Tearing Off the Mask

Several Chen later, it was already midnight.

Li Qi sat atop a tall tower in Chang'an, looking up at the sky.

This was the tallest building in Chang'an, located in the Upper Garden. It was where the high-ranking Flower Gods normally entertained guests, but as a fourth-rank, Li Qi naturally counted as an honored guest here as well.

Different Flower Gods worked in this tower every night, so different people gathered here every day. It was a place of revelry and sensual pleasures in Chang'an.

Tonight's Flower God was Iron Begonia. Perhaps it was coincidence, but Li Qi actually knew this Flower God.

She had once been the enemy of the Trumpet Flower God, yet... at the last moment, she had given the Trumpet Flower God a helping hand and helped her leave the Upper Garden.

However, Li Qi did not go listen to Iron Begonia's performance below. He merely sat with Qiu Zhi in a small corner of the rooftop, overlooking the Upper Garden beneath them.

Chang'an at night was exceptionally prosperous, and the Upper Garden was prosperity within prosperity. Beneath the high towers lay formations of flowers and pools of wine, mountains of incense and seas of medicine, swallow halls and singing pavilions—too numerous to recount in detail.

Besides the pavilions, there were also variety-show boats, pleasure craft, and painted barges. Gongs and drums rang everywhere, music played, dancers waved banners, gold and jade reflected one another. Below, brocade stones wound along the paths, precious masonry lined the ponds, willows locked around rainbow bridges, and flowers curled around phoenix boats. Pedestrians passed everywhere, full of vigor, laughing and playing.

Yet unlike the merriment filling the Upper Garden, Li Qi's side remained silent.

Some time had passed since the dining hall at the Imperial Academy.

Qiu Zhi seemed to