Chapter 4

After listening, Shi Changyuan merely gave a cold snort and said nothing more.

Lin Ling keenly sensed that the other man seemed angry. Just as he wanted to say something else, the dream vanished and Shi Changyuan woke up.

For the first time, Lin Ling had been forcibly pulled out of a dream. Sitting on the beam, he could not understand it. Why had he suddenly gotten angry for no reason?

Mushroom was a very inquisitive mushroom. After observing and pondering for two days without reaching a conclusion, he decided to enter the dream again and talk to him.

When he saw Shi Changyuan lie down and was about to enter the dream, he suddenly heard faint noises.

He raised his head. The sounds came from above the beam, accompanied by tiles clattering and scraping together. Only then did he realize that the entire room was filled with sleeping gas.

Then the roof tiles were broken apart, revealing a masked human's eyes. They happened to meet Lin Ling's gaze on the beam, and Lin Ling jumped in fright.

"Assassin!!!"

Lin Ling had never encountered anything like this before. Terrified, he immediately started shrieking and fell straight off the beam.

The assassin reacted at once, sending a hidden weapon flying toward Lin Ling.

Clang—

The hidden weapon was blocked by a sword. A strong hand caught Lin Ling directly and swept him into an embrace.

So light. So soft.

That was Shi Changyuan's first impression.

As expected of a mushroom.

He had never imagined that the mushroom he had gone to such lengths to lure out had been hiding directly above his head.

"Your Majesty!!!"

The Imperial Guard surged in at once. They had clearly been prepared and had deliberately laid a trap. The assassin, too, had apparently not expected to be captured the moment he revealed himself.

Just as he tried to bite down on poison and kill himself, an Imperial Guard beside him swiftly dislocated his jaw.

"The one hundred and forty-third spy hiding by My side. Interrogate him."

"Yes!"

Watching the usually quiet Imperial Study suddenly fill with so many people, Lin Ling panicked and desperately tried to hide himself.

Shi Changyuan noticed Lin Ling's movements and immediately understood what he was thinking. He took the initiative to explain to the palace servants, eunuchs, and Imperial Guard kneeling all over the floor, none of whom dared raise their heads.

"This is My shadow guard."

"He has rendered meritorious service in protecting Me."

Lin Ling buried his head in Shi Changyuan's arms, his heart pounding as he considered whether to vanish on the spot. Then he suddenly heard Shi Changyuan's deliberately lowered voice by his ear.

"If I give you a human identity, no one will know you're a spirit creature."

"Except Me."

Chapter 4

A human identity...?

Lin Ling suddenly felt as if the door to a whole new world had opened.

He truly was a very easily fooled mushroom, and also easy to persuade, because humans' cunning and scheming were sometimes genuinely useful.

"If you tell them that, will they believe it?" Lin Ling seemed to think it was a good idea too. His eyes shifted as he cautiously asked.

"Believe it?" Shi Changyuan seemed to chuckle. "They have no choice but to."

The mushroom before him seemed to have no clear understanding of mortal emperors and rulers.

In fact, one did not even need to be an emperor. Anyone holding power could call a deer a horse and turn black into white.

Whether they believed it or not was no longer up to them. Whatever those in power said was the truth, and they could only believe it.

The Embroidered Uniform Guard soon escorted the spy away. The other palace servants and eunuchs also withdrew at Shi Changyuan's command. Only the chief eunuch Shunde remained, eyes lowered, standing to one side and doing his utmost to reduce his presence, acting as a pillar in the Imperial Study with neither eyes nor ears.

The pillar hid himself very successfully. Seeing that no one else remained, Lin Ling immediately broke free from Shi Changyuan's embrace. The two drew apart and looked each other over.

Lin Ling suddenly realized that Shi Changyuan outside the dream looked fiercer and more imposing than he did within it—the sort of person Lin Ling would detour around upon seeing.

It was a creature's instinct to seek advantage and avoid harm.

Although he had secretly observed Shi Changyuan from the beam before, viewing him from this human perspective while standing before him felt particularly different.

"...What exactly is different?" Lin Ling became so absorbed in thought that he murmured his inner thoughts aloud.

Hearing Lin Ling's muttering, Shi Changyuan lowered his gaze and looked deeply at him.

The youth before him seemed to be comparing the current Shi Changyuan with the one in the dream, trying to see where they differed. Yet the youth himself was almost no different from how he had been in the dream—exquisite brows and eyes, a beautiful face, and childish mannerisms...

Only everything was more real.

Without that illusory white glow from the dream, the youth before him did not resemble some wild mountain spirit creature at all. He looked more like the pampered youngest son of a powerful aristocratic family, bright-eyed and fine-toothed, full of youthful spirit—perhaps a little spoiled, but with no bad intentions.

Shi Changyuan shifted his gaze from Lin Ling's face and noticed that he wore only a white robe with golden patterns and a distinctly foreign style. His hair hung loose, his feet were bare, and a small braid was woven over his right shoulder.

"Shunde."

"This servant is here." The chief eunuch stepped forward two paces and prostrated himself behind Shi Changyuan.

"Prepare a set of clothes."

The chief eunuch said nothing more. After accepting the order, he went off to make preparations.

Watching Shunde leave, Lin Ling looked at the man's retreating figure, then at Shi Changyuan before him, and finally down at what he was wearing. His eyes immediately widened.

"Heavens." Lin Ling instantly panicked. "Have I been exposed?! What do I do?"

Mushroom's white robe was rather unusual in style and stood out completely from the other humans.

"No."

Shi Changyuan pressed a hand onto Mushroom's head. "Great Li is open in its customs. After unification, the people of every region retained their own clothing, so it is not strange."

"Only..." Shi Changyuan glanced again at Lin Ling's robe, hesitated, then spoke after stopping himself. "It would be best to keep a low profile."