After catching a glimpse of Grace, Li Fei's expression soured. She turned on her heel and walked away, only pausing once she'd rounded the corner into a deserted stretch of corridor. Her tone came out with all the sweetness of vinegar:
"Why are you following me?"
She let out a contemptuous little laugh.
"Looking to force yourself on me again?"
"Just let me explain..."
Grace had been awake the entire night, rehearsing her words for hours. She gathered her nerve and launched in, quickly explaining the side effects of the antidote.
Li Fei was silent for a moment. Then, all at once, she broke into a smile.
"Could you perform that again for me?"
"...What?"
Grace picked anxiously at the hem of her clothes, a flicker of something that might have been anticipation buried beneath the anxiety.
"I promise I won't act against your will," Li Fei added — in a tone so thoroughly sardonic it drained the color from Grace's face in an instant.
"I had the remaining drug tested," Li Fei continued, crossing her arms. "There are certain side effects, yes — but with sufficient willpower, they're entirely controllable."
That was assuming, of course, that a certain top-tier courtesan with off-the-charts Charisma hadn't been doing her absolute utmost to bait and seduce. But that was beside the point. Setting the facts aside entirely — even if Li Fei bore ninety-nine percent of the blame, did that really absolve Grace of even one percent? All Grace had done was scheme and seduce. But Li Fei had shown weak will. Clearly the more grievous sin.
Li Fei stepped up close, her gaze pressing hard:
"Besides — the drug's effects should have lasted about half an hour. How much longer than that did things go on? Surely even you know the answer to that."
"Some people ride a convenient wave to do something terrible, and then have the nerve to blame the drug. How is that any different from the sorry lot in prison who commit crimes drunk and then weep that it wasn't their fault?"
"And all that chest-thumping — 'You can always trust me,' you said."
"Hah. Quite the joke, isn't it."
Grace's color drained further and further, blanching to match Li Fei's own pale complexion. Tears gathered in her blue-green eyes, trembling at the edges.
"I'm sorry."
She bowed her head deeply, tears splashing onto the floor. "Please forgive me. Whatever you ask of me — anything..."
Li Fei tilted Grace's chin upward and looked down at that achingly pretty, tear-streaked face from above.
— No matter how many times I see it, Grace's expression is always so composed, so carefully neutral. And yet seeing her cry like this, petals shaking in the rain — it moves me every single time.
There was a tenderness turning over in her chest. But the words that came out of her mouth remained thoroughly, poisonously wry:
"How could I possibly not forgive you?"
"After all, you were the one who accidentally ingested the drug. You're the victim here. If I held it against you, wouldn't that make me the unreasonable one?"
Grace had dissolved entirely into a sobbing, shaking mess, her murmurs coming out in broken pieces:
"I'm sorry... I'm sorry... forgive me, whatever you want... anything..."
"Don't make promises you can't keep," Li Fei said quietly, releasing her hold.
"Please..."
Grace had wanted to say 'please trust me' — and then immediately recalled that the last time those words had left her mouth, she had proceeded to do something utterly unconscionable. The words lodged themselves in her throat. What finally came out was: "Please give me a chance."
"A chance? Sure."
Li Fei's lips curved. "Be my dog."
"W-what?"
The turn of events was so unexpected that Grace's eyelids fluttered, her voice stumbling with disbelief.
"In front of everyone. Get down and beg to be my dog."
Li Fei repeated herself.
Grace's lips moved soundlessly. The look in her eyes was a storm of conflict and confusion.
— Not quite done yet. Needs a little longer to marinate.
So Li Fei let out a cold laugh, shoved Grace back against the wall, and walked away.
---
"There's something that feels... slightly off."
Mrs. Annie's expression carried a faint, bashful uncertainty.
"Mm..."
Li Fei studied the delicate, graceful handwriting covering the draft pages, turning the matter over in silence.
The idea had come to her yesterday on a whim. She'd floated the concept of a co-authored project to Mrs. Annie — the division of labor being that one of them would transplant the plot outlines and worldbuilding from another world, while the other would do the actual writing.
Whether readers would buy it, Li Fei had no idea. But it seemed like a decent way to earn a little in manuscript fees at best, and at worst, a pleasant way to spend time and deepen her friendship with Mrs. Annie.
The first novel was titled «Battle Through the Azure Sky». Its premise: the female knight Artoria Pendragon of the Continent of Enlos crosses into a plane known as the Dou Qi Continent, reborn as an infant girl, taken in by the Xiao family of Wutan City, and given the name Xiao Li.
From a very young age, Xiao Li displays extraordinary talent and is regarded as a genius who will restore the family's glory. She is even engaged to Nalan Yanran, the pride of the Cloud Mist Sect — her future seems limitless.
But as Xiao Li blossoms into a young woman, her Dou Qi cultivation inexplicably deteriorates. The once-celebrated genius becomes a laughingstock, a waste — tasting every shade of human coldness. Nalan Yanran personally delivers the rejection, calling off the engagement.
With a furious cry of "Don't look down on a girl just because she's down on her luck," Xiao Li challenges Nalan Yanran to a decisive duel three years hence.
It is only when the true culprit behind Xiao Li's declining cultivation comes to light that her life finally turns around — and armed with the incomparable lost technique «Fen Jue», she sets foot on a magnificent path of rising against all odds.
A classic web fiction template.
As Li Fei silently read through what Mrs. Annie had written, the best way to describe it was... the feeling of a certain literary romance writer from one site jumping ship to write power-fantasy fiction on another. The refined, finely wrought prose sat oddly against the straightforward pulp plotting — the mismatch made Li Fei vaguely uncomfortable, like a shoe on the wrong foot.
She thought it over and offered some suggestions:
"I think... environmental description can be trimmed down as needed. It'll help with pacing."
"Character dialogue doesn't need to be so refined and elegant either — it's mentally taxing to read, and it doesn't feel grounded enough."
"After all, what we're writing is popular fiction meant to entertain and bring readers joy — not a work of literary art. Don't you think?"
She laid out her thinking on "reader targeting" in a gentle, unhurried voice, walking Mrs. Annie through her reasoning.
Books could be written like this?
Mrs. Annie knitted her brows, deep in thought. This was the first time she had ever encountered a creative approach so thoroughly results-oriented, so utterly unconcerned with the intrinsic value of the work.
As an editor, she had certainly come across novels crafted to cater to readers; and when reviewing manuscripts, she'd always factored in reader reception. But the more important considerations had always been the quality of the prose, whether the plot had real pull, whether it struck the reader with genuine force...
This philosophy — built entirely around the creed that 'the reader is more important than my own parents,' and that systematically and lucidly dissects the psychology of reader desire — was something Mrs. Annie had never heard of in all her years.
Absurd. Preposterous. Inconceivable. And yet — when you sat with it and turned it over — somehow entirely reasonable.
Her long-dormant editorial instincts stirred to life in that moment, repeating insistently: written this way... sales could be absolutely staggering.
At that thought, Mrs. Annie looked at Li Fei with an expression that was difficult to read.
A girl with no writing experience whatsoever — just how razor-sharp and perceptive a mind would she need, to stumble her way into such a singular creative philosophy by pure instinct alone?
The inferiority that had long taken root in Mrs. Annie's heart deepened once more.
Age, romantic experience, looks, wealth, social standing, potential on the path of Transcendence — that she fell short in all of these was something she'd already made peace with. But why, even in her own professional domain, did this girl possess such monstrous, self-taught genius — capable of blazing an entirely unprecedented trail with no one to guide her?
What have I done to deserve her attention...
Mrs. Annie's heart was a tangle of indistinct flavors — bitter and sweet all at once, threaded through with an inexplicable pride, and a fragile, anxious tenderness that feared both loss and gain.
"Mrs. Annie — is something wrong?"
Seeing Mrs. Annie's furrowed brow, Li Fei assumed she couldn't agree with the approach, and considerately offered: "If you'd rather not write it this way, we can drop the whole idea..."
"No. I'll write it."
Mrs. Annie shook her head slowly, her voice gentle and certain.
Before Lilith was born, she might have marveled at this 'heretical' creative philosophy for a moment — and then turned right back to her essays and poems that no one would ever read, content to admire her own work in solitude. Imitation would never have been on the table.
But she had tasted the bitterness of life since then.
She had experienced the suffocating anxiety of scrambling to piece together tuition fees.
She had felt the helpless, stinging shame of having her pride wounded when a student girlfriend younger than her own daughter offered to help pay the bills.
Mrs. Annie had learned, since then, to choose what mattered.
If her pride could only be maintained by living off someone else — then it wasn't worth keeping.
She only hoped that when her lover soared, she would not hold her back; and if her lover ever fell, she could be the one to shelter her from the storm — so neither of them would sink too far.
That resolute, open-hearted look in those blue eyes made Li Fei's heart beat a little faster. She blinked, and began to lay out what she knew, piece by piece:
"I think... for a long serial like this, split across several volumes, pacing is everything. There has to be a kind of rhythm to it — something that keeps readers hungry for more."
"For example: Xiao Li races to Cloud Mist Sect to honor her three-year promise with Nalan Yanran. The plot is building toward its absolute peak — and then the volume ends, cold. All the reader sees is: 'To find out what happens next, please read the following volume.'"
"I imagine readers would be clawing at the walls waiting for the next installment?"
"And update speed matters enormously. There's no need to agonize over every word or polish every sentence — just make sure the writing flows smoothly and there are no grammatical errors or typos. The time you save can go into writing more content..."
"Oh, and illustrations! You absolutely must commission the best artist you can afford. A striking, eye-catching cover illustration can lift a novel's popularity by an entire tier..."
Before either of them noticed, an entire afternoon had slipped away.
As the sky outside deepened toward evening, Li Fei said a hurried goodbye and left — yet Mrs. Annie remained at her desk long after, brush in hand, carefully combing through and internalizing these entirely new creative techniques.
Then, without meaning to, her gaze drifted to the wedding ring on her finger.
She came back to herself with a start, a shiver running through her whole body.
Tomorrow was a particular day... and she had forgotten entirely to tell Li Fei not to come...
She looked with a complicated expression at the wedding photograph on the headboard — a golden-haired bride and a silver-haired bride, leaning softly against each other, both of them smiling like flowers in bloom.
Mrs. Annie was silent for a long moment. Her trembling fingertip reached out toward the face of the one she had once loved — and in the end, with a quiet sigh, drew back. Without a sound, her lips formed two words:
"I'm sorry."
---
At the vanity table of her new home, Li Fei changed into a red velvet-textured formal dress. She took a small square of rouge petal between her lips, pressing the deep crimson color evenly across them.
Pop.
With a sound nearly too soft to hear, those vividly painted lips pressed together and parted, and Li Fei blew a kiss at her own reflection in the mirror.
All she was missing to complete the image of the perfect, elegant older beauty was a glass of red wine.
Li Fei quietly held herself up against Leona in her mind before delivering the verdict.
Spending time with charismatic people always gave Li Fei so much to take away. Mrs. Annie's tenderness, Leona's elegance, Bai Mengtian's... subtlety. Only by gathering the best of all of them and smelting it into one could she forge herself into an utterly flawless work of art.
Li Fei's gaze drifted, warm and languid. Her fingertip — wrapped in a black lace fingerless glove — reached out and tilted up the chin of Li Yue, who had just returned to Loxibrook that afternoon:
"Have you missed Mama, Yueyue?"
Her fingers were elegant and long, pale skin bleeding softly through the intricate black lace pattern, giving off a hazy, mysterious beauty. Li Yue's spectral form actually wavered slightly under the effect, rippling like the surface of disturbed water:
"Mm-hm."
"You've worked hard."
Li Fei's lips curved. "Once there are enough sisters who can each hold their own ground, we can start rotating shifts with you."
The Mother of Fairies gave Li Yue's cheek a little prod — the texture was springy and yielding, like soft jelly. Only a high-ranking specter possessed the ability to shift between corporeal and incorporeal states. A Sequence 7 wandering spirit still had a physical form — it could absorb a great deal of the damage from physical attacks, but it was not truly immune to them.
And so the tyrannical little empress leaned in close to Li Yue's ear and murmured: "When you come back next time, I'll teach you a game called hide-and-seek..."
Hide-and-seek? Oh, I'm excellent at that.
A look of pure, guileless delight spread across Li Yue's face.
When she'd been living in the Secret Garden, she and her sisters had played that game often. Thanks to her ghost constitution, she was almost always the last one to be found.
Meanwhile, Li Fei let out a lazy yawn and rose gracefully to her feet. Her high heels pressed deep into the plush red carpet as she drawled, languid and beguiling:
"Alright, children. Time to receive our guests."
---
"Now this is a place."
Having taken in the century-old oak trees lining the path and the fountain sculptures along the way, Cowell — whose well-built physique filled his dress suit with impressively defined lines — rubbed the stubble on his chin and gazed at the elegant, beautiful five-story villa before him, admiration written plainly across his face.
"If you'd bought two fewer useless suits of armor, we could live somewhere like this too."
His wife, whose head barely reached his chest, heard this and reached over to give the muscle of his upper arm a distinctly displeased pinch.
"Ha-ha-ha..."
Cowell scratched the back of his head with an embarrassed laugh.
By his estimation, a villa of this design, in this location, at this size, couldn't have been acquired for less than tens of thousands of gold coins — and adding the cost of hiring staff and ongoing maintenance, the total expense probably wasn't far off the price of a Sunrise-grade suit of armor.
Even a Sequence 5 Transcendent, without outside financial backing, would need years of hard work to piece together a full Sunrise-grade loadout — and not ten rings on ten fingers worth of Sunrise-grade rings, but a full complement of ten-odd Sunrise-grade Transcendent items in total.
For someone like Cowell — who had plateaued at the peak of Sequence 6 and was currently pushing toward Sequence 5 — selling off most of his gear to move into a place like this simply wasn't something he could ever consider doing.
"Klein actually cleans up pretty nicely tonight," his wife said, giving Cowell a look, then appraising Klein — who was quite handsome in his suit — with open approval.
"Then my eight gold coins were well spent."
Klein's voice paused for a beat, then he lifted the heavy ledger in his hand with a touch of dry humor:
"I did the math wrong — it should be eight gold coins and seventy-six silver."
The three of them chatted and laughed their way toward the villa.
The lawn in front of the main entrance had been tastefully set up as an open-air gathering space, with maids of various races weaving between the tables, carrying glasses of wine and exquisite platters of food.
They quickly noticed that not only were all the servants female — so were virtually all the guests, and virtually all of them possessed breathtaking beauty.
These ravishingly lovely guests moved with easy intimacy, leaning close to whisper in each other's ears, laughing softly, their exchanges and expressions composing a scene of brilliant, dazzling color.
"Didn't the papers say the Island Angel grew up in poverty..."
Cowell's wife murmured to herself, and instinctively tucked her hand through her husband's arm. "Her friends are all so beautiful... oh no, I shouldn't have worn this dress."
"And I really should have done a proper job on my makeup before we came."
"I should have started losing weight two months ago."
"Whatever you wear, you're the most beautiful one in the room to me," Cowell offered, seizing the moment with a well-worn line.
"Save it," his wife said, and then gave a sudden cold laugh. "Oh, is that right, Cowell? After all these years together — now that you've moved up in the world, you're thinking of trading me in, are you?"
"That is absolutely not the case," Cowell said hastily, startled into an oddly formal register: "My lady, where does this come from?"
"Then why did you try to come to this banquet without me in the first place?"
His wife crossed her arms and asked.
Cowell fumbled for an answer, unable to voice the actual reason. He shot Klein a look, silently pleading for rescue.
Klein spread his hands, returning an expression of helpless sympathy.
In truth, after several encounters, Klein had long since figured out that Cowell and his wife had a deep and solid bond — their everyday bickering was more like a tonic for the relationship than any cause for alarm.
Just then, the villa's front door swung wide open. The mistress of the house emerged from within, flanked by a cluster of fairies.
Cowell's wife opened her mouth — and slowly, the hand that had been tugging at Cowell's ear went slack.
She murmured:
"I was wrong to doubt you."
"Standing before a jewel that blazes like this — I think it's safe to say, not a single lady or young woman here is in any danger of developing feelings for a man."
____
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