“I’m withdrawing from this matter.”
Wu Tingchao’s voice fell coldly across the Hall of Life-Destiny.
Zhu Changli lifted his eyes to look at him.
Wu Tingchao had always been the most unrestrained of the three when it came to using force.
If they were investigating Jiang Qingwan, putting pressure on the Tianyuan Sect, or using the might of the Divine Palace to intimidate the four provinces, he might well have been the first to step forward.
But investigating Tantai Jingyue’s old records from the time she entered the palace was different.
That had been a choice personally made by the current Hairuo.
Tantai Jingyue had not become the Heir to Hai Ruo because the nine hall priests had unanimously recommended her, nor because the various branches of the Water-Worshipping Faith had petitioned for her.
It was because Hairuo had brought her back to the Divine Palace, personally taught her, and tacitly approved of her status.
To investigate the old records was to investigate Hairuo.
This was no longer a matter of anger.
Nor was it about defending the dignity of the Divine Palace.
It meant touching the boundary of blasphemy against a deity.
Wu Tingchao said coldly, “I can investigate Jiang Qingwan.”
“I can also investigate why Mirror Sea concealed the records.”
“But investigating the records from the time she entered the palace… Once this precedent is set, it won’t be the outside world that falls into chaos first…”
“It will be the Divine Palace itself.”
After saying this, he turned and walked toward the hall entrance.
When he reached the doors, Wu Tingchao paused for a moment.
“I won’t report you to Lord Hairuo.”
“But I won’t continue taking part, either.”
The doors opened, then closed again.
The figure of the Tide Priest vanished beyond them.
Inside the Hall of Life-Destiny, only Zhu Changli and Li Fuyuan remained.
The pool gradually settled, once again becoming calm. It reflected the cold lamplight in the hall, as well as Zhu Changli’s face, which had slowly darkened.
Li Fuyuan looked at him.
“It’s still not too late to stop.”
Zhu Changli did not answer.
He merely rose to his feet, his broad ceremonial robes trailing across the icy floor behind him.
“It’s already too late.”
Li Fuyuan’s brows drew together slightly.
“Zhu Changli, you’d better be sure—”
Zhu Changli stopped in his tracks.
After a moment, he said quietly, “Once this is over, I’ll confess my crimes to Lord Hairuo and resign as Life-Destiny Priest.”
“Then… I’ll spend the rest of my life atoning for them.”
After those words fell, Li Fuyuan did not try to persuade him again.
To a Life-Destiny Priest, the words fate and destiny were a poisonous drug that inspired endless curiosity.
……
The following day.
During the day, Cangming Divine Palace remained as lively as it had been after the ceremony.
The guests from the four provinces had yet to depart. The banquets on Welcoming Island had not been cleared away, and the sea market had reopened.
Under the guidance of Divine Palace disciples, the young talents from various factions toured the nearby islands, admiring the strange and wondrous sights of Cang Province.
Deep within the Divine Palace, however, silence still reigned.
Using an old case in the Hall of Punishment that required him to cross-check restricted volumes as an excuse, Li Fuyuan personally went to the Archive Hall.
The Archive Priest, Qi Zhaoye, was seated behind his desk, reading.
He was slender and refined, with gentle features. After hearing Li Fuyuan explain his purpose, he merely looked up at him for a moment.
“When has an old case from the Hall of Punishment ever required me to personally verify it?”
Li Fuyuan’s expression did not change.
“It involves the ancient statutes of the nine halls. It would be inappropriate for anyone else to interfere.”
Qi Zhaoye closed the book in his hands.
He seemed to have realized something, yet did not question him. He only said calmly, “Let’s go.”
The two of them left the Archive Hall one after another.
A moment later, Zhu Changli appeared silently before the inner chamber of the Archive Hall.
Several scholars responsible for organizing the old scrolls were just about to rise and salute when Zhu Changli swept his sleeve.
A pale-blue mist soundlessly passed over them.
Their expressions froze. Then they slumped against the desks and fell into a deep sleep.
Zhu Changli had harmed no one, nor had he wasted any time.
He raised a hand and sealed the inner chamber’s doors. His spiritual sense immediately spread outward, swiftly searching through the countless old scrolls stored in the Archive Hall.
The old records from the time Tantai Jingyue entered the palace.
Records of Hairuo’s eastern sea patrol.
Hairuo’s personal approval.
The Life-Destiny register.
He located every record related to that incident, one by one, among the layers of bookshelves and seals.
Soon, he found an old file that had been sealed away for many years.
Four characters were written on its cover:
The Ancient Tide of the Eastern Sea.
Zhu Changli unfolded the file.
It recorded the tidal anomalies that had occurred along the eastern sea around the time before and after Tantai Jingyue entered the palace.
Yet the records were extremely brief.
In a certain year and month, the current Hairuo departed the palace to tour the eastern sea.
She returned seven days later.
Upon her return, she brought back a young girl.
The girl’s name was Tantai Jingyue.
Hairuo selected her as the next Hairuo.
Afterward, the Hall of Life-Destiny registered her name, the Hall of Rituals entered her into the Divine Maiden records, the Hall of Prayer prayed for the tides on her behalf, and the Hall of Medicine verified the clarity of her divine nature.
Every procedure was complete.
And perfectly clean.
Too clean to resemble a record. It was more like a conclusion that had been written long ago.
Normally, any candidate for Divine Maiden personally brought back by Hairuo would have detailed records left behind: her destiny, her response to the tides, fluctuations in her divine nature, and Hairuo’s personal approval.
If she came from a particular place, that region would also receive special favor from the Divine Palace.
The local tides, villages, households, rites, bloodlines, and even the celestial phenomena witnessed when the Divine Maiden was discovered should all have been recorded in detail.
But in Tantai Jingyue’s old file, every crucial detail had been brushed aside with a single sentence.
“Her divine nature is clear, and she is aligned with the moon phases.”
There was no record of how her divine essence had manifested.
No indication of the strength of her response to the tides.
Not even an explanation of where Hairuo had found her.
Zhu Changli stared at those words as his expression gradually darkened.
“Her divine nature is clear, and she is aligned with the moon phases…”
He repeated the sentence under his breath, as though chewing over everything that had deliberately been erased behind those words.
It was too clean.
So clean that it seemed as if someone had used a layer of pure moonlight to conceal all the silt and ancient tides beneath it.
Zhu Changli did not stop.
He continued searching.
Soon, among the supplementary files transferred from the Hall of the Sea, he found an inconspicuous volume of tide reports.
This volume recorded the tidal information collected from the villages along the eastern coast in those years.
Most of it consisted of trivial matters, such as the rising and falling of the waters near fishing villages, the migration of sea beasts, and unusual sea fog.
Some records merely stated that a fisherman from a certain village had heard a strange sound during the night, after which the tide rose by half a foot the following day.
Zhu Changli had not held out much hope.
But when he turned to one particular page, his fingers suddenly stopped.
“On the eastern sea frontier, the tide flowed backward at midnight outside Luoxia Village.”
“Sea fog entered the village and did not disperse for three days.”
“Fishermen claimed to have heard the cry of a whale during the night. It continued without pause for a long time.”
“They also claimed that two moons had hung side by side in the sky over the sea.”
“The people prayed for blessings.”
Zhu Changli’s fingertip rested on the words two moons hung side by side.
Luoxia Village.
Two moons.
The cry of a whale.
His gaze sharpened slightly.
“How could there have been the cry of a whale in such shallow waters?”
Luoxia Village on the eastern sea frontier was nothing more than a remote fishing village.
The waters offshore were not deep. Ordinary sea beasts rarely approached the area, let alone a whale’s cry from ancient times.
Everyone in Cang Province knew that whales held a highly special position in the eastern sea.
They were regarded as the mounts of the Sea Mother, auspicious beasts of the sea, and messengers of the ancient tides.
If the cry of an ancient whale had truly appeared outside Luoxia Village, then it absolutely could not have been an ordinary tidal anomaly.
Zhu Changli’s pupils contracted slightly.
A moment later, he slowly closed the old file.
“Luoxia Village.”
“Could that have been Jingyue’s home before she entered the palace?”
Zhu Changli returned both old files to their original places, then turned and left the Archive Hall.
……
That night.
The lights in the main council hall of Cangming Divine Palace burned brightly.
The High Priest, Cang Xuanzi, had summoned the ten divisions for a council.
The Grand Ceremony of the Myriad Phenomena of the Void had already concluded.
The Divine Palace now had to determine how it would deal with the aftermath, and the necessary arrangements had to be finalized as soon as possible.
The priests of the nine halls entered one after another.
The Ritual Priest, Shui Guanlan.
The Mirror Priestess, Luo Chenbi.
The Archive Priest, Qi Zhaoye.
The Medicine Priest, Pei Qingheng.
The Prayer Priest, Yun Wanshuang.
Sea Priest Ling Chaosheng.
Tide Priest Wu Tingchao.
Punishment Priest Li Fuyuan.
Everyone took their seats.
Only the Life-Destiny Hall’s seat remained empty.
Cang Xuanzi’s gaze swept over the vacant seat before turning to Li Fuyuan.
“Where is Zhu Changli?”
Li Fuyuan’s expression remained calm.
“The Life-Destiny Hall is still engaged in a ritual deliberation today, so Priest Zhu is temporarily unable to leave.”
“He asked me to convey that, whatever is decided here, the Life-Destiny Hall will fully cooperate and raise no objections.”
Cang Xuanzi glanced at him.
Li Fuyuan’s expression did not change, and no one in the hall pressed the matter further.
After a moment, Cang Xuanzi withdrew his gaze and slowly spoke.
“If that is the case, let us begin.”
The main issue discussed at this meeting of the Ten Priests was not whether the final rankings of the Grand Taixu Myriad Phenomena Ceremony were correct.
The rankings had already been decided.
The champion had already been rewarded.
To raise objections now would only make the Cangming Divine Palace look even worse.
Thus, as soon as Cang Xuanzi spoke, he set the tone for the meeting.
“First, the Divine Palace acknowledges the results of this year’s Grand Taixu Myriad Phenomena Ceremony. There must be no further dispute over the Taixu champion.”
“Second, the Divine Palace will continue entertaining guests from the four regions and will open the Sea Market and certain outer islands to them.”
“Third, although Jingyue placed second, she remains the Divine Maiden of the Divine Palace. No disciple of the Divine Palace may privately discuss the ‘loss of prestige’ of the Divine Maiden.”
The priests in the hall wore differing expressions.
Shui Guanlan was the first to nod.
“The more trying the circumstances, the more composed the Divine Palace must appear.”
“The championship has become an established fact. If we show reluctance or lose our dignity, we will only invite even greater contempt from the outside world.”
Sea Priest Ling Chaosheng added, “There are already quite a few rumors circulating among the outer islands today.”
“If we attempt to suppress the news, the rumors will only spread faster.”
“It would be better to acknowledge the final rankings openly, while also publicizing the Divine Maiden’s performance in taking second place.”
“Besides, there was no direct confrontation in this year’s ceremony, and not everyone accepts the outcome.”
“Jingyue did not suffer a humiliating defeat, either. She remains one of the most outstanding members of the younger generation across the four regions.”
Prayer Priest Yun Wanshuang spoke in a gentle voice.
“All things lie beneath the gaze of the Sea Mother.”
“The gods have their own arrangements.”
“I believe the Divine Maiden’s defeat may not necessarily be a bad thing.”
“Perhaps this is also the Sea Mother’s warning—a reminder that both we and the Divine Maiden should set aside some of our pride.”
As soon as these words were spoken, the atmosphere in the hall grew subtly tense.
Wu Tingchao’s expression turned cold, but he did not argue.
Although he disliked seeing Jiang Qingwan take the championship, he was even less willing to see the Cangming Divine Palace lose face.
Yet he could not refute Yun Wanshuang’s words.
Tantai Jingyue had indeed had things too easy.
From the day Hairuo brought her back to the Divine Palace, she had stood in a place countless people could only look up to.
The Divine Maiden.
The Heir to Hai Ruo.
The Divine Emissary.
Everyone in the Divine Palace believed that she was destined to become number one.
But in this world, no one’s position at the top was simply a matter of course.
Not even the Divine Maiden of the Divine Palace.
In the end, the meeting settled the arrangements that would follow.
The Divine Palace would no longer pursue the matter of the ceremony’s results, nor would it display any hostility toward Jiang Qingwan or the Tianyuan Sect.
The branch temples in every region were to reassure the believers of Cangzhou and maintain a unified account.
They were to say only that the geniuses of the four regions had risen together in this year’s ceremony, and that although Tantai Jingyue had placed second, the Divine Maiden had nonetheless displayed her radiant brilliance.
Until the geniuses of the various regions had departed, all disciples of the Divine Palace were forbidden to cause trouble over the matter in private. Anyone who did so would receive severe punishment.
With that, the matter was concluded.
The priests murmured their assent.
