then this Chi will be greedy," she said softly. "And trouble Young Noble again."
"Good," Ling Feng replied, satisfied. "I like high-maintenance."
Bing Yuxia's eyes were sharper, ice-cold and bright. The Ice Empress' aura around her carried the chill of ten thousand snowy peaks.
"You are insane," she said frankly. "Killing Heavenly Sovereigns like that… You're dragging the academy into the eye of the storm."
Ling Feng grinned at her.
"You say that," he said, "but your eyes are shining, Ice Empress."
Her fan snapped open halfway, hiding part of her face.
"…This young master is merely curious," she said. "If you fall, I will have front-row seats."
"Mm," Ling Feng said. "You can sit next to me."
Her fan twitched, just a little.
Chi Xiaodao, who had been standing at the back trying not to hyperventilate, finally blurted, "Brother Ling, are you sure you don't need us to—"
"Nope," Ling Feng cut him off. "Your job is to keep breathing and not trip into any more scams. Let the old men panic; we'll use the quiet to train."
He turned, raising his voice just enough for the upper terraces.
"Old Daoist Peng!" he called. "I promised you a demonstration, right? Consider this the teaser. Full show comes later."
Somewhere in the distance, an ancient sigh drifted on the wind.
The academy's old monsters had watched everything.
They would move—or choose not to—based on their own calculations.
Ling Feng… did not care much.
He had his own timetable.
…
The crowd eventually began to disperse, the story already taking root in countless mouths.
By the time the sun had dipped westward, every hall had its own version of the events on the Dragon Arbiter Stage.
In Idle Era Hall, disciples gestured wildly as they retold it.
"Two punches, Senior Brother, just two!"
"In one breath—gone! Heavenly Sovereigns!"
In Grand Era Hall, younger students walked more quietly, but their backs were straighter, as if Ling Feng's shadow had quietly pressed their spines upright.
In higher realms, letters and communication jades flew back to various sects and countries.
"The Mortal King has fallen."
"Tiger King has fallen."
"The Heavenly Dao Academy's Grand Era Hall… has birthed a storm."
…
That night, the Grand Era Hall courtyard was calmer than rumor suggested.
The evening sky shifted from blood-red sunset to deep indigo. Lanterns hung from carved eaves, casting warm halos over stone paths and ancient pines. The wind carried faint scents of ink, tea, and the lingering sharpness of sword qi from earlier training.
Ling Feng did not half-ass his bets.
He had claimed winning days from Chi Xiaodie and Bing Yuxia. So when he wanted a "day" with Chi Xiaodie, he did it properly.
The first day belonged to the Lion's Roar princess.
…
Lion's Roar's assigned courtyard in the academy was usually a place of strict discipline—jade pavilions arranged with military precision, practice fields lined with spear racks, banners bearing the roaring golden lion fluttering in the wind.
Today, Chi Xiaodie stood in the center of that courtyard in full formal royal robes.
Her hair was coiled in an elaborate, dignified style. Bronze armor plates hidden beneath silk. The aura she wore was that of Lion's Roar's princess meeting foreign envoys, not a girl paying a gamble.
She looked like she was about to negotiate a truce between civilizations.
Ling Feng gave her a once-over.
He lasted for three breaths.
"Yeah, no," he said. "You look like you're going to sign a border treaty, not hang out."
Chi Xiaodie's brows twitched.
"This princess is honoring the bet," she replied calmly. "Naturally, proper decorum—"
Ling Feng stepped in close.
Before she could react, his hand slid up and gently tugged at the ribbon tying her outer robe.
The knot came loose.
The heavy outer robe slipped from her shoulders like a shed shell, revealing a lighter inner dress beneath. It was still dignified, still carried the Lion's Roar grace—but now it looked like something a young woman could breathe in, rather than armor a princess wore to withstand a thousand eyes.
"There we go," Ling Feng said, satisfied. "I asked for a day with Xiaodie, not Her Highness Lion Monarch's Diplomatic Envoy."
Her ears flushed crimson. She snatched the robe from his hand on reflex.
"You—! If any elder saw—"
"They'd die of envy," Ling Feng said, dead serious. "Come on. I'm kidnapping you."
"…This princess is not so easily kidnapped," she muttered, but she did not move away as he folded the robe neatly and tucked it into his ring.
He held out his arm.
For a moment, Chi Xiaodie hesitated.
In her mind, maps of the Eastern Hundred Cities appeared—Lion's Roar's borders, threats from Furious Immortal, shadows of Ancient Kingdoms, the fresh image of Heavenly Sovereigns turning to blood mist.
Duty weighed on her shoulders.
Then she exhaled.
She set her hand lightly on his forearm.
The disciples on guard duty nearly swallowed their tongues.
"P-Princess…"
Her eyes slid to them with a faint glare, and their gazes dropped at once. They pretended to be stone statues. Very nervous stone statues.
Ling Feng just grinned at them as he walked past with her.
"Don't worry," he said cheerfully. "I'll return her in one piece. Probably."
"Ling Feng," Chi Xiaodie hissed under her breath, but the corner of her lips betrayed the urge to laugh.
…
He didn't take her to some remote secret realm or dragon bone peak.
He took her down the mountain.
The city beneath the Heavenly Dao Academy was alive, as always—vendors shouting under hanging lanterns, spirit beasts pulling carriages, mortals and cultivators weaving through streets paved with old stone and older arrays. Stalls steamed with spiritual beast meat. Street performers balanced blades infused with faint qi, entertaining children.
Chi Xiaodie had walked cities all her life—touring garrisons, inspecting soldiers, bowing to elders.
She had not walked them like this.
With roasted skewers in one hand, sugar candy in the other, following a man who seemed determined to buy snacks from every stall that caught his eye.
"Try this," Ling Feng said, breaking a skewer in half and handing it to her. "Spiritual beast meat. They say it helps you grow taller."
"This princess does not need to grow taller," she said sharply.
He looked her up and down very obviously, eyes comically thoughtful.
"Couldn't hurt," he said.
She choked.
Her Dao Heart—tempered through politics, saber practice, and the pressure of Heavenly Sovereigns—had held steady through storms and bloodshed.
It apparently did not protect her against a man teasing her height while hand-feeding her street food.
She took a bite anyway.
The flavor hit her tongue: rich, spicy, layered with a faint trace of qi that warmed her meridians. For a moment, the heaviness of the day—the dead Heavenly Sovereigns, the fallen geniuses, the looming storm—blurred at the edges.
"…It is acceptable," she admitted, eyes lowering.
Ling Feng nodded solemnly.
"Highest praise from Her Highness," he said. "I'll immortalize this: 'Princess of Lion's Roar grudgingly approves one skewer.'"
They threaded through the city slowly.
He pointed out little things—children playing cultivation games with wooden swords, an old granny selling talismans that were probably fake but made with care, a calligraphy stall where a scholar was writing famous cultivation maxims for coins.
Sometimes he bought things without much reason.
A cheap hairpin shaped like a lion.
He passed it to her, deadpan. "For your brand."
"This princess has no need for such—"
He gently slid it into her hair himself, fingers warm as they brushed her ear.
"Humor me," he said.
Her protest dissolved into a tiny exhale.
Later, they found an old teahouse and took the cheapest table by the open window.
"Why this one?" she asked, bewildered. "The private rooms upstairs are—"
"All the best gossip sits near the street," he said. "Trust me. Upstairs is just old men pretending to be mysterious."
They watched people pass.
Chi Xiaodie spoke about Lion's Roar in measured tones—oaths sworn by her ancestors to guard the human race, the weight of a throne built under the shadows of Immortal Emperors, the constant calculations needed to keep their country from being swallowed by Ancient Kingdoms.
She talked about threats creeping from three directions at once—Tiger's Howl pressing here, Furious Immortal there, some unknown hand tugging threads in the dark.
Ling Feng listened.
He didn't interrupt with grand strategies or moral lectures.
He just leaned back, sipping tea that wasn't very good, and filled the silences.
"So you're scared they'll come for you from three sides at once," he said at one point, watching a boat drift along a canal outside. "Tiger's Howl on one, Furious Immortal on another, and some hidden clown pulling strings from behind."
"This princess is not afraid," she retorted, too quickly. "She merely understands the difficulty."
"Mm. Sure," he said lightly. "But even if you were scared… that'd be normal."
She glanced at him, startled.
He smiled sidelong at her.
"Honestly?" he said. "You're doing great. Most people fold the moment someone waves Heavenly Kings at them. You're here swinging your saber at so-called geniuses."
She looked down at her tea.
"…You make it sound simple," she murmured.
"Because for me, it is," he said plainly. "You're the one doing the hard job. I just kill things."
The way he said it—calm, matter-of-fact, as if he were naming the weather—made her chest tighten.
Two Heavenly Sovereigns exploding into blood mist flashed in her mind again.
She suddenly laughed, quietly.
"Only you would say such words," she said.
"You like it, though," he said.
Her ears colored again.
"This princess… does not dislike it," she conceded.
He let the words hang there.
The day stretched into evening.
They wandered through quieter streets, watched a street performer fail spectacularly at balancing on a sword, listened to an old storyteller recount tales of Immortal Emperors on a corner.
Eventually, they stood on a rooftop terrace near the academy as the sun sank completely, leaving the Eastern Hundred Cities glowing faintly below like a constellation.
Night wind tugged at their hair and sleeves. Far below, lantern lights flickered, reflecting in Chi Xiaodie's eyes.
"Ling Feng," she said suddenly.
"Yeah?"
"…If the storm grows larger than expected." Her gaze never left the horizon. Her fingers brushed the cheap lion hairpin he had given her. "Even then, will you still say such words? That it is simple?"
Ling Feng studied her profile for a long breath.
Princess of Lion's Roar—her back straight, saber calluses on her palms, shoulders holding up a country and a race.
He stepped closer.
His hand rose slowly, giving her every chance to pull away.
She didn't.
He cupped her cheek, thumb brushing the faint flush there, then gently drew her into his chest.
Chi Xiaodie stiffened for a heartbeat.
Then, gradually, she relaxed.
The embrace was not distant politeness.
It was warm and solid, his chin resting lightly atop her hair, one hand at the small of her back, the other steady at her shoulder. It said: I'm here. Stop overthinking for a minute.
"If the storm grows larger," he said quietly, voice gentler than anyone in the academy had ever heard from him, "then I just punch harder."
Her fingers curled into his robe.
"…This princess," she murmured, voice slightly muffled, "will hold you to those words."
"Good," he answered, smiling into her hair. "I like greedy women, remember? So be greedy. Take everything I can buy you."
The phrasing made her heart stutter.
"Buy" sounded almost flippant on the surface. But she had seen what he used as currency—Heavenly Sovereigns' lives, geniuses' corpses, storms of Dao turned into nothing.
She didn't pull away.
The physical closeness did not feel forced. It felt like the inevitable conclusion of the day—the street food, the teasing, his casual promise to stand between her and a world of wolves.
By the time they stepped apart, the night sky was fully scattered with stars.
Chi Xiaodie's face had regained its usual solemn composure—but beneath that calm, something inside had settled. A knot of tension that she had carried alone for years had loosened.
Something had opened.