Gu Chengming now had a complete and thorough grasp of this new technique's personality.
In vino veritas, as the saying went. By this point in his conquest career, Gu Chengming had seen a fair bit of the world. The one who called herself the Heavenly Emperor. The one obsessed with storybooks. The one who insisted on rank and ritual propriety. The one who loathed the world and bristled at everything. The one who demanded all-pure and all-claimed. Every type, he'd met.
But a keyboard-politics lady drunkard… that one was genuinely too cursed. He really hadn't seen that before.
Then again, the main reason Gu Chengming was cultivating this technique at all was to give himself an extra layer of insurance for the coming trip to the Yunyue Sect. He didn't urgently need to grind the favorability up to any great height.
From that angle, at least, he could relax about it.
Only, Gu Chengming had always been the sort who figured that once you'd entered a personal route you might as well see it through to the end. Only when he genuinely couldn't read the direction of a route would he choose to sit back and observe for a while.
And that was precisely the problem here. Right now he really couldn't read the direction.
Meanwhile, the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula showed no sign whatsoever of stopping.
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula went on: And take a look at the pill market! Who holds the pricing power over spirit pills? The four great alchemy families. A rogue cultivator who wants a single Foundation Establishment Pill for his breakthrough pays three to five times what sect disciples pay at internal rates. Is that reasonable?]
[And the Great Qian royal house? Have they ever done anything about it? No! Because the four great alchemy families send tribute to the royal house every single year!]
From a rogue cultivator's point of view none of this was wrong, but to a technique like Zhouli's Heaven-Human Heart-Rectifying Method it amounted to pure contrarianism.
Sure enough —
[Zhouli's Heaven-Human Heart-Rectifying Method finally spoke: This statement is in error.]
[The Great Qian has stood for a thousand years, governing the realm by rites and settling the state by law. The institution of sects, the bond between master and disciple — these were laid down by the sages of high antiquity through untold hardship, unchanged through ten thousand generations, and there is deep purpose in them. You have barely glimpsed the threshold, yet you dare to slander the constitution of the state and the cardinal order. Is that not sheer insolence?]
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula, seeing that someone was willing to debate it, came thoroughly alive: Unchanged through ten thousand generations, therefore correct? Before all that, the cultivation world ran on the strong devouring the weak for tens of thousands of years too. I don't see you rushing to defend that.]
[Zhouli's Heaven-Human Heart-Rectifying Method said gravely: How can the law of the strong devouring the weak be lumped together with the institution of sects? A sect takes in disciples, transmits the Dao and imparts learning; disciples honor their masters and revere the Way, and in turn give back to the sect. This is the reciprocity of rites.]
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula shook its head: Then are the spirit stones and the corvee labor that the mass of outer disciples hand over every year really equal to the cultivation resources the sect gives them?]
[Zhouli's Heaven-Human Heart-Rectifying Method said in a low voice: Whatever ills exist within must be addressed slowly, through gradual reform, step by orderly step. Not as you would have it — opening your mouth and at once flipping the table and smashing the bowls, repudiating the whole. That is the thinking of traitors and rebels, not the discourse of the orthodox path.]
—Was this still the cultivation world?
Was this still his cultivation LOVELOVE system? Where the hell had he ended up?
[The Qingxin Formula watched the whole scene with relish.]
[Hundred Bones Resonance had no idea what they were arguing about, but it was lively, so it joined in: Right! Well said! This Emperor also thinks — uh — anyway, well said!]
The debate rolled on, from sect resource distribution to the Great Qian royal house's spirit vein taxation policy, and from spirit vein taxation back around to the calcification of class in the cultivation world.
Back and forth they went, thrust and parry, citing classics and precedent.
But an argument like that was never going to reach a conclusion.
[Zhouli's Heaven-Human Heart-Rectifying Method drew a deep breath: To debate with one of such rogue-cultivator mentality is no different from playing the zither to an ox.]
Translation: speechless, can't talk to you, classic rogue-cultivator brain.
This was the first time he'd ever seen Zhouli's Heaven-Human Heart-Rectifying Method annoyed badly enough to log off and go mute.
On any ordinary day, no matter what she encountered, this Confucian maiden maintained a mild and proper bearing, expressing her attitude with at most a "good" or a "not good."
Today her composure had cracked clean through.
Court Loyalist versus Old Guard — you follow?
Gu Chengming could only sigh. Wine reveals truth, wine loosens nonsense — either way, the conquest of this technique looked like it would be a long road, and the way far.
Never mind. Thinking about it now was wasted effort. Everything else could wait until the wine qi cleared.
Gu Chengming breathed in deep and actively circulated his spiritual power, forcing the residual wine qi out of his meridians bit by bit.
As the wine qi dispersed, the restless atmosphere in his Sea of Consciousness slowly settled with it.
He had just finished driving out the last of it when two sounds of air being split arrived from beyond the small courtyard.
The visitors made no effort to conceal themselves. Footsteps came down steady on the bluestone flags, and Gu Chengming raised his eyes to find Ren Wencai and Shen Qianqiu standing beneath the osmanthus tree.
That last sword strike had been far too loud, he thought. The entire Wenjian Sect had probably felt it — maybe even the other sects of the Great Qian.
"There's no need for concern, teachers." Gu Chengming got a word in before either of them could speak. "What happened just now was only routine practice of a sword art."
Shen Qianqiu faltered. "…Only routine sword practice?"
He glanced up without thinking at the layer of cloud the sword light had cleaved open. The gap still hadn't fully healed, and light poured down through the rift, drawing a band of silver-white across the mountains of the Wenjian Sect.
What kind of routine practice made a mess like that?
Ren Wencai, beside him, was rather calmer. He'd long since stopped being surprised — though he did have a few private complaints.
"Chengming, ah…" Ren Wencai coughed dryly. "Didn't you tell me before that you hadn't even crossed the threshold with this Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula?"
Gu Chengming answered without a flicker of change, perfectly composed. "Master, this disciple is slow-witted, and truly hadn't grasped the essentials before. Just now, with a few cups in me, I flailed about at random — and it seems I happened to touch on a bit of the knack."
"Flailed about at random? Touched on a bit of the knack?" The corner of Ren Wencai's eye twitched several times.
He turned to Shen Qianqiu, pointed at the sword scar in the ground, then up at the cloud layer split in two and still not closed, half exasperated and half laughing — and half using both to cover his own showing off.
"Senior Brother, listen to him. He calls that flailing about at random."
Set aside, for the moment, the fact that a few days ago the boy hadn't so much as made contact with the art and had crossed the threshold of a top-tier sword art within a few days.
The commotion from that one crossing was every bit a match for the strike old devil Hua had cut at the peak of his powers.
Shen Qianqiu returned the look but didn't take him up on it. Instead he turned to Gu Chengming. "The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula channels wine into the sword. It turns on the fusion and resonance of wine qi with sword intent. The presence behind that strike of yours was already no less than a late Fourth Realm cultivator's."
Shen Qianqiu had never been one to exaggerate his assessments. He paused, then added offhandedly, "Still, next time you practice this sword art, remember to give notice beforehand. The disciples on watch thought some sword cultivator had shown up to pick a fight with the Wenjian Sect."
Gu Chengming cupped his hands and agreed at once, and the three of them exchanged a few more idle words.
Ren Wencai urged him to make sure his cultivation base was solid and settled before departure. Shen Qianqiu reminded him to keep a low profile at the Hunyuan Sect — Hunyuan disciples ran hot-blooded and were quick to fall into conflict, and with Gu Chengming's reputation as a prodigy spread far and wide, plenty of them would want to spar with him. Requests of that sort could simply be declined.
Gu Chengming accepted every word of it obediently.
About the time it takes to drink a cup of tea later, the two elders rose to leave.
Old Man Ren waved a hand and turned toward the courtyard gate. Halfway there he stopped and said, without looking back, "That letter to Hua Daiyi — your master will be rewriting it."
The contents would presumably shift from "this unworthy disciple of mine has yet to cross the threshold, please bear with us" to "this unworthy disciple of mine has only just glimpsed the way in, and already carries such presence — all owing to Fellow Daoist Hua's grace in transmitting the art."
In a certain sense, the old man was basking in reflected glory too.
On the mountain path toward the main peak, Ren Wencai walked a stretch and then stopped.
Shen Qianqiu had already gone ahead to the side residence, leaving him alone on the stone steps under the moonlight.
Night wind on his face, the faint drift of osmanthus.
Hands behind his back, Ren Wencai tipped his head up at the seam in the clouds that the sword light had opened. The seam was slowly knitting shut, but the residual sword intent still moved faintly through the high air, carrying a thread of wine fragrance so thin it might not be there at all.
The old man was moved to a hundred sentiments at once.
Hua Daiyi, oh, Hua Daiyi.
You've come out way ahead on this half-disciple of yours.
Back then you shamelessly forced a manual into his hands and then, brazen as anything, claimed the standing of half-master. Lucky for you Ren Wencai is a generous man. Anyone else, and wouldn't they have wrapped this precious treasure up tight and refused to let another soul near him?
Such breadth of spirit! Such magnanimity!
In all the Wenjian Sect — no, in all the cultivation world — you'd likely not find a second man like him.
—He had entirely forgotten that when he first learned Hua Daiyi meant to poach his disciple, he had chased the man from the outer sect all the way to the back mountain, worked up enough to start swinging.
He had also entirely forgotten that for several days afterward, every time he saw Gu Chengming he'd fish sideways for reassurance: "Chengming, ah, you don't have any thoughts about the Hunyuan Sect side, do you?"
Memory, after all, always beautifies itself.
Especially when one wishes to be seen as magnanimous.
Ren Wencai nodded, satisfied, and set off toward the side residence with a spring in his step.
The small courtyard on the back mountain.
With everyone gone, quiet settled over the yard again.
The night wind passed through the osmanthus leaves with a soft rustle. The empty wine jar still stood on the stone table, moonlight sliding over its celadon surface in a cold, clear glaze.
Calm returned to the courtyard.
Gu Chengming watched his master and the Sect Head go, then turned back to the stone table.
Autumn chill seeped in from every direction. The osmanthus leaves whispered in the wind. The celadon jar on the table was empty, only a thread of scent still curling faintly from its mouth.
His gaze fell on the system panel. Since the wine qi had dispersed, the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula's chatter had stopped.
A thought struck him. Perhaps the state of the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula was tied to whether or not he himself was drunk?
He was still turning the theory over when the dialogue box flickered and text surfaced.
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula stirred awake, its eyes noticeably clearer.]
It seemed to notice his attention.
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula spoke, a little sheepishly: Did I make some kind of scene just now? I didn't scare you, did I?]
Gu Chengming went blank for a moment. Where had that other technique gone?
Where did you stash the Keyboard-Politics Wine Formula on me?!
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula let out a few contented little hums, like someone who'd just had an excellent nap.]
[It spoke again: By the way, that strike just now was quite good. I don't remember the details clearly, but a feeling like that doesn't lie — the fusion of sword intent and wine qi was pitched exactly right. Your comprehension really is fine, young friend. Much faster than I expected.]
The tone in the box carried genuine, unfeigned admiration, the way an easygoing friend claps you on the shoulder and says, damn, brother, you've really got it. So natural you couldn't find a single fault in it.
After two breaths of silence, Gu Chengming tested the water. "…Do you know what you said just now?"
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula tilted its head and thought about it: More or less? When you've had too much, you always end up spouting a bit of nonsense.]
Seeing that attitude, Gu Chengming fell to thinking.
The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula wasn't ashamed of what it had said while drunk, nor did it dodge behind an I-was-drunk-so-it-doesn't-count excuse.
Which meant that although the manner and personality shifted enormously, the views and the core beneath them didn't change. Perhaps drunkenness was simply the side on which it showed its true self.
Gu Chengming filed the discovery away and glanced up at the sky. The moon had slid west, and the osmanthus fragrance in the night wind had thinned.
Tonight's haul was considerable. At the very least he'd mapped out the two states of the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula, and the opening for the conquest most likely lay hidden in the switch between them.
Still, he'd been at it long enough for one night. The rest could wait for tomorrow.
Over the next several days, Gu Chengming put most of his energy into figuring out how to raise the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula's favorability.
That was right. As the God of Galgames, Gu Chengming never gave up on a single technique.
The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula's keyboard-politics streak was genuinely a headache, but now that he'd crossed the threshold, there was no reason not to see the route through.
Reality, however, promptly clubbed him over the head.
The sober Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula was exactly as he'd guessed: cheerful, generous, very nearly the least troublesome of all his techniques apart from the Red Dust Phantom Body Formula. And that was precisely where the problem lay.
It was too easy to get along with. So easy that the favorability barely moved.
Gu Chengming tried a great many approaches. Three days produced one single point.
Consider that Hundred Bones Resonance, at her peak, could gain sixty-odd points in a day. A bit of casual snuggling with the Huiyuan Sword Formula was worth five or six. Even Flowing Cloud Moon-Following, when the right event triggered, could jump ten in one go.
Granted, one point in three days wasn't unbearably slow… but this was the early stage of the route!
By rights, early-route favorability moved from Stranger to Friendly easily enough once you found the trick. A situation like this could only mean he hadn't yet found the true method for winning this technique over.
Gu Chengming stared at the number on the panel, which sat all but motionless, and sank into thought.
The sober Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula might be bright and open, but it kept its distance — much like the Clear-Heart Formula in the beginning.
Before he'd found elements like "storybooks" and "entertainment" that the Clear-Heart Formula actually cared about, raising her favorability had been just as difficult.
So perhaps he needed to find what this one cared about first?
The thought brought a great many things into focus at once.
The conquest of the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula — how could it possibly work without wine?
With that clear, Gu Chengming had a plan on the spot.
He rose, brushed nonexistent dust from his robes, and set off toward the market district.
The back mountain courtyard of the Wenjian Sect, after nightfall.
Gu Chengming sat cross-legged beside the stone table, a newly bought spirit wine flask in front of him. Yu Wenqiu's dowry wine had run dry, so he'd gone to the market and picked up several jars of decently graded aged brew.
It couldn't compare to that jar of immortal brew, but for bringing on drunkenness it was more than enough.
The spirit wine went down. The wine qi rose.
The instant his awareness began to blur, the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula's dialogue box flared to life.
—As if someone had flipped a switch.
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula's eyes lit up at once: Wine? Good, good. And where there's wine, how can there be nothing to talk about?]
[Come on, come on, let's pick up where we left off —]
After a long stretch of babbling.
[Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula favorability +3]
One evening had yielded more than three sober days combined.
From then on, every night at dusk, the scent of wine drifted punctually out of the back mountain courtyard.
And in those days of "drunken exchange," Gu Chengming discovered another rather interesting trait of the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula: it was passionately fond of unofficial histories.
Not the documented, verifiable sort recorded in proper texts, but the kind dug out of some forgotten corner — strange anecdotes of thoroughly uncertain truth.
And it made a specialty of the Great Qian royal house.
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula swayed as it spoke: Young friend, did you know that the founding emperor of the Great Qian sold hooks when he was young?]
Gu Chengming: "…?"
[Hooks! Fishhooks! They say that before he raised his army, he ran a little stall on the shore of the East Sea selling fishhooks, and business was pretty good. Later on, halfway through conquering the realm, he ran short on military funds and went back to selling hooks for a few months to make up the difference.]
"…?!"
So that was the kind of hook he meant.
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula only grew happier as it talked: And there's more, there's more! That Great Qian Founding Emperor once put on women's clothing to raise the morale of his troops. Supposedly it was wildly effective — the whole army's spirits shot up thirty percent afterward, because everyone figured that if His Majesty would do even that for their sake, what excuse did they have not to fight for their lives?]
Gu Chengming held these unofficial histories in the deepest suspicion, but he had to admit that keeping the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula company through all this nonsense was far and away the fastest way to raise favorability he'd found.
Every time they finished, the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula would say, thoroughly content, that drinking with young friend was a real pleasure.
And the favorability would tick up a few points.
It was the first time, outside of Hundred Bones Resonance, that Gu Chengming had felt what it was like to do essentially nothing and watch the number climb.
All right — "climb" was overselling it. All told it had only gone up ten points.
But compared to the rate before, this was nothing short of rapid.
And so several more days passed, woven of wine fragrance and unofficial history.
While keeping up his nightly drinking sessions with the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula, Gu Chengming methodically completed his final preparations for the Yunyue Sect trip. Everything that needed packing was packed, and his cultivation base had firmed up considerably in that stretch.
The departure date was close at hand. Two evenings before he set out, Gu Chengming was cultivating in the courtyard when the message jade slip at his waist gave a faint tremor.
He drew it out and sent his spiritual sense in. It was Ji Yixi.
Her Highness clearly already knew he was about to travel to the Yunyue Sect. She stated her purpose outright from the first sentence, and the amount of information packed into her words was considerable.
"Your Highness is well informed."
"A projection by the Imperial Astronomical Bureau." Ji Yixi's answer came fast, with no extra explanation.
Gu Chengming offered neither agreement nor objection. After their time together at Floating Isle City, he had a fair guess as to why this princess was so fond of speaking in riddles.
The contents of the Record of the Myriad Worlds could not be disclosed to others directly, nor could she explain the existence of the technique itself.
But there was no doubt at all that this young princess bore him no ill will.
Sure enough, her next words were:
"There are some things I need to tell Commander Gu in advance."
Ji Yixi hesitated a moment, then spoke patiently.
"While the Imperial Astronomical Bureau was conducting a routine celestial projection toward the Emerald Screen Range, certain images appeared that could not be read normally."
Gu Chengming's ears pricked up, and he let Her Highness continue.
"The results of the projection were clear in themselves, but the clear content could not be understood." Ji Yixi paused, seeming to weigh her words. "I'll describe what I saw. Judge it for yourself."
In the first image she described, the disciples inside the Yunyue Sect were going about their lives normally — resting, cultivating, walking about.
Lessons were held as usual, morning drills were run as usual, the refectory lit its stoves as usual, the mountain patrols changed shifts as usual.
But the part that made the hair stand up was this: every disciple's shadow was wrong. A person would walk forward and the shadow wouldn't follow. Or a person would stand still to rest and the shadow would drift off on its own toward some direction of its choosing. And in all of the Bureau's projected imagery, not a single Yunyue Sect disciple noticed.
Next came the Yunyue Sect's sect-protecting grand formation as the Bureau had projected it: spirit patterns drawing inward from the outside, clamping down from top to bottom — as though to keep something from getting out.
Gu Chengming turned it over in his mind.
Last time, in the Grand Tournament incident at Floating Isle City, the thread had been "names." And this time the thread was "shadows"?
If even the Imperial Astronomical Bureau — or rather, the Record of the Myriad Worlds — couldn't read the information correctly, then whatever was happening inside the Yunyue Sect might already fall outside the range that ordinary cognition could cover.
"This information… has the Bureau drawn any conclusions?" Gu Chengming asked.
"No."
Ji Yixi's answer was flat and immediate. "The Bureau's projection masters developed severe cognitive derangement after viewing those images."
Oh, wonderful. Now we get the classic Cthulhu-mythos decryption segment.
Even the information was unnameable?
"One last thing." Something seemed to occur to Ji Yixi, and her tone softened slightly. "That spirit artifact. The End Lotus."
"It can skip over a process whose ending is already determined. That ability may be of limited use when exploring unknown environments, but under certain specific conditions — if Commander Gu confirms that his situation is safe yet he cannot extract himself — it will be an excellent means of escape."
"Please keep it on your person at all times. When the moment comes, don't hesitate."
There was real weight behind that. Given how sparing with words Ji Yixi normally was, the fact that she'd gone out of her way to stress the End Lotus's use meant that somewhere in those fragmented projected images, this artifact had likely played a decisive role along certain world lines.
"Thank you for the warning, Your Highness." Gu Chengming's gratitude was sincere.
"It's nothing." A trace of well-wishing entered Ji Yixi's voice. "Be safe."
At that exact moment, a dialogue box lit up in his Sea of Consciousness.
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula's ears perked up.]
[On the surface it maintained a posture of idle, casual listening, but its attention had plainly locked entirely onto the direction of the message talisman.]
[From the instant the keywords "Great Qian royal house" and "princess" surfaced, its eyes had been shining.]
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula restrained itself with tremendous effort, but the words in the box gave it away anyway: That, um… young friend, are you communicating with the Great Qian princess right now?]
A flash of inspiration hit Gu Chengming. Wait a moment!
A possibility had just occurred to him. Drunk, the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula loved to talk Great Qian unofficial history. Sober, it remained unusually sensitive to royal topics.
And he happened to have an actual Great Qian princess on the line.
If he ran a few of those anecdotes past a genuine heir of the imperial house…
Gu Chengming looked at the dialogue box.
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula is gazing at you with wide, pleading eyes, its expression a solid wall of "ask her, go on, ask her."]
The anticipation was practically overflowing the box.
—Fine. Worth a try.
"Your Highness, I have one more question, somewhat unrelated. I'm not sure whether it's proper to ask."
The other end of the message talisman went quiet for a breath. "Commander Gu, go ahead…"
Gu Chengming weighed his phrasing, doing his best to keep his tone offhand and natural.
"I've read through a number of Great Qian local gazetteers and folk miscellanies, which record a good many curious anecdotes about the imperial house. For instance…"
He paused deliberately.
"For instance, there's one account claiming that when the founding emperor of the Great Qian first raised his army, he once wore women's clothing to lift the morale of the soldiers under his command?"
The silence stretched a long while before Ji Yixi replied, with a rare note of exasperation. "…No such thing ever occurred."
"Talk of that sort is nothing but idle gossip from ignorant villagers. There is not the slightest possibility of it."
As her words landed, the eager Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula in the dialogue box froze.
[Disappointment settled over it at once. All that eager readiness of a moment ago evaporated without a trace, leaving it looking like someone whose prized collection had been exposed as fakes to their face — mortified and crestfallen at once.]
—So it was fake after all.
Gu Chengming had expected as much, but seeing the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula look so deflated, he couldn't quite bear it, and he pressed once more.
"Truly nothing? Not a single related record?"
By rights, pressing further after an explicit denial from a member of the imperial house was poor form. But there was earnestness in the way Gu Chengming asked, a note in his voice that said he genuinely found the story rather delightful.
The other end of the jade slip went quiet again.
Ji Yixi was thinking. If Gu Chengming had asked a second time, then this matter carried some significance for him that she didn't yet understand.
In which case — what answer did he want?
Ji Yixi wavered. She rarely let another person's attitude shake her judgment, and yet where Gu Chengming was concerned, she always ended up granting him certain "privileges."
Last time they'd met she'd been tied up and hadn't lost her composure, and now, merely because he'd asked one extra question, she was beginning to wonder whether she'd missed something.
Ji Yixi's lips moved, and her voice came through the jade slip carrying a thread of careful, tentative probing.
"There… is there?"
Gu Chengming found this delicately absurd. Why was she asking him back?
"Surely Your Highness would know this better than I would?"
Ji Yixi struggled with it for a while, then said, in the manner of someone who has decided that whatever your reasons are, she'll simply go along with you, "It could have."
The subtext of those three words ran roughly: although the imperial archives genuinely contain no record of the matter, if you believe there ought to be one, I am not unwilling to reopen the investigation on my end.
Translated more plainly: …whatever makes you happy.
Gu Chengming was genuinely moved. He had no idea what state of mind had produced that sentence, but there was no doubt at all that to the Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula it sounded like the music of heaven.
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula, downcast a moment ago, heard those words and had its mortification swept clean away.]
[It knew it! How could the unofficial history it told be idle gossip from ignorant villagers? Even the princess had admitted it — the Founding Emperor had absolutely worn women's clothes!]
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula looked at Gu Chengming with eyes full of admiration and warmth: it decided he not only had discerning taste but was also willing to believe in her, which made him a true confidant well worth trusting.]
[Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula favorability +20]
[It watches you with considerable anticipation, hoping you'll verify more of the "unofficial history" it has to offer.]
Gu Chengming looked at the face full of expectation in the dialogue box, then at the jade slip in his hand.
Fine. Strike while the iron was hot.
"Your Highness, one more matter…"
"Speak."
"Concerning the passage about the Founding Emperor making his living by fishing and hunting in his youth — there's a folk account holding that he was in fact selling hook gear on the shore of the East Sea—"
He hadn't even finished before Ji Yixi answered.
This time the reply came far faster than the last, and far more certain.
"It could have."
Wait, Your Highness, I hadn't finished.
[Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula favorability +10]
[Current favorability: 36]
[Status change: raised from Stranger to Friendly]
[Strength attribute +3]
[The Immortal-Concealing Wine-Sword Formula grew excited too, and said: Young friend, they say that back in the day the Great Qian royal house tore itself apart over power, which let the Eternal Life Sect slip in through the gap, and the Great Qian emperor had his body seized by an evil cultivator — which is why the Great Qian is so rotten now. Ask her whether that's true for me.]
—Fuck, you really are trying to get me killed!
____
________________________________________
If you want more chapters, please consider supporting my page on (P). with 50 advanced chapters available on (P)
👻 Join the crew by searching Leanzin on (P). You know the spot! 😉