The village was bustling when they arrived, however, once Shen QuanLi and his disciple walked through the gate, it quickly went silent. The shuffling and muffled talking that began among the residents felt oppressively unwelcoming. The glances they received were of wariness and pity. Yet, Lai XingXue paid no mind to them, all too used to such looks from his time in the palace.

The pair idled at the village gate, the meeting location of their patron. And soon, an elderly woman approached them from the crowd. “Daozhangs¹, thank you for coming.”

The youth looked at his master for approval, to which he responded with a simple nod.

“Ou-zhangzhu²?” The second prince tested out.

“This small daozhang is correct.”

Lai Bing paused, unsure how to continue. QuanLi pressed forwards quickly, “How can we help?”

“Repairs for the temple.” The village chief bowed her head, “All the men and youth in the village have left, and there’s no longer any substantial labor force in our village. We think it’s due to the god of prosperity’s temple caving in, just earlier this month.”

The master and his disciple exchanged a look. Shen QuanLi’s hands were refined and uncalloused, untouched by physical labor. Doing construction for a building was naturally not within his skill set. But it hurt his pride how his disciple, his student, gave him a look of understanding.

Receding his thoughts, he instead clutched his horsetail whisk tighter while crossing his own arms ever so slightly. “I understand, where is this temple, Ou-zhangzhu?”

The elderly woman nodded before walking towards a small hill, where a simple temple stood. A large inscribed plaque hung at the entrance, praying for prosperity. When she finished her tour around the temple, she had gone on her way quickly. Exclaiming she still had quite a number of things to do as village chief.

Leaving the pair on their lonesome, Shen QuanLi inspected the foundations of the building, the minuscule cracks and barely fractured boards that seemed to be the result of the proclaimed cave-in. Lai Bing trailed quickly behind him. This expenditure wasn’t exactly cultivation experience, but to help the welfare of the public did come with the job.

“XingXue, please continue inspecting this building for any further damage.” The teenager swiftly followed orders and combed over the temple with a fine-tooth comb but all the damage he could assess was completely superficial.

“Shizun, isn’t our fee quite expensive?”

“Mhm.”

“Then why did they hire us?”

Encouraging his student to continue his stream of thought, Shen QuanLi gave a simple question back, “What do you find strange?”

Abruptly, there came a knock on the door. Lai XingXue who was about to respond instead came to open the doors. Cautiously he pried open the doors so only an inch of light from the outside could seep through. The older idled around the offering table, eyeing the golden statue placed into the wall.

A feminine voice called out, “Daozhangs’ you must leave.” Cracking open the door a bit more, Lai XingXue could see the figure of a young woman, with a dark black-out cloak covering over the majority of her head. It was nearing nightfall, so he wasn’t able to make out too much.

“Why must we leave? What happened?” A small and hesitant thought. Lai XingXue didn’t believe that cultivators should be the ones evading danger at the cost of others.

The woman let out a bereft noise and said nothing more on the topic. She brought out a lacquered stacking box and attempted to hand it to the teen. “Zhangzhu prepared dinner for you too, enjoy.”

Already being enormously wary of others in general, a stranger then threatened him, while proceeding to hand him food. Golden eyes blitzed between the night-colored eyes under the hood and back at the redwood lunch box. “...Leave?” He hoped to get the villager to speak.

“Are you going to take it or not? Her voice didn’t have a tinge of feeling to it, as she did before.

Lai XingXue certainly didn’t want to take it, and the lady was far too suspicious, but was it proper to reject a gift in his position?

“Just take it,” Shen QuanLi called out, drawing in the teen’s attention for a brief moment.

“Shizun--Alright,” Yet, when he turned back to accept the lady’s gift, she had already left. Luckily the lunch box that his master told him to get was placed at the footstep.

He took the handle and presented it to Shuangyue Elder. “Is Shizun hungry?” Lai XingXue placed it down between the middle of them.

The elder brushed his hand over the polished wood of the handle, softly uttering a barely audible ‘I see’ before responding curtly. “No, Inedia.” Shen QuanLi resumed examining the gift.

Curious about the sudden interest in the item, the noirette sat down on the stone floor beside his master. Golden eyes stared at the movement of the latter’s hands, “Then-”. Yet that sentence quickly brought one of Shuangyue Elder’s fingers to his own bottom lip. Sheer red embarrassment bloomed on his cheeks and the second prince didn’t know what to do. He didn’t dare to move, barely permitting himself to breathe.

Having successfully silenced the student for a moment, LiangDi Immortal brought both of his hands to lift up the lacquered stacking box. The angle revealed a plain octangular base, but with more inspection, there was a small carved dent in the edge. The brunette pushed his finger into it, popping the piece of wood off, revealing the actual base of the object. Three yellow talismans were pasted snugly to it.

Ah. Lai XingXue let himself breathe again, once he saw. Realization flitted across his expression and he turned his head to look closer at the talismans.

An aura suppression talisman, An audio spying talisman… and… The youth wasn’t able to decipher the last one. He looked up to his master for guidance out of habit, only for the elder to tap his finger below the middle talisman. Shen QuanLi pressed the plank back into place and set the container aside. The brunette proceeded to pat himself looking for a brush and parchment, sighing only to come up empty. He held his hand out, in front of the youth, much again to Lai XingXue’s confusion. Hesitantly he set his own hand into Shen QuanLi’s open palm.

Shuangyue Elder’s thin finger came up to draw a couple of characters against his hand.

“Danger. Someone’s listening. Wait for them. Act Normal.”

The brunette withdrew his finger and started, “XingXue, did you pack dinner?”

Dumbly, he feigned ignorance hoping to disguise a secret, “Dinner?...”

“I’m aware you don’t like eating things you can’t see made.”

The teenager hung his head, almost disappointed in himself, “I’m sorry for being picky, Shizun…”

Quickly, Shen QuanLi softly flicked the area in between the teenager’s eyebrows. “Don’t apologize senselessly. Now did you bring anything to eat?”

Actually taking a moment to contemplate, Lai XingXue's eyes suddenly shone. He withdrew a small pouch from his white and gray uniform. Loosening the ribbon to reveal a collection of grains, nuts, and dried berries to his master.

Shen QuanLi’s expression became increasingly dim. Refusing to believe that his disciple ate so meagerly, “XingXue, don’t tell me you’re planning to eat so little?”

“I’m- No, Shizun, this is just the birdfeed I made before the trip.”

The elder’s voice became even drier, “You’re planning to eat birdfeed.”

“Shizun-” Unsure how he could deny it by this point, it was a lucky time that the door flung open. Lai XingXue had never felt more blessed to see a dishonest and untrustworthy stranger.

The elder stared languidly for a moment, for he was expecting this. “So you actually came.” He picked up his lavish jade pipe, drawing in a smooth breath of air, leaving a resplendent sheen in his eyes. Shen QuanLi balanced the body of the pipe between the fingers of his right hand, casually leaning it back and forth, “Ou-zhangzhu”.

“Correct.” The stranger stepped forwards smiling, revealing the face of a sculpted young man.

The second prince turned his head when he heard a nasally lowly pitched voice speak. He was entirely certain the person who had greeted him, led them here, was an elderly woman. “Ou… Ou-zhangzhu?” He turned to ask his master for direction, yet what was returned was an equally puzzled expression.

A sharp-toothed grin appeared from the new arrival. “Too late.” Having caught the master and disciple pair off guard, he proceeded to all of a sudden kick open the lacquered lunch box that was cast aside. The neatly stacked layers flew into a mess. The first layer intended to be a simple meal crashed into the floor, as a gust of unraveling black smoke was expelled from the second container. Shen QuanLi quickly prepared to cast a spell enchantment, a protective barrier to filter out the smoke, but instead, once he stared behind his disciple, he clenched his fist and only grimaced.

The teenager’s expression grew distraught, had he done something? What had he- he stopped and stared. The intruder had silently approached him in the chaos and brandished a sharp outgrown set of inhumane claws to the side of his neck. The man would mock his master: lazily waving his hand whenever Shen QuanLi would seek to take action. How could he have gotten himself taken hostage!

Yet he wasn’t able to think of much else after, with black smoke flooding into his orifices and blurring his vision, he began to slowly lose consciousness. Panic set into Lai XingXue’s eyes as he pinched his nose, don’t-

◈

The next moment he woke up paralyzed. With no feeling and control over his body and limbs, his heart rate quickly accelerated and more panic seared into his veins. His mouth felt numb and Lai XingXue could only control minimal parts of his face. The setting was unfamiliar, unrecognizable.