Liu Denger's Vigil

Outside the Emperor Mubei's mausoleum, a solitary lamp flickered again and again.

After a long while, Liu Denger put away the lamp, gazed into the distance, and let out a sigh.

"Alas."

What she had just sent was the coded lantern signal used by Nine Yang spies to contact one another: I am Ling Gu Die. Reply upon receipt.

When Green Snake had been captured, she had feared her own identity would be exposed. Then came the great upheaval in the Divine Capital, and even her master, Li Longchan, had died. She had lost her standing as well.

Yet she was unwilling to leave the Divine Capital.

So, to protect herself, she volunteered to atone for her master's crimes and offered to become the keeper of the Emperor Mubei's mausoleum. At the time, the Divine Capital was in utter chaos—who had the time to care about such a thing? Her application was approved just like that.

But mausoleum keepers were sealed within the formation and could no longer contact the outside world, so before she left, she sent out one final message.

"I have secured an important post. It concerns the life and death of the Emperor of Yin."

Once the Nine Yang army reached this place in the future, they would naturally learn of her situation.

Thus, Liu Denger waited day and night within and outside the mausoleum.

By rights, someone should have brought her supplies every ten days or half a month. But before long, even the supply deliveries stopped. She had no choice but to grow her own fruits and vegetables and raise chickens, ducks, and wild beasts.

But...

She could not help feeling puzzled. What exactly had happened? However inadequate the Emperor Mubei might have been, he was still the Emperor of Yin. No one even