The current standing of Helian’s royal court is more stable than ever– The eighteenth living saint was born within the royal court. Even the saint is in the arms of the royal power. Whenever people bow to the saint they will be bowing to the king, so what else can be said? 

  •  Due to the chaos Kelie caused, the clan of Firefox was forced to move from their current territory and replace their clan leader. The mine that used to be owned by the Firefox clan has been forcefully returned back to the royal court with an announcement that all the income from the mine will be divided among the clans based on their yearly merits. 
  • The moment things on the grassland calmed down, Zhi Wei began focusing on Inerji (Helian’s family clan) fighters’ training. The grassland warriors all have solid riding and leg fighting skills yet when compared to the real master fighters from the central plain then their fighting skill became insufficient. 
  • Picking out the three thousand most loyal Inerji warriors to form a “Shunyi Iron Cavalry”, Zong Chen personally assigned his men to go train them. Sometimes when Master Gu is in a good mood then he would carry his saint daughter on his back and go teach the men a bit. 
  • Zong Chen also put together some medicines targeting at the health issues that came from the people living on the grassland. In the past, every year the newborns would die in large numbers during the spring disease seasons but since Zong Chen arrived, there are almost no infant death anymore. 

While Helian stabilized his royal power, the new grand queen also gained prestige and status that is no less than queen Peony. 

During the later period of “Shunyi Iron Cavalry’s” training, their leader was gradually replaced by a young lad named Wei. 

This particular character made his debut like this. 

One day, Master Gu who was most admired by all the warriors brought a Han lad in blue robe over to observe their training. 

All feeling like they have improved greatly, the Inerji warriors eagerly showed off, waiting for that fragile looking youth to shower them with his admiration and awe. 

What they got instead was three short sentences after the young man finished watching them in stoic silence. 

“Dumb movement! Weak strength! Bad reaction time!” 

The three thousand fierce warriors’ expression turned stony green. 

That day, the blue-robed young man, under the killer gaze of three thousand men, raised one single hand to challenge the eight leaders of the three thousand guards– the King’s Eight Braves. 

The Eight Braves had their butt kicked. There were chins (from shock) on the ground everywhere that day. 

The Eight Braves “who can’t even stand up”, laid on the ground and thought to themselves “Our acting skills sure have gotten better and better as we followed the King and Queen around. See, they say fall we fall, they say pretend dead we pretend dead, they say roll three times to the left then we would never roll four times to the right…” 

Just like that, the boy with the surname Wei easily won the complete admiration of the grassland warriors. From that point on, he showed up frequently on the training ground, ate, and lived with the warriors. He is quite kind and talented so in no time he was on very familiar terms with the men. Gradually, people came to find out that this young man had a sad story. He was attacked and lost his memory. Walking aimlessly until he ended up in the grassland, he has no clue where he came from or where he is going, he only vaguely remembers that his surname is Wei. 

The kind and generous grassland took in this lost wanderer. Even the grand queen held a banquet to entertain this Wei young man, which of course won the queen another round of praise from the people. 

(I can’t remember if I mentioned this before but I know it might seem like our heroine is taking a great risk in using Wei as her pseudonym when it is so close to her real name. However, in Chinese, the two names really wouldn’t look or even sound the same.  Our heroine’s real name is Zhi Wei (知微) with both characters in the first tone (out of the four tones in Chinese). Our heroine’s alter ego’s last name is 魏, which is a last name Chinese character that we don’t usually associate with first names (ie. You would automatically think of Smith as a last name, not someone’s first name). The last name Wei 魏 here is also fourth tone so it wouldn’t sound the same as our heroine’s Wei in her name.

In a flash, several months have passed. During early autumn of the month of August, the imperial court envoy came to preside over the sitting ceremony of the Living Saint. 

The Holy Temple prepared a grand celebration for the ceremony and for the first time, Gu Zhi Xiao is forced to leave her dad. Utterly unwilling and uncooperative, Feng Zhi Wei had to threaten and bribe little Zhi Xiao. Threatened that if she doesn’t cooperate then she would have to sleep alone from now on but if she behaves well then she would be able to sleep with her. Between the threats and bribes, the 18th Living Saint is finally convinced. 

The envoy turns out to be a familiar face. The kind that is very very familiar– Xin Ziyan. 

In the sacred sitting ceremony, among the incense filled temple, the imperial envoy Xin Ziyan and Queen Shunyi Feng Zhi Wei, in the autumn of the 13th year of Changxi finally meet for the first time. (Not the first time they meet but here it means after they saw each other last at the palace after Madam Feng died. The author didn’t mention Xin Ziyan during those scenes but it is assumed he would’ve been in the palace when Zhi Wei was made a princess.) 

Nodding and smiling at each other, the ambiance is quite good.

“Has the Grand Queen been doing well?” Xin Ziyan bows almost all the way to the ground, the perfect picture of courtesy. 

Zhi Wei looked at his sideburns that has turned slightly grey, she suddenly remembered the moon-white buttocks hanging on the tree in the brothel backyard. 

That year, she rescued him from his cleaver wielding lioness of a wife. Soon after, he caused her to become mired in the case of the Dacheng’s last royal descendent that eventually led her to lose her only family. 

This is a sworn enemy. 

But then she has long learned to smile at her enemies. 

“Thanks to Official Xin.” She returns the bow, “Everything is well, and you sir? Living in the Capital is not easy but judging by your glowing countenance, everything should be going well.” 

Xin Ziyan raised his head to look up at her. He still has no idea that Feng Zhi Wei is Wei Zhi, so his only impression of this woman is her talent on the palace feast and her calm indifferent manner when she was made a princess before leaving the Capital. Now that they are meeting again half year later, the woman is still serene, but the brightness she showed on the palace feast has all been hidden away. Despite her gentle and warm manner, he suddenly felt a chill, like seeing a phoenix perching on the snow-capped mountain, tilting its head as it hunts you with its gleaming eyes. 

The expression in her eyes is as calm as the sea but the waves could at any time submerge the sky and earth at any time. 

“No, no.” Lowering his eyes, Xin Ziyan takes a step back, “Everything is due to the grace of His Majesty and Prince Chu. Ziyan has been fortunate to be greatly favored by the masters. Thus no matter what size the matter is, be it big or small, if the master can’t attend to it at the time then Ziyan will work hard to serve.” 

Is he saying that the whole case concerning the last royal descendent has nothing to do with Ning Yi but it was his own doing? 

A faint smile appears on Feng Zhi Wei’s lips. 

If Ning Yi really wanted to protect her, then he would not have turned over the Gold Feather Guards to Xin Ziyan when he left the Capital. 

If Ning Yi had never thought to deal with her, then the Gold Feather Guards’ investigation into Feng Clan and her family would’ve been cut off a long time ago. 

Without Ning Yi’s acquiescence, there are many things that would’ve not progressed so easily. 

He is the hand up in the cloud controlling everything. Perhaps the hand didn’t personally thrust out the knife, but when the hand loosened and the knife fell, it still hurt people. 

All text copyright @ www.Ninja-Reflection.com

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