"Laughing skyward, I walk out the gate; how could I be a man of mugwort and weeds?"
Watching Mu Shaoan leave in high spirits, Zhang Yang's originally bitter, helpless expression vanished at once. He sat down comfortably, feeling utterly refreshed. It was a lightness and pleasure beyond words.
"D-did I do something wrong?"
Qu Shang asked cautiously from the side. Although she prided herself on being clever, she seemed completely unable to see through these two cousins, who were sometimes mad, sometimes twitchy, and sometimes cunning and wicked.
Still, she knew which side to stand on.
"It's fine. Go back and rest. There probably won't be any trouble for the next thousand years."
Zhang Yang smiled faintly at Qu Shang, leaving her stunned. It wasn't because of this rare tenderness and thoughtfulness, but because Zhang Yang looked far too relaxed—as though he had finally set down a thousand-jin burden and countless debts, and could now frolic about eating, drinking, and having fun.
Wasn't he the one who had taken the loss?
Qu Shang was puzzled, but didn't ask further. She merely told him to rest as well before leaving.
Only then did Zhang Yang's gaze fall on the ancient bronze coffin. Yet he did not rush to open it. Instead, he summoned the Stellar Imprint and looked at the numbers that had become 12:12:12:12:12:12, then once again burst into delighted laughter.
Yes, that was right. After the Stellar Imprint had been split in half, owing to his achievement of guiding a new Apprentice Time Guardian, all the numbers he had previously consumed had been reset to zero.
He didn't care about the changes in the rules behind this. He only knew that because the numbers had reset, the reward he would receive for completing this Time Guardian mission was pure