Chapter 743 — The Stair

CHAPTER 743

The Stair

The main stair of the Phoenix Tail Pavilion had thirty-six steps of red stone, and Shen Yaoqing was standing on the nineteenth.

She hadn’t been there a moment ago. Shi Feng had started up behind Ke Lianshu, and halfway up, the steward had bowed to someone above, murmured an apology and gone back down without him. Now there was only her, three steps higher, in the plain blue robe of the Serene Jade, with a sword on her back and a white jade tassel on its hilt.

Shi Feng stopped on the sixteenth step.

“Fairy Shen,” Shi Feng said, and bowed as far as his ribs allowed.

“Shen Yaoqing,” Shen Yaoqing said. “The title is for people who want something.”

Up close, she looked younger than her rank. Her face was calm, pale and completely closed, and her eyes were the only part of it that moved. She studied his bound ribs, his face and the hand resting beside his sword. Shi Feng couldn’t tell what conclusion she reached.

No pressure came off her at all. She kept her Shattering Void pressure completely restrained. Her stillness was deliberate, and Shi Feng waited for her to speak.

“You fought four Shattering Void men last night,” Shen Yaoqing said. “With broken ribs.”

“Cracked,” Shi Feng said. “And they were ordinary men. They were used to collecting from people who pay.”

“You beat Huangfu Lie. You beat Tang Mingyu. You sent the Clan Court away with a receipt,” Shen Yaoqing said, watching for a reaction. “You’re a 4 Mark. A 4 Mark in this city can name his price at any sect’s door. You don’t need a princess’s backing, and you don’t need a sword art from her vault.”

“No,” Shi Feng agreed.

“You were entered by a clerk’s mistake,” Shen Yaoqing said. “Why do you stay?”

Shi Feng thought she would probe his backing first. Instead, Shen Yaoqing asked exactly what she wanted to know. He preferred that. He didn’t need to guess what answer she was trying to draw out.

So he answered.

“There’s a lotus behind the recruits’ vault door,” Shi Feng said. “A Quiet Soul Lotus. The princess put it there the morning I came to buy it. It’s owed to a man who counts.”

Shen Yaoqing’s eyes stopped moving.

“The old man,” Shen Yaoqing said. “Your attendant.”

“Master Ji Yuanhe,” Shi Feng said. “He was a 2 Mark alchemist in Hongye Kingdom. Somebody took him and broke something in him, and he counts to hold it together. I’ve mended most of it. The lotus is for the rest.” He shrugged, and his ribs made him regret it. “I told him I’d get it. He’s waited long enough. I’m not leaving without it.”

“That’s all?” Shen Yaoqing asked.

“That’s all,” Shi Feng said.

She looked at him for a long moment. The wind came in through the open window on the landing above and lifted a few strands of her hair, and she didn’t brush them back.

Shi Feng waited. He’d told her the truth, and he had nothing to add to it. If she wanted more, she would have to ask.

She didn’t ask.

“I see,” Shen Yaoqing said.

She stepped aside against the wall to let him pass.

“You asked him a question,” Long Caili said from the top of the stair. “He answered it. That’s rare.”

The princess stood on the landing in a plain dark robe and a pale gauze veil, with a ledger under her arm and no jewellery at all, as if she’d come straight from work. Nobody had heard her arrive.

Shen Yaoqing didn’t turn around.

“…He answered it,” Shen Yaoqing said. “That’s all.”

“I heard,” Long Caili said coolly. “Most men who climb this stair answer a question with three questions and a gift. Gold and jade outside, rotten cotton inside.” She looked down at Shi Feng. “Most of them want to know what I’ll pay. You want to know what’s in my vault.”

“I already know what’s in it,” Shi Feng said. “I’d like to know when I can take it out.”

“When you’re a recruit,” Long Caili said. “Not before. The lotus is a prize, Candidate Shi. I don’t sell my prizes to men who stand in the wrong queue.”

“Then I’ll win the remaining rounds,” Shi Feng said. “Keep the lotus ready.”

The princess’s veil stirred with one short breath. It might have been the cold.

“Your report reached me last night,” Long Caili said. “Ke Lianshu wrote it down word for word. ‘If someone comes near the old man, it stops being a contest.’” She paused. “I don’t like threats in my pavilion.”

“It wasn’t a threat,” Shi Feng said. “It was a notice. I’d rather you heard it from me first than from the watch afterward.”

Long Caili looked at him for one breath, then nodded once, as if she were marking a line in her ledger.

“The fourth round is in four days,” Long Caili said. “My banquet. Twelve candidates, twelve guests, twelve cups.” She turned back toward the door. “Come with a steady hand, Candidate Shi. The ribs are up to you.”

The door closed behind her.

Shen Yaoqing was still standing against the wall. She looked at the closed door, and then at him.

“She doesn’t come down that stair for anyone,” Shen Yaoqing said.

She walked down past him without another word, and she didn’t hurry.

Shi Feng stood alone on the sixteenth step and counted. Four days. His ribs still needed healing, and stronger opponents waited after the banquet. Four days would be enough. He already knew where to begin.