Seong Misun narrowed her eyes at Eunae, seemingly disappointed that her mockery had failed to get a rise out of her sister. Jia opened her mouth to speak, but Yoshika snapped it shut again. This was not the time for her to speak out of turn. She had gotten used to Eunae, but this was a princess who was more than happy to wield her status. Eunae’s formal attitude wasn’t just a way to dodge her sister’s scorn—it was a warning to the rest of them.

“Tsk, well at least your time here hasn’t been entirely wasted. It looks like you’ve managed to squeeze enough power out of your heritage to catch up to little Haeun!”

At her words, a little girl poked her head out from behind Seong Misun’s tails. She couldn’t be more than four or five years old, and had the same dark hair and blue eyes that was apparently ubiquitous to the Seong clan—or perhaps just Eunae’s immediate family. Like Eunae, the girl had three little fox tails swishing nervously behind her. Eunae crouched down to be level with her and smiled brightly, completely ignoring her older sister.

“Hello little sister! I didn’t see you there. Are you having fun watching the tournament with your big sister?”

Seong Haeun nodded silently.

“Good! These are my friends, do you want to say hello?”

Haeun looked up at the girls, but just clutched Misun’s tail and shied away behind her. There was a chorus of ‘awws’ at the adorable little princess—she was so cute! Misun cleared her throat to return the attention to herself.

“Yes, yes—everybody loves little Haeun. At least she doesn’t have to magically compel people to do so.”

“Misun!”

Eunae’s tone was warning, but that only seemed to egg her older sister on, a cruel grin forming on her face.

“Oh, are you going to tell me that you haven’t already enthralled this little entourage of yours? Are you sure? When has anyone ever loved you without you forcing them to, Eunae?”

Eunae’s tone and expression were carefully neutral, but Jia could practically feel the heat of her anger pouring off of her as she spoke.

“Misun, you are going too far.”

Misun scoffed incredulously.

“I’m going too far? Please! I’m not the one who had all the servants in the house walking on eggshells around the short-tempered little brat who could enthrall them with a glance!”

Eunae’s response was through gritted teeth, though she kept her eyes firmly shut.

“That is not who I am anymore, big sister. I’ve sworn never to use my power like that again.”

“Then what purpose do you even serve, little sister? Which is it, are you a worthless coward, or a little monster?”

“Is there a point to this, Misun, or did you just notice that I was happy and feel the need to intervene?”

Misun tossed her hair back over her shoulder with one hand, glaring condescendingly despite the fact that Eunae’s eyes remained closed.

“I thought I would do your little friends the favor of making sure they knew who they were associating with—on the off chance you hadn’t already enslaved them all. Have you told them how many lives you’ve destroyed? How many people you’ve killed?”

“Misun! Please, stop! What do you want with—”

“KITTY!”

There was a deathly silence as all eyes fell on Seong Haeun, who had run out from behind Misun to pet Heian, oblivious to the argument she’d just interrupted. Jia stared off to the side, feigning innocence as the tension faded a bit at the sight of the little princess playing with the kitten spirit. She was more than a little bit surprised that Haeun’s attempts to pet her familiar were actually successful—nobody but her and Eui had been able to touch Heian before.

Misun shook her head and sighed ruefully before turning to lock eyes with Yan Yue.

“You, tell me honestly what you think of Eunae. If you lie to protect her, I’ll know.”

Yue blinked in surprise at being addressed suddenly, but quickly rallied before bowing politely.

“Princess Seong Eunae is perhaps the most terrifying person I have ever met in my own age group. Had I not been forced to by circumstance and other associations, I doubt that I would have ever allowed myself anywhere close to her. That said, she has an agreeable personality, and excellent taste in tea. I think we get along quite well, and I would dare to venture that she is among the few people that I can honestly call friends.”

Seong Misun bit her lip, frowning—that was clearly not the response she’d been looking for. She huffed in annoyance before turning on her heel.

“Fine! You haven’t pulled us into a war by enthralling Yan De’s only daughter—I don’t care what else you get up to. Come along Haeun, it’s time to go.”

Seong Haeun looked up in distress at her oldest sister.

“But the kitty!”

“Tsk, just bring it with you. Let’s go.”

Jia hesitated for a moment before clearing her throat.

“Ahem, um—my apologies Princess Seong, but Heian is my spirit familiar. She can’t leave my side.”

Misun whirled around and scowled at Jia.

“Oh really? You certainly picked an interesting time to summon it. Who exactly do you think you are?”

Lee Jia swallowed nervously, but forced herself not to look away from the angry princess.

“I’m Lee Jia.”

Misun gave her a flat look.

“I know that. Eunae already introduced you, and besides—you made quite a stir during the qualifiers. Who are you? Where did you come from? You’re obviously common, but why haven’t I heard of you?”

“Uh...I don’t know? I was nobody from nowhere. I ended up here by accident.”

Seong Misun’s lips formed a thin line.

“By ‘accident’, is it?”

Jia just stood frozen under her scrutiny for a long moment before Misun threw her arms in the air in exasperation.

“Whatever! I’m sick of this. Eunae, I’m leaving Haeun with you. Bring her back later. If anything happens to her I’ll tell mother it was your fault.”

Seong Misun stormed off down the middle of the street, forcing people to move out of her way. Once she was out of sight, a pressure was lifted and Jia let out a sigh of relief. The sigh was matched by Eunae, who bowed to her friends apologetically.

“I’m sorry you had to see that, everyone. Misun has always been a bit...antagonistic towards me. I think she relishes having someone with even worse status than herself within the family that she can bully.”

Rika chuckled nervously.

“She’s low status in your family? Her domain was terrifying—it felt like I was going to drown.”

Eunae nodded slowly.

“She has six tails, which is quite good—even the queen only has eight. The number of tails among our clan generally corresponds to power and talent. I have almost none, while the queen is unmatched. Misun has a lot of potential, but she tends to squander it. She has a reputation for being...rebellious.”

Jia could definitely see that. Her scandalous attire and haughty attitude were indication enough, but the real giveaway was her domain. It felt as if it constantly wavered between anger and listlessness. As if she hated the world, but lacked the ambition to do anything about it other than rage impotently. Seong Misun must have been pretty powerful indeed to have reached the xiantian ranks with such a personality.

She shook her head and moved her attention to the little girl still quietly playing with her familiar. Jia knelt down next to Seong Haeun and joined her, petting Heian.

“Hey there! Looks like Heian likes you! I’m Lee Jia, it’s nice to meet you.”

The little princess glanced up from the cat and nodded.

“I’m Haeun. I like your kitty—she’s all glowy and pretty. Can I have her? Big sister said I could take her, but mommy says I shouldn’t take things from other people without asking.”

Heian nuzzled her head against Jia’s hand and meowed.

“Myommy!”

Jia’s eyes widened, but she tried not to get too excited as she answered Haeun’s question.

“Heian doesn’t belong to me. She’s a spirit, which means she’s her own person—even if she looks like a cat. She can even talk...sometimes. If she feels like it.”

“Okay.”

The princess accepted what Jia said in that straightforward way that only children could manage. Jia remembered the other kids in the orphanage being like that, just accepting whatever the older kids told them without question. She’d been like that too, at first.

“You know, you’re pretty lucky. Most people can’t even touch Heian because she’s a spirit. Isn’t her fur nice and soft?”

“Mhm! I saw she was all glowy so I made myself glow to pet her!”

The little princess puffed out her chest proudly, but Jia had no idea what she was talking about. Jia gave Eunae a questioning glance as she knelt down on the opposite side of Haeun. Eunae giggled and ruffled her little sister’s hair.

“Little Haeun has an incredible talent for mana sense. She awakened all by herself when she was just a baby, and learned how to manipulate her own aura intuitively. The way she uses magic is a bit strange, and her tutors have had quite a time trying to teach her the traditional methods. She’s still too young to understand.”

Sure enough, when Jia paid closer attention, she noticed that the little girl had a thin aura of mana concentrated over her body. She wasn’t actually touching Heian, she was petting the cat with her aura. It was such a simple, obvious idea—yet nobody else had thought of it. The insight of a child. Jia looked up at Eunae and grinned.

“Hey, if you’re stuck babysitting anyway, why not bring her back to our place while we practice? She can play with Heian all she likes there.”

Haeun’s eyes went wide as saucers as she looked up at her sister, pleading.

“Can we!?”

Eunae chuckled and ruffled the little princess’ hair again as she stood.

“Of course we can!”

Haeun squealed with delight and hugged Eunae’s waist tightly—her shyness from before completely forgotten.

“Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!”

Eunae returned the hug with a warm smile on her face.

“I missed you, Haeun.”

“I missed you too!”

Jia smiled at the sight, happy to know that Eunae wasn’t entirely estranged from her family. Unfortunately, the heartwarming sight also reminded her of her own ‘family’ back in Goryeo. The older sister that she’d betrayed and the little sister that she’d abandoned. She had been uncertain before, but now her resolve was firm—she would go back for them one day. One way or another, Jia would return home to face her past.

---

Seong Haeun soon became a regular face when the girls got together at Jia’s dorm—apparently Misun was happy to let her wander as long as she had Eunae as a scapegoat—and rapidly became something of a team mascot along with Heian. The two of them would play together while the girls practiced or watched bouts using the scrying formation. Jia, Eui, and Eunae got to enjoy their bye round, as the entire first half of the week was dedicated to the first round.

There weren’t very many interesting fights in the first round, and Jia was happy to spend time playing with Heian, practicing, or meditating unless somebody she knew was fighting. Much to her delight, Haeun turned out to be a good influence on Heian. Not only did the little girl persistently cajole the cat spirit into playing human games like tag or leapfrog, but even games that required communication like statues. Thanks to her hard work, Heian could now vocalize yes and no, as well as her own name, Haeun, and Jia—though always as ‘myommy’. In the last four days, Heian had developed more than she had in the previous six months.

Meanwhile, there were a few particularly interesting fights that caught Lee Jia’s eye in the first round. The first was Ishihara Nao on the first day. She hadn’t paid attention to it in the first half, because Guan Yi’s match took place at the same time, but it had become notable because of how long it ended up taking.

Long after Guan Yi had finished dismantling his opponent—another boy from Qin—Ishihara was still going. It was an unusual matchup—Ishihara was a unified cultivator, but he mainly focused on magic and spiritual arts, while his opponent was a spiritual artist from Qin, who dabbled in magic. The similarities ended there, as Ishihara’s opponent pressed him with a nearly endless barrage of attacks, spanning a surprisingly wide array of elements, while Ishihara himself just...defended.

If you didn’t know what to look for, it would almost seem as if Ishihara was completely invulnerable, as he turned away or absorbed one attack after another. Jia did know what to look for, though—and what she saw was extremely impressive. Ishihara had combined the mana shield spell with basic qi shielding techniques in order to block qi attacks with extreme efficiency, while he simply moved out of the way of more physical attacks with minimal movement. He matched the elements being thrown at him with perfect accuracy, and moved before the physical attacks even came toward him—as if he could read his opponent’s mind.

Yue giggled maniacally when Jia said that, eager to show off the progress of her protege.

“It’s his Melody of the Dreaming Moon technique. It manifests differently from mine. Instead of creating an illusion in his enemy’s mind, he can read their thoughts and memories. It works best if they are asleep, but reading the surface thoughts of someone as unguarded as the moron he’s fighting is nothing.”

Ishihara’s offense wasn’t much—in fact, it had been nothing for most of the match—but his defense was impenetrable. Eventually, his opponent wore himself out and was forced to surrender without Ishihara ever landing a blow. A truly bizarre outcome.

The next day, Yue had her own first match against a smug looking Yamato boy that Jia didn’t know. He seemed extremely confident as he faced off against Yan Yue, who’s expression remained impassive.

“I saw the dirty trick you used against my brother in the qualifiers! That won’t work this time—I have to willingly surrender!”

Yue just frowned, not dignifying the boy with a response. He didn’t seem bothered as he continued to taunt her.

“I know your other weakness as well! Your technique can only hold someone for a few seconds at most. Once it ends, you’ll be helpless! This is a free round for me!”

Yue huffed irritably.

“Are you finished?”

“You’re the one who’s finished!”

The boy charged forward at full speed, his arms flashing as he cast spells to enhance his body—they’d become quite popular among the Yamato students. Yue rolled her eyes and whistled sharply as the boy lunged at her, causing his entire body to stiffen up. Before he could fall, Yue caught his arm and swung him around in a display of strength unbefitting of her willowy build. Her throw, combined with his own momentum sent him careening off the edge of the ring while his body was unable to move to prevent his fall.

Yue approached the edge and glared down at him with undisguised contempt.

“A few seconds is more than enough to handle the likes of you. Come try me again when you’ve managed to fill the space between your ears with something other than mud.”

Jia winced as Yue flung insults at the poor boy, probably injuring his pride more than she had his body. She had to admit, it had been pretty moronic of him to charge in without considering just how much could happen in a few seconds.

The last fight of interest in the first round was Takeda Rika’s, though it had been something of a disappointment. Rika had defeated her opponent using only the orthodox style of her martial art. She hadn’t even bothered using any spells or spiritual arts. It was certainly impressive enough that she’d taken out her opponent with only martial arts, but Jia couldn’t help but wonder why. Hadn’t she wanted to show off her newly developed style for her grandfather? What was she waiting for?

She got her answer when Eunae showed Jia a drawing of the tournament brackets. Assuming both of them won their bouts, Takeda Rika was going to meet Minami Yuuko in the third round. The two of them had established something of a friendly rivalry over their political affiliations, and it seemed like Rika wanted to save her best for that match. Incidentally—the winner of that bout would be Lee Jia’s quarterfinal opponent, followed by An Eui, and then Hayakawa Kaede in the finals.

All of that assuming none of them got knocked out beforehand. Hayakawa would likely have to contend with Dae or Eunae, while Jia had to face Yue, and either Rika or Yuuko. Eui’s only real competition was whoever that ‘Bai Lin’ person was. They were a bit worried, since they had no idea what to expect from him, but Jia was confident that Eui would manage whatever he threw at her.

The real question was what Jia and Eui were going to do for the semifinal. They couldn’t really fight each other, and they had no clue which of them stood a better chance against Hayakawa. They decided to just play it by ear, and cross that bridge when they came to it. Neither of them wanted to waste time preparing for fights that might not happen when they could spend their time focusing on whatever challenge was right in front of them.

On the fourth day of the tournament, the second round began.