Chapter Summaries

The Setting Sun Courtyard received invitations from Luoyang’s factions and agreed to attend a gathering at the Golden Wave Pavilion, where more than three hundred martial artists assembled to negotiate a truce. At noon, the scattered members of the Courtyard entered the tense gathering, leaving the confrontation about to begin.

• Thirteenth Son read an invitation from Beggar Gang headman Gao Tai, and representatives of the White Camel Temple, Ziyang School, and Mount Song Academy arrived with further invitations.
• Wei Xun returned exhausted from searching for the missing Donkey-Riding Lady, took the invitations, and said the Courtyard would attend despite being outnumbered.
• On the twenty-second day of the eighth month, Luoyang’s factions and religious schools gathered at the Golden Wave Pavilion, where they found a blood-red lynx drawn over a treasured poem.
• The gathered leaders discussed the Courtyard’s killings, the missing Donkey-Riding Lady, and the rumored divine artifact left by Chen Shigu while tension mounted.
• At noon, members of the Setting Sun Courtyard arrived separately and took scattered seats among the assembled factions.

The Setting Sun Courtyard’s four members defended their search for the missing Donkey-Riding Lady against the assembled Luoyang martial leaders, who accused them of disrupting the city and seeking power. After Tuoba Sanniang humiliated Yin Shu in a brief confrontation, a ragged young beggar arrived and was greeted as someone important by the four.

• Huijue asked the Setting Sun Courtyard to stop its bloody search and offered the White Camel Temple’s help, but Tuoba Sanniang and Xu Baozhen challenged the other leaders’ motives and hypocrisy.
• Qiu Ren criticized the righteous sects for failing to investigate the City Procession’s disappearances, while Wei Xiangrong accused the Setting Sun Courtyard of using the missing woman as a pretext for attacks.
• Yin Shu tried to provoke a fight, then hurled steel darts at Tuoba Sanniang; she evaded them behind Luo Toutuo, whose body stopped the darts without injury.
• Tuoba Sanniang used two throwing knives to make Yin Shu dodge, then cut down an oil lamp with a third and scalded him with its hot oil.
• A ragged young beggar entered the hall and sat among the honored guests, and Xu Baozhen, Tuoba Sanniang, Qiu Ren, and Luo Toutuo rose to greet him.

Wei Xun confronted Luoyang’s faction leaders with stolen treasures and incriminating evidence while searching for Baozhu. After humiliating several leaders, he revealed Chen Shigu’s ornate Lacquer Box, drawing every gaze in the Golden Wave Pavilion.

• Wei Xun presented the White Camel Temple elders with the Palm-Leaf Sutra, which he had taken from a statue in their Chan Martial Courtyard.
• Wei Xun warned Master Ziyang that Xu Two would visit Mount Laojun, then exposed Wei Xiangrong’s poisoning plot against Zhou Shuying and prompted Zhou Zian to take his daughter and her child home.
• Wei Xun revealed that he had stolen Gao Tai’s Blackwood Signal Staff, cut it shorter, and returned a piece to the Beggar Gang chief.
• Wei Xun said he had searched Luoyang’s major factions for the Donkey-Riding Lady and brought out Chen Shigu’s Lacquer Box, making the assembled leaders focus on it.

Wei Xun used Chen Shigu’s relic to enlist Luoyang’s heroes in the search for the kidnapped Donkey-Riding Lady, then continued searching despite his worsening illness. A fortune-teller suggested Baozhu was imprisoned but had not given up, giving Wei Xun resolve to keep looking.

• Wei Xun displayed Chen Shigu’s lacquer box and promised it to anyone who found the Donkey-Riding Lady or provided a useful lead.
• Elder Huijue warned Wei Xun against becoming trapped by attachment, but Wei Xun vowed to search heaven and earth to bring her back.
• Qiu Ren visited Rongqing Pharmacy, took Xu Shan’s shangdang ginseng, and left without promising to prepare the Great Bliss Powder soon.
• Wei Xun collapsed in the street and vomited black blood, but continued searching for the child who sold peaches.
• Wei Xun asked the diviner Qian Zhiwei to read the character “cage”; Qian said Baozhu was in danger but had not yielded.
• Wei Xun walked away in tears, telling himself that because Baozhu had not given up, he would not give up either.

Baozhu served guests at the banquet while learning that dirty ice might explain the illness that preceded her apparent death, raising doubts about whether she had been poisoned. As she was led out of the hall, she recognized the pattern on the master’s hidden lamp stands, but the doors closed before she could see them again.

• Baozhu swallowed her anger at being made a serving maid and followed Mi Moyan to the kitchens to carry food and drinks.
• After a cook berated Baozhu for placing fruit directly on dirty ice, Mi Moyan explained the danger, and Baozhu recalled the chilled food she had eaten before her death.
• Baozhu and the other dancers served the guests in Auspicious Cloud Hall, where the master’s honored seat remained empty behind a gauze curtain.
• A guest summoned Mi Moyan to stay and attend him, and Mi Moyan reassured Baozhu before she left with the other dancers.
• A breeze lifted the pavilion curtain, and Baozhu recognized the distinctive pattern on the gilded lamp stands before the hall doors closed.

Baozhu learned the full cost of Mi Moyan’s captivity and tried to protect him while preparing for the Golden Osmanthus Banquet. At the banquet’s summons, she discovered the mansion’s master was Li Yu, Prince of Qi, and answered his question under the name Dan Niao, courtesy name Dragon Maiden.

• Baozhu waited for Mi Moyan to return from serving wine and saw that he was injured and humiliated.
• Mi Moyan told Baozhu how his eldest sister, Yao Jiangzhen, had discovered his captivity and failed to secure his release, leaving him convinced he could never return home.
• Baozhu promised to find Mi Moyan a safe home after they escaped, and Mi Moyan tricked her into believing socks would prevent pregnancy.
• Jade Ewer warned that Baozhu had to attend the Golden Osmanthus Banquet, so Mi Moyan proposed dancing beside her to help her remember the choreography.
• Baozhu and the dancers were summoned to the Auspicious Cloud Hall, where Baozhu recognized the master as Li Yu, Prince of Qi.
• Li Yu asked Baozhu's name, and she introduced herself as Dan Niao, courtesy name Dragon Maiden.

Baozhu was brought before the Prince of Qi, who became convinced that her supposed destiny and a lynx she described might help him reclaim the throne. When he ordered her to dance wearing a jade armlet, Baozhu connected his fixation to her mother’s death and the mysteries surrounding the Great Chan'guang Temple.

• Li Yu had Baozhu chained beside his couch and inspected her, nearly ordering Xu Shiyi to cut off her ears before deciding to have her cover them with hanging side buns.
• Baozhu gave the name Dan Niao and claimed that a Barefoot Daoist had named her and that a ferocious lynx obeyed her, feeding Li Yu’s belief that heaven might favor him.
• Li Yu questioned Dong Shiguang about medicine being prepared for him, then ordered Baozhu to dance and had a jade armlet brought for her.
• Seeing the armlet, Baozhu recalled the verse on the Nine Contemplations mural and realized the clues pointed to her mother’s Zhezhi Dance, the altered Guanyin statue, and the vanished Guanyin Attendants.

Baozhu recreated the ending of her mother’s Zhezhi Dance to win Li Yu’s favor and was sent back to the Rainbow Garment Courtyard. Mi Moyan revealed that the Prince of Qi had killed the previous Guanyin Attendants after using them, leaving Baozhu to face the danger with only a slim chance of survival.

• Baozhu deliberately danced her mother’s choreography and stopped at the moment Princess Wanshou had been injured during the original performance.
• Li Yu recognized the dance’s ending as a heavenly portent and ordered Baozhu back to the Rainbow Garment Courtyard instead of keeping her for the night.
• Baozhu returned to her room and angrily rejected Mi Moyan’s advice to please Li Yu in order to gain favor.
• Mi Moyan revealed that Li Yu’s previous Guanyin Attendants had been abducted, forced to dance, and killed at banquets, while Mi Moyan had been castrated and kept as a dance instructor.
• Baozhu understood that Li Yu’s favor offered her only a sliver of hope of surviving.

Baozhu endured captivity and humiliation in the Prince of Qi's household while fearing she shared the blood of men like him. After Li Yu's consort challenged his Golden Osmanthus Banquet plans, Baozhu returned to practice and heard that Jade Ewer had been summoned under unusual circumstances.

• Li Yu kept Baozhu chained beside his throne and made her dance while his guests treated her as a prized possession.
• Baozhu realized the Guanyin Attendants' exploitation was an open secret among Luoyang's elite and wondered whether Wei Xun would rescue her before the Golden Osmanthus Banquet.
• The Prince of Qi's consort confronted Li Yu over his banquet, his use of the osmanthus name, and his sons' indulgence in wine and women.
• Li Yu dismissed his consort and sent Baozhu back to the Rainbow Garment Courtyard, where her humiliation left her contemplating suicide.
• Mi Moyan urged Baozhu to practice before eating, and they heard that Jade Ewer had been summoned by a maid from the consort's rooms, possibly to receive free-person status.

Wei Xun uncovered the kidnappers’ decoys and found Baozhu’s hidden clue at the window. He realized she had been taken away across the Luo River, but her whereabouts remained unknown.

• The Setting Sun Courtyard investigated a lead about two executed bandits, but the missing bodies prevented them from confirming the men’s identities.
• Wei Xun noticed rice straw in the donkey’s hoof-worn hollow and realized the donkey had been trying to alert them to something it witnessed.
• Wei Xun deduced that the gray-clad kidnapper had used straw in the felt bundle as a decoy and had walked into the South Market without Baozhu.
• Wei Xun reconsidered the abduction scene and found three marks of Baozhu’s rouge on the outside of an upstairs window frame.
• Wei Xun concluded that Baozhu had been carried away by water across the Luo River.

After Jade Ewer was beaten to death by the Princess Consort of Qi, Baozhu comforted Mi Moyan and resolved to fight back against the people who controlled them. At the next banquet, Baozhu won Li Yu’s approval by proposing a grander Battle-Formation Music performance, unaware of what consequences his plans might bring.

• The Princess Consort of Qi had Jade Ewer beaten until her face was ruined, and two days later Jade Ewer died after crying out an ominous verse about the king’s descendants perishing.
• Baozhu reassured Mi Moyan that he was not guilty for helping prepare the Guanyin Attendants, then decided she would fight their oppressors rather than accept humiliation.
• Guards smothered Jade Ewer and removed her body, while Mi Moyan explained that the back-gate servants might profit from her remains.
• At the next banquet, Baozhu criticized the plain-clothed dancers performing the Qin King's Battle-Formation Music and described how Emperor Taizong’s original dance had been staged.
• Baozhu suggested making black paper or rattan armor for a more impressive performance, and Li Yu ordered his servants to prepare it without telling the Princess Consort of Qi.

After waking from a brief collapse, Wei Xun traced Baozhu’s kidnappers to the Luoqing Guild and confronted its leader, Cao Hong, at his tonsure ceremony. Cao Hong admitted he had abducted the Donkey-Riding Lady and the previous Guanyin Attendants.

• Wei Xun woke in Baozhu’s bedroom, learned he had been unconscious for less than two hours, and gathered Tuoba Sanniang, Yang Xingjian, and Qiu Ren to pursue the kidnappers.
• Wei Xun’s group reached the Luoqing Guild’s headquarters, where Cao Hong was preparing to become a monk, and entered by invoking Yang Xingjian’s supposed official authority.
• Wei Xun accused Cao Hong of hiding the Donkey-Riding Lady and presented the rouge box she had left behind as evidence that the kidnappers had escaped by water.
• When Cao Hong questioned whether Wei Xun had proof, Wei Xun threatened the Cao family and said he would search for the culprit.
• Cao Hong laid down his sabers and confessed that he had abducted the Donkey-Riding Lady and the previous Guanyin Attendants.

Baozhu’s attempt to join the battle-formation performance failed, and Li Yu chose Mi Moyan to take her place as the Guanyin Attendant at the Golden Osmanthus Banquet. Mi Moyan left for the banquet dressed in celestial garments, while Baozhu remained chained behind and could only exchange keepsakes with him.

• Li Yu learned that Dou Jing had declined his invitation and ordered Dong Shiguang to arrange a loan from a merchant while selling objects from his ancestral estate.
• Baozhu asked to portray Princess Pingyang in the battle-formation rehearsal, but Zhang Gougou stopped her from handling the bow and arrow.
• Baozhu told Li Yu that the lion dance was missing Bixie and suggested that the five-colored lion perform with it; Li Yu agreed to the performance but later decided not to send Baozhu onstage.
• Li Yu ordered Mi Moyan to replace Baozhu as the Guanyin Attendant, and guards chained Baozhu to a couch while Mi Moyan dressed for the banquet.
• Baozhu marked Mi Moyan’s chest with rouge, and Mi Moyan gave her a lock of his golden hair before leaving with the guards.

Cao Hong confessed to abducting the Guanyin Attendants and claimed Cao Yan had died, driving Wei Xun into a grief-stricken battle. Cao Hong died before Wei Xun could learn the truth, and the only clue he left behind proved unreadable.

• Cao Hong confessed that he had hidden Cao Yan after she fled with her beloved and had abducted the other Guanyin Attendants to keep her company.
• Cao Hong presented Cao Yan’s hair ribbon and claimed he had killed her and disposed of her body in the Luo River.
• Wei Xun charged Cao Hong, fought past Abbess Duanchen and the White Camel Temple elders, and severely injured Huijue while breaking through their formation.
• Cao Hong offered no resistance to Wei Xun’s palm strike and suffered fatal internal injuries; Qiu Ren realized he had deliberately used Wei Xun to kill him.
• Tuoba Sanniang suspected Cao Hong had swallowed something, and Wei Xun found a blood-soaked note in his stomach bearing the characters “Bingzhi.”
• Yang Xingjian explained that “Bingzhi” meant to burn and destroy the letter, leaving Wei Xun without a usable clue as Cao Hong’s final memory returned to Cao Yan’s escape.

Baozhu witnessed Li Yu’s confrontation with the Princess Consort of Qi, whose accusations drove him deeper into madness. Li Yu chained Baozhu in the Auspicious Cloud Hall to enact a Buddhist contemplation of death, while she reached helplessly toward a bloodstained bell left from Mi Moyan.

• Baozhu noticed the servants scrubbing the stage where Mi Moyan had performed, and she was summoned to the Auspicious Cloud Hall.
• Li Yu threatened the silent Dan Niao, but the Princess Consort of Qi arrived and condemned his debauchery and his empty ambitions to reclaim power.
• Li Yu struck the Princess Consort after she exposed his obsession with the Noble Consort and his failure to pursue the throne; she told him to silence Baozhu and left.
• Li Yu decided to create his own Nine Contemplations practice and ordered the stage dismantled so Dan Niao could be chained there as a living subject.
• Li Yu ordered the eunuchs to pose Baozhu like the Newly Dead Phase Mural and dye her nails with balsam flower.
• Chained in the sunlight, Baozhu spotted a bloodstained golden bell in the stones but could not reach it before a servant swept it away.

Yang Xingjian proposed that a powerful person had arranged Baozhu’s abduction, but Qiu Ren and the others pursued another lead and found Wei Xun at the Mass Burial Mound. As Baozhu neared death from thirst in the Prince of Qi’s Residence, a miraculous storm brought rain to Luoyang and extinguished the Coiling Dragon Lanterns.

• Yang Xingjian argued that the note Cao Hong swallowed pointed to a powerful mastermind, but Qiu Ren and the others secretly decided not to pass on his theory.
• Qiu Ren, Xu Baozhen, Tuoba Sanniang, and Luo Toutuo found Wei Xun at the Mass Burial Mound and told him their last lead concerned someone who was already dead.
• Wei Xun said he had to see Baozhu alive or see her body, and Qiu Ren agreed that the Setting Sun Courtyard would dig up graves again.
• Baozhu endured three days of heat, hunger, and thirst while Li Yu watched her, and she hallucinated that her mother had come to take her away.
• Guanchao and the disaster victims saw a strange radiance in storm clouds above Luoyang, and the crowd prayed for rain.
• Rain poured over Luoyang and extinguished the two Coiling Dragon Lanterns in the Auspicious Cloud Hall.

Wei Xun found a foreign boy’s corpse marked with red pigment and demanded to know where it had been collected. At the Prince of Qi’s Residence, Baozhu survived an attempt on her life, killed Dong Shiguang, and took up the Giant-Que Sky Bow as she set out to kill Li Yu.

• Qiu Ren, Tuoba Sanniang, and Wei Xun searched fresh graves with Mangbei Hall’s matchmakers for the Donkey-Riding Lady, but instead found a foreign boy’s corpse.
• Qiu Ren identified the corpse as a castrated boy, and Tuoba Sanniang concluded he had been tortured to death for someone’s lust.
• Wei Xun spotted red pigment on the boy’s chest and demanded that Ruan San reveal where the body had been collected.
• After Baozhu survived the rain and remained alive for seven days, Li Yu ordered Dong Shiguang to kill her and preserve her corpse.
• Baozhu resisted Dong Shiguang’s poisoned water, killed him with his own dagger, and freed herself from her shackles.
• Baozhu took the Giant-Que Sky Bow and ran toward Auspicious Cloud Hall’s equipment room, determined to kill Li Yu.

Baozhu and Wei Xun fought through the Prince of Qi's Residence, where she killed Li Yu to avenge her suffering. After Baozhu collapsed, Wei Xun carried her out and opened the locked doors, allowing the imprisoned Household Courtesans and slaves to escape.

• Wei Xun recognized the Prince of Qi's Residence and followed the trail of dead guards in search of Baozhu.
• Baozhu fought her way toward Li Yu's Bedchamber, killing guards with her Four-Feather Great Arrows.
• Wei Xun killed Zhang Gougou, and Baozhu shot Xu Shiyi when he tried to ambush Wei Xun.
• Baozhu ordered Wei Xun to find Li Yu, then shot him and killed him with an arrow through his eyes.
• Baozhu collapsed after Li Yu's death, and Wei Xun carried her away while opening the residence's locked doors.
• The imprisoned Household Courtesans and slaves fled the Prince of Qi's Residence.

After Wei Xun brought the badly injured Baozhu to safety, she recovered from her ordeal while Luoyang erupted over the Prince of Qi’s death and the crimes revealed at his residence. When Yang Xingjian urged her to flee, Baozhu refused and ordered him to help carry out collective punishment against the prince’s surviving accomplices.

• Wei Xun cared for the unconscious Baozhu, and Qiu Ren treated her burns before selling Yang Xingjian ginseng for forty-five taels of gold.
• Thirteenth Son helped Wei Xun replenish Baozhu with honey water, and Wei Xun told Yang Xingjian that she had shot Li Yu, the Prince of Qi.
• Yang Xingjian moved the group to a house beside a Wuhou Post, where Baozhu and Wei Xun slept for three days as Luoyang searched for the assassin and learned of Li Yu’s crimes.
• Baozhu awoke, confirmed Thirteenth Son was safe, and rejected Yang Xingjian’s proposal to leave Luoyang before avenging herself on the Prince of Qi’s remaining followers.
• Baozhu told Yang Xingjian to bring out brush and ink because she wanted collective punishment.

Baozhu resolved to destroy the Prince of Qi’s branch by accusing Li Yu of rebellion, using the residence’s armor and lion dances as evidence. She directed Yang Xingjian to draft the petition and said she had chosen someone to submit it under their real name.

• Baozhu ordered Yang Xingjian to write an impeachment petition against Li Yu, but he warned that Li Yu’s crimes against low-status victims would not earn him a death sentence.
• Baozhu rejected Wei Xun’s plan to massacre the Prince of Qi’s Residence, explaining that Li Yu could still receive a grand burial and an heir could inherit his title.
• Baozhu decided to accuse Li Yu of rebellion and described how she had encouraged him to make armor and perform the Qin King’s Battle-Formation Music and Yellow Lion Dance.
• Baozhu told Yang Xingjian how the court had used pottery armor to condemn Prince Yiyang for rebellion and instructed him to exaggerate Li Yu’s offenses under the ten abominations.
• Baozhu assured Yang Xingjian that someone else would submit the petition under their real name and clenched the golden lock of hair as she vowed to make her enemies dance to her rules.