Chapter Summaries

Disguised as Wang Jinyu, Lin Su told Duan Shangao that the emperor had secretly invited Great Corner to invade and ordered Zhou Ze to abandon Helan City, testing whether Duan was truly upright or the emperor’s hidden agent. Lin Su then told Yuan Ji his plan to kill Wang Jinyu was also a test of Duan Shangao, and they waited to see what would happen.

• Lin Su overheard officials celebrating his reassignment and heard Li Zhiyuan and Zhang Lao Er worry that Li San would be targeted after Lin Su left.
• Disguised as Wang Jinyu, Lin Su visited Duan Shangao and claimed Ding Jiye had revealed that the emperor arranged Great Corner’s invasion and ordered Zhou Ze to abandon Helan City.
• Duan Shangao reacted gravely and told Lin Su to keep the revelation secret while he considered what to do.
• Lin Su returned to Yingbin Restaurant, where Yuan Ji asked about his plan to arrange Wang Jinyu’s death.
• Lin Su explained that the plan would either remove Wang Jinyu or expose Duan Shangao, whom he suspected might secretly serve the emperor.

Lin Su had Wang Jinyu arrested by using forbidden information as an excuse, then promised Yuan Ji that Lei Zheng could be brought down within half a year. After Deng Qiushan and Qi Bei visited and revealed Lin Su’s celebrated identities to Yuan Ji, she left to await confirmation of Wang Jinyu’s death before honoring her promise to become his little wife for a month.

• Lin Su explained that Wang Jinyu’s arrest was a pretext to silence him and predicted he would die in the Heavenly Prison, while telling Yuan Ji he would avenge her against Lei Zheng within half a year.
• Deng Qiushan and Qi Bei visited Lin Su, declared their support, and accepted his offer to share study materials with Qu Zhe.
• Yuan Ji overheard that Lin Su was the First Grandmaster of Azure Lotus and the Great Cang Top Scholar, then confronted him about concealing his fame.
• Lin Su and Yuan Ji spent the afternoon together, but Yuan Ji refused his advances until Wang Jinyu’s death was confirmed.
• Yuan Ji flew away to watch for news from the Heavenly Prison and said she would honor her month-long promise if Wang Jinyu died.

Lin Su left the capital for his new post as Nanshan Prefect, where Prince Luyang controlled the region’s vital water supply and held power over its people. After arriving, Lin Su found the prefectural yamen nearly empty, revealing how little the local officials respected his authority.

• Lin Su reassured his friends at West Mountain Villa and sang “Moonlit Night” before leaving the capital the next day.
• Lin Su took Li San with him, met Yuan Ji aboard the ship, and studied Bi Xuanji’s intelligence on Nanshan Prefecture.
• Cao Fang received Lin Su in Central Province, then warned Lei Zheng that Lin Su had arrived and discussed the possibility of killing him.
• Lin Su reached Nanshan Prefecture and learned that Prince Luyang controlled Long Lake and the water supply serving eight million people.
• Lin Su entered the Nanshan Prefectural Yamen, where only a few gatekeepers were waiting until he showed his Official Seal.

Lin Su took office as Prefect of Nanshan and ordered officials to gather, intending to use their response to begin purging an administration dominated by Prince Luyang. Most officials ignored the order to attend a concubine-taking banquet, leaving Lin Su to face an almost empty hall as Li Yueran asked him to wait longer.

• He Xingong and a small group of officials welcomed Lin Su, while Wei Qun explained that many senior officials had gone to Prince Luyang's Mansion for a banquet.
• Lin Su ordered all officials of Seventh Rank and above and every county magistrate to assemble at the Prefectural Yamen within half an hour.
• Lin Su told Yuan Ji that he intended to purge the South Mountain officialdom and wanted the officials to defy his order.
• At Prince Luyang's banquet, Mao Pi composed a Golden Light Poem praising the Prince and received the Great Jiang Brush as a reward.
• Du Tiangao told the Nanshan officials to stay at the banquet, and the half-hour deadline passed with only eighteen of sixty-one officials present.
• Li Yueran arrived late and asked Lin Su to give the banquet guests more time to attend.

Lin Su punished Nanshan Prefecture officials for skipping his welcome and disobeying his orders to attend their duties, stripping dozens of them of their posts. When Chief Constable Li Xinwei refused to carry out Lin Su’s order to beat Du Tiangao, Lin Su took up the punishment staff himself.

• Lin Su reassigned Li Yueran from the Postmaster Office to a low-ranking Executive post in the Rites Office for defending officials who attended Prince Luyang’s concubine banquet during working hours.
• The Nanshan officials ignored Lin Su’s repeated orders and returned from Prince Luyang’s banquet after nightfall, led by Du Tiangao.
• Lin Su declared that forty-six officials, including Du Tiangao and seven county magistrates, had violated the Officials Regulations and reassigned them all as Executives in the Rites Office.
• When the officials pleaded for leniency, Lin Su ordered them to report to the Rites Office and sentenced Du Tiangao to thirty strokes for insulting his superior.
• Chief Constable Li Xinwei refused to carry out the punishment, so Lin Su took a staff and prepared to do it himself.

Lin Su crippled Du Tiangao, demoted Li Xinwei, and barred the officials he had purged from returning to office while he remained in Nanshan. Cao Fang and Prince Luyang considered how to counter him, and the Prince ordered the Yanghu Waterway closed; the chapter ended with Lin Su waking in the Prefectural Manor as Yuan Ji brought him rinsing water.

• Lin Su struck Du Tiangao with his staff, then demoted Li Xinwei to the Dispatch Office after Li had refused to carry out his order.
• Lin Su warned the assembled officials that they could not return to their former posts while he remained in Nanshan, then adjourned the meeting.
• Cao Fang learned that Lin Su had removed forty-eight officials and admitted he could not move against him without disrupting the Prime Minister's plan.
• Cao Fang's adviser suggested Prince Luyang act against Lin Su, and the Prince ordered the Yanghu Waterway closed to pressure Nanshan Prefecture.
• Lin Su woke in the Prefectural Manor, where Yuan Ji brought him rinsing water.

Lin Su refused to negotiate with Prince Luyang after the prince cut off the Yanghu Waterway, and instead set out with He Xingong to find former prefect Cao Li. The two reached Mount Lu, where Lin Su identified the blocked waterway gap and the powerful Cultivator guarding it, as the crisis in Nanshan Prefecture worsened.

• Lin Su told He Xingong that he wanted to visit Cao Li in Qingtian, where the former prefect was struggling to keep his school running.
• An official reported that the Luhu Waterway had run dry, and He Xingong recognized that Prince Luyang had cut off Nanshan Prefecture's water.
• Lin Su declined He Xingong's suggestion to appeal to Prince Luyang and ordered him to accompany him to Qingtian, while unrest and rumors spread across Nanshan.
• Lin Su and He Xingong traveled to Mount Lu and saw a Heavenly Phenomenon Manifestation Cultivator guarding the blocked gap in the Yanghu Waterway.
• Lin Su identified the waterway gap as Prince Luyang's handiwork, and He Xingong began explaining how it had been made twenty years earlier.

Lin Su traced Prince Luyang’s exploitation of Nanshan Prefecture to the imperial favors that protected him, then visited retired former Prefectural Governor Cao Li. Lin Su told Cao Li he had dismissed the corrupt officials and asked him to return as an adviser, leaving Cao Li to consider the offer.

• Lin Su concluded that Prince Luyang’s control of Lake Yang depended on Current Majesty’s tacit support for the prince’s past help in securing the throne.
• Lin Su and He Xingong traveled to Qingtian County and met Cao Li’s wife and daughter at his home.
• Lin Su asked Cao Li to return to public service, but Cao Li initially refused, unwilling to undo the reputation he had gained by retiring.
• Lin Su told Cao Li that Nanshan’s upheaval had begun and that he had dismissed Du Tiangao, forty-eight officials, and the magistrates of all seven counties.
• Cao Li asked what Lin Su wanted him to do, and Lin Su invited him to return as an adviser and guide him through the prefecture’s troubles.

Lin Su recruited Cao Li and He Xingong to help fill Nanshan Prefecture’s vacant offices with provisional appointees, then returned to find a crowd protesting outside the yamen over Prince Luyang’s water cutoff. As dismissed officials organized the unrest, Li Chaoyun warned them that Lin Su might not care about his reputation and could be protected by a mission from the court.

• Lin Su explained that he could use provisional appointments to fill vacant posts, and Cao Li and He Xingong agreed to help recruit candidates.
• Lin Su and He Xingong selected forty-eight officials and thirty-six backups, while Cao Li agreed to join Lin Su as an advisor.
• Lin Su returned to the Prefectural Yamen to find a growing crowd demanding that he plead for the people, and he appointed Constable Sun Lie as Chief Constable of South Mountain.
• Li Jiang and other officials dismissed by Lin Su coordinated the protest, hoping public pressure would force him out of Nanshan.
• Li Chaoyun warned the officials that Lin Su did not care about reputation or promotion, and suggested that the court might still need and protect him.

Lin Su appointed forty-eight officials to fill the vacancies left by his purge and urged them to transform Nanshan Prefecture for its people. He gave them authority to remove anyone who resisted, setting the stage for sweeping upheaval across the prefecture.

• Lin Su told the forty-eight officials that their Provisional Appointments came from He Xingong and former prefect Cao Li, and urged them to improve life for Nanshan’s people.
• The officials shared reports of prosperity in Haining Riverbank, Yishui North Bank, and Beichuan County, strengthening their belief in Lin Su’s ability to transform Nanshan.
• Lin Su appointed magistrates for the seven counties and assigned officials to the Four Departments and Eight Offices, then named Sun Lie Chief Constable.
• Lin Su appointed Cao Li adviser of Nanshan Prefecture, with Cao Li handling internal matters in Lin Su’s absence and He Xingong handling external matters.
• After Sun Lie asked how to deal with disobedient subordinates, Lin Su authorized the new officials to remove or replace them without reporting to him.
• The forty-eight officials pledged their loyalty and left to take up their posts across Nanshan.

Lin Su explained to Yuan Ji that he had allowed the unrest around the Prefectural Yamen to gather so he could expose the officials directing it. He revealed the village elders’ sponsors before the crowd and ordered the conspirators arrested, leaving South Mountain in upheaval.

• Lin Su told Yuan Ji that his literary standing and unfinished mission protected him from dismissal, and said he suspected the court wanted him to eliminate Prince Luyang.
• Lin Su explained that he planned to let the instigators gather before casting his net the next morning.
• A hundred village elders and thousands of people confronted Lin Su over the Luhu Waterway, and he announced that he would neither beg Prince Luyang for water nor pay for it.
• Lin Su used Literary Way Cleansing of the Heart to expose the dismissed officials and others who had bribed the village elders to incite the crowd.
• Lin Su cited Great Cang Law and ordered Sun Lie to arrest everyone on the list, while the Official Seal suppressed Literary Way Power throughout the city.

Lin Su crushed a gathering of officials who had plotted against him and stood firm against former Assistant Minister Li Chaoyun, while the waterway standoff with Prince Luyang left Nanshan facing a worsening crisis. As landlords began to fear the loss of their farmland, Lin Su secretly sent Li San on an unexplained task, and a Village Girl entered South Mountain City.

• Lin Su had more than eighty people dragged before him and exposed the legal case that would end the careers of forty-eight officials who had plotted against him.
• Former Assistant Minister Li Chaoyun challenged Lin Su, but Lin Su dismissed his former rank, picked apart his argument, and ordered Constable Sun to arrest anyone who remained outside the yamen.
• Lin Su secretly gave Li San an assignment, then teased Yuan Ji about the plan; Yuan Ji agreed to kiss him but did not learn what Li San was doing.
• A Village Girl entered South Mountain City as thousands of people left, confused and angry after their clan elders had misled them.
• Prince Luyang kept the Luhu Waterway shut and diverted its water through a wasteland to his Water Pavilion Mountain Villa, leaving Nanshan's people without water.
• After the crisis sent landlords into panic, Chen Jiahe learned that others were selling their farmland and feared that Nanshan could no longer sustain its residents.

Lin Su revealed that he had secretly bought more than eight hundred thousand mu of land to break Nanshan Prefecture’s land annexation, then went to confront Prince Luyang over the Yanghu Waterway. On the way, he met a Village Girl named Yao Gu, who had recently bought a riverside plot.

• A wealthy buyer frightened Chen Jiahe and other landlords into selling their properties, and the purchase prices fell across Nanshan Prefecture.
• He Xingong reported that crops had withered and landlords were dumping their land, while Lin Su explained that his attendant Li San had bought more than eight hundred thousand mu to break land annexation.
• Lin Su told He Xingong to prepare the officials and constables to visit Prince Luyang’s Mansion that afternoon and resolve the Yanghu Waterway.
• Lin Su and Yuan Ji discussed Prince Luyang’s motives as they walked beside a vegetable plot near the river.
• Lin Su approached the Village Girl tending the plot, and she introduced herself as Yao Gu, a newcomer who had bought the thatched hut’s land.

Lin Su led South Mountain officials to Prince Luyang's Mansion as the Yanghu Waterway crisis continued, but he refused to negotiate after the Fourth Prince barred their entry. He ordered the mansion's illegally built fences and structures destroyed, and the chapter ended as ten powerful opponents appeared to confront them.

• Lin Su left South Mountain City with He Xingong, Cao Li, Yuan Ji, and other officials to visit Prince Luyang's Mansion.
• The Fourth Prince refused to receive the officials and ordered them to leave, citing his father's instructions against anyone from South Mountain, especially Lin Su.
• Lin Su had Wang Huai Shui identify the fief boundary, then ordered Sun Lie and the constables to tear down the mansion's fences and buildings beyond it.
• When two Peeking Human Realm martial wanderers attacked Lin Su, Yuan Ji blocked them with her umbrella and destroyed their martial paths on Lin Su's order.
• The Fourth Prince called for help, and ten powerful figures emerged from the eastern side of the mansion, leaving Yuan Ji facing a force she could not see how to overcome.

Lin Su punished the Fourth Prince and ordered Prince Luyang’s occupied garden demolished, insisting that his actions followed the law. He then challenged the prince’s cultivators to a wager in which he would fight using martial arts and the Cultivation Way, giving Prince Luyang an opportunity he eagerly welcomed.

• Lin Su subdued the Fourth Prince after he ordered his men to kill the officials, then spared his life and had Sun Lie cane him thirty times.
• Lin Su ordered the constables to tear down the part of the garden Prince Luyang had occupied, and Prince Luyang warned that Lin Su would face consequences.
• Lin Su defended his actions as lawful and told Prince Luyang that he looked down on the cultivators in the manor.
• Lin Su proposed a wager: he would fight every cultivator in the manor without using Literary Way Power or the Official Seal, and Prince Luyang would win if anyone defeated him.
• Prince Luyang accepted the prospect of the contest as a chance to kill Lin Su, while Yuan Ji realized that Lin Su was the Lingyun First Seat of the Cultivation Way.

Lin Su wagered the Yanghu Waterway against the Lin Family’s perfume and wine formulas, then fought Prince Luyang’s cultivators after the contract was signed. He killed Qi Yuanqing with a decisive sword strike, leaving Prince Luyang and the witnesses stunned.

• Lin Su offered Prince Luyang the Lin Family’s perfume and wine formulas in exchange for ownership of the Yanghu Waterway, and they signed a contract witnessed by the Literary Way.
• Prince Luyang threatened to destroy the Lin Family after Lin Su’s death, and Lin Su replied that he would feel no guilt about killing the Prince.
• Lin Su killed ten cultivators in two breaths, prompting Qi Yuanqing to appear and threaten both Lin Su and Yuan Ji.
• Lin Su revealed that Qi Yuanqing had made his must-kill list by blocking the Yanghu Waterway, then split Qi Yuanqing’s Heavenly Phenomenon Dharma Palm with his sword.
• Qi Yuanqing manifested his three-hundred-zhang Dharma Body, but Lin Su’s full-strength Heavenly Sword Stance split it apart and annihilated his Primordial Spirit.

Lin Su defeated Prince Luyang in their wager, slaughtered the mansion’s Cultivators, claimed the Yanghu Waterway, and opened the dam to end Nanshan’s flood. As the news stirred the court and the princes, Yuan Ji asked Lin Su whether his actions had been crude or calculated, and he invited her to explain her judgment.

• Lin Su cleaved Prince Luyang’s Heavenly Phenomenon Manifestation and stormed the Prince’s Mansion, killing its Cultivators until the Prince conceded the Yanghu Waterway wager.
• Lin Su warned that anyone who interfered with the waterway would face Nanshan’s justice, then opened the dam with his sword and sent water rushing downstream.
• The people of Nanshan celebrated the end of the flood, while Li San escaped after buying and reselling farmland ahead of the water’s return.
• Cao Fang and the capital were shocked by Lin Su’s victory; Qiu Zixiu told the Crown Prince that Lin Su’s actions were protected by law and his contract.
• The Third Prince laughed at Prince Luyang’s defeat, while Du Qing hoped the Crown Prince would retaliate against Lin Su and ignite a larger conflict.
• Yuan Ji asked Lin Su whether his actions had been crude or brilliantly calculated, and Lin Su invited her to share her reasoning.

After Lin Su revealed that his wager had let him lawfully eliminate Prince Luyang's cultivation experts, Yuan Ji's agreed month together ended and she left after he sang only two lines to her. Lin Su then met Yao Gu, who accepted his offer to help with her field, while the unfinished song lingered in her thoughts.

• Yuan Ji recognized that Lin Su had used the wager both to claim the Yanghu Waterway and kill more than five hundred cultivation experts in Prince Luyang's Mansion, exposing his Lingyun First Seat identity.
• Yuan Ji reminded Lin Su that their one-month agreement had expired and insisted they would be strangers again.
• Lin Su tried to persuade Yuan Ji to stay with perfume, wine, and a song, but she left after he sang two lines and promised to finish it when they met again.
• Yao Gu heard Lin Su's song from her cottage and wondered whether its strange beauty belonged to the literary or musical path.
• Lin Su encountered Yao Gu beside her vegetable garden and offered to help her dig; she accepted, so he joined her in the field.

Lin Su returned to the Prefectural Yamen after tasting Yao Gu’s extraordinary tea and laid out plans for South Mountain’s future. The next day, he began riverbank renovations and land-rent reforms, leaving officials and landlords stunned.

• Lin Su tasted Yao Gu’s tea, asked whether she sold it, and returned to the Prefectural Manor after she invited him to visit for more.
• Lin Su told South Mountain’s officials that the Yang River’s banks needed reinforcement and declared that cement would be used to complete the work within a month.
• Lin Su arranged for the Lin Family to supply cement and offered one year of tax relief to workers, prompting crowds to sign up for the riverbank project.
• Boss Li announced that he would lease his 930,000 mu of land to farmers for ten percent rent, alarming local landlords and revealing to He Xingong and Wei Qun that Li San was Lin Su’s attendant in disguise.

Lin Su’s policies set Nanshan Prefecture’s residents and officials scrambling to take part in the land rental, flower-growing, and riverbank reconstruction projects while Sister Chen helped organize the work. After leaving the prefecture’s affairs to his aides and Sister Chen, Lin Su visited the Demon Race Store, where the shopkeeper explained that his Young Lady had sent Myriad Spirit Dew to apologize for using Lin Su’s poem.

• Lin Su’s advance deposits and tax-exempt labor policy prompted residents to sign agreements and county magistrates to compete for workers and land-rental opportunities.
• The Demon Race Store provided flower seeds and Myriad Spirit Dew that the shopkeeper said Prefect Yang had arranged in advance.
• Sister Chen joined Lin Su in Nanshan and took charge of organizing labor, land agreements, and flower purchases while Lin Su toured Dongting Lake with her.
• Lin Su left prefectural duties to He Xingong, Cao Li, Sister Chen, and the county officials, then changed into a Scholar’s Robe and went out in South Mountain City.
• At the Demon Race Store, Lin Su asked why the shopkeeper had given away so much Myriad Spirit Dew, and the shopkeeper said his Young Lady had sent it as an apology for using Lin Su’s poem on a set of wine cups.