Chaos

After a long, silent gaze, Lady Linji slowly closed her eyes, letting the sheer veil fall back over her sight.

The sun and moon ornaments in her hair began to revolve, simulating a small-scale illusion of sunrise and sunset within the alternating light. Time within that span rushed forward or backward, allowing her to see both the past of the hair's owner and the most likely future.

Tang Shuyu had seen Lady Linji divine for others or for subordinate deities before, and every time, she would only close her eyes for three seconds before opening them again with a precise answer.

But this time, she kept her eyes shut for an unusually long time—so long that Liang Yi above had already spoken a lengthy passage.

A full incense stick's worth of time passed before Lady Linji slowly opened her eyes. Her expression turned somewhat subtle. "Your friend... the clue to her home lies atop the number one Star-Gazing Tower in the world."

There were many Star-Gazing Towers throughout the world, and every country with any semblance of power had its emperor order one built in the capital.

But the one worthy of being called the best in the world was only the Star-Gazing Tower within the imperial palace of Moyi.

Tang Shuyu listened, said nothing, folded his hands on his knees, leaned back in his chair, and wore a faint, unreadable expression.

Lady Linji suddenly spoke again: "Would you like a divination for yourself as well?"

She used the informal "you" rather than the more respectful form—Lady Linji was a very polite True Deity. Even with her strength, she usually used honorifics when addressing other True Deities.

Now she had even forgotten to use the honorific, clearly very eager to cast a divination for Tang Shuyu.

Tang Shuyu noticed, but didn't mind. He nodded slightly with a smile at the corner of his lips and turned his chair toward Lady Linji.

Lady Linji turned her palm over, and three copper coins lay in her hand. She first lined them up, wound them around the strand of hair bound with red string three times, then held the coins in her palm and offered them to Tang Shuyu.

Tang Shuyu traced the surface of the coins with his fingertip, silently agreeing to the divination.

Lady Linji cast the coins six times. With each throw, the eyes behind her veil widened, and her initially relaxed posture grew more upright.

Tang Shuyu propped his cheek on his hand and watched. "What did you divine?"

Lady Linji replied, "Lake over Mountain, Xian; favorable for perseverance."

Tang Shuyu: "What does that mean?"

He was indeed a True Deity and did have a clever mind, but no one had ever required every True Deity to know how to interpret hexagrams—moreover, Tang Shuyu was the type who was not skilled in divination and was very young among the deities. Compared to the other eight old-timers in the room, his age was hardly different from a child's.

That "child's" Divine Palace and authority had not yet been carved up, not because the other eight True Deities were particularly kind.

Half the reason was that Tang Shuyu was dangerous enough; the other half was that the eight True Deities each had their own personal grudges, and they were not in a position to trust or cooperate with one another.

Lady Linji smiled slightly, put away the coins, and said, "It's a good omen."

She did not elaborate, and Tang Shuyu didn't care either. He turned his chair back, picked up the strand of hair tied with red string. As he reached out, his movement paused for a subtle moment—every inch of his skin felt a slight, squeezing, constricting pain.

His face still bore a look of idle boredom, but as he lowered his head to take the item, he skimmed the memories of the Blind Puppet.

The puppet had no sight, so the memories Tang Shuyu extracted had no images.

Only the sound of He Zhuoming talking.

All of it was He Zhuoming's voice.

Ever since that night, when He Zhuoming stepped into the pure white room where the puppet stayed, he had stopped listening to anyone else's voice—the puppet's world had become only He Zhuoming in these past days. The occasional presence of others flickered by only because they were connected to her, earning a sliver of the puppet's remaining attention.

It was but a few days of memories. Tang Shuyu only needed a few seconds to skim through such a dull content.

In truth, these memories weren't even worth going through twice. The only piece of information that mattered was that the puppet had left the formation.

The Blind Puppet existed to take Tang Shuyu's place in the formation. If the Blind Puppet left on its own, while the formation's binding would fall entirely on the puppet, the main body would still suffer some effect.

He really didn't understand what the puppet was thinking—Tang Shuyu believed he had been more than tolerant and generous with the puppet. Knowing it was a defective product, he had only one requirement of it: stay put in the formation.

Even the stupid dog Liang Yi raised could manage that. Why would the puppet mess up? Was what sat between its ears actually wood, or a pig's head?

A nameless anger suddenly surged in his chest. Tang Shuyu's lips flattened, the smile gone. Cursing the Blind Puppet under his breath, he picked out and replayed the segments of the puppet's memories that involved He Zhuoming, ignoring the parts where the puppet had finally walked out of the formation and caused chaos.

The more he listened, the more annoyed he got—What's wrong with Xiao He? She was always fierce and fussy with him, but with the puppet, she actually treated it much better, even giving it flowers.

Giving, giving, giving—why was she so fond of giving things!

I've been so good to her, acting like both father and mother... If I had a biological daughter, I'm sure I wouldn't have this much patience—so why doesn't Xiao He ever show any gratitude and give me something?

As these thoughts churned, Tang Shuyu suddenly stood up with a jolt. The other eight True Deities turned to look at him, puzzled.

Tang Shuyu smiled. "Something came up. I'll step out for a moment; I'll be back before the karma inspection."

A gathering of True Deities couldn't be skipped casually, but Tang Shuyu was this session's host, and he had assured he'd return for the karma check. The other discussions at the gathering were merely exchanges of basic information—in truth, none of the True Deities actually disclosed all the goings-on in their territories. They mostly picked a few high-profile incidents that had made the rounds elsewhere to muddle through. The most important, central matter was only one thing.

That was the karma inspection.

Corrupted Deities whose karma crossed the danger line would be instantly purified by the other colleagues on the spot.

So, since Tang Shuyu promised not to miss the karma inspection, the other True Deities had no objections.

After he left, Lady Linji happily took a bite of a fruit and casually placed a piece on the plate of Zhixing beside her.

Zhixing glanced at the immortal fruit in her plate and asked, "In a good mood?"

Lady Linji said with a grin, "Seeing someone I dislike about to get what's coming to them, surely that's reason to be in a good mood."

Zhixing: "Is the Earth Immortal's omen bad?"

She had seen Lady Linji cast divination for Tang Shuyu, but she couldn't hear what they said, nor could she see the results of the six coin throws.

Lady Linji adjusted the sun-moon scale in her hair, and said cheerfully, "For others, it's a good omen, but for him, not so much. Though it's what he deserves—taking shortcuts always comes with a price."

Tang Shuyu stepped out of the meeting room, and the next step landed on the floor of the pure white room.

This room, which should have been pure white, had now been completely submerged in red lines, turning into a crimson sea.

Tang Shuyu stirred his hand through the pile of red lines, quickly pulling out a white candle—its flame had already gone out, and the yellow talisman rolled inside the wick had been sliced so thoroughly by the red lines that not even ash remained.

The vengeful spirits that had been sealed inside had all escaped. The weakest among them had at least a thousand years of cultivation, and they were now darting around in the air above the Divine Palace, cackling as they grabbed cultivators and ate them.

If not for the solid barrier of the Divine Palace, they would have already burst outside and gone foraging.

Tang Shuyu crushed the candle and walked out expressionlessly. Outside, everything was in utter chaos. The crabapple trees were growing wildly like bamboo fed on drugs, smashing through the eaves of his favorite palace.

Tang Shuyu didn't care about how many people died, but his glazed roof tiles, the floor tiles baked from cold clay, the windows cut from cloud gauze, the musicians he had trained for nearly ten years before they started to look presentable...

And that fool friend of his, He Zhuoming, who couldn't even tell a puppet from the real him.

The more Tang Shuyu thought about it, the angrier he got; he laughed at his own anger. Raising his hand, he grabbed a handful of gold paper from the main hall's altar and scattered it out. The gold paper linked together in mid-air, forming a huge, shimmering golden net that flew up and caught all the vengeful spirits that were flying around with cultivators in their mouths.

The net shrank smaller and smaller, until it became a paper ball the size of a palm, landing in Tang Shuyu's hand. The vengeful spirits inside immediately started begging for mercy, declaring their loyalty, pleading for forgiveness.

Without turning his head, Tang Shuyu called out, "Qing Yang!"

The green-maned horse with the green saddle trotted over, opened its mouth, took the paper ball, chewed a few times, and swallowed it.

Tang Shuyu smiled as he walked forward, the horse hanging its head behind him. Everywhere along the way were broken walls, burning houses, blood-soaked floor tiles—and the newly dead, souls who hadn't yet realized they were dead, drifting around in a daze as fresh ghosts.

Tang Shuyu plucked a crabapple blossom from the side and waved it in his hand. The lingering souls nearby, guided by the gesture, slowly drifted over and gathered around him, following him all the way to a certain palace that had been turned into a gambling den.

The sharp red lines on the path softened the moment they touched Tang Shuyu, flowing like water along the ground, no longer easily cutting anything apart.

The green-maned horse followed behind Tang Shuyu until he walked into the gambling den. It wisely stepped forward first and pushed open the door, which was already completely broken in the middle.

Inside was also a wreck. Tang Shuyu swept his gaze around without a smile. The first thing he noticed was that his palace, with its unified decoration style, had been turned into a casino. He said coldly, "Tasteless thing."

Then Tang Shuyu finally caught sight of the puppet collapsed in the center. The puppet no longer looked human at all. Its limbs had been twisted off, and its head had been hollowed out in the middle, caved in by a large chunk.

The ball of blood belonging to Tang Shuyu inside the puppet was gone.

This puppet was different from ordinary ones—it was a non-recyclable puppet. Because of its reckless behavior, the karma it bore had long exceeded its limit, so it could be classified as a Corrupted Deity.

If he were to recycle it, it would increase Tang Shuyu's karmic burden. His original plan was to let it fall into the hands of the Demon Suppression Bureau and survive for a while, then find time to destroy it after the Day of Divine Celebration.

Everything had been planned well; everyone had a role: the non-recyclable failure would be handed to the Demon Suppression Bureau for now, Xiao He would stay deep in the Divine Palace, temporarily protected by the Blind Puppet, while her daily needs would be handled by the maids.

Considering Xiao He was still a child, he had also instructed the maids to find a young musician to accompany her with music and dance, so she wouldn't get bored. As for the questions Xiao He cared about, he just needed to ask Lady Linji during the gathering to get the answers...

The only thing these people needed to do was to look after Xiao He for these fifteen days and make sure she didn't run into any trouble, just like when she was by his side. Why did everyone have to mess up something this simple? Why not just go and die instead!

Tang Shuyu stomped the puppet's broken body to pieces. His smile, born of fury, looked especially cold and sinister.

The green-maned horse silently retreated behind him, lowering its head, trying its best to pretend it was just a puff of air.

In the next moment, the man, the horse, and a large crowd of wandering souls appeared in the back courtyard of a shabby, makeshift temple.

This not-so-narrow courtyard was completely filled with crabapple branches. Anyone who approached would be attacked by the tree trunks; only Tang Shuyu could walk close, and the tangled trunks would part on their own, opening a path for him.

The green-maned horse wisely remained where it was and did not follow.

Deep in the courtyard, the Blind Puppet gently held He Zhuoming's hand, gazing at her with his ever-bleeding eyes. He Zhuoming's eyes were closed, her breathing light. To him, she was likely asleep.

So this is what Xiao He looks like.

His curiosity made his pupils contract unnaturally, then dilate, as if the eyes themselves had their own breath.

These were eyes he had dug out from another puppet's face, and they fit well. He had seen color for the first time, and he had also seen Xiao He; Xiao He's face was wet, as if it were constantly raining.

When would she wake up?

Now he could go outside, and he could see. Once Xiao He woke up, they could go out and play together, and also help Xiao He find a way home. The main body was so busy, needing to man the Divine Palace, so of course, it had to be him to accompany Xiao He...

What would the outside of the Divine Palace look like?

The Blind Puppet hadn't even fully seen the inside of the Divine Palace, yet now he was already looking forward to the world beyond.

His heart felt a fullness it had never known, light and giddy, the surge of emotion dizzying. In his memory, images flickered—of He Zhuoming giving him crabapple blossoms, sitting with him and chatting; then of him teasing her to tears and being stabbed in the chest by her sword.

They were equally brief periods of getting along; a few days and a few hours made little difference—the jumbled memories left him dazed, torn between wanting to immediately plan where to take Xiao He once they left, and wanting to ask her name.

What's your name? How do you write your name? How did you meet me?

Use the memory stone with me too, smile at me too!

Stop asking about my parents, stop asking about my past—talk to me about the present, about the things that happened after I met you, alright?

...

He stared at He Zhuoming, smiling one moment, agitated the next, then his brows drooped, half-laughing, half-crying, looking very wronged, tears and blood streaking down his cheeks.

The Blind Puppet lowered his head, gently pressing his face against He Zhuoming's wrist, sobbing softly: "You're my only good friend. Why can't you just meet only me, like I look forward to seeing only you every day..."

As he wept, he suddenly felt a weight press down on the top of his head. With a crack—

The Blind Puppet's head was twisted off.

His vision spun around, and he found himself face to face, held by the head, with a flawless youthful face. The youth had a pair of perfectly intact eyes, and when he smiled, his straight, thick lashes half-covered his pupils, casting a soft shadow.

The long beaded earring on his left ear swayed gently, the refracted glow of the pearls sweeping past his pale lips and the sunken dimples.

The shimmer of the pearls swaying against his skin made his smile look both eerie and cold—and brilliant.

He hurled the puppet's head out with force, then pried open the puppet's hand that was holding He Zhuoming, kicking the body away as well.

Finally, there was space beside He Zhuoming. Tang Shuyu sat down there as a matter of course, pulled out a handkerchief, and wiped the bloodstains from her hand.

His handkerchief had been soaked in cold water, and it clung to He Zhuoming's hand with a cool touch. He Zhuoming wrinkled her nose and opened her eyes, dazed.

Her vision was a blur. She felt someone take her hand, and a gentle, light voice whispered by her ear, "Alas, poor Xiao He, scared senseless by a pig-headed fool."

TL Note:

"泽山咸" (Lake over Mountain) is one of the I Ching's 64 hexagrams, an omen for mutual influence and attraction