A tense atmosphere hung in the air after Jia’s question. Anyone else might have been offended by the accusatory tone in her voice, but Dae simply chuckled.

“Why am I here? Well, more or less the same reason as you, I imagine. I’m looking for the gang boss whose name you share—and more importantly, his benefactors.”

Jia crossed her arms and channeled her inner Eui to level her best glare at Dae.

“That doesn’t really answer my question, does it? Why are you after Boss Lee? And if you knew I was here, why didn’t you tell me about it?”

“I assure you, I was wholly unaware of your presence in the city—in the country, in fact—until the very moment I saw you approaching the gang’s headquarters. An unfortunate side effect of working in secret is that our ability to receive information from elsewhere is somewhat limited. As for why—well, did you think your friends wouldn’t look into your whereabouts?”

Eui looked askance at Dae from her spot leaning against the wall.

“So, what, you just decided to go digging up Jia’s past in case she’d gone back to old habits or something?”

Dae shook his head.

“Not quite, no. It was Miss Eunae’s idea to track down your families. At first it started out as something to pass the time while I was still under investigation and stuck as a ‘guest’ in the palace, but the more I dug the more anomalies I found. There were too many things connected—too many coincidences to ignore.”

Coincidences—the word sent a shiver down Jia’s spine. She was starting to understand Magus Hwang’s stark disbelief in them. Dae went on.

“For example, Miss Jia, did you know that the same gang responsible for the orphanage you grew up in has also been responsible for the ongoing harassment of a certain merchant family at the behest of some ‘anonymous’ benefactor?”

Eui bristled at that—there was only one reason Dae would be talking about merchant families here.

“Who!?”

“As you’ve no-doubt surmised, Miss An, it was your family. They’ve since been safely relocated outside of the influence of the gang, and I even had the opportunity to meet them—lovely people, though I can’t help but wonder where you get your personality from.”

“The fuck is that supposed to mean!?”

“Er—a-anyway, hehe—it’s quite an unusual link is it not? I wasn’t able to conclusively prove who the benefactor was, but it stands to reason that it was probably either the Sun or Yeong families. But why this gang, of all criminal organizations that they might have contacted? What—other than you two—is the common link between the Sun and Yeong families, the Lee Gang, and the An family?”

Jia pinched the bridge of her nose and groaned.

“Don’t you dare say it. Is this how Magus Hwang feels all the time?”

Dae chuckled sardonically.

“I’m afraid you’ve guessed correctly. Each and every one of them has at one point or another been in contact with my former master, Grand Magus Do Hye.”

“That’s insane, Dae. Do Hye is centuries old, he’s been all over the place. His conspiracies might run deep, but whatever you’re getting at seems like way too much of a stretch.”

“Perhaps, Miss Jia, but here lies the crux of the issue—according to Magus Hwang’s investigations, Do Hye operated mainly through agents. Despite our best efforts, we haven’t been able to track any of them down—however, whoever has been paying the Lee Gang to harass Miss An’s parents is still doing so. That benefactor may be the only active link we have to an agent of Do Hye—a potential clue to his whereabouts or motives.”

Jia sighed, holding a hand to her face as she realized that Dae hadn’t yet been clued in about the Sovereign’s Tear or the secret realm of Sovereign Chou. How many times was she going to have to have that conversation?

“I don’t know about his whereabouts, but I already gave Magus Hwang a pretty big clue about his motives...”

Once again, Jia explained everything she’d learned about the divine realm from Jianmo, including her intention to enter the sovereign’s realm to recover his treasure and keep it out of the hands of the gods. Dae took the news quite well, nodding along as he listened patiently, and even stopping Harada and Ishihara from interjecting until Jia’s story was complete. His reaction was unlike that of Hayakawa or Rika—who immediately pledged their support—or even Magus Hwang who simply became concerned about the implications it had on his investigation. Dae’s reaction was instead, uniquely Dae-like—unerringly supportive while also pragmatic and rational.

“What happens afterwards?”

Jia blinked in confusion at Dae’s question.

“Afterwards?”

“Assuming you manage to outmaneuver the gods, enter the secret realm, defeat any other representatives that manage to enter with you, and then acquire this treasure—which I have every confidence you will—then what?”

“Um...I hadn’t really thought that far ahead. Saving our realm from destruction kinda takes precedence over planning for the future, I guess.”

Dae shook his head.

“No, I mean immediately afterwards. The realm isn’t saved just because you managed to acquire the Sovereign’s Tear. Once you leave that realm, the gods will still be here—probably waiting in ambush. You need a better plan than just running in and grabbing the treasure.”

Jia hesitated—she hadn’t considered that possibility.

“Jianmo—”

“Is powerful, but alone. From what you said, they already had a difficult time handling just one of these avatars. Plus for all we know, Jianmo will be among those fighting for the tear—don’t be too quick to trust what they tell you.”

Jia frowned, considering Dae’s words carefully. Eui interrupted the conversation before she got too far, however.

“That’s all great, but we’ve gotten off track. We can think about Chou’s stupid realm later—right now I want to hear why Dae thinks we shouldn't go across the street and raze the gang that fucked with my family to the ground.”

Dae withered slightly under Eui’s intense glare.

“A-as I was saying, Miss An, if we can find the gang’s benefactors, it may be our first and only chance at finding a real link to my master’s motives and whereabouts.”

“Why should we care?”

That gave Dae pause, and he frowned thoughtfully for a moment.

“Well, it seems like Do Hye was trying to arrange things such that the secret realm would be opened—a scheme that predates the academy by decades, if not more. I suspect that the academy may have secretly been a training ground for candidates to enter that realm. You two were the only successes among a group of unawaked candidates that Do Hye attempted to sneak into the academy. Unawakened, and—perhaps more importantly—unaffiliated. If my master has been intentionally pushing you towards that secret realm, wouldn’t you want to know why?”

“No.”

Dae started to nod, then did a double-take, choking and sputtering on his response.

“Wh—wait, what!? Why not!?”

Eui shrugged.

“I don’t really care. The more we try to understand why he did the shit he did the more we’re probably playing into his hands. Things are the way they are, and knowing why isn’t going to change it. Do Hye can take his fucking plans and shove them straight up his—”

“Okay! I understand. Then, as a personal favor to me, could I ask you to wait for a month—no, a week! One week for us to try to catch them meeting with their benefactors. You may not care, but for me it’s personal. My master was the only family I had.”

Eui scowled, but she could feel Jia’s hesitation, and didn’t reject Dae outright. Both Jia and Eui could empathize with Dae’s desire to find his family—even if his family was just one extremely suspicious old man. As one, they closed their eyes to consider the problem. After a moment, Yoshika opened her eyes and spoke in chorus.

“Maybe we could arrange a compromise.”

Harada Jun sat forward, suddenly extremely alert in reaction to the change in Yoshika’s demeanor.

“Woah, what is this? What’s happening?”

Dae chuckled and waved off Harada’s concerns.

“Ah, that’s right. You never had the opportunity to meet Yoshika, did you? I take it you’re no longer keeping it a secret?”

The last part was directed at Yoshika, who nodded with both heads.

“Our joint cultivation was already an open secret back at the academy. There’s no point anymore. Harada, Ishihara—we are Yoshika. No need to reintroduce yourselves, we are just Jia and Eui.”

“Their cultivation method allows them to share thoughts and memories, merging into a single gestalt entity that we call Yoshika.”

Ishihara glanced between them with a curious expression—the most interest he’d shown in the conversation since the start.

“Really? What happens when you dream? If you share a dream, what happens when one of you wakes up?”

Yoshika narrowed her eyes, and her voice was icy as she responded.

“You’d have to ask Yan Yue about that.”

Ishihara stared back at her for a moment, expressionless and unblinking, before nodding slowly.

“Ah. She did mention you had a history—I’ll leave it alone, then.”

Just like that, Ishihara returned to his quiet meditation. He’d been a little odd back at the academy, but it seemed as if he’d gotten even stranger since. Dae cleared his throat to regain Yoshika’s attention and get the conversation back on track.

“Ahem, you were saying? About a compromise.”

Yoshika nodded.

“We don’t have a week to spare. We’ll be leaving for Songdo before then, and we plan on taking our sisters with us. Lee Jung and her daughter deserve to feel safe. We won’t have them looking over their shoulders constantly like Jia had to.”

Dae sighed, his shoulders falling in disappointment.

“I understand. I suppose it would be hypocritical of me to ask you to spare a thought for my family at the expense of your own.”

Yoshika nodded, but cut Dae off as he opened his mouth to respond.

“We did say we’d offer a compromise. Admittedly, we haven’t had a chance to fully think this through. We decided that we would do it on impulse, then after finding our sisters we just as impulsively decided to do it now. Lee’s Gang needs to end tonight, but that doesn’t mean we have to kill the man himself. Ishihara, your technique lets you read people’s memories through their dreams, right?”

Ishihara cracked an eye open and smiled sinisterly.

“Oh, it does much more than that, Miss Yoshika. I’ve spent the years practicing everything Miss Yan taught me, and expanding on her ideas.”

Yoshika grimaced. She didn’t like the sound of that at all. She had to wonder how much personality affected the manifestation of spiritual techniques—her own version of the Melody of the Dreaming Moon was nothing like Yue’s or Ishihara’s. In fact, she still wasn’t entirely sure what would happen if she used it on another person, and she was a little worried about it. She shook both her heads, returning her attention to the present.

“Right, anyway, once we put down the gang, we can leave Boss Lee with you. As long as you promise us that he’ll never bring harm to our families again, we’ll trust you with his fate. It’s not the direct link you wanted, but perhaps something in his memories will lead you to Do Hye.”

Dae took a deep breath, then nodded.

“That...that could work, yes. It’s, er, not as subtle as the methods we’d planned for, but if you’re planning on destroying the gang anyway, taking the leader into custody should work just fine for our purposes. Ishihara really has gotten much better over the last two years. He’s practically an expert interrogator! If Boss Lee knows anything about my master or his agents, we’ll find out.”

“It’s a deal then. Now, let’s not waste any more time—we have a fifteen year debt to repay.”

Dae chuckled softly, while Ja Yun just looked resigned to whatever was going to happen. Ishihara was uninterested, but Harada grinned, slamming a fist into his palm enthusiastically.

“Now you’re speaking my language! Finally, some real action. What’s our plan of attack?”