Wang Xiuyu quickly agreed to Rong Tang’s proposal. When Ke Hongxue heard of it, he considered it briefly, then broke into a smile. He clasped his hands together and saluted Rong Tang with open candour: “Hanying thanks young Prince on behalf of scholars across the land.”
He had spoken of “scholars across the land”, never once mentioning gender.
He was the most unorthodox tutor at the Imperial Academy, yet also the one who gave lectures at Linyuan Academy each month without fail.
Rong Tang understood the meaning behind his words and said nothing more, simply letting him handle the discussions with the head of the academy.
When Princess Duanyi learned of their plan, her gaze—ancient and deep—rested for a long time upon these heirs of a new age. She sent over two land deeds, some rare ancient texts from the Princess’s private collection, and even donated several crates of brushes, ink, paper, and inkstones to Linyuan Academy.
It was difficult to categorise this behaviour, what it was or what it meant. But Rong Tang only knew one thing: from start to finish, he hadn’t been alone in a fanciful dream. He hadn’t been the only one pursuing something that the times might deem impossible, beneath the eyes of a world that could not understand.
He had many like-minded companions around him. People who advanced and retreated with him, willing to share in this great dream.
Rong Tang was deeply grateful for the choices he had made in this life.
And so, in the midst of this hectic but fulfilling life, summer came to an end. As early autumn passed, Sheng Chengming sent two baskets of green persimmons from his fief. They were soaked in clear water, their stems stuck through with stalks of straw. Once the fruit stems dropped off entirely, the persimmons were at their sweetest. Crisp, fresh, and delicious.
Rong Tang sat in the courtyard’s rocking chair, eating persimmons and gazing at the shifting clouds above. He closed his eyes and gently rocked back and forth, feeling the wind of the changing seasons brush against his face.
As he rocked, the light before his eyes suddenly dimmed. He opened his eyes slightly in confusion… only for a soft, dragonfly-light kiss to land on his brow.
Su Huaijing stood before him, smiling. His voice was warm and teasing. “Is Tangtang waiting for me to wake him with a kiss?”
Rong Tang blinked, stunned for half a second. His cheeks flushed uncontrollably, and his mind involuntarily recalled a certain fairy tale.
Su Huaijing, smile full of mischief, pulled out a still-warm packet of spicy rabbit heads from behind his back. “Fancy a snack?”
Whatever shyness Rong Tang had felt at being likened to a sleeping beauty vanished in an instant at the sight of food. His eyes lit up, and he shot upright. “Yes!”
Su Huaijing was startled by his reaction and, once he’d recovered, gave a helpless laugh. “Slow down. No one’s going to fight you for them.”
The one who might have done so wasn’t here. Yuanyuan was practically being raised into a little young master by Ke Hongxue and wouldn’t be competing with Rong Tang over a packet of rabbit heads.
Su Huaijing took his hand and led him towards the dining room. Another season had passed. The ring of the year had worn thinner.
—
On the night of the Ghost Festival, they gathered at Tangjing Residence to burn paper for the departed and share a reunion meal.
Yuanyuan looked somewhat puzzled. He didn’t understand why his shushus and geges were dragging him along to kowtow. Su Huaijing looked down at him for a long time and didn’t tell him the full truth. Half-joking, half-serious, he said, “The debt of raising someone is greater than the sky. Your Mumu gege has been raising you for a year now. He’s your father.”
Mu Jingxu froze, then furrowed his brow and rebuked him softly, “Don’t be absurd.”
Su Huaijing merely shrugged, unbothered, and turned to check if the food was ready in the kitchen.
Rong Tang lingered in the smoky courtyard for a while before following him in. When he saw Su Huaijing’s slightly reddened eyes, he chuckled softly. “Had I known, I’d have come a little later, crybaby.”
Su Huaijing shot him an annoyed glance. “I am not.”
“Alright,” Rong Tang murmured soothingly and stayed quietly by his side until the main villain’s heart had settled again.
Su Huaijing eventually said, “It’s not that I don’t want to acknowledge him.”
“I know,” Rong Tang nodded. “But xiong zhang needs Yuanyuan too.”
He didn’t say that Mu Jingxu needed kin more than Su Huaijing did. They were both people whose ties to family had long scattered. There was no point in comparing who was more pitiful or fragile.
Still, a young child and a youth experience the same truth in very different ways.
Su Huaijing may have been too young to comprehend what had happened, too small to grasp the full picture. But Mu Jingxu had always been sharp and perceptive. The betrayals and farewells he’d faced had played out vividly before his eyes. In many ways, the blows he’d suffered cut even deeper.
And yet…
Rong Tang whispered, “Xiong zhang needs you, too.”
Su Huaijing bowed his head and fell silent for a long time.
Rong Tang sighed inwardly. After supper, he returned to his room, as usual waiting for his little fool. Meanwhile, Su Huaijing and the others were in the study discussing matters.
The system was later than usual that night. Before Rong Tang could tease it for darting about constantly, the glowing orb had already nestled into the crook of his neck. It didn’t say a word, curling up tightly like a child returning home in silent distress.
Rong Tang was slightly taken aback but quickly guessed the reason.
Outside the window, moonlight pooled on the sill. The light droplets wept by the system shimmered softly in the room.
Rong Tang lifted his hand and gently cupped the system in his palm, slowly smoothing its fur with patient strokes.
Only after a long while did the system speak. “Tangtang…”
“I’m here.”
“I’m sorry,” it said.
Rong Tang smiled. “Was it that you couldn’t find the exit, or did you leave and fail to find the mainframe?”
The system was quiet for a long time before replying in a muffled tone. “There’s nothing out there…”
An endless, boundless darkness. No channels to the mainframe as it had imagined. No trace of other systems. Just… nothing.
Heavenly Way had flaws. That’s how it managed to escape through a tear in the sky. But beyond that gap, there was nothing to be found. They were a world unto themselves.
Rong Tang closed his eyes briefly and murmured, “I thought as much.”
The system blinked and looked up at him, stunned.
Rong Tang asked, “Do you remember how you were forced out?”
The system replied, “The male protagonist’s eyeball?”
Rong Tang nodded. “Funny, isn’t it? All these months—whether Sheng Chengli’s fortunes rose or fell, whether he was rewarded or punished—I never once felt a change. No worsening of pain, no easing of it either.”
A single, offhand remark left the system dazed for half the day. When it finally processed what had been said, it shot out of Rong Tang’s palm in disbelief, hovering mid-air, its entire fuzzy body quivering with excitement. “You mean… you’ve unbound yourself from Sheng Chengli?!”
Rong Tang saw the joy and anticipation in its expression and couldn’t bring himself to give a definitive no. Instead, he offered a faint smile and replied ambiguously, “Perhaps. Who’s to say?”
But the system wasn’t so easily fobbed off. “What do you mean “perhaps” ?”
Rong Tang replied, “Let me give you an analogy. Imagine there’s a bottle in front of you, filled with water, or energy, if you like. This water doesn’t simply vanish or multiply on its own, yet you need it to complete a project. The project is made up of multiple parts, each with its own container. You have to pour water into each one for it to function properly.”
The system asked, “What’s that got to do with Sheng Chengli?”
Rong Tang spoke softly, “If the mainframe doesn’t exist… then is the so-called Heavenly Way really Heavenly Way at all?”
The system was left bewildered once more.
Rong Tang continued, “If the mission was a lie from the very beginning, then couldn’t it be that everything around us is a fabrication? That someone had to expend a tremendous amount of energy constructing a logically consistent world just to deceive us? That energy, that’s the water in the bottle.”
“It’s been divided into many purposes. Some of it channelled into bestowing fortune on the protagonist, some used to sustain the system’s existence, and some to generate reward mechanisms. But when the energy runs low, something has to give. They repurpose it, cut back on one area to reinforce another, all to keep up the illusion of stability.”
The system was silent for a long while. The surroundings were still. Rong Tang waited until he finally heard it speak, downcast: “Tangtang, I don’t get it…”
Rong Tang chuckled and stroked its fur again. “That’s alright. I’m here.”
He added, “You don’t need to understand all the details. Just know that if my hypothesis is correct, then the day Sheng Chengli’s eyes were gouged out, the mainframe paid a steep price to restore him… or to swap him into another body. Either way, it could no longer maintain the link between you and me.”
Or perhaps it wasn’t that the link couldn’t be maintained, but that they’d realised: if the two of them remained connected, they might soon uncover the truth behind the curtain. So, when faced with the need to cut something loose, the first thing they did was expel the system from Rong Tang’s conscious space.
The system still looked lost. Ever since it had been forced out of Rong Tang’s mind, it seemed dimmer somehow. A whole glowing sphere, now curled up in its host’s palm, it voiced the question that had most plagued it from the start: “If you’ve really unbound yourself from Sheng Chengli… why not just kill him?”
A shadow passed through the young man’s eyes. Rong Tang replied, “It’s just a theory. Maybe the bond’s still there.”
He paused, then asked quietly, “And what if I’m wrong? What if Sheng Chengli really is the Heaven’s chosen one, and this entire world rests on his shoulders?”
Even if there was only a one in ten thousand chance, it wasn’t a risk he could take.
The system went quiet for a moment before muttering, voice uncertain whether with confusion or frustration,
“Maybe that’s exactly what they’re counting on. That hesitation of yours.”
Rong Tang didn’t argue. “Then they bet right.”
The system sulked, muttering, “You really are a Holy Father type. And I mean that as an insult.”
Rong Tang smiled faintly, returning a line they’d once argued over years ago: “If not the Holy Father, who else would save the world for you?”
The system froze, choked, then finally grumbled in a small voice, “It’s not for me.”
But it clearly was. Because Tangtang just couldn’t let it go.
The system stayed with him for a long time. And just before the ball of light dimmed completely, Rong Tang murmured, “Don’t go flying off again. Just stay by my side.”
The system didn’t respond directly, but said instead, “I’m not of age yet.”
Rong Tang was caught off guard. The calm, unruffled ease he always carried vanished in an instant. After a beat, he replied quietly, “Then don’t come into my room at night.”
“Hmph,” the system scoffed. “Do you lot only sleep at night?”
Rong Tang was silent for a long while. In the end, mortified and annoyed, he snapped, “Get lost.”
“Tui! As if I want to watch you sleep anyway,” the system retorted.
It wasn’t until the moment before it faded entirely that it said: “I’ll go and have a look at the world for you. I can fly really fast.”
That had once been Rong Tang’s dream… but one he’d never managed to fulfil.
He hesitated for a moment, then gave a nod of agreement. Outside, dark clouds swallowed the moon. The light disappeared.
Rong Tang stepped out into the corridor and made his way to the study, just in time to see Mu Jingxu emerge. Several books were scattered across the floor, evidence of some recent quarrel.
Half a month later, in the beginning of the eight month, an imperial edict arrived from the palace: the Fifth Prince was to be permanently stationed at the Imperial Court of Justice to assist the minister in studying criminal proceedings.
When Rong Tang heard this, he stood frozen, unable to recover for a long time.
He looked up at the sky. Once autumn set in within the capital, winter would not be far behind. A chill wind had already crept into the air, sharp and desolate… as if snow could begin falling at any moment.
In neither the original novel nor his previous life had Sheng Chengli ever walked this path.
To say he was there to study legal proceedings was putting it mildly. It was far more likely he’d gone to the Imperial Court of Justice for someone in particular.
A sudden, inexplicable fear gripped Rong Tang’s heart.
So deep …