Now that’s different, Wang Jun thought. She’s really desperate. He thought for a moment before summoning a small box from his spatial treasure. “Let’s first settle debts owed before talking about further exchanges.” He opened the box, revealing a mauve hairclip inscribed with black runes. He looked for a reaction, but to his disappointment, didn’t find one.
The headmistress’s hand trembled slightly as she reached toward the box. She took the mauve hairclip and placed it on her head. The headmistress vanished, leaving him alone inside the room. He could see her, of course—shadows could never hide from him. But any other person in this city wouldn’t be able to see her unless they physically bumped into each other.
“It might seem easy to make, but I had to infuse it with my own blood essence,” Wang Jun said. “I can only make a few such treasures. Then again, objects are much easier to conceal. Why do you require such a thing?”
“I can’t tell you that,” the headmistress said, reappearing before him. “I need them to hide seven individual objects. They’re roughly one foot tall with a half-foot-by-half-foot base. Each object is stationary. I need people to actively avoid them while not realizing it.”
Wang Jun nodded. “Doable, but expensive.” He tapped his finger on his lips. “But I suppose there’s a piece of information you could give me that’s worth the trouble.”
“Oh?” the headmistress said. “What might that be?”
“I want to see your face,” Wang Jun said. “Your true face. No one outside the pavilion has ever seen you without glamour, and even my astute senses can’t pierce your veil.”
It was a simple favor, worth far less than what he was offering. But the tells were adding up, and he wanted to confirm his suspicions were baseless. Anything to ease his uncertain heart.
The headmistress thought for a while before speaking. “Change your request. Many other things are negotiable.”
“Are you sure you can’t satisfy this one simple request?” Wang Jun pressed.
She hesitated, then spoke. “I can’t show you my face, but I can show you something none of our patrons have seen.”
“And what might that be?” Wang Jun asked.
“A personal performance,” the headmistress replied. “By yours truly. This might not be my true appearance, but there’s a saying: a face is only a mask, but a dance tells all.”
“You’re a dancer?” Wang Jun asked. He hadn’t expected that. Instruments and singing were proper entertainment, while dancing was considered lewd and base. For the headmistress of the Red Dust Pavilion to admit to such a fact was surprising.
He hesitated. A dance wouldn’t give him the answer he wanted, and it certainly wasn’t worth the price of seven obscurity formations. But his heart couldn’t help but beat a little faster when he thought of the Red Dust Mistress performing just for him. He checked his emotional state for tampering and found none.
As Wang Jun agonized over the decision, the headmistress stood up and walked out from behind the short tea table. Every step she took caused his mind to shake and his heart to pound. “Are you sure you won’t reconsider?”
His mind was in chaos for reasons he couldn’t fathom. He stood up hurriedly and presumptuously put a hand on her shoulder and held her at bay. The shoulder felt familiar yet foreign, and to his surprise, she didn’t brush his hand off. Still, Wang Jun was a calm man. He never made decisions in the heat of the moment. He had to do what he was best at. He had to hide and escape.
“I might take you up on that offer,” Wang Jun said, calming himself. “Or maybe another favor.” He pulled his hand back. “The personal cost in making these obscurity formations is high, so it won’t just be a matter of money. We’ve dealt with each other for long enough; I know you’ll repay a favor. Will delivery in one week be fine?”
Silence, then a nod.
“Then I bid you good day, Headmistress.”
Wang Jun’s pounding heart finally calmed once he was out of the building. He detected no tampering with his emotions, so that could only mean they were genuine. Whether they were the result of infatuation or something else, however, was an entirely different matter.
As he walked back to the Jade Bamboo Headquarters pavilion under cover of darkness, he looked back at the Red Dust Pavilion, where patrons flocked despite the late hour. He somewhat understood their persistent yet irrational behavior. Stupid, he thought to himself. He couldn’t allow himself to fall for someone else.
His heart couldn’t take it.
Chapter 30: Elation
Silence reigned in the inheritance chamber as time flowed like a gushing river. As Huxian and his friends slept, Gong Shuren slowly but surely attuned to the Sea God Clock Tower. What had originally been a plain stone clock with golden highlights now glowed with blue runes starting from the base. The tower portion was completely covered in glowing blue runes, while gold-and-blue ones were slowly creeping onto the clock’s circular face, complete with frame, numbers, and needles. The clock’s backdrop remained plain as ever.
In the background, the ticking of the Sea God Clock was a constant buzz that most couldn’t perceive. Cha Ming had only noticed it after two and a half long months of waiting, during which he’d done things like craft pills, craft talismans, and stock up on time essence. He now possessed a large pool of it, safely nestled inside the Clear Sky World.
The white noise muffled most sounds here. But today, an entirely different sound broke that silence: a pulse, then a soft trickle of liquid. Cha Ming’s eyes slowly opened. He turned his gaze to the two objects just beneath the clock and noticed one had changed. The transparent blue orb that Huxian had found in the fissure was glowing. Where there once was nothing, a few drops had condensed at the center of the gem. The soft blue light they generated shone through the Water Essence Core’s transparent
