Su Chen lowered his gaze.
His eyes neatly avoided that flush of crimson, as well as Bibi Dong's hands, withdrawn into her sleeves, their fingertips faintly white.
He said nothing and let nothing show.
Turning, he walked to the tea table and pulled out a wooden stool. Its legs scraped against the floor tiles with a piercing creak.
He sat down.
Bracing the food container, he took out the dishes one by one and set them on the table.
He picked up the wooden chopsticks, his movements so steady he hardly seemed like a prisoner who had just returned from the gates of hell.
The chopsticks lifted a roughly cut piece of fish and carried it to his mouth.
Bibi Dong stood frozen.
She watched Su Chen, but unlike usual, her feet did not instinctively turn toward the door.
Her boot shifted slightly. She walked to a row of bookshelves that had not yet collapsed and pulled out a high-backed wooden chair.
Turning, she smoothed her moon-white skirt and sat down.
Her back was ramrod straight, her chin slightly raised. Her gaze passed over Su Chen's head and settled on several newly nailed boards across the window lattice.
She struck an inspecting pose.
But her hands, crossed in front of her abdomen with the backs pressed together, were held tightly in place, betraying a trace of tension that was difficult to notice.
The sound of chewing was very soft.
Su Chen did not burst into tears like he had last time, nor did he swear his loyalty again.
He simply ate.
He lifted his bowl, picked up food, shoveled in rice. His Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed.
Each time his chopsticks touched the bowl, they made a crisp, light sound, like a steady beat meant to put the heart at ease.
There was something plain and grounded in it, the simple way ordinary folk treated their food.
Bibi Dong's gaze was fixed on the crack in the window, but the corner of her eye remained locked on Su Chen's hand around his chopsticks and the movement of his throat as he swallowed.
This guy... isn't afraid of me?
She had been the pope for forty years. For forty years, every living thing that faced her could only tremble, kneel, and obey.
That instinctive reverence for power, carved into one's bones, was being chipped away and undone, bit by bit, by Su Chen's steady rhythm as he ate.
She had meant to leave as soon as he took his first bite, but the focused sounds of his chewing pinned her firmly to her chair.
Her legs felt nailed to the spot.
Outside the Library Pavilion, the night wind swept through the covered walkway.
Angela leaned against the cold stone wall. The red lining beneath her uniform was soaked through with cold sweat, clinging damply to her back.
By the rules, the pope's inspections and any matters she handled were not supposed to take more than a quarter of an hour.
But half an hour had already passed!
Behind the broken door, nailed over with boards, it was as quiet as a grave.
There was no oppressive Rakshasa Soul Power, no killing intent, nothing at all.
Angela clapped a hand over her mouth, forcing every ragged breath back down her throat.
Beside her, the sixteen Temple Knights stood perfectly still, but the knuckles of the hands gripping their swords had turned deathly pale from the strain.
No one dared move.
Even fewer dared discuss this act of "staying the night," which was enough to overturn the entire Spirit Hall's understanding of power.
An hour later.
The rice in the food container was gone.
Su Chen raised his bowl and drained the last of the fish soup, letting out a satisfied sigh.
He set down his chopsticks, laid them across the rim of the bowl, stacked the three empty plates, and put them back in the container. Then he shut the wooden lid.
"Thud."
After the muffled sound, Su Chen stood up.
He made no effort to break the strange silence with small talk. Instead, he turned and walked toward the pile of ruined bookshelves.
Bending down, he pulled a battered copy of Chronicles of the Continent from between the wreckage.
He brushed the wood shavings from its cover, returned to the bamboo recliner, and sat down.
He pulled the thin blanket over his lap, covering his waist, then leaned back until his whole back sank into the chair.
By the moonlight, he opened the yellowed first page.
"Rustle—"
The dry whisper of turning pages strangely eased all the tension and wariness in the enclosed space.
Bibi Dong sat hidden in the shadows.
The moonlight outlined Su Chen's pale, calm profile.
Leaning against the back of her chair, she drifted into a daze for a brief moment.
On countless nights before, whenever she sat down, there had been either schemes lurking around her or absolute reverence.
She had never spent so long beside another living person without feeling her nerves pricked raw.
Tonight, that damned system in her mind was pitch-black.
There was no blood-red countdown, no warning of punishment.
She let the weight of her body sink little by little into the wooden chair beneath her, feeling the wariness slowly ebb from every limb.
Deep in her heart, she even felt a secret longing—one she herself found shameful.
A longing for this... stillness, free of schemes and oppression.
The air was so quiet that it seemed even a falling needle would be heard.
Su Chen's fingers rested at the edge of the page.
"Rustle."
Another page turned.
His gaze never left the ancient book. His voice seemed to mingle with the wind, so faint it was almost inaudible.
"Your Holiness, did you also grow up in Spirit Hall when you were little?"
Those thirteen characters struck Bibi Dong's eardrums like an ice-tempered needle.
Her shoulders jerked inward. Her back shot away from the chair with a swish, rigid as a straight line.
Her pupils shrank to pinpoints!
The dark underground chamber, the cold stone floor, the murderous training sessions where she could never meet their demands, and Qian Xunji's cold, appraising eyes...
Countless shards of memory exploded, dragging her back to that hell in an instant!
Her hands clenched inside her sleeves. Her fingernails dug into the scabs of her freshly healed cuts, reopening them as pain flared.
A wisp of dangerously potent, purplish-black Rakshasa aura sprang from her hairline!
The temperature around them plunged. Killing intent surged to its peak!
Yet Su Chen did not even lift his head.
He remained reclined, his gaze fixed on the yellowed page. He did not even move his chin.
No prying, no pressing questions, no looking at her in the midst of her loss of control.
That attitude of "you don't have to answer" was like a punch landing on cotton, instantly blocking every avenue of retaliation Bibi Dong had.
The frenzy she had gathered, powerful enough to destroy everything, lost its target and hung suspended in midair.
A few seconds later.
Bibi Dong watched Su Chen's even breathing. The tension in her shoulder blades softened, inch by inch.
The Rakshasa Soul Power spilling from her receded into her meridians like the tide.
A long half-stick of incense passed.
Bibi Dong looked at Su Chen's profile. Her lips moved, and her voice came out dry as sandpaper scraping.
"...Yes."
Su Chen gave a slight nod.
His fingers, resting on the page, paused for half a second.
Then he turned the page.
His gaze moved to the new passage. He asked nothing more.
And just like that, the topic ended.
Bibi Dong's chest rose and fell sharply once. Then her body relaxed completely, slumping back into the chair.
Her gaze swept over the broken doorframe and the wind leaking through the walls.
An absurd thought took shape in her mind, yet felt utterly real.
This ramshackle room, ready to collapse at any moment...
Somehow felt safer and more comfortable than the Pope Palace, that symbol of supreme power.
More like a place where a... "person" belonged.
The night deepened.
The two of them remained as they were, one sitting and one reading, neither disturbing the other.
Deep within Su Chen's mind, two notifications quietly appeared before him.
The Eye of Omniscience activated without a sound, and a pale blue Light Screen lit up.
A line of golden-red text sprang imperiously to the center of the screen:
[Binder 002 · Qian Renxue. Has completely departed Heaven Dou Imperial City. Moving at extremely high speed. Estimated to reach the Spirit City coordinates in three days.]
A ring of hidden crimson ripples spread across the lower-left corner of the screen.
Cold text flashed in turn:
[Detected, at an extremely distant location, in the direction of the Blue Lightning Tyrant Dragon Clan. Liu Erlong's Martial Soul has experienced its first resonance with a kindred source.]
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