Night had settled over the cloud ring. Even so, it was not truly night at all. The ring still bustled with people, lights, motion, and life. From afar, one could easily mistake it for midday, given how much activity thrummed through it.

  Only one section remained quiet: the cordoned-off district housing all participants of the second round of the tournament.

  Or, at least, it was supposed to be quiet.

  Bai Ning watched in mounting incredulity as another team slipped past them. She had always known it was possible that someone else would discover the hidden layer of the second round, so seeing four cultivators sneak off in the middle of the path – while they waited, concealed beneath Yue Shuangyi’s mirror – was not entirely unexpected. Still, she felt her shock was justified. Her team froze, silent and unmoving, until the other group rounded a bend and disappeared.

  Chen Zhuhe exhaled softly as he watched them go. “We’ll have to be quick. If someone exposes the secret, everyone will be on guard. That’ll ruin our chances too.”

  The others nodded, recognizing the truth of his words, and pressed on.

  The residence of the Fan team was once again covered by the Endless Worlds Two-Story Formation. Avoiding the front door, they circled around the narrow lane between it and the neighboring house, creeping as close to the surface of the dome as they dared. Yue Shuangyi expanded the shroud of stealth around them into a firm bubble, then settled in to wait with Li Kang beside her. Bai Ning and Chen Zhuhe, meanwhile, focused their energies on slipping past the formation.

  Chen Zhuhe had only just begun to set up the Closed World Formation, five formation flags rotating slowly to form a circle before them, when Li Kang spoke up, voice hushed.

  “Are you sure we shouldn’t set up another distraction today? If they’re keeping watch, there’s no way we’ll succeed.”

  Bai Ning, operating the secondary formation disk while Chen Zhuhe manipulated the primary, looked up with a frown. “That sort of thing only works once. If we make a racket again, they’ll either ignore it, or worse, realize we’re up to something. No, this is a risk we have to take. If it doesn’t work…” She gritted her teeth, disliking the thought but pressing on. “Then we’ll have to throw caution to the winds and do what we can in the arena tomorrow.”

  “Now hush,” she added irritably. “This is delicate work already. Keep watch while Brother Chen and I handle this.”

  Li Kang rolled his eyes, but fell silent, so Bai Ning counted it as a victory.

  Silence, however, did nothing to ease the task before them. Slipping past a formation was never simple, and the one looming over them now was particularly unyielding. As their own formation overlay pressed against the barrier, faint eddies of resistance curled along its surface; thin whorls of pressure, fleeting openings, and sudden null zones where spiritual energy warped, guttered, and reformed with a sound like distant static.

  Bai Ning and Chen Zhuhe leaned in, eyes narrowed, senses stretched razor-thin. They had to catch those fleeting distortions the moment they appeared, and then guide them, coax them, and, if luck favored them, shape one into a passage. More realistically, they needed only the smallest unnoticed seam, a hairline fracture invisible to anyone inside, just wide enough for all of them to slip through unseen. They each controlled a formation disk linked to the Closed World Formation, nudging parameters, redirecting qi currents, and probing gently at the barrier’s weak points.

  They had to be careful to ensure that not even the slightest fluctuation escaped to give them away. If the inhabitants inside sensed even a whisper of tampering, the path would be sealed forever.

  Sweat gathered at Bai Ning’s brow. Chen Zhuhe’s concentration was so absolute that veins stood out in his neck, his temples throbbing steadily in time with them. Under their combined pressure, the barrier shifted: silver brightened to a pale indigo, darkened through violet, then snapped back to its original sheen. Talismans drifted across the surface like drifting fish beneath water, but none neared their working space; they had taken great pains to isolate this section.

  A muted grunt escaped Chen Zhuhe. The circle of formation flags before them flared brilliantly for the space of a heartbeat. Bai Ning felt the telltale slackening, a fleeting gap in the structure, and immediately poured her qi into stabilizing it. It was too good an opportunity to waste.

  “That’s one,” Chen Zhuhe murmured, voice taut as wire. A razor-thin ripple of unstable qi trembled along the barrier’s skin, scarcely the width of a finger.

  “It’s too unstable,” Bai Ning whispered sharply. “I can only hold it for a couple more seconds before it snaps shut.”

  “I know.” Sweat dripped from Chen Zhuhe’s chin. “Buy me those seconds.”

  She pressed her palm to the secondary disk, threads of her own qi weaving into the formation’s edge. The air hummed with tension, the two formations starting to grind against each other like mismatched gears. A sharp crackle burst overhead – far too loud for her liking.

  Li Kang hissed. “Careful! That thing echoed-”

  “Quiet,” Yue Shuangyi snapped, eyes fixed on the barrier. “Let them work.”

  The gap widened barely. It shivered with each passing breath, a trembling slit of warped light, swelling and shrinking unpredictably.

  “Go,” Chen Zhuhe urged.

  Bai Ning did not hesitate. Chen Zhuhe was the true formation master among them; he had the best chance of holding the gap long enough for all four to pass. She sprang forward, slipping through the wavering distortion. For an instant she felt the pressure of the barrier against her skin, cool, taut, and alive, like the flutter of butterfly wings over her skin, before she tumbled inside the dome of the Endless Worlds Two-Story Formation.

  She paused, chest tight, senses sharpened, but the night within was undisturbed. No alarm sounded.

  Li Kang slipped through next, then Yue Shuangyi, who immediately let the stealth shroud bloom outward again. Bai Ning, however, watched the entrance behind them. It writhed like a torn curtain in a stormwind, twisting and distorting as the formation fought to repair itself.

  Chen Zhuhe staggered through at the last possible moment. The gap clamped shut the instant his foot cleared it. The Closed World Formation collapsed with a brittle crackle, and the five formation flags clattered to the ground in a small, defeated circle.

  All four froze. Even Chen Zhuhe remained where he had fallen, half-kneeling on the packed earth. They waited beneath the sheltering hush of Yue Shuangyi’s stealth, breath shallow, every sense stretched outward. Nothing stirred. The residence remained dark, still, its occupants blissfully unaware of the trespassers now standing within their shell.

  Slowly, painfully slowly, Chen Zhuhe rose to his feet. His face was pale, and for a moment Bai Ning thought he might still keel over, but he steadied himself with a hand on Li Kang’s shoulder and gave them all a faint nod.

  They had made it.

  Now came the harder part.

  The residence of the Fan team was almost eerily quiet. The air felt heavier inside, muffled as though the night itself had thickened into velvet. The narrow courtyard beyond lay steeped in darkness; the lanterns hanging from the eaves had long since guttered out, leaving only a few fading embers. Something like crickets chirped beyond the walls, but even their song felt distant, gentled by the hush of the formation overhead.

  Bai Ning extended her spiritual sense as delicately as she could, weaving the thinnest, least noticeable thread she was capable of and sending it out to probe the residence. The others followed suit, both Li Kang and Yue Shuangyi letting their eyes shut in concentration.

  Li Kang found it first.

  “There,” he murmured, pointing toward the wall and the central room beyond it. “As far as I can tell, they’re all in the main room, and not spread out individually.”

  Bai Ning grimaced. “Of course they’re not spread out. Why would anything be easy?”

  Yue Shuangyi shot her a reprimanding look. “It might work to our advantage, if everything goes to plan. Complain later. For now, let’s move.”

  They crept forward, shadows gliding over shadow. The stealth bubble muted their steps, but they still placed their weight carefully—avoiding shifting gravel, loose tiles, and the faint creak of old wood. Every tiny sound felt too loud in the quiet of the night, and they winced in unison more than once.

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  As they skirted the courtyard, Bai Ning glanced upward and caught sight of the formation dome of the Endless Worlds Two-Story Formation. From within, the silver-bright shield pulsed softly with drifting talisman characters, threads of power running through it like veins filled with starlight. Against the deep darkness of the courtyard, the glow cast everything from grass, and stone, to wood in softened, dreamlike hues.

  A breeze drifted through the courtyard, stirring dry leaves along the path. The soft rustling made all four of them stiffen. Bai Ning’s pulse spiked-

  Until she realized it was only the wind.

  And yet… beneath it, something else trembled. A faint vibration of qi from inside the house, too steady and rhythmic to be natural.

  “Someone’s awake,” she mouthed.

  The others tensed.

  Behind the door, and through the papered windows, a soft light flickered; faint, wavering, drawing closer, as though someone had just lit a candle and begun walking.

  The four exchanged a quick, panicked look.

  Then Yue Shuangyi raised a finger to her lips, urging silence, and slipped out the Everfrozen Silkworm Lotus. Even dormant, it exuded an icy chill that prickled against Bai Ning’s skin. Yue Shuangyi lifted it to her lips, ready to breathe life into it.

  The door slid open.

  A cultivator stepped out, clutching a candle set in a cup in his hand. He looked half-asleep, with his hair mussed, eyes bleary, and scratching lazily at his neck as he peered around the courtyard.

  “Damn regular checks,” he muttered. “Not like anyone’s going to break in without the formation going off-”

  He never finished the sentence.

  A single lotus petal, thin, translucent, and carved of pure ice, drifted gently through the air and settled atop his head. He blinked in mild surprise, lifting a hand-

  -but by then it was far too late.

  Ice burst outward in a silent bloom. It raced down his scalp, across his face, over his torso, swallowing his limbs in a heartbeat. In the space of a breath, the sleepy cultivator was no longer a man at all, but a perfect sculpture of frost. Even the candle’s flame had frozen mid-flicker, trapped in pale blue ice as though someone had carved a false flame from crystal.

  Bai Ning sucked in a sharp breath, fear sparking in her gut, but she did not make a sound. None of them did. They stood rigid, listening for the smallest sign of discovery, or worse; any hint that this might be judged as violence against competitors, costing them the second round entirely.

  But nothing stirred. There was no commotion or alarm, only the soft whisper of the frozen wind over the courtyard.

  The four of them exchanged a look filled with shared disquiet, before pressing on.

  They moved in silence toward the inner rooms, stepping past the frozen cultivator as though he were a strange, gleaming statue placed for decoration. Yue Shuangyi tightened the stealth bubble around them until Bai Ning felt the pressure on her skin, like being wrapped in a tight, invisible cloth.

  They stopped at the threshold. Yue Shuangyi stepped forward, raising the Everfrozen Silkworm Lotus. Its petals flared with pale blue light as she breathed across them. The blossom unfurled in a soundless bloom, releasing a swirl of frost that curled gently through the air.

  The icy petals drifted inside in a slow cascade, settling like winter’s first snowfall. A heartbeat later, a wave of cold washed back out of the open door, mist rolling along the floor and seeping around their feet.

  They stepped inside.

  Three cultivators lay scattered through the room, frozen solid. Each was encased in a pristine shell of frost, their final motions caught mid-moment—one reaching for a blanket, another turning on his side, the third sitting halfway upright. The air shimmered with a lingering chill so sharp that even Bai Ning’s breath fogged into silver trails.

  “I thought you were putting them to sleep,” she hissed.

  Yue Shuangyi shrugged lightly. “Since freezing works, it’s better to go with it than putting them to sleep. It’s more reliable this way.”

  Chen Zhuhe cut in sharply, “Forget that. Their storage pouches. Quickly.”

  They moved with swift, controlled urgency. Pouches were unknotted from belts and sashes, pried from beneath cushions, pulled from beneath mats. Bai Ning found one strapped around a cultivator’s ankle and winced as she eased it free without brushing his icy skin.

  Li Kang emptied the collected pouches onto a low table. “Let’s search.”

  They rifled through the contents – talismans, pills, magical tools, spare clothes, half-finished charms, even a snack bun someone had saved for later – until Bai Ning’s fingers brushed a small, lacquered box.

  Her breath hitched.

  Inside lay four jade tiles, each stamped with the symbol of a circular, spoked wheel.

  “Got them,” she whispered.

  They did not allow themselves to feel relief yet. Not yet. One by one, they restored every item to exactly where they had found it, save for the tiles, and slipped out of the room, retracing their steps with meticulous care. Even the frozen cultivator at the door remained undisturbed, still caught mid-blink.

  Their intrusion would certainly not go unnoticed, but avoiding needless risks still mattered. Leaving the formation’s boundary turned out to be trivial. It was designed to keep intruders out, not imprison anyone within. All they had to do was step through the barrier-

  -and the tension broke.

  All four of them exchanged quiet, disbelieving grins.

  They had done it.

  …………………………..

  The next morning, Bai Ning, Li Kang, Chen Zhuhe, and Yue Shuangyi walked onto the arena with supreme confidence.

  The Fan team glared at them so viciously that, had looks alone been lethal, the four of them would have long since blown away as ashes on the wind. Li Kang responded with a sunny smile, while Chen Zhuhe cheerfully rubbed his bald head; an action Bai Ning still didn’t understand. Was it supposed to be some kind of insult? Yue Shuangyi ignored their rivals entirely, regal as ever. Bai Ning herself was tempted to stick out her tongue, but she forced herself into poise and grandeur instead, chin lifted high.

  They approached the proctor, who watched them with supreme boredom, and respectfully presented the twelve tiles bearing the symbol of the wheel.

  Bai Ning stepped forward. “Senior, we have gathered the twelve tiles required to pass the second round. Please take a look.” The four of them bowed in unison.

  A wave of muttering rippled through the assembled cultivators as people took one look at the murderous expressions of the Fan team and immediately put two and two together.

  With a lazy flick of his sleeve, Shen Taixu summoned the tiles into his hand and motioned them off the stage with the same gesture. “Yes, yes, all done. You four pass the second round. Now, leave.”

  His brusque dismissal did nothing to dampen their spirits. Bai Ning had to fight the urge to cheer aloud, and from the looks of it, so did the others. They had all carried a small fear that Shen Taixu might object to how they had obtained the tiles, so this was as good an outcome as any they could hope for.

  Clearly, not everyone agreed.

  “Hold still, you scoundrels!” bellowed a voice behind them. “If I let you go today, then what face will I, Lan Wuyou, have left?” The leader of the Fan team, Lan Wuyou, stood red-faced, eyes bloodshot, his expression twisted by rage and hatred.

  He rounded on the proctor. “Lord Shen, what is the meaning of this? These thieves crept into our residence last night and struck us down with foul sorcery! Did you not explicitly forbid such acts at the start of the second round? And now you let it pass? Does this not shame the eyes of the Nascent Soul seniors watching us?”

  Shen Taixu hadn’t even deigned to look at Lan Wuyou at first, observing him with the same bored indifference as always. But at the last sentence, his expression darkened. He flicked his sleeve, sending out a ripple of qi that passed harmlessly over Bai Ning’s group but slammed into Lan Wuyou, knocking him backward.

  “Mind your words, lest you lose your tongue,” he barked, eyes narrowing in displeasure. “What will shame the elders-or not shame them-is not for the likes of you to decide. When did I lie? Did I not say that tiles may be taken without violence in this round? Have not many teams already traded sets among themselves? What violence was committed upon you, when you stand here perfectly fine? It is giving you face that I have not slapped you already. Now scram!”

  Lan Wuyou paled, but Li Kang’s mocking expression, adopted the moment Shen Taixu began scolding him, only threw fuel onto the fire. Lan Wuyou gritted his teeth, jaw clenched so tightly a vein twitched along his temple, even as his teammates tried to restrain him.

  “I see. I see.” His voice trembled with fury. “So this is how it is. Was it planned from the start? Or did you decide to target us later, knowing we have no backing? How hateful,” he cried, pounding a fist against his chest. “How hateful indeed!”

  Bai Ning startled, blinking quickly. That line… it sounded exactly like the jade slip of the melodramatic revenge tale she’d read last month. And if this followed the same pattern, then-

  Lan Wuyou swung toward them, chest heaving, eyes entirely bloodshot. His expression was so twisted it could have curdled milk.

  “I will not forget this affront. Li Kang, Chen Zhuhe, Yue Shuangyi, Bai Ning – I will remember every one of you. No matter how many generations pass, no matter what I must endure, this hatred will live on. One day, I will take my due and make you pay for this humiliation.”

  His declaration echoed across the entire arena. And instead of the eye-rolling and poorly stifled chuckles Bai Ning expected, because honestly, he was acting like the protagonist of an underdog revenge drama and as if they were the villains, all the assembled cultivators grew solemn. They listened to his vow as though he were reciting ancient heavenly wisdom. Even Lan Wuyou’s teammates looked awestruck.

  Her own teammates, however, were grim and tight-lipped. Even the proctor seemed to be taking the whole thing unnecessarily seriously. Only Bai Ning was reacting appropriately; by treating it as a deeply embarrassing, cringeworthy spectacle. Did… did this happen often? Was this genuinely how cultivators behaved when thwarted? She had always assumed revenge speeches were exaggerations in the jade slips. Master Mo Jian had certainly told her that anyone who started monologuing about eternal hatred had something wrong with their head. But here, everyone was treating it like an official proclamation from the heavens.

  While she was still processing this unsettling revelation, Lan Wuyou whipped around, sleeves flaring dramatically, and stalked off the stage.

  Bai Ning stared after him, baffled, as the proctor simply let him go. They… weren’t going to stop him? And what about his loudly declared intention to seek revenge over something so petty? Apparently that wasn’t an issue either.

  Yue Shuangyi shook her head, face solemn. “We have made an enemy today. Best be on our guard in the future.”

  Li Kang and Chen Zhuhe, now equally grave, both nodded.

  Bai Ning, who discreetly pinched her leg to confirm she was awake, looked at all of them in utter bewilderment. Yue Shuangyi was the disciple of a Core Formation cultivator, same as herself. Li Kang belonged to the Seven Light Enclosure and had boasted about his sect’s ties to Ancestor Qing multiple times by now. Even Chen Zhuhe, rogue cultivator that he was, hadn’t hesitated to fight Li Kang or shown fear or undue awe after meeting Bai Ning’s master.

  Yet this threat; this dramatic, melodramatic speech delivered by a man who’d just been scolded like a naughty child, they treated as though it had come from Fu Zhan himself?

  What was wrong with them?

  She really needed to go back up to the Cloud Ring and spend some time with Master Mo Jian and her parents. If she stayed with this group any longer, she was genuinely afraid she might end up catching whatever melodrama-disease was afflicting them.