Jiang Shang was consequently promoted to Grand Master and formally appointed to oversee the Imperial Astronomical Bureau, serving at court as needed. Daji reached out for the pipa and placed it atop the Star-Picking Tower, where it absorbed the pure energy of Heaven and Earth day and night, swallowing the essences of the sun and moon. Five years passed. The pipa re-formed a human body, its spiritual embryo awakened once more, and it ultimately became the root of disaster that would overthrow the Cheng Tang dynasty.
The Marquis of the West's mother, Tai Jiang, had silver hair as white as snow, yet her eyes were clear and bright, like moonlight reflected in a deep pool, without the slightest trace of cloudiness. Three feet above her head, a green lotus slowly bloomed in the empty air, its petals spreading as radiance gathered within. It was a Wisdom Lotus formed from an enlightened and lucid heart, beyond the sight of ordinary mortal eyes.
At that moment, she stood before the divine urn in the ancestral temple, burning incense. Statues stood in rows along the walls: the Three Sovereigns solemn and dignified, the Five Emperors majestic, Nuwa compassionate, and Kong Xuan imposing. Only the position of the Saint Father was mottled with shifting light and shadow, its features impossible to make out, as though it had been silently concealed by an invisible haze.
Tai Jiang bent down and kowtowed, incense smoke rising in curling wisps. Then she took three ancient coins from the incense altar. Their copper was dark and dull, their patterns vigorous and archaic. Before the coins had even left her hand, the statue of Fuxi suddenly glimmered. A warm, gentle power quietly flowed into the coins and instantly coursed through Tai Jiang's blood vessels. Her Mortal Body borrowed the Saint's