Stealing The Heavens

The moon hung high.

On the top of a mountain outside An He City, Xiang Yu and Yuji snuggled together under a big old tree. Their eyes were red, but they both looked calm. After all, Wu Qi had just assured them that by adding a certain identifier to Yuji’s soul, Xiang Yu could easily find her after her reincarnation.

Yue Tan and Yuyao stood to a side, their faces looked extremely unsightly. Yuyao had a slight glimmer of energy on her face, and she was whispering something to Huhai. By contrast, Yue Tan’s face was as lifeless as a dead person, losing all its vitality.

Huhai, Great Qin’s Prince of Zui, huddled in a dark wagon suspended in front of Yuyao, telling her with a slight look of madness what Ying Zheng wanted him to say. Yuyao was shivering, and two lines of tears kept trickling down from her eyes. Occasionally she waved her arms violently and argued with Huhai.

Only Yue Tan had no one to talk to. She stood alone under an old pine tree, staring blankly at Yuji snuggling in Xiang Yu’s arms, and at Yuyao talking to the son sent here by Ying Zheng. She stood there, empty as a doll cut out of paper. The night breeze blew over her skirts as if it was about to bring her up into the sky.

Wu Qi, who had been standing by watching quietly, walked up slowly and cleared his throat, “I still remember your three questions.”

Yue Tan shuddered. She dared not look at Wu Qi, but bowed her head and sighed. At length, she said softly, “Actually we have failed Young Master. We should have notified him of things here, but…”

Wu Qi gave a little laugh and said, “Fortunately you did not inform your Young Master about the arrival of the six states on Pangu Continent, or the Yu Clan of Liangzhu would have been wiped out months ago. You know I’m Great Yu’s King of Dong Hai now, but what you don’t know is that if I’m going to deal with Yu Clan, I’ve got a lot of means to make them all die with no clear reason whatsoever.”

Yue Tan looked up at him blankly. Wu Qi shook his head and said, “You’ve saved the whole Yu Clan. Of course, I have a good relationship with some of their elders. So, even if you tell your Young Master all the information, I’ll only take his life.”

With an odd chuckle, Wu Qi said, “Too bad you didn’t give the information away. If truth be told, I’ve been waiting for you to do that!”

Yue Tan looked up in horror and exclaimed in a low voice, “What?!”

Wu Qi rested his eyes on her face and said in an almost cruel voice, “I know there is something wrong with the three of you, so I’ve been waiting for you to leak information about the six states. I’m waiting for that master behind you to take action against them, waiting for the emperors and the courtiers of the six states to be cornered, and then I can take over their power without any challenge! Unfortunately, Yuji begged you not to do that.”

Yue Tan stared at Wu Qi as if he were a devil.

Gently shaking his head, Wu Qi said, “Look, I scared you into this with just a few words. How could Grandmaster Yue Tan, who was so famous in Great Yan, be frightened by my words? You know, you’re all nice girls, but you shouldn’t do these things.”

He took a step forward, put his arms around Yue Tan, and gave her a gentle kiss on the forehead. “Girls are meant to be loved and protected,” he whispered, “he shouldn’t use you as tools. That Yu Xin, he will die. And you, forget all this and be a good person in your next life.”

Under the bright streaming moonlight, the scene looked like something that happened long ago in a courtyard in Ji City. Yue Tan stared at Wu Qi’s face that was still as young as a teenager and was stunned for a moment. Two lines of warm tears rolled down her cheeks, and then she heard Wu Qi sighed softly and said, “I’ll try my best to make Yuyao reincarnated as a member of Great Qin’s imperial clan within a hundred years, but I don’t know when exactly she will be reincarnated. As for you and Yuji, I’ll make you real siblings in your next lives… well, actually I think Xiang Yu is a nice guy!”

He smiled and said, “He’s a little impetuous, a little reckless, a little too loyal to friends, and a little too thin-skinned, but at least he is true to his woman! So, I’ll make you and Yuji siblings in your next lives, twin sisters. Remember, don’t tell him who you are, let him marry you both!”

Yue Tan looked at Wu Qi with astonishment. “Th-thi-this… this is ridiculous!” she stammered.

He slapped her on the head and laughed. “Ridiculous? Well, at least he is better than that Huang Xie.”

After laughing evilly for a moment, Wu Qi took a glance at Xiang Yu, who was holding Yuji in his arms and whispering words of love, then suddenly heaved a heavy sigh. “Not only can this fella fight and lead an army, but he can also sweet-talk to his woman. Aye, what a unique man he is! You will not suffer if you stay with him. Believe me, stay with him with all your heart in your next life!”

Yue Tan squinted and thought for a moment, then burst out laughing. “If he’s really as good as you say… well, I’ll give it a try then!”

With a faint sigh, she looked up at the bright moon in the sky and said, “I’m really tired. In fact, when I asked those three questions, I was already very tired. But I can’t stop, there was no way for me to stop. My life is given by Young Master, and I don’t know what else I can do if I stop.”

Wu Qi stroked her long hair. “Nonsense,” he said calmly. “Your parents gave you your life. What does it have to do with that Young Master of yours? If you’re tired and can’t find what to do, find yourself a new goal—to live well, live happily. In this life, you’ve lived in misery, so in your next lives, you all must live well! Just go torture Xiang Yu, I hope he doesn’t mind to have one more beautiful woman by his side! Haha!”

After saying that, Wu Qi produced an ancient zither. He smiled and said to Yue Tan, “It’s a good day, don’t you think so, Grandmaster Yue Tan?” Yue Tan sighed, then she smiled, wiped the tears off her face, took the zither and sat down under an ancient pine. There, she spent some while to carefully fine tune the zither, before starting playing a tune of nature.

Like a bright moon shining high up in the night sky, like a clear spring in the wild, like the wind blowing through the pine forest, and like a crane singing in the air, the music rang out across the place. Even Huhai, who was chattering nervously to Yuyao, was attracted by the tune, looking curiously over.

When he saw Yue Tan playing the zither with a big smile on her face, Huhai said thoughtlessly to Yuyao, “Look at her, even though she knows she is going to die, she still looks so happy. Why are you still arguing? The faster you die, the sooner you will be reincarnated. Father said if you become my sister in your next life, he will treat you well.”

With a cold snort, he rolled up a dark cloud and turned away. As he left, he said neurotically, “If you were willing to give birth to a child for Father and willing to stay with Father, maybe Great Qin would still exist today. I can’t believe you are a spy sent to us by some outsider. It’s such a pity that Father treated you with sincerity!”

Looking up at the bright moon in the sky, Huhai suddenly heaved a long sigh and said, “Senior Ao Buzun has a point. Women are the most precious for that brief moment in bed, and it is wise to throw them as far away as possible when you get out of bed. This is true wisdom!”

Wu Qi almost fell head over heels. How did Huhai and Ao Buzun get together in such a short time?

Wu Qi looked at Huhai with a gleam flickering in his eyes, and he suddenly laughed. This Huhai was a good piece of material, too, much better than his brother, Fu Su. If taught well, he could be of great use. If Wu Qi were to nurture an agent in Great Qin, who would be better suited than Huhai?

Amid Yue Tan’s beautiful and ethereal music, Yuji nestled in Xiang Yu’s arms with a shallow smile on her face. Silvery gray blood oozed from every pore across her skin; her delicate and fragrant body quickly became cold and stiff, and in just a flash, a living beauty had turned into a translucent, silvery gray crystal.

With a wave of Wu Qi’s hand, Yuyao and Yue Tan grunted at the same time as their foreheads split open, from where came flying out their souls.

Wu Qi whispered a few Buddha epithets. A faint glow came bursting out of his forehead, enveloping the souls of Yuji, Yuyao, and Yue Tan. Then, his finger quickly sketched a swastika and a Lotus Soul Protection Seal in midair. Using the mystic arts in the Great Light Indestructible Amitabha Treasure Scripture, he helped the three women solidified their souls, and at the same time ensured that their souls could not be invaded by external evil, and that after they reincarnated, they would not forget their past lives and recall what they should remember when they grew up.

As for what these memories were, it depended on what Wu Qi wanted them to remember.

The painful, annoying, unbearable, sad, all the negative memories were erased by Wu Qi. For example, Yuji, except for the moment when she committed suicide during the battle of Gaixia, all the other bad memories were gradually faded in the light of the Buddha, then turned into a thread of thoroughly tempered sentiment and firmly tied to Xiang Yu.

Wu Qi did the same with Yue Tan’s memories, making sure that she would have a crush on Xiang Yu when she was reincarnated.

As for Yuyao, Wu Qi did not want to ruin his current rapport with Ying Zheng, so he just erased what needed to be erased and did not do anything else.

After adjusting the souls of the three women, Wu Qi spared no expense and drew a trace of his own soul essence and injected it into their souls. The strength of a trace of his soul essence now was unlike any other, probably equivalent to that of the immortal soul of a peak-level Heaven Immortal.

With Wu Qi’s generous gift, the souls of the three women suddenly glowed with pale golden light and became incomparably stable. They no longer need to worry about any accidents during the reincarnation.

Xiang Yu saw the change in the souls of the three women. He cupped his fist and said to Wu Qi gratefully, “Thank you!”

Although it was just two words, Wu Qi heard a heavy confession.

He nodded to Xiang Yu with a smile. Wasting no more time, Wu Qi tore open the void and threw the souls of the three women into the Nether World where the Six Paths of Reincarnation was. His vast divine sense turned into a giant invisible net and smashed into the depths of the Nether World. He wanted to open the door of reincarnation for the three souls, directly send them into the transmigration so that they could be reincarnated according to his will.

All of a sudden, a glittering huge golden hand flew over and grabbed the souls of the three women.

Wu Qi was stunned, then shouted at the same time as Xiang Yu, who had witnessed all this.