Chapter 578: Heh, You Saw That, Didn’t You?

Late at night, the Great Pure Palace’s Back Mountain. In the clear night, thin mist and moonlight like silver shone everywhere; the trees on the mountain cast dark shadows under the moon, and the insects chirped in the grass as densely as falling rain. 

Suddenly, the chirping cut off, and at once a small white shadow flashed by, threading through the grass, skimming over treetops, slicing ripples across the mirror-like surface of the Cold Pool, and finally vanishing into a small hill pocked with large and small grottoes. This little Paper Cicada Immortal, with no one controlling it, didn’t know what it ought to do or where to go—only that, following its master’s preset command, it would drift forward, forward in a daze…

——

Explain it? How am I supposed to explain that? Lu Yibei looked at Huá Sāng, whose expression had grown so grave it was almost frightening, and her thoughts spun as she plotted a response. This girl is sharp as a tack—sometimes she looks slow to react, but that’s only because she can’t be bothered. Now that it involves her personal ferule, the situation is definitely different…

Trying to bluff with tall tales probably won’t work; she’d already seen through me once on the bus…

If push comes to shove, I’ll just have to tell the truth—hmm… a “truth” arranged and combined, with slight embellishments! Lu Yibei thought. Her willow brows arched; she let out a cold snort and said, “Hmph! I, Senior Juejuezi, when I do things, why should I have to explain myself to a junior like you?”

Since I’ve already thrown that name out there, I might as well use it—waste not. With luck, Fu Xinyi might even back me up! Lu Yibei thought, pressing on, “Are the disciples of your Great Pure Palace all this discourteous now? Is this how Zhang Huainan teaches you?”

As she spoke, she unreservedly released her psychic energy fluctuation, laced with a faint power of royal authority, pressing down on Huá Sāng. The terrifying fluctuation descended abruptly; Huá Sāng at once felt as if she’d been tossed into a furnace, a faint scorch tingling across her skin. This fluctuation… A+ level? Hm, even within A+ it should be among the top! It looks a bit like a bluff, but it’s not something I can handle easily…

But she also mentioned the Headmaster old man by name—maybe she’s an old acquaintance of his? I probably won’t have to fight head-on, right? After all, whether it’s fighting or getting beaten one-sidedly… it’s exhausting! The mild intimidation from royal authority led Huá Sāng to overestimate the girl’s psychic energy fluctuation level, and she couldn’t help feeling a few degrees more tense. “This… Senior Juejuezi?” Huá Sāng cupped her hands to Lu Yibei. “I’m not questioning you—only asking for guidance. Whether you speak or not is your freedom, but I have reasons I must inquire.”

Although just thinking about getting entangled with someone stronger made her feel physically uncomfortable, and although her senior brother had just had an accident with many matters needing handling, she still couldn’t ignore this. Not to mention the ferule was a great treasure of the Great Pure Palace—in it dwelled a friend who had nearly sworn sisterhood with her. She couldn’t just let it be. Nice words! Can’t you tell I don’t want to talk? Lu Yibei griped inwardly, then said with a blank face, “Very well. Since you’ve asked, I’ll sell Zhang Huainan some face and answer you a little.”

“Yes, I do have some connection with your Great Pure Palace. I studied for many years under your palace’s former guest elder, Qing Ji, and count as his disciple.”

This was the truth—bring in a psychic or a haunting holding the power of the Xie Zhi to discern lies, and it would still be ironclad truth! Though if the Ancestors heard of it, they might split apart on the spot—but if I don’t say it, how would the old man ever know? Lu Yibei thought. Huá Sāng: “???”

For real? Senior Qing Ji was actually a former guest elder of the Great Pure Palace? And this young lady is his disciple? “May I ask, Senior—what are the characters for ‘Qing Ji’?” Huá Sāng probed. Lu Yibei glanced at her and said coolly, “When the rain stops and the fog lifts, the weather clears—Qing Ji.”

Hearing this, shock exploded in Huá Sāng’s heart, and her trust in the girl jumped two or three notches. Before Qing Ji himself recalled it, she hadn’t known Qing Ji’s name; the girl not only spoke it, but clearly explained its origin—she must be closely connected to Qing Ji. In that case, the Broken Sword in her hand… Huá Sāng looked at the ferule in her own hand, then at the Broken Sword in Lu Yibei’s, and frowned. Just then, Lu Yibei spoke. “That’s right. The Broken Sword in my hand and the ferule in yours both once belonged to Qing Ji. Their resonance likely arises from that bond.”

Put together, the Broken Sword and the ferule form the complete Pure Lotus Sword—the Ancestors’ paired blade. Saying it was his possession is perfectly reasonable! She paused, then shifted her tone. “Hmph, now you see? If not for Zhang Huainan’s sake, I would take my master’s belongings back today, without question. As it is…”

“Hold on to your thing, take your senior brother, and get lost!”

“…” Huá Sāng was silent for a few seconds, then wordlessly cupped her hands to Lu Yibei. She bent, lifted Wu Yutang’s head, and turned to leave the alley. Watching her go, Lu Yibei quietly let out a breath, then turned to the side where Fang Ji lay still fast asleep—and froze. Crap—how did she forget Miss Fang? She’s pretty cute, but her presence is that low? Damn—what now? She couldn’t very well ask Huá Sāng to take her along! 

“Senior Juejuezi” had no reason to know a total stranger was a member of the Spring Advanced Training Class. But if she just left her in a pitch-dark alley like this, who knew what indescribable plot threads might spin out! As Lu Yibei fretted over Fang Ji, Huá Sāng, who had only taken a few steps, began thinking. Though there were some small holes in her story and much to verify, if most of it was true, it would be a reasonable explanation. With her strength, she had a good chance of forcing the ferule from my hands, yet she let me leave… Although that could also be out of wariness of the Headmaster old man.

But there’s another strange thing I can’t explain. The sensory confusion, the illusions I saw—it wasn’t the first time today; it began back in Hua City…

Wait! Hua City? Something seemed to click for Huá Sāng. Her steps halted; she snapped back around with a soft exclamation. “Lu Yibei! Senior, you know Lu Yibei, don’t you?”

At that, Lu Yibei’s body went rigid. For a moment, she didn’t know how to respond. What the hell? Even if you could connect this to “Lu Yibei,” you shouldn’t be this fast! Are you some kind of wallhack player? Watch me kick you out! As Lu Yibei grumbled inwardly, Huá Sāng continued, “I previously heard there was a senior master by Lu Yibei’s side—presumably you?”

This senior often stayed with Lu Yibei, letting him be in frequent contact with the Broken Sword, thereby forming a certain connection. Then the Broken Sword and the ferule resonated, causing the sensory confusion between me and Lu Yibei back in Hua City…

That being so, it makes sense why this senior happened to pass by here—because Lu Yibei is in Shizhou City’s urban district! Yes, that should be the sequence of events. Huá Sāng concluded. Lu Yibei: “…”

I don’t know who told you there’s a senior master following me, but…

“Right. That’s exactly it!”

“I understand. Thank you for informing me, Senior.” Huá Sāng nodded. “In that case, I’ll take my leave.”

With that, Huá Sāng turned again toward the alley’s mouth. After walking a short distance, her pace suddenly quickened; her figure flickered a few times and vanished into the night. In that departing back was a trace of inexplicable heaviness and urgency. Grief is often a delayed emotion—it may not erupt at the moment, but it keeps working on you. When the ferule suddenly acted up earlier, it had temporarily kept Huá Sāng from showing sorrow over Wu Yutang’s death. Now that things were settled, her mood was gradually beginning to feel its weight.

She was eager to rush back to the Great Pure Palace and tell Qingxiazi everything she had experienced tonight, as well as the words her senior brother spoke before he died. Watching Huá Sāng leave, Lu Yibei finally let out a sigh of relief. She turned to look at Fang Ji, considering how to deal with her. Just then, as if she had suddenly sensed something, her face went pale. “Damn! Where on earth did that Fu Xinyi throw the Paper Cicada Immortal?”

Through the vision relayed by the Paper Cicada Immortal, she saw an old face twisted into a grotesque grin—downright terrifying.

————

A moment earlier. Among the many stone grottoes on the Back Mountain of the Great Pure Palace, there was an inconspicuous cave called the Moon-Gazing Cave. The Moon-Gazing Cave sat near the mountain peak on the Back Mountain, with doors and windows opening to the north—a south-facing-north layout, unsuitable for most people but particularly fitting for psychics like Zhang Huainan, whose Spirit Pattern was closely tied to the Five Qi Heavenly Sovereigns who preside over the Ren and Gui methods. 

As the saying goes: “When the setting sun has passed and the lunar yin first rises, the north belongs to water, which aids the flourishing yin and gentle qi; thus by sitting facing north, one can gather and replenish yang, achieving the mutual generation of yin and yang and a long, steady breath.”

For those with water-type Spirit Patterns, once their psychic energy fluctuation level reaches a certain threshold, prolonged exposure to such an environment subtly completes their Spirit Pattern and augments their breath. However, for Zhang Huainan, these effects no longer mattered much. His mastery over the power corresponding to his own Spirit Pattern had surpassed ninety percent more than a decade ago. 

In truth, whether a psychic is drawing Spirit Pattern or a haunting inherits a certain power, one can never obtain one hundred percent of that power; depending on individual differences, the power is more or less diluted. To obtain one hundred percent, one would have to be like Gou Meng, who used the opportunity of power conversion to acquire a brand-new power unique to her. Therefore, being able to control over ninety percent of a high-tier haunting’s power was already quite terrifying. If one likens the process of completing a Spirit Pattern to filling a balloon with water, then at Zhang Huainan’s stage, any further “water” added would, with the slightest misstep, burst the balloon, causing an instant explosion and total loss of control. To this day he still chose this grotto as his seclusion spot, mostly out of habit.

Inside the Moon-Gazing Cave, beneath a roof inscribed with a moonlight-driven solidified spell formation, Zhang Huainan sat in a massage chair with his feet soaking in an electric thermostatic foot bath, a cigarette in his left hand and a fidget spinner in his right. On the long desk before him sat a large bottle of cola, craft beer, pearl milk tea stored in a water-dispenser jug, a stack of novels and manga pressed under a Switch, and miscellaneous items like a short sword, a long blade, and a silver handgun loaded with Alchemy bullets placed in one corner. 

Directly ahead, five large-screen smartphones sat on stands in a fan-shaped array, respectively playing an esports replay, the latest hit anime, a variety show featuring a traffic-driving idol, a livestream by a highly popular virtual idol, and a sexy dance stream by a cam model. His gaze swept back and forth among the five phones, finally lingering on those fair, slender legs and the vigorously twisting waist, and he smiled knowingly. Tsk, what a shameless Headmaster—disgraceful! “I’m not, I didn’t, don’t talk nonsense!”

As if rebutting someone, Zhang Huainan muttered to himself, quickly pulling his eyes from the phone screen and sighing silently. Though it might sound like quibbling now, his usual seclusion life wasn’t like this. At sunrise he studied spells and practiced martial arts; at midday he read and played the qin; at most, after night fell, he would visit a certain mysterious streaming site and, through the scrolling comments, offer pointers to those unlucky souls caught up in livestream haunting incidents. That was his normal seclusion routine. As for the mess in the Moon-Gazing Cave at this moment, he had asked his disciple Lingjizi to secretly bring it all over before he began today’s seclusion, just so he could experience it firsthand. Truly! …

After a long while, Zhang Huainan stubbed out his cigarette, grabbed the craft beer, took several deep swigs, then stroked his beard slowly as he stared at the items on the desk. He had always believed that whether a person is diligent and enterprising, or indulgent in pleasure, both in a sense are following their true nature—neither is inherently a big problem. As the saying goes, do the work of March and April, and in August and September you will have your answer. Whatever choices his disciples made were choices about their own lives, and they would ultimately bear the consequences themselves. 

A teacher could guide but need not forcefully interfere; in such matters, channeling works better than blocking. Whether they wanted to be a mountain-guarding tiger, a battle-hardened wolf, a fish muddling through the waters, or a motionless turtle—it was all fine, so long as they did not become a lapel-pulling ox or a herd-harming horse. He could even understand those who fancied being a shit-stirring stick; after all, X-orientation in such things was their freedom. So while Zhang Huainan knew this messy paraphernalia might influence his disciples, he didn’t mind. He just couldn’t figure out how, without any power attached, these things could threaten his disciples’ lives. “Strange, too strange…”

Several times he had cast divinations concerning the Esoteric Society, and the results all pointed to these seemingly meaningless items—very strange. At first he had suspected a haunting had attached its power or an avatar to those objects, but after probing them with his psychic sense, he found nothing. If there truly were some power present, he would have detected a clue or two. After all, even methods like those of the Haze Deity and the Plague Taisui—attaching power to a grain of dust or a bacterial cell—couldn’t escape his eyes; he could even sense a thing or two about those nebulous online hauntings. However, he did not let down his guard; failing to detect did not mean absolute nonexistence. Each time he cast the hexagrams, every step of their transformations kept conveying danger to him, revealing an eerie calm and a heavy breath of death. 

Those who sank into it would be maimed or killed, even consigned to a fate worse than death. Moreover, ever since the night began to grow long, all sorts of hauntings with inscrutable powers had been emerging one after another; a haunting that could attach power to something even smaller than bacteria would be perfectly plausible. After all, even the Millennium Bug could become a haunting. “Speaking of the Millennium Bug…” Zhang Huainan stroked his beard, musing, as he reached into his robe and took out three copper coins, casually casting a divination regarding Lu Yibei’s arrival at the Great Pure Palace. The hexagram did not change; like the last time and the time before that, it was still Loss—loss within which there is benefit, and benefit within which there is loss. “Oh? So that’s fine.”

He had performed the same divination once before Lu Yibei came to the Great Pure Palace, and again when he had the other guardian of The Midnight Watchers Society—Wordless Book—seek out Void to post a bounty mission, guiding Lu Yibei to slip into the Esoteric Society. All three results were identical, unchanged. 

This indicated that such actions would not significantly affect Lu Yibei; perhaps only the Great Pure Palace would change—ending either in a crippling setback or in a small loss that yields benefit. Gazing at the three copper coins on the desk, Zhang Huainan suddenly had a strong thought. Could it be that the “loss within benefit, benefit within loss” in the hexagram originally referred to Lu Yibei coming to the Great Pure Palace, drawing the long-dormant Esoteric Society to the surface, causing chaos and thereby exposing their tracks? If that’s the case…

“Heh-heh, I’m suddenly a bit excited to see that kid muddy this dead pond and set it roiling.”

Zhang Huainan had great confidence in Lu Yibei’s ability to stir things up. Their Old Lu family had Qing Ji’s excellent genes; every generation had more or less a troublemaking constitution. All the more so given the fate Lu Yibei bore…

Forget the Esoteric Society—under the whole sky, there was probably nothing he couldn’t mess up, right? Zhang Huainan thought conservatively, when a faint rustling sound drifted in from outside the window, slipping into his ears and breaking his train of thought. He looked toward the sound and saw a white shadow like a ghost flicker past. He frowned slightly. With a thought, his figure seemed to evaporate, vanishing from the Moon-Gazing Cave.

One second later, when he reappeared in the Moon-Gazing Cave, there was a tiny Paper Cicada Immortal in his hand. “Paper Cicada Immortal? Who made it? Kinda cute! But…”

“Heh, you saw it all, didn’t you? Just now in the Moon-Gazing Cave—smoking, drinking, getting a massage, and looking at beauties.”

Though Zhang Huainan didn’t care about others’ opinions, it would be best if what happened here didn’t get out, as it would undermine his dignity as the Headmaster. Lu Yibei: “…” Didn’t see anything, saw nothing at all, I’ll make it self-detonate right now! “Oh? You want to self-detonate? That won’t do!” Sensing the Paper Cicada Immortal in his hand begin to heat up, Zhang Huainan let out a light breath. With that, he moved his mind, activated the Spirit Pattern, and used power to wrap the entire Paper Cicada Immortal. The next moment, inside the Paper Cicada Immortal, on the alchemical dirty bomb, the rapidly heating palm imprint was instantly extinguished. “Now, let this old man see who exactly is controlling you!”

Hearing this, Lu Yibei’s heart tightened, and in the next instant she felt a lewd gaze, as if projected from distant void, lock onto her. “!!!”