[ Weicheng's POV ]
"... distinguished guests."
The smooth, resonant voice echoed softly through the pristine air, carrying an undercurrent of ancient authority that seemed to steady the very foundations of the room. I kept my fingers pressed firmly against Lady Suan Ming's slender wrist, monitoring her vital pulse as the fierce, blistering crimson of the fire flower petals gradually faded away, leaving nothing but clean, unblemished skin behind. A profound wave of internal relief washed over me.
The physical environment of this apex floor was oddly comforting, drastically detached from the lethal, blood-soaked gauntlets we had just conquered below. The architecture featured incredibly high, vaulted ceilings that seemed to stretch into infinity, and the entire space was furnished with elegant, high-backed chairs draped in immaculate white cloth. Everything on this floor was a study in pure, unblemished ivory.
Moving with slow, reverent grace despite her lingering physical exhaustion, Lady Suan Ming dropped into a deep, formal bow toward the figure standing at the center of the room.
Lord Dame—the legendary Master of the Night Pavilion—was a figure vested with the weight of primordial astrology and absolute prediction. The bedtime stories whispered across the provinces often claimed he was a divine being sent by the heavens specifically to supervise the shifting fortunes of the neighboring kingdoms and the crown. It was universally accepted that the Arghon Empire was exceptionally blessed to retain his spiritual counsel.
The master offered a slow, knowing nod as his gaze swept across each one of us, a calm smile playing upon his lips.
To my surprise, his physical features appeared remarkably younger than the traditional historical depictions found in the academy's textbooks. In the ancient scrolls, he was routinely illustrated as a frail, seventy-year-old patriarch with a long white beard and a weathered brow. But looking at the man standing before us in the flesh, it felt as though he had drank a full, untainted cup directly from the mythical Fountain of Youth—if such a fantastic legend could even be considered true.
His face possessed the smooth, unlined vigor of a scholar in his early thirties. He wore a neatly tied, heavy white silk robe, complemented by an ornate, towering headdress that featured intricate, moving diagrams of several constellations stitched with silver thread.
Without uttering a word, he turned and gestured for us to follow him toward a low, wide receiving table crafted from pale driftwood. Laid out across its polished surface with meticulous, geometric accuracy were a large brass magnifying glass, a thick, leather-bound celestial codex, and a scarcely detailed ceramic tea set that emitted a faint, wispy trail of steam.
A soft smile touched my face the exact microsecond the aroma hit my senses. Jasmin tea. Oh, how I absolutely loved the smell of mountain flowers; it was a scent that instantly grounded me, pulling me away from the terrifying illusions of the lower levels.
We took our seats on the opposite side of the driftwood table, the white cloth of the chairs cool against my damp uniform, as Lord Dame fluidly raised the ceramic kettle and poured the amber liquid into our respective cups. I lowered my gaze, carefully eyeing the fine details of my teacup. My brow twitched slightly as I noticed the peculiar, microscopic paintings delicately baked into the porcelain—scenes of ancient wars and fallen dynasties playing out across the clay.
The tense silence in the room suddenly deepened as Lord Dame paused his movements, shifting his gaze directly onto me before letting out a soft, melodic laugh.
"Do you find my personal tea set to your liking, young scholar?" he asked, his sharp eyes dancing with amusement.
Still intensely analyzing the fine brushwork on the rim, I offered him a silent, respectful nod.
"I originally stole that specific set from my ancestral home centuries ago," he revealed casually, his smile widening as my eyes widened slightly in surprise. "You possess a remarkable eye for small, easily overlooked details, Dan Weicheng."
I simply hummed in quiet agreement, refusing to let my guard down around an immortal, and immediately retrieved the cup from the table as if it were the most fragile, purest treasure in the world. I held it securely using both of my palms, completely engulfing the warm clay within my hands. Closing my eyes, I drew in a deep breath, inhaling the floral notes of the heated brew as the master settled back into his grand ivory chair.
The sudden, radiant warmth of the porcelain seeped beautifully through my calloused palms, melting away the residual chill of the Death March.
"Suan Ming," the master started off, his voice dropping into a professional, measured register.
"Lord Dame," the seer responded instantly, her blind face tilting toward his position. "We have bypassed the traditional boundaries and come before your presence tonight on behalf of the Arghon Empire."
"Let us completely dispense with the standard courtly courtesies, my dear," Lord Dame interrupted, waving a dismissive, elegant hand through the air. "Go on and tell me exactly what matters are currently bothering the peace of the Empire."
Lady Suan Ming subtly shifted her posture, casting a meaningful side-glance toward Tae Hua, silently initiating the cue for the royal prince to take command of the inquiry.
Understanding the weight of the moment, Tae Hua stood up from his white-clothed chair, smoothing down the front of his royal uniform before offering a deep, flawless imperial bow. "I must formally apologize for our incredibly sudden intrusion into your sanctuary, Lord Dame. I am Wang Tae Hua, the Third Prince of the Empire."
Before he could even complete his formal introduction, Lord Dame smoothly extended his arm, his fingers lightly tapping Tae Hua's wrist to arrest his descent and gently guiding him back down into his seat.
"There is no need for such performance, Third Prince, Wang Tae Hua," the master said softly, his tone carrying an unsettling familiarity.
Tae Hua settled back into his chair, his jaw tightening as he forced himself to speak with absolute clarity. "Precisely eighteen winters ago, my royal mother received the first official prophecy concerning my life directly from your lips. I was a mere toddler of two years, struck by a mysterious ailment and hovering on the absolute precipice of death. The scroll dictated that I would be destined to receive a secondary, history-altering omen the moment the phoenix successfully rises from the ashes after years of deep sleeping."
My right brow raised automatically at his words. I can't believe a prince of his caliber actually believes in those ancient, fabricated fairy tales, I thought to myself, a faint, cynical huff escaping my nose.
The exact microsecond the thought crossed my mind, I caught Lord Dame casting a sharp, knowing side-glance directly at me—as if he had literally heard the silent, skeptical sulking occurring inside my skull. I quickly shifted my gaze toward the far white wall, deliberately avoiding his penetrating stare.
"In accordance with that first prophecy," Tae Hua continued, entirely oblivious to the silent exchange, "the Arghon Empire willingly instituted every necessary protection method. We aggressively strengthened the imperial education system to establish a sturdy foundation for the youth, we managed to grant systemic leniency toward minor crimes, and we completely abolished several cruel, archaic physical punishments from the penal code."
As it rightfully should be, I whispered bitterly inside my own mind.
My fingers instinctively tightened around the heavy fabric of my scholar's robe, a sudden, cold pang of grief striking my chest as the vivid memories of my slaughtered tribe flashed behind my eyelids. I looked back at Tae Hua, noticing the subtle, microscopic tremor in his hands. For all his royal arrogance, the prince was actively harboring a deep, visceral fear of whatever cosmic truth he was about to receive next.
"And so," Lord Dame answered smoothly, swirling the remaining tea in his cup, "you have climbed my tower to inquire whether the path you have actively led will ultimately prove beneficial to the longevity of the kingdom... or if a secondary, unavoidable disaster is about to be foreseen across the land?"
"I am standing here tonight strictly on behalf of the empire's future, and absolutely not for my own sole, personal interest," Tae Hua declared, his voice ringing with a fierce, unyielding conviction that caught me entirely off guard. "If the Arghon Empire is destined to prosper under another individual's natal star, then who am I to maliciously steal the throne from the heavens?"
I narrowed my eyes at him, my mind spinning. If that specific statement ever manages to reach the ears of the Grand Empress, she will probably die on the spot out of sheer fury and embarrassment, I mused.
The Empress had engineered this entire lethal expedition under the absolute expectation that Tae Hua would secure his divine right to rule the empire. To hear the prince openly offer to yield his birthright for the sake of the common people was utterly unfathomable for a royal.
Lord Dame let out a sudden, boisterous laugh that echoed through the high ceilings. He turned his heel away from the driftwood table, walking with slow, rhythmic steps toward the massive, open-air window before extending a pale finger to point toward the indigo sky.
"Your natal star still continuously shines the absolute brightest among the constellations, young prince," the master murmured, his eyes reflecting the silver light of the moon. "I do not believe a celestial anchor of that magnitude has ever shone over anyone quite like yours does. Your destiny is already beautifully laid out across the canvas of the sky."
I had to actively restrain myself from rolling my eyes out of my head. Does a literal ball of burning gas in the upper atmosphere truly possess the functional capacity to dictate a human being's destiny?
The thought had barely formed when Lord Dame abruptly whipped his head around, fixing his sharp, analytical eyes directly on my face, his expression filled with a barrage of silent, dangerous questions. Sensing the immediate spike in tension, Lady Suan Ming quickly bowed her head, stepping into the space to introduce me before a conflict could brew.
"Master, this is Dan Weicheng of the household of Dan," she explained softly. "A senior vanguard scholar currently residing within the capital's imperial academy."
My posture locked up instantly. I took a deliberate step backward as the immortal began to slowly advance his steps toward my position, his movements predatory and perfectly silent. He stared intently into the absolute depths of my eyes, his right hand continuously rolling two smooth, pitch-black divination stones against each other with a soft, rhythmic clack... clack... clack.
"You must be an individual who has been deeply, systematically deprived of life," Lord Dame murmured, his voice dropping into a chillingly low frequency. "I can see the spiritual threads of your fate... they are thoroughly wretched, tangled in blood and ash."
I stared right back into his youthful face, a sharp, bitter scoff escaping my lips. I was entirely willing to grant him the aesthetic benefit of owning an exceptionally nice ceramic tea set, but his mystical, arrogant demeanor was far too off-track for my liking. A small, cold, and borderline sinister smile formed across my lips as I braced my shoulders.
"I do not believe in the concept of pre-determined fate, Lord Dame," I countered, my voice laced with a dangerous quietude. "I will personally write every single line of my own destiny with my own two hands. No immortal, king, or star can ever take over it—but I sincerely thank you for attempting to read my fortune."
The master's smile faltered for a fraction of a second. He abruptly closed his palm, tightly enclosing the two black stones within his grip as if attempting to violently extract further celestial information from the air. He closed his eyes, turning his back on me to face the prince once more. I simply shrugged my shoulders, entirely unfazed, and took another slow sip of my jasmine tea.
"The Second Princess..." Lord Dame lowered his head, his voice turning incredibly solemn before he returned his full focus to the Third Prince.
Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Tae Hua immediately sit up perfectly straight, his spine turning to absolute steel as his breathing hitched. The raw, internal pressure inside him looked as though he were about to physically explode from anticipation. We had all distinctly heard him hysterically screaming her name while he was trapped inside the cemetery's hallucinations on the third floor; it was blindingly obvious that he shared an incredibly deep, unresolved bond with this missing princess.
"You have also ventured here tonight to inquire about her current state, have you not?" Lord Dame's eyes swept across the vast, high-caliber room before he raised his hand, pointing precisely to a singular, isolated star in the northern sky that blinked with a frantic, wildly unstable frequency. "Look closely. That is her life-anchor."
He truly correlates the physical lives of mortal people to the blinking of a star, I thought, shaking my head in quiet disbelief.
"A highly confidential piece of intelligence recently broke out within the inner palace corridors," Eun Jo interjected, his military voice sharp and cutting through the mysticism. "The rumors claim that Princess Xie'en is actually still alive."
We waited in an absolute, suffocating silence as Lord Dame slowly set his ceramic teacup back down onto the driftwood table with a soft, decisive clink.
"She must be," the master whispered flatly.
The moment the validation left his lips, I felt every single fine hair on my arms stand up in an instant. The psychological impact was devastating—it felt as though our entire group had been suddenly poured with a bucket of freezing, sub-zero mountain water. I heard Tae Hua let out a sharp, ragged gasp from across the table, his shoulders dropping as if he were drawing a real breath of fresh air for the absolute first time in thirteen long winters. It was a profound, agonizing breath of pure relief.
"However," Lord Dame continued, his expression hardening into a grim expression, "because of her lineage, she is undoubtedly in grave, mortal danger every single day she draws breath. There are powerful factions who desperately want to harm her, or even completely execute her to protect their secrets. I can only hope you manage to locate her coordinates first, before anyone else can secure her blood."
So... the exiled princess is truly, functionally alive? I thought, my heart sinking like a stone into the pit of my stomach.
A sudden, overwhelming weight settled over my chest. If the rumors were true, that young girl had been wandering through the brutal wilderness of the empire entirely alone for over a decade. I felt Lady Suan Ming's silent, heavy gaze shifting onto me from the side; I slowly turned my head toward her, forcing my face to form a small, reassuring smile to indicate I was fine. She offered me a solitary, solemn nod of understanding.
"What exactly do you mean by 'anyone else'?" Tae Hua countered, his brow furrowing in total, fractured confusion. "Who else is actively hunting her?"
"The imperial officials have already secretly initiated an aggressive campaign, looking for every single eighteen-year-old girl residing across the various provinces of the empire," Lady Suan Ming revealed, her voice steady but dark. "They are subjecting them to brutal interrogations one by one. Several family members have even been forcefully dragged into the capital's dungeons for simply questioning the validity of the order."
My eyes almost dropped to the ground in sheer horror. My knuckles turned white against my teacup.
"I personally overheard the local merchants talking in hushed whispers back at the trading village earlier today," she answered, addressing our silent, questioning stares.
[ Third Person POV ]
"What?!" Eun Jo shouted, his commanding, thunderous voice ripping violently through the pristine quietude of the top floor.
The sound was so immense it seemed to pierce through the high open windows, bleeding out into the dark, silent night where only the faint cries of the crickets, the whistling blows of the mountain wind, and the roaring current of the distant river could be heard. His expression was a mask of stern, conflicted military rage.
"According to the merchants' reports," Lady Suan Ming continued, her voice remaining low and analytical, "a girl's family must immediately register their exact birth records with the local magistrate, or else the civil registrar will instantly place them into indefinite military detention for harboring an unregistered female aged eighteen winters. Everyone is being alleged of treason otherwise."
"That is absolute madness," Tae Hua said, his voice dropping into an exasperated, breathless tone as if a physical blow had just struck his chest.
The prince had been present within the main palace chambers when the high ministers had discussed the parameters of the candidate search, listening from behind the silk screens. But in his wildest, most cynical calculations, he had never imagined that his own royal mother would stretch her imperial authority to such a tyrannical degree—treating innocent commoner families as if they were harboring dangerous, wild criminals.
Meanwhile, sitting silently across the table, Weicheng slowly closed her fists into tight, trembling knuckles as the horrifying realization dawned on her. This entire vanguard candidate expedition... it was nothing but a grand, calculated cover-up, she realized, a cold sweat breaking out across her neck.
The Grand Empress was utilizing this highly publicized academy mission as a chess piece to advance her brutal purges in the provinces, while simultaneously removing Tae Hua from the capital so he wouldn't interfere with the slaughter of these eighteen-year-old girls. She was being used as an oblivious pawn to facilitate the murder of innocent lives.
A profound sense of deep disgust settled into Weicheng's gut. She couldn't even begin to imagine the horrors currently transpiring outside the safety of their inn during their trek through the mountains.
"It is indeed madness, Prince," Lady Suan Ming affirmed grimly. "It goes entirely against the foundational imperial rule to place commoners into indefinite detention without a formal tribunal. The official imperial decree was heavily hidden from the lower courts, but the physical events cannot be concealed for long due to the sheer number of detained girls already being subjected to highly unreasonable, dangerous questioning."
"She is absolutely not a runaway criminal!" Tae Hua hysterically yelled, his composure completely fracturing as he slammed his palm onto the driftwood table.
He couldn't believe the sheer scale of the deception occurring under his family's name, but he forced himself to swallow down the rising bile, his dark eyes instantly darting over to lock onto Weicheng's pale face. A sudden, dangerous realization flickered in his mind—he knew with absolute certainty that this commoner scholar was intimately tied to the Empress's shadow network. Before his rage could manifest into a physical action, Lord Dame smoothly stepped into the space, his fingers gripping Tae Hua's shoulder and steering him toward a concealed side-door.
"Follow me, Third Prince," the master commanded softly.
Tae Hua was about to voice a fierce objection, but the look in Lord Dame's eyes caused him to simply nod in silent compliance. The master guided him into a separate, completely enclosed side-chamber. Unlike the grand apex room, this space was a clean, minimalist study completely devoid of the shifting star illusions and moving constellations. It was a space designed for clear, unclouded sight—a mundane, grounding sanctuary away from the cosmos.
The prince's breath hitched as Lord Dame turned to face him, his voice dropping into an uncharacteristically serious tone.
"Your internal concerns regarding the survival of the Second Princess are entirely correct, Wang Tae Hua. I was physically present alongside the imperial investigation team thirteen winters ago, right after her carriage was ambushed at the northern ravine. We searched the site for days, but we never located her physical body—not even a single piece of her personal belongings was left behind in the snow, aside from that jade-tipped hairpin."
Tae Hua's brows narrowed fiercely, his chest heaving. He had spent over a decade forcing himself to believe she was still breathing against all rational logic, but hearing the truth validated by an immortal who had physically stood in the blood-stained snow was nothing short of a miracle. He couldn't contain the raw, explosive emotions surging through his veins.
"She is... truly alive," his mouth gaped, the words trembling.
It was as if he had just seen her physical form standing right in front of him in the flesh. As if a beautiful, long-forgotten ghost had suddenly materialized out of the shadows to claim his soul. He stood entirely paralyzed, trapped inside a sudden, euphoric trance.
In that singular, crystalline moment, he finally realized the true reason his spirit had never allowed him to stop searching for her. His immense, exhausting efforts across the years had not been put to waste. The royal blood inside his heart, which had felt entirely cold and dead for thirteen long years, suddenly surged with furious, burning life throughout his veins—a sensation so overwhelming it instantly stripped away all of his inhibitions.
"She must be hiding somewhere within the borders," Lord Dame warned, his sharp voice slicing through Tae Hua's euphoria. "But you must proceed with absolute, microscopic caution, Prince. The sudden, public appearance of a lost princess will throw the entire empire into a state of violent chaos. She will undoubtedly encounter several dangerous mischiefs before she ever reaches the palace gates."
Tae Hua listened intently, his internal core vibrating so violently from the massive influx of information that he could scarcely process the ambient sounds of the room anymore. He was simply, profoundly glad that she was alive.
The master offered a slow nod, guiding him back out into the main white lobby where the others were still sitting in a state of tense, anxious idling.
Lady Suan Ming likely possessed a deep understanding of these hidden political gears already, but Tae Hua knew he had to be exceptionally careful with the companions he had brought into this sanctuary. Not everyone standing inside this room wanted Princess Xie'en to return to the capital alive.
His dark eyes dropped down, locking onto the back of Weicheng's neck with an intense, unreadable gaze as he whispered a final, chilling warning to himself.
"Especially if they are actively working directly under the shadow of my mother, the Grand Empress."