Above the ruins, the night wind wailed.
King Song's figure slowly emerged from the billowing dust, the hem of his bright yellow robe dragging a faint trail through the broken stones.
He walked slowly, every step carrying an unquestionable composure, as though beneath his feet lay not ruins freshly overturned, but the pebble-paved path in the rear garden of his Prince's Mansion.
Moonlight fell across his face, illuminating those gentle eyes, unchanged as ever, as though the fierce battle that had nearly shaken all of Zhongzhou City had been nothing more than an insignificant farce in his eyes.
Zhang Chu hovered in midair, looking down at the approaching figure.
His breathing had yet to settle completely, and the rise and fall of his chest was somewhat greater than usual.
Although Steward Gu's palm strike had ultimately been pierced through by the third form of Godslayer, the backlash accumulated over seventeen hundred years had still left faint traces throughout Zhang Chu's meridians.
The golden radiance of the Southern Bright Undying Heavenly Art was slowly repairing them. It was not slow, but neither was it especially fast.
Yet his expression remained calm.
So calm that it was as though he were watching a play whose ending he had known all along.
King Song stopped roughly two hundred feet away from him.
He raised his head, his gaze passing through the lingering dark crimson and dark gold motes of light before settling upon Zhang Chu.
Within those gentle eyes was a faint appreciation, so faint it was nearly imperceptible.
"This Prince read your dossier while I was in my fief," King Song said. His voice was neither too loud nor too soft, exactly the same as it had been in the Academy Great Hall.
"At the time, This Prince thought that if a