chapter 3

That miser of a woman bought me a bowl of wontons from a roadside stall, then ate dry rations washed down with water herself.

She stared at the crowded street, lost in thought.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“At first glance,” she said softly, “it almost looks like an age of peace.”

The thriving capital showed no trace of the natural disasters beyond its walls.

Who would guess that less than a hundred li away, the people were already suffering so terribly?

She was still brooding when someone suddenly seized her arm.

Pengpeng spun around in alarm. A young Daoist nun stood there, her hair bound beneath a carefree cap.

“You are already dead. Go back where you belong!”

Pengpeng went pale. “Wh-what did you say?”

The young nun’s expression hardened. Keeping one hand clamped around Pengpeng’s arm, she reached behind herself with the other to draw her sword and strike.

I pushed the blade back into its scabbard.

The young nun froze. “The Kunyu Sword… How did you…”

I yanked her toward me and smiled at Pengpeng. “She’s an old acquaintance. She likes to joke. Let me have a word with her.”

I dragged the reckless girl into a nearby alley.

The Kunyu Sword had been my ritual weapon before I fell onto the demonic path.

Later, I passed it down to the junior members of my old sect from my human days, and it had continued down the line.

The girl had not cultivated long enough to know better. Seeing me command her sect’s sacred weapon, she took me for some mysterious ancestor.

She grew terribly excited and demanded to know why I had protected that living corpse.

I cut her off. “Who sent you?”

Disciples of Qingyun Abbey rarely entered the mortal world anymore, much less marched around carrying the Kunyu Sword.

She answered readily enough: Grand Marshal Song, a high official of the current court.

“These decades were meant to be an age of peace. It is only because demons have grown restless and stolen the realm’s fortune that the people suffer! Ancestor, why would you stop this disciple from slaying a monster?”

I looked at her coldly.

“Do you know who that woman is, where she came from, or what she has suffered?”

The young nun looked baffled. “Does that matter? She’s a living corpse!”

I laughed.

Then I closed my hand around her throat.

“A-Ancestor—”

Terror filled her eyes.

I let the red of my blood-demon gaze shine through.

“Go back and tell your master this: if he touches a single hair on her head, I will kill any human he sends and devour any demon. And if a god comes, I will slaughter the god.”

I released her and strode out of the alley.

By the time I returned to Pengpeng, my face was harmless once more.

“Where’s your friend?” she asked.

“A sudden call of nature. She’s relieving herself in the alley, so don’t disturb her.”

Pengpeng stared at me.

She actually tried to glance back. I caught her arm and pulled her onward.

“Does the noble consort we’re going to treat happen to be surnamed Song?”

“Yes… She’s Grand Marshal Song’s daughter.”

So she was the woman originally proposed for empress.

What a coincidence.

Empress Dongye had died suddenly only six months after entering the palace. Then the Song clan had sought out masters and sent them everywhere to hunt demons.

The next day, we entered the palace without incident and were led to Noble Consort Song’s residence.

The moment we stepped inside, thick smoke from incense rolled out of the inner chamber.

Temple sandalwood.

Talismans and ritual implements covered the room—Daoist charms, ritualist tools, Buddhist objects, spirit-medium tokens, and shamanic artifacts of every tradition.

Noble Consort Song lay unconscious, her cheeks flushed and her breath coming fast.

A palace attendant was warning us, “Take care. Do not injure Her Highness’s precious body…”

Footsteps sounded behind us.

Pengpeng whipped around.

A man in black imperial robes strode into the chamber.

For the first time, a ripple disturbed her usually placid eyes.

That single glance held all the emotion a human heart could bear. It vanished almost at once. She lowered her gaze and bowed beside me.

The new emperor, Li You, could not possibly recognize her. He walked straight to the noble consort’s bedside.

“Rise. Examine her.”

The emperor’s expression could not have been more different from that of the wife he no longer knew.

His words sounded concerned. His eyes were ice.

Pengpeng did not notice. “Yes, Your Majesty,” she murmured.

She had prepared, at least. She stepped forward, took the noble consort’s pulse, frowned, and began to invent a diagnosis.

Something about pent-up emotions turning into liver fire, disturbing the mind and causing chronic sleeplessness…

She said a great deal, but it all came down to this: Noble Consort Song was unhappy, and the unhappiness had caused insomnia so severe that she had collapsed.

It was an impressively vague piece of nonsense.

Fortunately, Li You did not challenge it.

“Can you cure her?”

Pengpeng opened her mouth.

“Yes,” I answered for her.

Only then did Li You look at me.

This emperor had risen from among the common people. His youth had been one long exile, and the moment he reclaimed his throne, he lost the wife he loved.

To tell the truth, there was very little human feeling left on his face.

He was looking at me, but Pengpeng was the one who blanched—because I had already raised three fingers.

“Our Physician Cao can cure her. She needs only three—”

Pengpeng grabbed my hand and blurted, “Three months! Within three months, I—no, this commoner—will restore Her Highness completely!”

Li You frowned.

“You will see improvement in three days!” she added hastily.

After a moment’s thought, Li You nodded. “Then begin treatment.”