Ye Qingzhou raised her right hand, the last three fingers slightly curled, her index finger pointing into the crowd, sweeping lightly past the front rows.
“Was it not ‘let me test you’? Then you shall…” she murmured, letting her gaze settle back onto Luo Jiao.
Prickling under that stare, Luo Jiao chickened out, lifted a foot, and began backing away.
Then she heard Ye Qingzhou’s floating question:
“My, my… Little Jiao, where exactly do you think you’re retreating to?”
The words had barely fallen—and giving Luo Jiao no time to respond—Ye Qingzhou pointed again, like a general naming a champion, toward Fang Lei. “Then you shall duel this Little Jiao here.”
“Wha—”
Fang Lei scrambled up from the floor, faintly dazed. He looked at Ye Qingzhou, then at Luo Jiao.
The whole hall went quiet as held breath; beside Luo Jiao, Lin Zhi’s jaw simply wouldn’t close.
Luo Jiao’s eyes bulged and her voice shot up. “I—I refuse! This makes no sense! Why should I—”
“—The loser of the duel,” Ye Qingzhou ignored her entirely, cutting in mildly, “needn’t be a disciple either. Go sweep the Outer Mountain. Granny Jin of the Scripture Pavilion is old, her legs failing—she’s been short of an extra pair of hands.”
Tang Yi said hesitantly, “Qingzhou…”
Ye Qingzhou raised her eyes and gave her nothing more than one flat, expressionless glance.
But that single glance silenced Tang Yi.
On the high dais, astonishingly, no one dared interject again.
Facing the stunned crowd below, the two maintained a tacit silence, then with mutual understanding looked away.
Ye Qingzhou said nothing more, only tossed a Peachwood Sword to land before Fang Lei.
Without hesitation, Fang Lei snatched up the sword and pushed through the crowd.
Those around gave way.
Holding the sword, Fang Lei bowed his head to Luo Jiao in salute. “Fellow disciple. Pardon the intrusion.”
Luo Jiao frowned, snorted out a breath, and looked up in disbelief, glancing all around.
Only Lin Zhi fished a small dagger from her sleeve and stuffed it into Luo Jiao’s arms. “Use this.”
Luo Jiao: “…………”
But while she hesitated, Fang Lei was already advancing with his sword raised—
And the blade came straight for Luo Jiao’s face!
Caught off guard, Luo Jiao could only tilt back on instinct, flipping backward, narrowly dodging the sword-wind.
Perhaps because he held only a Peachwood Sword and considered it little threat, Fang Lei had put ten-tenths of his force into the strike—its power astonishingly great.
The crowd watched a gust of force tear across the hall, splitting curtain after curtain of poetry scrolls, sending sand and dust flying.
The seats fell into shocked silence, dead quiet.
Only Elder Chi on the dais clicked his tongue in admiration. “This Fang Lei is good stock. If Elder Ye—ah, if only someone would truly take him in, it would be no loss at all.”
Luo Jiao, by contrast, rolled across the floor hugging her dagger, a sorry sight.
She patted her trouser cuffs, stood, bit her lower lip, and smiled strangely. “Strike from surprise. Truly filthy.”
Fang Lei took it as a compliment. He was about to return a few showman’s words when Luo Jiao’s figure closed in at blinding speed; the last few steps, she actually sprang from flat ground—
Dagger in her left hand, right hand clawed, she went straight for the crown of Fang Lei’s head!
Darkness flashed before Fang Lei’s eyes; he ducked instinctively to block—only to see Luo Jiao’s right hand halt abruptly before his face while her left flipped the dagger, raised it in one clean arc, and with unstoppable momentum cleaved his Peachwood Sword in two!
Fang Lei froze; the sword was out of his hands.
The one brimming with swagger now retreated blow after blow; the one battered and sorry now struck with fatal precision—
In the span of a single breath, the battle had reversed.
Not that Fang Lei was riddled with openings—only that Luo Jiao was simply too fast, and every move precise and ruthless.
Crowd and dais alike buzzed with talk.
“Does this look like watching two green new students at all? More like a disciple on the verge of mastery, discoursing on the sword atop the Sword Pavilion. Utterly seasoned.”
Others marveled. “How bizarre! She’s nothing but a fisher girl who can’t even give a family name—where did all this martial skill come from?…”
In the crowd, Lin Zhi whooped, “That’s my great-aunt! That’s MY great-aunt!”
And in the duel, Luo Jiao, as though finally sated, flicked the broken Peachwood Sword up with her dagger and tossed it carelessly to the ground.
Staring at the sword’s broken body, Fang Lei panted hard, head lowered, not daring to look up at Ye Qingzhou.
On the dais, Ye Qingzhou’s face was placid as she peeled her lychee, slow and methodical.
She praised no one. She scolded no one.
Still, she did not call a stop.
Fang Lei thought: that means there is still a chance.
He watched the fisher girl wipe her dagger on her hem, eyes lowered, lost in thought; then step away to return the dagger to her friend.
Seizing exactly this opening, Fang Lei dropped his hand, snatched up the broken Peachwood Sword from the ground, drew in a fresh breath, and charged at Luo Jiao!
Luo Jiao heard only the wind and had not yet turned—but Lin Zhi spotted it first and shoved her aside.
Caught off balance, Luo Jiao staggered several steps before just managing to steady herself.
She found it almost funny. “It’s one little friendly match—is a fight to the death, no quarter given, really necessary?”
The boy looked up, eyes burning with hate. “How could it not be?!”
Luo Jiao clenched her fist, about to strike back—but at the sight of the other’s bloodshot eyes and the blood scabbed across his forehead, she distinctly wavered.
Was it worth it?
How could it not be.
A hundred years ago, it seemed, someone had also worn just such a pair of eyes, kneeling in the ice and snow.
That single instant of distraction cost her the initiative.
Fang Lei roared, putting his whole strength into driving the broken half of the Peachwood Sword into Luo Jiao’s shoulder!
Luo Jiao counterstruck and barely dodged. She was just about to press harder—
Ting-a-ling.
That sound again.
A pain flared in her wrist, and she could hold nothing at all.
At the dais, Ye Qingzhou’s hand hung slightly lowered, her lips curled as if in mockery.
“Swordwork this rotten—who would ever want to teach it?”
Beside her, Elder Xu couldn’t help adding, “Besides, striking with such treachery, without an ounce of honor…”
Ye Qingzhou glanced at her, and for once put in a word for Fang Lei. “To win against someone, striking first, or counterattacking when they least expect it—neither is wrong.” She said, “It is hesitation, or a soft heart, that most often brews catastrophe.”
“And useless kindness…”
At this point, Ye Qingzhou turned her head.
Her gaze landed squarely on Luo Jiao.
Ye Qingzhou said, “I usually call it—foolish goodness.”
Luo Jiao said nothing, only rubbed her wrist where the blood mark lay.
Embedded within the mark was a lychee shell; the rind, toughened by Ye Qingzhou’s circulated energy, was now as sharp as a blade.
Around her, people murmured—some protesting the injustice, some consoling. Luo Jiao said not a word.
She only tossed the lychee shell to the ground, thinking to herself:
Ye Qingzhou…
So you really do hate me.
“Jiaojiao, you’re really going to the Outer Mountain? I saw your name still on the roster—let me go beg Elder Ruan to intercede, and we can pretend nothing ever happened…”
In the courtyard, Lin Zhi hovered around Luo Jiao, chattering about future plans.
“You’re so talented—going to the Outer Mountain—not even the Outer Sect—this is a crime against nature!” Lin Zhi’s eyes were wet, utterly sincere. “They’re so unreasonable! Why isn’t it Fang Lei going to the Outer Mountain?!…”
Luo Jiao, eyes lowered, packed her scant belongings. The slightest pressure, and blood seeped through the white cloth at her wrist.
She hid her hand behind her back and shook her head at Lin Zhi. “I’m off. If anything comes up, look for me at the Scripture Pavilion.”
In truth, walking alone halfway there, gazing at the sun sinking in the distance, Luo Jiao’s chest was tight with humiliation.
With no one around, she set her bundle at her feet, leaned against a great boulder, and slowly crouched down.
All the doubt, the bafflement, the anger, dissolved at this moment into grievance.
When she’d first heard that Ye Qingzhou hated her Sanqing Senior Sister, she’d assumed it was rumor.
But now—one exoneration, a few sword forms, even just a name that rhymed…
Was enough to make Ye Qingzhou hold her in such contempt.
Luo Jiao had never imagined she truly despised her so.
She sighed.
She didn’t want to stay at Fengyi Sect anymore.
Luo Jiao hadn’t forgotten Zhou Kong’s instructions. She thought only: undo the array outside Fengyi Gate quickly, settle it fast, and go on to Qingdu.
After that, she and Ye Qingzhou would have nothing more to do with each other.
So thinking, Luo Jiao rose, braced against the boulder, and gazed down at the mist-shrouded mountain below.
Luo Jiao could sense it: a heavy fog lay there.
If nothing unexpected, this place, like Mount Sanqing, had its array suspended in midair.
She tightened her sleeve cuffs and let out a long breath.
And so she leapt from the edge of the boulder—
The daylight seemed, in that instant, to freeze.
Night fell abruptly; the darkness whimpered.
A rustle of wind passed her ears, like silk and rosy clouds, carrying some faint fragrance, hazy and intimate.
That familiar lotus scent again.
And so memories crowded in upon the wind, rustling and colliding, mingled with forest leaves, pressing in from all sides.
Through Luo Jiao’s mind flashed a pair of limpid, luminous eyes.
Delicate brows curved; lashes long; pupils black as ink, brimming with laughter.
They were the clearest eyes Luo Jiao had ever seen in her life.
It was impossible for her not to know whose they were.
And precisely because of that, it hurt all the more.
What could have gone wrong a hundred years ago, to make Ye Qingzhou hate her so?
But…
Before Luo Jiao could finish the thought, the next instant, she plunged into water.
Icy water invaded her ears, eyes, nose, mouth—like Wind Blades of midwinter bearing frost and rain—flooding down her throat, piercing into her vitals, freezing her body solid.
The sudden cold was agony beyond bearing.
Luo Jiao squeezed her eyes shut, feeling she was about to suffocate in the water.
And yet she clearly felt an unseen force pulling her down, deeper still.
Drawing her into the Illusion Array.
Luo Jiao decided to let the force take her, swimming toward that far end.
Underwater, she seemed to catch hold of a wisp of gauze—
The moment she opened her eyes, all sound had died.
Luo Jiao found herself lying in a bed.
The gauze in her hand was, presumably, someone’s garment front.
Not far off, light canopies and curtains hung strung with crystalline Bells, ringing ting-a-ting.
Before her, a figure bent low.
Still lost in the drowning, panting, Luo Jiao could make out nothing.
She only suddenly felt a scalding tear, hot as blood, brand itself onto her cheek.
The one before her, eyes blurred with tears, held amber-colored eyes brimming with grief.
And in the next breath.
The flickering light before Luo Jiao dimmed abruptly for an instant.
A breath, tinged with careful hesitation, fell beside her nose; strands of snow-white hair spilled across her neck, ice-cold.
—That person, eyes half-closed, leaned down and softly kissed Luo Jiao’s lips.
