Gu Chengming smacked his lips, savoring what still lingered on them from a moment ago.
Why had the Hundred Emperor come out so forcefully this time? Those two small hands had clamped around his waist hard enough to nearly squeeze the breath out of him on the spot.
Granted, the Hundred Emperor had never been what anyone would call restrained about expressing enthusiasm before, either...
Well. He couldn't quite work out the reason, and he didn't let his thoughts linger on it.
Once he'd collected himself, Gu Chengming turned his attention to the Dharma-Station.
The whole point of tonight, after all, had been to help Zhou Qingmu prove a Dharma-Station. If the proving had failed, the entire affair would have fallen apart at the last step.
So he was, admittedly, a little worried about whether Director Zhou had managed it.
With that thought he looked toward the spot where Zhou Qingmu had vanished — and found that at some point he'd missed entirely, she had already proven it. The pressure of a Sixth Realm Sovereign rolling off her was proof enough.
On the ground, the handful of Fifth Realm cultivators who had been beaten black and blue all tucked their heads a little lower in the same instant. Under the circumstances, playing dead was clearly the optimal strategy.
Relief loosened in Gu Chengming's chest. He was on the verge of offering congratulations when he noticed his Director's face had gone subtly strange — roughly the look of someone who had just won the grand prize and then discovered a good chunk of the winnings had been stolen.
It took him no time to work out what she must have seen, and for reasons he chose not to examine, a twinge of guilt went through him.
Zhou Qingmu, meanwhile, had just watched Little Gu smack his lips like that, and something distinctly unpleasant welled up in her.
She said nothing about the scene she'd witnessed. She behaved as though nothing had happened at all, smiled, and delivered the line with the full weight of her considerable acting ability: "I have not failed the charge."
It came out crisp and clean. Had Gu Chengming not spent the last minute studying her face on the sly, that breezy composure would have fooled him completely.
Something eased in him, and he smiled, meaning every bit of it. "Congratulations, Director."
He was honestly glad for her. With the Sixth Realm in hand, the Night-Watch Bureau had its load-bearing pillar back, and there would be no more petty operators taking a mile the moment they were given an inch.
"Now you'll have to come back to the Night-Watch Bureau and take the whole board in hand again," he said sincerely.
Zhou Qingmu laughed under her breath.
"What kind of talk is that?" Her gaze settled on him, warm. "How long has Director Little Gu even been sitting in that chair? I think I'd do better staying where I am, as Deputy Director, and assisting you."
Gu Chengming weighed his words. "Wouldn't the Night-Watch Bureau overawe people more with a Sixth Realm Sovereign sitting openly at its head?"
He wasn't joking.
With the Great Tribulation approaching, if the Bureau had no visible Sixth Realm presiding over it, it would never hold down the restless mass of rogue cultivators and outside sects underneath.
Zhou Qingmu thought about it, then smiled. "Not necessarily. As things stand now, the arrangement is more intimidating, not less."
Gu Chengming considered that, and his face turned peculiar.
She had a point, actually. A Fourth Realm cultivator seated as Director of the Night-Watch Bureau, with a Sixth Realm Sovereign content to serve beneath him as Deputy Director. Any ordinary cultivator hearing that arrangement would arrive at exactly one first thought —
— this kid is absolutely some ancient monster hiding his cultivation and starting over.
Cut loose, he could probably match a Sovereign holding a high-ranked Sixth Realm Dharma-Station. How else would you explain a Sovereign willingly serving as his second?
Zhou Qingmu watched that expression cross his face, and her smile widened.
Night wind swept the broken walls of the Joy Palace ruins, lifting a few dead leaves into a spiral and carrying them off. The Fifth Realm cultivators on the ground still held their "already deceased" poses, motionless, committed to the role with a dedication that was frankly moving.
Zhou Qingmu glanced at the sky. The moonlight had slipped behind the clouds, and the dark thickened.
"Let's go." She turned her head toward him, her tone light. "Back to the Night-Watch Bureau. Late supper."
Gu Chengming: "After you, Director?"
Zhou Qingmu: "Dear—"
Ah, no. The Gu-repression had slipped out again.
The word already on her tongue, she changed course. "But of course."
It seemed to Gu Chengming that his Director kept stopping halfway through her sentences today, but he didn't dwell on it. He only smiled and nodded. "Then I'd be rude to refuse."
The two of them walked out of the Joy Palace ruins one behind the other, their figures dissolving into the night.
Behind them, a certain Sect Head of the Central Province lying on the ground finally dared to move. He raised his head with enormous care, watched the two retreating backs, and swallowed. "That Director Gu..."
Beside him, the Roving Swordsman of the Eastern Territory answered feebly, "Don't ask. The answer is that we can't afford to offend him."
...
Just as Gu Chengming had predicted, once word of everything that happened at the Joy Palace ruins traveled back to the Capital, cultivators everywhere reacted with startling unanimity.
Knew it. The kid's an ancient monster, cultivating over from scratch.
And in fairness, they had grounds. Gu Chengming's earlier record was astonishing, but item by item it could still be crammed under the heading of "brilliant young talent." Slaying the jiao in the East Sea, hunting demons at Snowfall Pass — outrageous, certainly, but not outrageous past the heavens.
The further down the list you went, though, the worse the flavor got.
Crushing the field on points at the Grand Tournament. Making his name in a single battle at Floating Isle City. And now, at the Joy Palace ruins in the Capital, taking on the Delirium Jintian and a whole pack of Fifth Realm cultivators alone. The man's record read like the protagonist of a storyteller's tale — except a storyteller at least gives his protagonist some room to grow, whereas this one had come out of the starting gate at max level and gone sprinting off.
And then you remembered that Gu Chengming was only just past twenty this year.
In all the thousands upon thousands of years of the cultivation world, when had there ever been such a precedent?
Even the Tribulation-Severing Sovereign, called the foremost genius of his age, had frittered away who knew how many years in his youth before climbing step by step to the summit.
This one, on the other hand, had gone from initiation to thrashing Fifth Realm cultivators as easily as drinking water, and along the way had still found time to fall in love, collect cultivation techniques, and become a Holy Son.
So the conclusion most people reached was—
— the old bastard isn't even pretending anymore!
Naturally, the handful of people close to Gu Chengming knew the truth of it.
Honestly, there were moments when Zhou Qingmu genuinely wished he were some ancient great power reincarnated and rebuilding his cultivation.
It would have made a certain hurdle inside her so much easier to clear.
An older man, after all. Pursuing one carried no guilt whatsoever, and she wouldn't get that queasy lurch every time she remembered her own age.
But she knew Little Gu was nothing of the kind. He was the genuine article, a dazzling young prodigy — no memories of a past life, no ancient monster pouring cultivation into him, nothing but his own two feet carrying him step by step to where he stood today.
Which left Zhou Qingmu's feelings on the subject extremely complicated.
What Zhou Qingmu did not know was that if Gu Chengming had any inkling of these thoughts, his first words would probably have been: "Everything I, Gu Chengming, have attained today, I attained entirely on my own." Followed at once by: "Cultivation LoveLove System, allocate my stat points!"
But of course, Gu Chengming had no idea what Zhou Qingmu was thinking.
For that matter, Zhou Qingmu counted as a young prodigy in her own right. She entered the Imperial Academy at fourteen, created Zhouli's Heaven-Human Heart-Rectifying Method at seventeen, and had begun making her mark at court while barely past twenty. In those days no one in the Capital could mention her name without praise.
But between one genius and another there is, in the end, still a gap.
Take, for example, the "young" in her young genius. The shelf life on that seemed about to run out.
Ascending to Sixth Realm Sovereign had, if anything, made Zhou Qingmu's days busier.
Back when she stood half a step into the Sixth Realm, no one at court had dared oppose the Night-Watch Bureau openly, but the quiet business of tripping it up in the shadows had never once let up.
Ministry of Revenue allocations always stalled at the final approval and sat there. A Ministry of War transfer order could take half a month to grind through the process. Even the clerks at the Ministry of Rites had taken to writing their official dispatches in ornate parallel prose so they could insult the Bureau by indirection.
And now? With a Sixth Realm Sovereign presiding, every one of those problems split open at a touch.
Ministry of Revenue funds arrived the next day. Ministry of War transfer orders went from half a month to half a day. Ministry of Rites dispatches now came in immaculate handwriting and warmly affectionate phrasing — even the salutation at the top had changed from "Director Zhou of the Night-Watch Bureau" to "Sovereign Zhou Qingmu of the Night-Watch Bureau."
Congratulatory gifts from every quarter, meanwhile, piled up until they filled the Bureau's rear courtyard.
Making Sovereign had eased the pressure from court considerably. It had also buried her in that much more work.
And of all of it, what troubled Zhou Qingmu most was the matter of Gu Chengming.
For reasons she couldn't name, the sight of him locked in that kiss with the white-haired woman refused to leave her head.
Her Gu-repression was getting worse besides. She had even, in private, called that image up in her mind and touched herself to it a few times.
Every time she finished, lying on the couch in her own residence, her feelings were exceptionally complicated.
The deeper the Gu-repression ran, the sharper her sense of crisis.
Zhou Qingmu saw it clearly enough: her Little Gu genuinely had feelings for that white-haired girl, and the two of them were just as plainly mutual about it.
Which made her strategic position a decidedly grim one. If she didn't move soon, someone else was going to settle into that seat for good.
And so, on the day the Gu-repression had been repressed past all possibility of further repression, Zhou Qingmu changed into plain clothes, picked up a jar of wine, and knocked at the gate of Gu Chengming's courtyard.
Gu Chengming, at that moment, was wrestling with two problems of his own.
The first was the Delirium Jintian, who had slipped away from the contest over the Dharma-Station that day.
He'd combed through a great deal of material afterward, only to discover that the Delirium Jintian didn't actually count as a member of the Eternal Life Sect at all.
The Delirium lineage had originally been a side branch of the Eternal Life Sect, specializing in word-becomes-law. Later, for reasons no one could articulate clearly, a portion of that lineage defected, carrying off the title of Jintian and setting up on their own.
Strictly speaking, relations between the Delirium Jintian and the Eternal Life Sect were about as poisonous as they came.
A traitor is more loathsome than an enemy. That much passes for common wisdom in any world you care to name.
Left alone, the Delirium lineage might even function as a serious check on the Eternal Life Sect.
The enemy of your enemy can, provisionally, be called a friend.
But Gu Chengming had already used Infinite Love on her. How could he allow Infinite Love's record to slide down from a hundred percent?
All right — that part was a joke.
But he had in truth resolved to kill the Delirium Jintian. He'd wounded her that badly; the two of them were blood enemies now, surely. If he didn't finish her, the Capital could look forward to a few more pieces of nonsense before long.
[The Red Dust Phantom Body Formula is in profound agreement.]
[The Red Dust Phantom Body Formula's approval of you has deepened.]
Gu Chengming took some comfort in that. A true kindred spirit is hard to find; Miss Red Dust remained rock solid.
Even so, he had used the Red Dust Art to sweep along the direction of her flight over and over, and had not turned up a single thread of her trail.
Which bore out the old saying: the Eternal Life Sect's people may not be much in a fight, but when it comes to running and staying alive, they are genuinely first-rate.
The second problem was his own efforts to grow stronger.
As the days passed, his cultivation had risen, easily and of its own accord, to the fifth level of the Fourth Realm.
Ever since he'd advanced into the Fourth Realm, the improvement the realm itself brought him had become negligible. In the eyes of outsiders, though, that pace would knock another batch of jaws loose.
For Gu Chengming, it was simply water finding its channel.
The enemies he faced these days were all mechanics bosses, after all. A gap of one or two levels of cultivation — four or five, even — counted for almost nothing against opponents who casually turned words into law or ran time backward.
If his power was going to make another leap in kind, the key still lay with the CGs.
And there happened to be one sitting right in front of him.
Love's Zhouli's Heaven-Human Heart-Rectifying Method.
Except Gu Chengming had gone as far as looking in on the Zhouli's Heaven-Human Heart-Rectifying Method's room, and then given up.
One step through the door and he'd been thrown straight back out. Clearly a rather complicated CG; clearing that route would take no small amount of time and effort.
For the moment, better to settle the Delirium Jintian problem first.
The Flowing Cloud Moon-Tracing Sovereign had asked once whether he'd like her to take a hand in the search.
A Sixth Realm Sovereign hunting down a wounded Fifth Realm cultivator wouldn't be effortless, but it beat him blundering about at random.
He'd thought it over and declined politely. He wanted to try on his own first, and if he truly couldn't find her, then he'd ask the Sovereign to take the field.
The Sovereign didn't press. She only pushed the jade slip with her aura sealed inside it a little further into his hand and told him to keep it close.
It was during these days of hunting the Delirium Jintian's trail that Zhou Qingmu came knocking.
It was dusk. Gu Chengming had just come back from a circuit outside, and when he pushed the courtyard gate open he found his Deputy Director standing beneath the eaves with her hands clasped behind her back, studying the osmanthus tree in his yard — the one he had, at some point, forced into full bloom with his Jiahao's ability.
"Director?" Gu Chengming quickened his steps. "What wind blew you here?"
Zhou Qingmu turned, unhurried. "The Folly-Joy Gu's Dharma-Station has stabilized. There are a few matters I wanted to go over with you in person."
He nodded, showed her inside, and brewed a pot of tea with his own hands before setting it out.
"You're looking well, Director," he said after studying her face, and he meant it.
"Thanks to you." Zhou Qingmu took the cup and sipped.
Then she gave him a brief account of the Folly-Joy Gu's Dharma-Station rules.
"Governing rite through theater." She thought a moment and picked the shortest explanation she had. "Within the bounds of my authority, I can frame the present moment inside the structure of a play. Everyone inside it, high cultivation or low, must observe the rites of that structure."
"And if the rites are not kept, the play does not hold, the role does not stand, and nothing goes right for the one who broke them."
Gu Chengming turned that over. "With a hand like that, Director, court business should run smoothly for you from here on."
Zhou Qingmu smiled. "I don't expect much use out of it at court."
Her gaze rested on his face a moment, as though there were something she meant to say. In the end she drew it back.
She had obviously not come to discuss Dharma-Station rules. But she could hardly lead with Little Gu, let's have a talk about that white-haired girl, so the plan was to circle in slowly by way of official business, take a few laps, and then move as the opportunity offered.
So the two of them chatted on and off, the mood perfectly comfortable.
Until a moon-white figure came out of the back hall.
The Flowing Cloud Moon-Tracing Sovereign carried in a plate of freshly steamed jujube-paste cakes, strolled unhurriedly to the table, and set the plate down by Gu Chengming's hand. "Young friend. You said earlier that you wanted these."
Gentle tone, entirely natural manner, carrying a faint air of I made my young friend a snack in my own kitchen.
Zhou Qingmu's hand stopped. She was of course aware that the Sovereign was living here.
Gu Chengming had mentioned it before — that the Flowing Cloud Moon-Tracing Sovereign was staying in the courtyard for the time being, the better to guide him through a few difficulties in his cultivation. Zhou Qingmu hadn't thought much of it then. Ordinary contact between a senior and a junior.
She was an ancient Sovereign, after all. What was wrong with instructing a junior? But looking at the shape of things now...
Having set the plate down, the Sovereign did not leave. She sat down at Gu Chengming's side as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
Now Zhou Qingmu understood. Ah. The Flowing Cloud Moon-Tracing Sovereign had feelings for Gu Chengming as well.
She stole a look at the Sovereign's profile. Moon-white robes, cool and otherworldly; on face and bearing alone, the woman would rank in the nation-toppling tier anywhere you set her down.
For reasons she couldn't explain, what rose in Zhou Qingmu was not defeat but a small, secret glee.
Consider the ages. She and Gu Chengming were separated by a little over ten years. The Flowing Cloud Moon-Tracing Sovereign and Gu Chengming were separated by more than ten thousand.
Excellent. All at once she no longer felt like an "older woman."
Ten thousand-odd years set beside thirty-odd — round to the nearest figure and they were practically the same age.
Zhou Qingmu pressed down the curve tugging at the corner of her mouth and lifted her cup for another sip.
Round to the nearest figure and she could even pass for a maiden in the first flush of youth.
Zhou Qingmu carried that inexplicable little glee home with her.
That night she turned over and over without sleeping.
Not because the Gu-repression was acting up again. Purely because she was working through a problem.
The Flowing Cloud Moon-Tracing Sovereign had feelings for Gu Chengming. That much was out in the open now. By rights she ought to be on her guard — one more rival meant one more variable.
But the longer Zhou Qingmu thought about it, the more the whole thing struck her as off.
Consider who the Flowing Cloud Moon-Tracing Sovereign was. An ancient Sixth Realm Sovereign, cultivation reaching to heaven, connections everywhere, living inside Gu Chengming's courtyard and making him snacks besides. Her principal-wife energy was maxed out.
And yet, to this day, the Sovereign hadn't said a word outright. It was young friend this and young friend that, morning to night. As offensives went, hers was less direct than the white-haired girl's.
What did that tell you? That the Sovereign had all the power in the world and no practical experience whatsoever.
Or, to put it another way: where feelings were concerned, she and Zhou Qingmu were both beginners.
And there inspiration came to her. As the old saying goes — the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
One afternoon, the Flowing Cloud Moon-Tracing Sovereign sat beneath the osmanthus tree in the courtyard, leafing through a scroll of old notes, when a gust of wind swept past and a familiar figure appeared at the gate. Zhou Qingmu.
The Sovereign lifted her eyes a fraction, her fingertips pausing on the page.
This Deputy Director of the Night-Watch Bureau kept fairly close company with Little Gu as a matter of course; the Sovereign was well aware of it.
Nothing worth remarking on, really. Her young friend held a post at the Night-Watch Bureau; being on close terms with the people there was perfectly ordinary.
She closed the notes and said gently, "Sovereign Zhou? My young friend is not in the courtyard at present."
"I'm not here for Little Gu." Zhou Qingmu was crisp about it.
The Sovereign blinked. Zhou Qingmu walked over, sat down on the stone stool across from her, and came straight to the point.
"Does the Sovereign have feelings for my Little Gu?"
The courtyard went quiet for a beat.
The osmanthus leaves rustled in the wind, as though sucking in a breath on behalf of that sudden fastball straight down the middle.
The notes nearly slipped out of the Sovereign's hands.
She looked at Zhou Qingmu. Then she looked at Zhou Qingmu again, confirming that the woman was not joking.
Was this a declaration of war?
The Sovereign's spine tightened a little. She had lived through a very long span of years — contesting the Dao with fellow disciples, debating law among Sixth Realm powers, immortal sects settling matters by force. None of it gave her the slightest trouble. This particular scene was the one thing she had never once had to handle.
And then Zhou Qingmu's next words left her utterly at sea.
"If the Sovereign truly does, I'd like to form an alliance with you."
Zhou Qingmu sat perfectly upright on the stone stool, her tone as frank as if she were discussing a matter of official business.
"Our positions are similar. We may as well pool what each of us has."
A question mark rose slowly over the Flowing Cloud Moon-Tracing Sovereign's forehead.
"?"
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