The night grew deeper, and the lights within the Imperial Palace painted the sky with brilliant vermilion clouds. ᴛʜɪs ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ɪs ᴜᴘᴅᴀᴛᴇ ʙʏ ɴo(v)elFɪre.ɴet
As Lin Jinyu described how Su Bei treated those disabled disciples, a flicker passed through Ji Nanjue's eyes. Lin Jinyu failed to notice her tightly grasping the brush, the ink staining the palm of her hand black.
"Did he really do that?"
Ji Nanjue sighed softly, closing her eyes. The trembling candlelight cast a dim halo on her androgynous face.
Lin Jinyu's eyes narrowed slightly. She could distinctly feel a surge in Ji Nanjue's emotions at that moment and hummed softly in response.
Ji Nanjue put down the brush and suddenly felt a coldness growing within her, seeping into her bones.
Enduring the discomfort in her body, she addressed Queen Lin behind her with a faint voice, "I've grown tired, Empress. You should also rest early."
"Mhm, tomorrow, accompany me to the Sacred Land."
"It has been... a long time since I've last seen Master."
Lin Jinyu released the hand massaging her shoulder. It might have been an illusion, but she felt that the Emperor's body seemed softer somehow, her profile more slender and feminine, ...increasingly resembling...
But without giving it much thought, she nodded and gracefully left the Imperial Study Room.
She knew this recruitment convention of the Twenty-One Provinces was unlike any before—not just an opening ceremony. To her knowledge, the Saintess of the Sacred Land even set up the Gathering Immortals Platform, claiming the title of the foremost Sect under the heavens.
It was foreseeable that this time the Sacred Land would be extraordinary, a gathering of masters. These Great Sects, even if they disdained the honor granted by the Sacred Land, would never tolerate other Sects receiving such a title.
At this thought, Lin Jinyu suddenly entertained a strange idea. Would Su Bei participate in this recruitment convention? And would he ascend the Gathering Immortals Platform?
Lin Jinyu swallowed, hastily patted her bosom to calm herself, and cast out the wandering thoughts from her mind.
How could I suddenly think of him? That would be a grave disrespect towards Ji Nanjue!
Moreover, he was but at Half-Step to Reverie. Facing the many masters at Peak Refining Void, or even those Half-Step into Dao Integration, his slight strength couldn't possibly stir any waves. Who would notice someone not even at the Refining Void Realm?
Which one in the Sacred Land could the Emperor's Master be?
Lin Jinyu looked into the watery moonlit night, biting her lower lip, a haze of bewilderment in her eyes.
I had heard that the Emperor had a Master.
Inside the Imperial Study Room, Ji Nanjue's eyes were tightly closed. Frost faintly formed on her long lashes, and her complexion turned ghostly pale. Her entire being seemed to transform into an ice sculpture, emitting an intense chill stronger than any block of ice.
She staggered towards her chamber, removing the Dragon Robe from her body.
In the moonlight, as clear as water, a perfect body like a work of art was reflected, skin as lustrous and white as alabaster, revealing her graceful figure.
At this moment, all Spiritual Energy around her dispersed, and every false male trait vanished entirely.
She wrapped her arms around her shivering body, took out a fiery red pill from her storage ring, and swallowed it.
Her snow-white body finally turned a deep red, and the frost slowly melted from her dark eyebrows and lashes. Forcing herself to rise despite the discomfort, she found a piece of cloth. She gently placed it beneath her and wiped away the bloodstains, sighing softly, "Being a woman is truly troublesome."
Her expression indifferent once more, she wrapped herself in a brocade quilt and gazed vacantly at the bright moon outside the window.
Moonlight poured like water, and nobody knew the sacrifice she had made to reach the stature she held today.
In the dynasty, being born a woman with the untrainable Supreme Yin Vein was one thing; disguising herself as a man from birth as per her mother's wishes was another. Even as a man, an ordinary person incapable of cultivation, how much suffering had she endured in the heartless Cold Palace of the royal family?
This was why since ascending the throne she had relentlessly strived for the integration of mortals and immortals.
Later, she met her Master, a woman whose mannerisms strayed far from what was expected of a Master. She didn't like being called Master, always insisting Ji Nanjue call her "sister."
This woman, renowned in the Sacred Land for her terrifying cultivation skills, was privately nothing more than an endearingly naive girl who couldn't cook and loved sweet preserves.
She did everything in her power to repress her Supreme Yin Vein by taking the Extreme Fire Golden Pill to forcibly suppress the cold within her body and convert it into absorbable Spiritual Energy.
That very reason propelled her cultivation to advance by leaps and bounds, and over a few hundred years, she reached her current level.
Still, she could clearly feel that the Extreme Fire Golden Pill's effectiveness on the cold within her was not as strong as before. A hundred years ago, she had discussed with her Master whether the side effects of her Supreme Yin Vein might completely vanish one day.
Key Smoke only patted her own head and said it depended on her fate.
The Supreme Yang Vein?
Ji Nanjue sighed, a trace of bitterness on her lips. If it could have been found, why would I have suffered these several hundred years?