A month later, the time finally arrived for the meeting between the Nascent Soul cultivators on the palace’s second level. Mo Jian was in the Incense Forest when the voice transmission talisman found him. He had been burning an ash beast down into something even finer than ash when the talisman flared against his robes and interrupted the quiet. He finished his work before reading it.
Gu Daisheng’s residence, at noon, three days from now.
He held the talisman a moment longer than necessary, and then put it away.
After finishing his work in the Incense Forest, Mo Jian immediately returned to the residence he shared with Bai Ning. They had decided early on to use only one residence between them; the estates were enormous, and it was far easier to speak privately in person than rely on voice transmission talismans or other methods that might be intercepted.
In the month they had spent within the palace, Mo Jian had slowly grown accustomed to the place. At first, learning the palace had felt like learning a language with shifting grammar. The hallways rearranged themselves without announcement. Chambers appeared where they had not been the evening before. Staircases led to places that bore no relationship to where they should have emerged. However, little by little, the palace had begun to reveal its rhythms to him. The particular quality of light that preceded a corridor's rearrangement. The faint pressure in the qi before a sealed room chose to unseal itself. The way the air settled, just slightly, when the palace had nothing it wished to show you.
Bai Ning had taken a different approach entirely. Where Mo Jian had spent his energy observing the place itself, she had devoted herself to observing its people, or more precisely, to winning them over. She had cheerfully befriended every painting she could find, every servant who passed within arm's reach, every lower-realm cultivator working in or near the Incense Forest. Since her efforts had proven far more fruitful than his own stiff and unproductive attempts at conversation, Mo Jian could not fault the strategy. The arrangement had simply sorted itself out by necessity: he handled most of the supervisory duties in the Incense Forest while Bai Ning cultivated what she chose to call an "informal information network."
In practice, it was mostly gossipmongers.
Still, they had learned a few useful things: the identities of the other fifteen Nascent Soul cultivators on this level, the relationship between this layer of the palace and the workings of the imperial court, and various other pieces of broad, frustratingly nonspecific information. Except for one detail. One detail that had shocked both him and Bai Ning. Who could have guessed that the inspector of the Kanchi mine would be connected to the very person they were planning to-
Mo Jian cut the thought short as he arrived before the entrance to the residence. He retrieved the restriction badge from his storage pouch and infused it with qi. With the soft whisper of wood sliding against wood, the doors opened, and he stepped inside. The courtyard beyond was lush and green, fragrant with growing things and freshly turned earth. Spirit butterflies clustered around flower buds, trailing motes of qi as they drifted from petal to petal. A narrow brook wound through the garden, burbling quietly over smooth river stones. Above, the open sky remained eternally blue; bright, warm, and cheerful, like a benediction bestowed upon the cultivators living beneath it.
Even after a month, Mo Jian still found himself marveling at the miniature world contained within the residence, and at how much it was beginning to feel like home. That feeling lingered throughout the palace itself. The place settled onto a person slowly, like moss spreading across stone. Given enough time, Mo Jian suspected one could spend decades here in perfect comfort, forgetting that there existed anything beyond these walls.
He shook the thought aside and headed toward the mansion at the far end of the estate. Built from polished wood and pale stone, the three-story residence radiated warmth and understated elegance. It was, Mo Jian had to admit, almost exactly his ideal home: neither austere nor ostentatious, but balanced somewhere comfortably between the two. He had claimed a room on the second floor for himself, largely because the entire first floor had been converted into an alchemy workshop and talisman-refining chamber. The remaining floor belonged to Bai Ning who, to his enduring amusement, had somehow transformed the space into a proper sword-fighting arena. Where she had gotten the idea, he had no clue, though he strongly suspected her murim jade slip was responsible.
He found her there now. Bai Ning sat cross-legged at the center of the stone ring, enclosed within a luminous crimson lotus. The flower's translucent petals shimmered with soft light, layered over one another in overlapping sheets until the entire construct resembled a living bloom forged from pure qi. It was large enough to swallow her completely, as though she sat at the heart of the lotus itself. Mo Jian paused quietly at the edge of the arena, choosing not to disturb her. It had taken her months to achieve even this much control, and what he had come to tell her was hardly important enough to justify breaking her concentration.
He did not have to wait long. A few minutes later, the lotus trembled. Its petals rippled like light reflected on turbulent water before thin cracks began to spread across the surface. In an instant, those fractures raced through the entire construct, branching into delicate crimson traceries from the outermost petals to the glowing core within. Then the lotus shattered apart into countless shards of red qi. The fragments dissolved quickly into the air.
Bai Ning exhaled sharply and opened her eyes, a flicker of frustration crossing her face. Then she noticed him. A hint of surprise entered her expression; she had likely been concentrating deeply enough that the outside world had ceased to exist.
“You’re back early, Master. Did something happen?”
Mo Jian tossed her the voice transmission talisman as he answered. “The meeting details from Gu Daisheng. Three days from now.”
Then he pursed his lips slightly. “But forget that. How is your training progressing?”
Bai Ning caught the talisman and scanned it with her spiritual sense. At his question, however, she immediately pulled a face. “Ugh,” she said with feeling. “I have no idea how that fiend Chao Qinzi made this look so effortless. I’ve never struggled this much with anything before. The slightest imbalance and the entire thing collapses.”
Mo Jian gave her a sympathetic look. “He was also at the peak of Core Formation,” he pointed out, “and probably had decades to refine the technique. Don’t be too hard on yourself. As long as you keep working at it, you’re doing fine.”
Bai Ning nodded distractedly. “I know. I am amazing, after all.” She delivered the words with such effortless sincerity that Mo Jian immediately decided never to comfort her about this topic again.
Completely unaware of his less-than-flattering thoughts, Bai Ning’s attention shifted elsewhere. “Three days…” she said slowly, a grin beginning to spread across her face.
Mo Jian felt an answering smile tug at the corners of his mouth. “Yes,” he agreed. “That caught my attention too. The timing is about as perfect as it could be. Every Nascent Soul cultivator on this level gathered in one place, away from their duties. I can attend the meeting and make sure you have the opportunity to do what we planned.”
Bai Ning pumped a fist triumphantly. “Good. I’ve been waiting long enough already. And it lines up perfectly with what that merchant painting, Guan, told me. The princess’s attendant personally delivers her refusal to attend court once every month. Supposedly, the fact that she keeps getting invited every month is meant as some kind of insult to her, but for us…”
Her grin widened. “It’s perfect. We can send her a message without anyone noticing.”
Mo Jian nodded, though inwardly, the situation troubled him. It was perfect – too perfect. By now, he had begun to accept that another hand was subtly moving pieces behind the scenes, arranging circumstances in ways too convenient to dismiss as coincidence. Mo Jian suspected the Immortal Emperor himself was responsible, or at least involved, and if that was true, then he would have to learn to navigate around such interference going forward. For now, those unseen manipulations were helpful. But once the true scope of his plans became clear, Mo Jian doubted the Immortal Emperor would remain nearly so accommodating.
He kept those thoughts to himself and instead addressed another part of Bai Ning’s plan. “I’ll send the Netherworld Scorpion with you,” he said. “You won’t be able to command it directly, but I’ll be able to observe through it and intervene if something goes wrong. We’ll only get one chance at this, so everything has to proceed perfectly.”
Bai Ning waved the concern away with complete confidence. “It’ll work,” she declared. Then, after a moment, some of that certainty faded. “Though… even if it succeeds, we might still anger Gu Daisheng. And if it somehow fails…”
She trailed off. She did not need to finish the sentence. If they failed, they would make an enemy of him. Sneaking behind his back to make direct contact with a member of the imperial family could not reasonably be interpreted as anything other than a deliberate attempt to circumvent his authority. But Mo Jian neither had the time nor the inclination to proceed slowly and cautiously. And as for angering Gu Daisheng… well, he would regret it somewhat. He genuinely liked the man. But they were still little more than recent acquaintances, however courteous, and his own goals mattered far more than the goodwill of one person who had happened to treat him kindly.
A month ago, after Gu Daisheng had finished giving them a tour of the palace, Mo Jian had quietly left the Netherworld Scorpion hidden within his residence as a ghostly spy. Gu Daisheng had remained completely unaware of it, as far as Mo Jian could tell. At the time, he had hoped to uncover something useful while the man was alone. Even small things would have been valuable, like his true thoughts about the situation, his opinion about his two new arrivals, whether he knew anything about the gui, or if he was secretly involved in matters beyond what he had revealed. Instead, he had learned absolutely nothing. The moment Mo Jian and Bai Ning departed, Gu Daisheng had calmly sat down to meditate. And then continued meditating for an entire week.
No secret visitors arrived. No hidden communications were exchanged. Gu Daisheng apparently lacked the useful habit of muttering sensitive information aloud for enterprising scorpion spirits to overhear and faithfully report back. All in all, it had been an utterly wasted week.
Eventually, Mo Jian had recalled the Netherworld Scorpion and sent it wandering through the palace instead, hoping the broader grounds might yield more information. As it turned out, they did not.
That was half the reason – beyond their secret plans – that he was looking forward to this meeting so much. The opportunity to quietly probe for information among the other Nascent Soul cultivators was invaluable. There were three things he especially wanted to learn. First: whether anyone knew about the gui. And if they did, what exactly they intended to do about it. So far, not a single person had mentioned it to him. No hidden envoys had appeared requesting an audience. No imperial summons had arrived demanding it be presented before the Emperor. In fact, everyone behaved as though the gui simply did not exist. The silence surrounding it was becoming increasingly unsettling.
The second matter concerned the imperial court itself. Mo Jian had spent an entire month within the palace and still did not truly understand how the Nascent Soul cultivators fit into the governance of the empire. Did they even participate in ruling it directly? Surely they had to, in some capacity. Yet his own responsibilities had amounted to little more than overseeing the Incense Forest; a valuable resource site, certainly, but one seemingly far removed from the actual machinery of state. Surely not every cultivator in a position of authority was so disconnected from real power.
Which meant there had to be more happening beneath the surface. And learning how that hidden structure functioned had become just as important to Mo Jian as everything else.
The third and final matter concerned bringing in his “entourage.” He knew it was possible. Every cultivator invited into the court was permitted to bring a small retinue. Most commonly, this consisted of close friends or family, though it was not unusual for people to include skilled cultivators or specialists to strengthen their standing and assist with duties. Mo Jian intended to settle the matter directly with Gu Daisheng. It had already been three months since Wei Shentong had departed for the Thousand Shattered Islands. By now, he must have arrived. Which meant that Mo Jian needed an answer before he returned with Bai Ning’s friends in tow.
"Are you going to prepare anything for the meeting?" Bai Ning asked, pulling him back to the present. She had risen from the edge of the stone ring and was absently dispersing the last traces of qi from her sleeves. "I assume there'll be some kind of trade exchange. A good artifact wouldn't hurt if you need to hold their attention."
Mo Jian considered it for a moment, then shook his head. “Anything I can produce, they can likely produce as well,” he said. “That won’t work. Besides, I already have something that should hold the attention of even Nascent Soul experts. We gathered quite a few materials from the Netherworld Domain, and since Fellow Daoist Gwei is supposed to be an expert in identifying exotic resources…”
Bai Ning nodded, though reluctance flickered across her face. “It feels like a waste to bring those here,” she said. “You told me there are materials in there that could be useful for both of our cultivation. And anything from that domain likely can’t be found anywhere outside it. If we could trade them later, they’d be worth considerably more.”
Mo Jian shrugged. “Value is relative,” he replied. “Right now, this is the best use we have for them. And who’s to say I’ll actually sell or exchange any of it? Simply revealing them should be enough.”
Bai Ning let out a small breath, still clearly unconvinced, but she did not press the matter further. Instead, she rose from the edge of the stone ring and let the last traces of qi disperse from her sleeves.
“Fine,” she said at last. “But if you end up regretting it later, I get to say, ‘I told you so.’”
Mo Jian rolled his eyes. “Noted.”
For a moment, neither of them spoke. The house held its quiet around them; the steady creak of settling wood, the distant murmur of the fire from the alchemy room below, and the low sound of wind passing through the garden outside. It was a comfortable silence.
Then they exchanged a look and went their separate ways. Mo Jian retreated to his rooms to go over his plans one final time, while Bai Ning departed for the Incense Forest. In his absence, it would fall to her to keep watch over the place. Not that it was strictly necessary; the forest largely ran itself, its assigned cultivators more than capable of handling the vast majority of issues independently. But still, appearances had to be maintained.
Three days would pass quickly. They were both looking forward to it.
…………………………………………………………………….
Three days later, Mo Jian hovered outside Gu Daisheng’s residence, studying the prismatic barrier of qi that enclosed the modest dwelling beyond. Bands of colored qi flowed through it like overlapping currents in deep water, folding into one another without collision. At times the barrier looked translucent, like glass catching sunlight; at others it seemed dense and alive, as though the air itself had been condensed into layered crystal. It was not, as far as Mo Jian could judge, a restriction meant primarily for defense. It was, more than anything else, meant to keep the qi within.
He was just about to send a voice transmission talisman announcing his arrival when Gu Daisheng’s voice echoed from within, bright and unhurried.
“You’ve arrived, Fellow Daoist Mo Jian. Come in, there is no need to stand on ceremony.”
The prismatic dome shimmered in response, its surface rippling outward. A perfect circular opening formed in the barrier, edges smooth and controlled. Mo Jian flew through, basking in the dense qi inside. The atmosphere was crisp to the point of clarity, each inhalation carrying a cool, almost mineral purity that settled into his meridians and lingered there, steady and invigorating. Faint wisps of qi mist curled around his robes as he moved through it, each motion leaving slow-dispersing wakes that lingered before finally dissolving.
He flew toward the blackwood pavilion, instinct slowing his pace without conscious thought. There was an almost magnetic reluctance to leave this space quickly, as if rushing through it would be wasteful. It was the densest qi environment Mo Jian had ever experienced.
Yet for all its richness, the residence itself was restrained. The five story pavilion sat quietly along the bank of an artificial river, its waters unnaturally still yet faintly luminous, reflecting the surrounding formation light in fractured patterns. The structure was built of dark blackwood, polished to a mirror sheen that caught both river and sky in its surfaces. Its design was simple, almost understated, an austerity that made the surrounding opulence feel even more deliberate.
In moments, Mo Jian reached it. He descended onto the pavilion’s approach, the lingering qi parting around him with reluctant ease, like a tide losing interest in resistance.
A single step carried him inside. The entire ground floor had been opened into a vast hall. There were no walls, only a sparse ring of pillars along the edges supporting the roof. Even the wall facing the river had been removed entirely, offering an unobstructed view of water and the lush gardens beyond. The floor was covered by an enormous beast hide, its fur richly dense and satin-soft, thick enough that his feet sank in to the ankles. Cushions were scattered across it in no particular order, save for the center of the room, where a low stone table waited in quiet patience. A brazier burned there, incense smoke rising in slow, curling spirals, briefly catching the scent of sandalwood before dissolving into the air.
It was a comfortable, almost inviting space.
It was also nearly full. Mo Jian immediately recognized Gu Daisheng standing near the open wall, gazing out at the river. The man turned just long enough to offer a faint smile before looking away again, clearly uninterested in conversation before the meeting began. Nei Pan – the little emperor, as Mo Jian had begun calling him in his mind – sat by the stone table, fully absorbed in a jade slip pressed to his forehead. In one corner of the room floated a painting bearing a single ink-drawn figure: Gwei, still in his ink form.
The remaining cultivators were unfamiliar. Most of them looked up as Mo Jian entered. Their spiritual senses brushed across him in quick, assessing sweeps, weighing his presence without restraint. An elderly woman with a high collar and a cane regarded him briefly before turning away. A man in rich red robes, a flame-like tattoo crawling across half his face, continued drinking from a flagon as he studied him. Another, young and handsome, watched with a gaze as cold and still as iron.
Mo Jian met their attention only briefly before moving inward and choosing a cushion. He sat down, settling into place, keeping his expression neutral and his eyes forward. Internally, he began matching faces to the descriptions Bai Ning had extracted from her “informal information network.”
Cultivation realms offered no easy distinctions here, since every cultivator present, save for Gu Daisheng, stood at the early Nascent Soul stage. Still, a few identities fell into place. The elderly woman had to be Madam Tai, overseer of the Abyssal Caverns, another major resource site on this level, known for its deposits of Infernal Metal Ore and Refined Earth Qi Stones. The man with the flame tattoo was almost certainly Chi Yanxiao, guardian of the stairways connecting this floor to those above and below it. The cold-eyed young man he did not recognize, nor most of the others.
But one figure drew his attention. A sloppily dressed man lounged against the wall with his head tilted back and his mouth open, snoring with a complete absence of self-consciousness. His robes were loose and slightly worn. His nose was red, as if perpetually afflicted by a cold. He looked, in other words, like someone who had wandered in from somewhere else entirely and simply decided to rest. Mo Jian’s eyes lingered for a fraction too long before recognition clicked. This was likely the Lord of Dreams, Meng Zizai. He quickly looked away, keeping his expression unchanged. The paintings had spoken of this man in hushed tones, laced with too many quiet warnings. Mo Jian was not afraid of him, at least, not in any immediate sense, but provoking unnecessary trouble served no purpose here.
The gathered cultivators waited in patient silence. There were exactly eighteen of them, most seated with eyes closed and expressions carefully still. Mo Jian mirrored them, settling into quiet observation rather than risk initiating conversation in a room already thick with unspoken scrutiny.
Then footsteps sounded outside.
A young man rushed in, red-faced and breathless, as though he had run all the way here. He was chubby, open-faced, and wearing an apologetic, almost sheepish expression. For a fleeting moment, Mo Jian was struck by a faint sense of familiarity – an echo of his past self, of the original Mo Jian – but the resemblance was more impression than reality.
“S-sorry,” the newcomer wheezed. “I ran all the way here as fast as I could.”
Gu Daisheng, who had been watching the river, turned at once. “No need to apologize, Brother Shihou. I know how busy the kitchens are. It is good that you made it.”
Shihou nodded, still catching his breath in deep gulps. Mo Jian couldn’t help but wonder what kind of running could leave a Nascent Soul cultivator so winded. A question for another occasion.
With his arrival, the assembly was complete. Gu Daisheng turned to face the room fully, his smile widening slightly. He opened his arms in a gesture that seemed almost ceremonial.
"Welcome, fellow Daoists," he said. "I am glad to see you all here."
A brief pause, warm and unhurried.
"Shall we begin?"
...............................................................................................
AN: Am I evil for cutting it off here? No, of course not. If I'd continued, the next chapter would have ended on a cliffhanger right in the middle of the meeting, and that would have been truly evil. See? I'm actually being very considerate and saving everyone from that fate.
On a more serious note, MJ's plan can be summarized as follows:
Step 1: Go to the capital and pass the Imperial Examination.
Step 2: Perform exceptionally well and earn an invitation to the Palace.
Step 3: Initiate contact with [spoiler redacted].
Step 4: ???
Step 5: Profit.
And now, Step 3 begins.