Chapter Summaries

After learning that something had happened to Sister Youwei, Li Ziye set out for Great Shang's capital with Zhang Lata and a heavily supplied convoy. He continued training on the road, determined to protect his family while planning to conceal his true abilities behind the image of a foolish, boastful heir.

• Zhang Lata explained that the Head of the Confucians drew on Confucian Fortune and was unmatched in Great Shang's capital, while he and Qin Enuo had reached the Fifth Realm.
• After receiving a letter from the capital, Li Ziye learned that something had happened to Sister Youwei and told Zhang Lata and Li Baiwan that he would go to the capital.
• Li Ziye explained to Li Baiwan that he would encourage people to see him as a conceited, talentless heir so they would underestimate him and tolerate his actions.
• Li Ziye and Zhang Lata departed with a convoy carrying supplies, and Li Ziye practiced the Flying Immortal Formula and swordsmanship along the way.
• After training through the night, Li Ziye sensed his True Essence had grown and vowed to reach Sister Youwei and defend the Li Family.

Chen Yifei repeatedly tried to force Li Youwei into marriage, but Li Ziye arrived at Li Garden and drove him out by force. News of Li Ziye’s arrival reached Mu Yao, who realized the Li Family’s legitimate son was already in the capital.

• Mu Yao warned Chen Yifei not to antagonize the Li Family, but Chen Yifei ignored him and went to Li Garden.
• Chen Yifei forced his way into Li Garden, ordered his men to beat the servants, and tried to have Li Youwei seized when she rejected his marriage proposal.
• Hongzhu stopped Chen Yifei from reaching Li Youwei, then directed his attention to the newly arrived Li Ziye.
• Old Zhang knocked Chen Yifei’s four men aside, and Li Ziye grabbed Chen Yifei by the throat before throwing him out of the hall.
• News of Li Ziye’s arrival spread through the capital, and Mu Yao was alarmed when he heard it.

Li Ziye reunited with Mu Yao in the capital after Chen Yifei’s attack on the Li Family, then defeated Chen Yifei’s friends when they confronted him on the street. The chapter ended with Li Ziye hoping the Imperial Academy would take notice of him so he could search for his fairy master.

• Mu Yao learned that Li Ziye had arrived and worried after hearing Chen Yifei had gone to Li Garden.
• Chen Yifei returned to King Xuanwu’s residence in a rage, but King Xuanwu refused to seek revenge and told him to rely on his disreputable friends.
• Tao Yaoyao left her meeting with King Xuanwu after Chen Yifei interrupted, and King Xuanwu rebuked his son for provoking the Li Family.
• Mu Yao visited Li Ziye, apologized for Chen Yifei, and invited him to tour the capital.
• Chen Yifei and his friends confronted Li Ziye and Mu Yao on the street, but Li Ziye knocked the friends down and warned Chen Yifei to leave him alone.
• Qin Enuo agreed to lecture at the Imperial Academy for a year, while Kong Qiu wondered when Li Ziye would arrive there.

Li Ziye encountered Tao Yaoyao, the Rakshasa King, who tested his skill before letting him go. After discussing the Li Family’s negotiations and receiving medicinal treatment, he was summoned to the Imperial Academy, where he appeared before four Confucian command officers.

• Li Ziye memorized the locations of Great Shang’s ten Martial Kings’ residences while touring the capital with Mu Yao.
• Tao Yaoyao stopped Li Ziye, questioned him about Qin Enuo, and attacked to test what he had learned; he evaded her palm with the Flying Immortal Art.
• Li Ziye told Li Youwei that the Rakshasa King had tested him, and Li Youwei explained that the Zhangsun Family, the Merchant Alliance, and the Yin Family Bank had ties to the imperial family.
• Li Ziye agreed to join Li Youwei’s upcoming cooperation talks, then endured a medicinal bath administered by Zhang Lata.
• Four Confucian scholars summoned Li Ziye to the Imperial Academy, where he greeted four command officers in the Law Enforcement Hall.

Li Ziye resisted the Imperial Academy’s attempt to punish him, then learned the Head of the Confucians wanted him to join the academy. He left the offer undecided and accepted Bai Wangyu as a powerful new resident of Li Garden, arranging for him to spar at reduced strength.

• Four Confucian command officers tried to punish Li Ziye for defending himself, but he challenged the Imperial Academy’s authority and made them hesitate.
• Venerable Law Confucian dismissed the officers, apologized to Li Ziye, and invited him to join the Imperial Academy on the Head of the Confucians’ instruction.
• Li Ziye asked to consider the offer, while the Head of the Confucians told Venerable Law Confucian to have his rigid disciple spend more time with Li Ziye.
• Bai Wangyu arrived at Li Garden, and Hongzhu told Li Ziye that he was Law Confucian’s eldest disciple and a powerful cultivator nearing the Third Realm.
• Li Ziye agreed to take Bai Wangyu in and asked him to spar while suppressing his cultivation to the early stage of the First Realm.

Li Ziye brought Bai Wangyu to a business negotiation with the Merchant Alliance, the Yin Family Bank, and the Zhangsun Family, using Bai Wangyu’s presence to strengthen his position. After demanding seventy percent of the profits from a single partnership, Li Ziye left with Zhangsun Nanqiao, who continued probing him about the Li Family’s inventions.

• Li Ziye sparred with Bai Wangyu, then invited him to accompany him and Li Youwei to Apricot Garden.
• The three business powers greeted Bai Wangyu warmly, and his statement that Li Ziye had invited him changed how they regarded Li Ziye.
• Li Ziye demanded a ten-ninety split from the Merchant Alliance and challenged the other parties to compete for the Li Family’s business.
• Zhangsun Nanqiao offered to buy the Li Family’s saltpeter ice-making and liquor-brewing techniques, and Li Ziye joked that he wanted her instead.
• Li Ziye stated that the Li Family would cooperate with only one partner and wanted seventy percent of the profits, then left the negotiation.
• Zhangsun Nanqiao escorted Li Ziye outside and asked whether he had invented the Li Family’s unusual products; he denied it, and she said his condition was open to discussion.

Li Ziye negotiated with Zhangsun Nanqiao over the Li Family’s businesses, then learned a Confucian sword technique from Bai Wangyu. He left Li Garden with Bai Wangyu to visit the Flower Cultivation Garden and seek information about the Yin Clan and a book he wanted.

• Li Ziye rejected Zhangsun Nanqiao’s offer to let the Zhangsun Family participate in the Li Family’s production, and she raised her proposal to a sixty-forty profit split without interference in the processes.
• Li Ziye returned to Li Garden, endured his medicinal bath, and asked Bai Wangyu about his missing master and the Head of the Confucians.
• Bai Wangyu demonstrated Wind Passes, Leaving Traces, then patiently taught Li Ziye the sword technique until he grasped its basics.
• Li Ziye took Bai Wangyu to the Flower Cultivation Garden, intending to visit his second brother, learn about the Yin Clan, and obtain Essential Arts of Heavenly Craft.

Li Ziye brought Bai Wangyu to the Flower Cultivation Garden, where his criticism of Yu Qingxuan’s zither performance provoked the guests and revealed Bai Wangyu’s presence to the Imperial Academy students. Yu Qingxuan invited Li Ziye upstairs, and he accepted before taunting the crowd on his way up.

• Li Ziye took Bai Wangyu to the Flower Cultivation Garden and arranged for Xinghua and Lihua to entertain him while he waited for Yu Qingxuan.
• Li Qingzhi watched Li Ziye from the third floor as Yu Qingxuan arrived and performed “Ambush from Ten Sides” on the guqin.
• Li Ziye criticized Yu Qingxuan’s playing, angering the guests, who mocked him after learning he was Li Baiwan’s son.
• The guests recognized Bai Wangyu as Venerable Law Confucian’s foremost disciple and grew angry that Li Ziye had brought him to the pleasure house.
• Yu Qingxuan invited Li Ziye upstairs, and he accepted, then called the guests a bunch of country bumpkins.

Li Ziye’s attempt to find Bai Wangyu at the Flower Cultivation Garden was derailed when Yu Qingxuan summoned him to ask about a pipa score, and he stalled in her room until the crowd downstairs left. After a chaotic chase, he returned to Li Garden and learned from Li Qingzhi that Yu Qingxuan could help him enter the Yin Clan, despite having just offended her.

• Li Ziye met Yu Qingxuan upstairs, denied knowing the origin of her pipa score, and provoked her with shameless jokes until she left through the back door.
• When Yu Qingxuan’s departure drew the crowd outside, Li Ziye seized Bai Wangyu and escaped the Flower Cultivation Garden, then ran from their pursuers through the streets.
• Li Ziye and Bai Wangyu shook off the last pursuers and returned to Li Garden near dawn.
• Li Qingzhi told Li Ziye that Yin Kuang had been placed inside the Yin Clan but could not easily reach the item in its treasury.
• Li Qingzhi explained that Yu Qingxuan would perform at the Yin Clan patriarch’s sixtieth birthday and could help Li Ziye enter the clan, leaving Li Ziye coughing in dismay after his quarrel with her.

Li Ziye pursued Yu Qingxuan to apologize and win her friendship, impressing her with his views on social status and promising her another musical score. After he frightened off Wu Duoduo, Yu Qingxuan invited him to her home for a chat.

• Li Ziye tracked down Yu Qingxuan by the Xiangshui River and apologized for his drunken behavior, but she challenged his claim that he had written “Ambush from Ten Sides.”
• Li Ziye persisted in following Yu Qingxuan and argued that nobility and baseness depended on a person's heart, winning her attention and forgiveness.
• Li Ziye took Yu Qingxuan's hand, prompting Wu Duoduo, heir to the Prince of East Lin, to accuse him of bullying her.
• Li Ziye carried Wu Duoduo to the riverbank and threatened to throw him in until the frightened youth gave up his attempt to play the hero.
• Li Ziye offered Yu Qingxuan the score “Guangling Melody,” and she invited him to her home for a chat.

Li Ziye gave Yu Qingxuan the score of Guangling Melody, but Chen Yifei arrived with two powerful Embroidered Robe Guards and threatened them. Bai Wangyu intervened and drove Chen Yifei away, and Li Ziye then asked Bai Wangyu to help him meet the Head of the Confucians so he could find his fairy master and obtain a king of medicines.

• Li Ziye gave Yu Qingxuan the score of Guangling Melody and invited her to exercise with him in the mornings.
• Wu Duoduo arrived with a group to rescue Yu Qingxuan, but Chen Yifei appeared and refused his offer to join forces against Li Ziye.
• Chen Yifei ordered his two Embroidered Robe Guards to attack Li Ziye, who stood in front of Yu Qingxuan despite being outmatched.
• Bai Wangyu arrived, blasted the guards away with the Taiyi Sword, and forced Chen Yifei and his men to retreat.
• Li Ziye asked Bai Wangyu to help him meet the Head of the Confucians, and Bai Wangyu agreed to ask Venerable Law Confucian to pass on the request.

Kong Qiu revealed to Qin Enuo that Li Ziye came from another world and might be the person who could change the Nine Provinces, then gave him the thousand-year-old fleeceflower root. Zhang Lata used the herb and his sword strike to break Li Ziye’s second blocked meridian, and Li Ziye began a breakthrough.

• Kong Qiu told Qin Enuo that Li Ziye’s birth had briefly disrupted the world’s rules and let him glimpse the true heaven and earth beyond the firmament.
• Kong Qiu explained that he believed Li Ziye could change the world and said Qin Enuo would need the thousand-year-old fleeceflower root to open her disciple’s blocked meridians.
• Bai Wangyu returned to Li Garden and gave Li Ziye the thousand-year-old fleeceflower root from Kong Qiu, lifting Li Ziye’s disappointment at being refused an audience.
• Zhang Lata shattered the herb king and used his sword strike to break one of Li Ziye’s major meridians while pouring the herb’s essence into him.
• Li Ziye emerged from the shattered medicine tub with his second meridian opened, and Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi surged into the room as Bai Wangyu sensed his breakthrough.

Li Ziye advanced to the middle stage of the First Martial Dao Realm, then failed spectacularly when he tried to practice the third form of the Flying Immortal Art. Zhangsun Nanqiao offered the Li Family political influence in exchange for cooperation, but Li Ziye rejected the offer and said he wanted to become a sword immortal.

• Li Ziye broke through to the middle stage of the First Martial Dao Realm and demonstrated his improved strength with the Ancient Chunjun Sword.
• Zhang Lata demonstrated the Flying Immortal Art’s third form, and Li Ziye crashed into a wall after attempting its first three steps.
• Zhangsun Nanqiao visited Li Garden to ask about cooperation between the Zhangsun Family and the Li Family, but Li Ziye avoided committing.
• Zhangsun Nanqiao warned Li Ziye that Yu Qingxuan had met the Eldest Prince and might be used to win the Li Family’s support.
• Zhangsun Nanqiao offered to use her family’s influence to raise the Li Family’s status, but Li Ziye declined and said he would rather become a sword immortal.

Li Ziye stirred up a confrontation between the Merchant Alliance and the Yin Clan after a fire destroyed the Alliance’s goods, while secretly investigating the young man who helped him fan the flames. Zhangsun Nanqiao suspected the Li Family was trying to make its rivals fight, and urged Zhangsun Fengyu to get closer to Li Ziye, who he feared might become his uncle.

• After Zhangsun Nanqiao left Li Garden rebuffed, a fire broke out at the Merchant Alliance, and Li Ziye recognized it as the start of his second brother’s plan.
• The Merchant Alliance accused the Yin Clan of burning its goods after finding a Yin Clan token, and Li Ziye joined the crowd to inflame the dispute.
• Li Ziye and a young man in blue separately stirred up the crowd, then exchanged false names and went home to investigate each other.
• Li Ziye discovered the young man was Zhangsun Fengyu, while Zhangsun Fengyu learned that Li Ziye had lied about his name.
• Zhangsun Nanqiao told Zhangsun Fengyu that Li Ziye was trying to set the three competing parties against each other and suggested he get closer to him.

Li Ziye struggled with his martial arts training before visiting Yu Qingxuan, where he discovered her connection to the First Prince. He persuaded her to help him enter the Yin Clan to steal something, and Yu Qingxuan resolved to remain loyal to him.

• Li Ziye challenged Bai Wangyu, learned that Bai Wangyu had fought Yan Xiaoyu to a draw, and left Li Garden frustrated about his upcoming match with Huo Liner.
• Li Ziye visited Yu Qingxuan as she tuned her guqin, but she asked him to hide when the First Prince arrived.
• The First Prince questioned Yu Qingxuan about her preparations and her closeness to Li Ziye, then left without confronting Li Ziye, whom he suspected was in the house.
• Li Ziye asked Yu Qingxuan to take him to the Yin Clan's old patriarch's birthday celebration so he could steal something important, and she agreed.
• Yu Qingxuan explained that she owed the First Prince three favors but had no other connection to him, and she vowed not to harm Li Ziye.

Li Ziye learned that Yan Xiaoyu was bringing a King of Medicines to the capital and began looking for a way to obtain it after it was presented to the court. Meanwhile, rumors portrayed Li Ziye as a peerless sword genius and Yan Xiaoyu’s target, a story secretly spread by Li Qingzhi.

• Li Ziye asked Bai Wangyu and Zhang Lata to help him ambush Yan Xiaoyu for the King of Medicines, but both refused; Bai Wangyu suggested Li Ziye seek it through the court after it became a tribute.
• Zhangsun Nanqiao received Li Ziye’s invitation to go boating, while Zhangsun Fengyu warned her that Li Ziye was likely pursuing an ulterior motive.
• Mu Rong urged Mubai to delay challenging Li Ziye or Yan Xiaoyu, warning that a fight could cause trouble for the imperial family.
• Rumors spread through the capital that Yan Xiaoyu was coming to challenge Li Ziye, who was supposedly a peerless sword genius; Li Ziye denied starting the rumors.
• Li Qingzhi revealed that he had instructed a servant to spread the rumors and privately considered them a gift to his younger brother.

Yan Xiaoyu’s procession survived a bandit ambush, but Liu Rongnü’s Fifth Realm strength made Li Ziye abandon his plan to seize the King of Medicines. Li Ziye took Zhangsun Nanqiao boating to win her over, but her calm response to his flattery left him unsure what to do next.

• Liu Rongnü drove off the bandits who attacked Yan Xiaoyu’s procession and revealed his terrifying Fifth Realm strength.
• Li Ziye learned Liu Rongnü was guarding Yan Xiaoyu and gave up on forcibly taking the third King of Medicines.
• Li Ziye told Bai Wangyu to protect him from trouble while allowing Zhangsun Nanqiao to make advances, then took her to the Xiang River.
• Li Ziye recited poetry to praise Zhangsun Nanqiao, but she teased him about his attempts to win women’s hearts.
• Li Ziye froze when Zhangsun Nanqiao did not react as romantically as he had expected.

Li Ziye and Zhangsun Nanqiao capsized while he tried to pole their boat, leaving them soaked and ending their outing. When Zhangsun Nanqiao grew feverish and lost consciousness on the ride back, Li Ziye brought her to Li Garden, where his companions misunderstood the situation and teased him about taking her as a wife.

• Li Ziye refused to pay the boatman an extra mace of silver and tried to pole the boat himself, causing it to capsize and throwing him and Zhangsun Nanqiao into the lake.
• Li Ziye helped Zhangsun Nanqiao ashore, then took Bai Wangyu's Confucian robe to cover her and warm her on the carriage ride back.
• Zhangsun Nanqiao grew increasingly pale and weak, so Li Ziye held her to warm her and diverted the carriage to Li Garden when she became unconscious.
• Li Ziye carried Zhangsun Nanqiao into Li Garden and called for the residence's physician.
• Hongzhu, Zhang Lata, and Li Youwei joked that Li Ziye had brought Zhangsun Nanqiao home as a prospective wife, leaving him choking in protest.

Li Ziye cared for the ill Zhangsun Nanqiao, then negotiated a business partnership with her while trading teasing remarks. Zhangsun Nanqiao left with Zhangsun Fengyu after agreeing that the Zhangsun Family would give the Li Family a twenty-percent share of its medicinal herb business and one herb king.

• Li Ziye's household dismissed his protests that nothing was going on between him and Zhangsun Nanqiao, then he fed her medicine while she lay unconscious.
• Zhangsun Nanqiao woke as Li Ziye leaned close to give her the remaining medicine, teased him, and learned that he had brought her to Li Garden for treatment.
• Li Ziye proposed a partnership with the Zhangsun Family and demanded a share of its medicinal herb business and herb kings; after bargaining, Zhangsun Nanqiao agreed to a twenty-percent share and one herb king.
• Zhangsun Fengyu arrived to take his aunt home, exchanged barbed greetings with Li Ziye, and left with Zhangsun Nanqiao, who asked Li Ziye when he would invite her on another lake outing.

Zhangsun Nanqiao agreed to the Li Family’s terms, realizing Li Ziye wanted the thousand-year-old herb king arriving with the Divine Oracle Hall. Meanwhile, Kong Qiu sent Bai Wangyu back to Li Ziye’s side and urged him to question authority and protect Li Ziye when needed.

• Zhangsun Nanqiao told Zhangsun Fengyu she had accepted the Li Family’s demand for a twenty-percent share of their medicinal herb business and a thousand-year-old herb king, which she planned to obtain through the empress from the Divine Hall’s tribute.
• Bai Wangyu helped Li Ziye practice the Flying Immortal Formula until Li Ziye fell from an apricot tree, then left after a disciple of the Imperial Academy summoned him.
• Kong Qiu asked Bai Wangyu to assess whether Li Ziye could catch up with Yan Xiaoyu, and Bai Wangyu said he could not.
• Kong Qiu instructed Bai Wangyu to stay beside Li Ziye, learn to question authority, and shield him from hidden attacks when the Divine Oracle Hall arrived.
• Qin Enuo joined Kong Qiu and accepted his praise for her judgment in choosing disciples.