A pair of dopes.
Watching the reactions of the Hundred Bones Resonance and the Yin-Yang Creation Strategy, Gu Chengming was rendered utterly speechless.
As the «Yin-Yang Creation Strategy» circulated, he could clearly perceive the fluctuations in the qi-mechanism of this Second Imperial Princess across from him.
Though her emotions were somewhat taut, that aura of hers was extremely pure.
She bore him no ill will at all—on the contrary, she radiated a near-clumsy eagerness to show goodwill.
"She clearly bears no ill will..." Gu Chengming mused inwardly. "So why is the way she goes about things so off-putting?"
Could it be she carried some treasure on her capable of shielding or distorting spiritual-sense perception?
"The conditions Your Highness offers sound very fine."
Gu Chengming suppressed the doubt in his heart and slowly spoke:
"But your manner of conduct leaves me, Gu, unable to pay it any compliment."
Ji Yixi was slightly taken aback.
"Before entering, you indulged your guard in using his momentum to pressure me. After entering, you said you wouldn't use the matter of the dragon energy to threaten me, yet the moment you saw I meant to refuse, you brought the matter up on your own initiative."
"And now you'd have me go risk my life for you on nothing but empty words."
"Force first, courtesy after; the big stick paired with the sweet date—Your Highness wields this art of handling people quite skillfully indeed."
"But if this is the attitude, then I think there's no need for any cooperation between us."
Ji Yixi froze, opened her mouth, wanting to explain something: "I am not..."
"Elder, see the guest out."
Gu Chengming gave her no chance to explain, simply rising to his feet and walking toward the room.
"Hmph!"
Off to the side, Yu Wenqiu—who had long since found this so-called imperial princess displeasing to the eye—at last found her chance to let loose.
She spat out the fruit-pit in her mouth, casually tossed onto the ground that withered branch she'd used to "reason things out," clapped her hands, and that pair of peach-blossom eyes brimmed with the murderous air of one protecting her own.
What Great Qian imperial princess?
Putting on airs before the Wenjian Sect? What Great Qian imperial princess? My own senior sister has even beaten up a Great Qian imperial prince before!
"Second Highness, this way, if you please?"
Yu Wenqiu walked up before Ji Yixi, the sharp qi-mechanism of a third-realm-perfected sword cultivator locking onto the other without the slightest courtesy:
"My little Gu is timid of heart and can't bear a fright. If Your Highness doesn't wish for me to lay hands on you and have you escorted out, it'd be more dignified to leave on your own."
"After all..."
Yu Wenqiu shot a glance at the guard behind the carriage and said: "This Jishan Ward alley is narrow. If it really came to blows and Your Highness got hurt, well, that wouldn't be good at all."
In the end, this most powerful princess of the Great Qian could only stiffly squeeze out three dry words.
"...Sorry to disturb you."
She didn't even manage to get any words of salvaging the situation out of her mouth before Yu Wenqiu, half-guarding and half-driving her, "escorted" her out of the small courtyard's main gate.
"Bang!"
That mottled wooden door slammed shut before her without the slightest mercy, shaking loose a few flecks of dust from the doorframe.
Ji Yixi stood outside the door, staring at that tightly-shut gate, the whole of her somewhat dazed.
The carriage slowly drove away from Jishan Ward.
Inside the carriage, a deathly silence.
Ji Yixi sat upright before that ancient bronze mirror, her originally cool and aloof features now carrying a measure of frustration and bewilderment.
She extended a finger and lightly touched the mirror's surface.
In an instant, countless voices burst open within her mind.
"You said I should first display strength... so I brought Commander Wang."
Ji Yixi asked softly in her heart.
"You said I should let him know I bore him no ill will, so I brought up the dragon energy."
"You said that so long as I offered enough benefit to make him unable to refuse, so I promised any condition."
"Wasn't this all... the optimal solution you taught me?"
The clamorous noise in her mind suddenly fell into silence.
For a long while.
Ji Yixi looked at that expressionless self in the mirror, and a rare trace of dejection showed in her eyes—the grievance of a good student who answered according to the standard answer key yet scored a zero.
"What you taught me... was the worst possible way."
She murmured under her breath.
"I botched it..."
Ji Yixi lowered her eyelids, her fingers gripping her sleeve tightly.
After a long while, she drew in a deep breath.
"I must make amends."
...
Jishan Ward, within the small courtyard.
Having seen off that princess Highness, Yu Wenqiu was rather pleased, as if she'd won, and grabbed a handful of melon seeds to start cracking.
But Gu Chengming's expression held little ease. He sat in the rattan chair, toying with a jade slip in his hand, brow tightly furrowed—clearly mulling over what had just happened, and the consequences it might bring.
"Elder Yu." Gu Chengming suddenly spoke.
"Hm?" Yu Wenqiu spat out a melon-seed husk and answered absentmindedly.
"If that Highness flies into a rage from humiliation and really exposes the matter of the dragon energy, or sends experts to surround and kill us... what should we do?"
Hearing this, the Hundred Bones Resonance seemed to only just suddenly catch on—was that woman just now threatening Heavenly Emperor Gu?
[The Hundred Bones Resonance flew into a towering rage: the imperial clan must be slaughtered to the last man!]
Compared to the extreme Hundred-Bones-Emperor, little Elder Yu was far more realistic.
"What else can we do?"
Yu Wenqiu brushed the dust off her hands and said, with a face full of matter-of-factness:
"We run, that's what."
"Run?"
"That's right. Worst case, we just head back to the Wenjian Sect." Yu Wenqiu patted her chest and said: "Little Gu, don't go thinking that just because this Elder doesn't cultivate on ordinary days, my means of preserving my life are anything to scoff at."
"I still have a bottom-of-the-chest secret escape art, called Traceless Over Ten Thousand Miles. Once this technique is unleashed, then even if a fifth-realm great power were to take action personally, they couldn't so much as catch a corner of our clothes. As long as we're out of the Capital, we leap onto a flying boat and head straight back to the sect."
"And once at the Wenjian Sect—even if she were lent ten times her courage, would she dare come up the mountain to demand a man back?"
Gu Chengming listened in dumbstruck astonishment, looking at his own master with some puzzlement:
"Elder Yu... how come your escape art sounds far more impressive than your swordsmanship?"
Hearing this, Yu Wenqiu's little face flushed somewhat red, and she lectured: "This is called prudence!"
"Just think—how dangerous is this immortal-cultivating world? Demons, monsters, ghosts and fiends, treacherous petty villains... if all you know how to do is charge ahead like some reckless hothead, the grass on your grave would already be three feet tall! Only those who survive are qualified to talk about the sword-Dao!"
Looking at Elder Yu's "I'm very experienced" demeanor, the tension coiled in Gu Chengming's heart eased considerably.
True enough—worst case, we just up and leave.
He had come down the mountain to temper himself in the first place. Whether it was the Great Qian's officialdom or the imperial clan's secrets, to him they were nothing but passing clouds before the eyes.
If it truly came to the point of the fish dying and the net breaking, then he'd just flip the table and walk away.
"Since the Elder puts it that way, then I'm at ease."
However, what Gu Chengming didn't expect was—
The next day, that Second Imperial Princess Highness seemed to have come again.
Gu Chengming had just opened the courtyard gate to go buy breakfast when he saw that figure standing at the mouth of the alley.
Today Ji Yixi hadn't brought that eyesore of a guard, nor had she ridden a carriage. She was simply there alone, dressed in plain, unadorned everyday clothes, standing quietly. Seeing Gu Chengming come out, she was just about to step forward and speak.
"Bang."
Gu Chengming shut the door, turned, and went back inside.
Ji Yixi's hand stiffened in midair. She pressed her lips together, yet did not leave, still standing there.
The second day, with the wind and sand blowing fiercely, she still stood there, strands of her hair slightly disheveled...
On the third day, Gu Chengming looked at that figure outside who had now stood in the rain for two whole hours, and in the end could only let out a helpless sigh, deciding to hear out what she wanted to say.
On the one hand, if Ji Yixi came to his place too many times it would inevitably arouse others' suspicion; on the other, Ji Yixi had indeed done as she'd said—even though the deal hadn't gone through, she hadn't breathed a word about the dragon energy.
"Come in."
Ji Yixi lifted her head, a flicker of barely-perceptible delight crossing that pale face. She opened her mouth as if wanting to say something, but her throat was a little dry, and in the end she only let out an "Mm."
Within the small courtyard.
Yu Wenqiu did not come out, only watching from afar within the main room—clearly leaving the space to the two of them.
Gu Chengming did not invite her to sit, nor did he pour tea, only standing beneath the osmanthus tree in the courtyard:
"What does Your Highness mean by this? A bitter-flesh ploy won't work on me, Gu."
"No."
Ji Yixi spoke with some urgency, standing before Gu Chengming, her two hands wringing together somewhat awkwardly, utterly without that lofty, condescending composure of their first meeting.
"I came to apologize. Last time I came, I was presumptuous and did many off-putting things. I don't know how to ask things of people, nor how to get along with people—I only know how to use those tactics."
"Your Highness overstates it. It's only that the matter of the dragon energy sticks in my throat like a fishbone, and I, Gu, truly cannot set my heart at ease. Who's to say that Your Highness, apologizing today, won't sell me out again tomorrow for the sake of profit?"
Ji Yixi seemed to have anticipated long ago that Gu Chengming would ask this.
Without any hesitation, she suddenly raised her right hand, three fingers pressed together pointing to the heavens. The spiritual power within her surged, and a profound, abstruse fluctuation radiated out from her body.
"I, Ji Yixi, this day swear upon my Dao-foundation!"
"No matter when or where, no matter what happens, I shall never reveal to a third person the secret that Gu Chengming bears the dragon energy! Should I violate this oath, may my Dao-foundation crumble, my body die and my Dao vanish, my spirit-soul utterly annihilated, never to enter the cycle of reincarnation!"
Immediately after, Ji Yixi's face turned abruptly pale, blood seeping from the corner of her mouth, and she looked at Gu Chengming with a measure of expectation, asking: "Now will you trust me?"
Gu Chengming did not know what a Dao-oath was, and was a little puzzled—making an oath and you expect me to trust you?
Off to the side, Yu Wenqiu, seeing this, sent a soft voice-transmission: "A Dao-oath is an oath that communicates directly with the Heavenly Dao, staking one's prospects of cultivation for the rest of one's life as the wager. The very instant the oath is sworn, a portion of the Dao-foundation must be forfeited as collateral—that line just now cost at least five years of cultivation. And once the contents of a Dao-oath are violated, one will immediately die and have one's Dao vanish, even unable to enter the cycle of reincarnation."
Gu Chengming felt somewhat awkward, thinking to himself that he really hadn't known that.
But this clearly defied common sense—just what was it about him that was worth this princess Highness going to such lengths?
If he didn't get to the bottom of her true motive, Gu Chengming would never be able to set his heart at ease.
Receiving no response, a flicker of helplessness crossed Ji Yixi's eyes. She anxiously stepped forward, seeming to want to grab Gu Chengming's sleeve, but stopped midair.
"I absolutely bear no ill will whatsoever, and I didn't come for the sake of the Azure Lotus Sword Realm either..."
"For certain reasons, I cannot tell you everything."
"But to me, you truly are that one and only 'turning point.'"
"So no matter what, I will never do anything disadvantageous to you."
Gu Chengming circulated the Yin-Yang Creation Strategy and sensed the true meaning behind these few words.
"That Your Highness can go this far has of itself already revealed your true intent. I, Gu, am impressed."
Though Gu Chengming said this, he did not bring up the matter of the Azure Lotus Sword Realm.
Hearing this, Ji Yixi let out a long breath of relief.
"Many thanks, Mister Gu."
She no longer pestered him, nor did she press her advantage. Quite tactfully, she wiped away the bloodstain at the corner of her mouth and once again saluted Gu Chengming and Yu Wenqiu:
"Then I won't disturb you any longer. I take my leave."
Until the courtyard gate closed once more.
[The Yin-Yang Creation Strategy was full of incomprehension and shock.]
[He subdued an imperial princess as a pet just that easily?]
[To think it had earlier been planning for him to agree to her, and then, when stating his demand, propose dual-cultivating with her—damn it, was it still too shallow after all!]
[The Yin-Yang Creation Strategy looked at Gu Chengming and once again jotted down a note in its little mental notebook.]
[This lad is terrifying to such a degree—he absolutely must not be taught to become a simp.]
[«Yin-Yang Creation Strategy» affinity +5]
[Current affinity: 20]
...
PS: Don't rush to slide down the slippery slope just yet, friends...
This stretch of plot serves, on the one hand, the Yin-Yang Creation Strategy's affinity, and on the other, to have the Second Imperial Princess make a mistake, so that the protagonist can later occupy the absolutely dominant position in their cooperation. The secret realm is essentially a reward instance and isn't dangerous at all.
The Second Imperial Princess is fundamentally a dummy who simply doesn't understand interpersonal relations—a bunch of dummies in a dummy server teaching each other to be dummies, and they straight-up bungled her first formal cooperation with the protagonist. That line, "I'm willing to do anything," was also sincere, because she doesn't know what the protagonist wants.
This is part of the reason she dies in nearly all the world-lines too.
The Second Imperial Princess is essentially a persecuted-supporting-role slot, so some misunderstanding-plot is needed to put her in a disadvantaged position. I'd even prepared the before-and-after contrast all set to be resolved in the new chapter, but then everyone slid down the slope and turned her straight into a doomed little fairy-maiden... I woke up from a nap and the sky had fallen.
She's fundamentally a dummy-type character; the earlier text actually showed it too.
Of course, it really is a problem with my writing that led everyone to misunderstand—I plead guilty.
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