Righteous Qi

"It's starting!"

Just as Su Mu's mind began to wander, the maid's voice gave his heart a jolt, and he hurriedly looked up.

He then saw the scholars in the distance rise to their feet, with brushes, ink, paper, and inkstones laid out on their desks.

One man in a blue robe dipped his brush in ink and began to write with sweeping strokes.

But as he wrote, he did not write on the paper. Instead, he wrote in the sky.

The sight made even Su Mu's eyes widen.

The characters were written directly in midair. Not only did they stay aloft, but once each was complete, it actually shone with a soft radiance, giving anyone who looked at it a sense of imposing righteousness.

"He truly lives up to his place among the Seven Talents. His characters have only just taken shape, yet they already possess such Righteous Qi. Who knows what level they'll reach once he finishes the whole piece?"

"Could it reach five inches?"

"That's possible. Mingze reached four inches a long time ago. If he outdoes himself this time, it really could reach five inches."

The words of those around him stirred something in Su Mu's heart.

A few inches? Was that how they judged whether the writing was good?

The maid beside him was also staring blankly at the literary display ahead, but Su Mu's expression suddenly changed.

Oh no, I forgot something. I can't read the writing here!

He had been so focused on seeing what this literary display was all about and whether it could offer a breakthrough that he had forgotten he could not read the writing here at all. What was he supposed to do now?

Su Mu grew a little nervous, while in the distance, the scholar named Mingze had already finished writing.

Then the characters in the sky flickered and slowly descended, landing precisely on the white paper before him.

In an instant, a wisp of bluish-white Qi leaped from the paper and rose steadily upward. Everyone around them held their breath, staring fixedly at it.

Su Mu was also watching intently, but he soon sensed something wrong. His eyes began to sting.

"Hiss, that hurts!"

Su Mu lowered his head. He felt as though his eyes would go blind at any moment if he kept looking.

Was this Righteous Qi counteracting me because I was a soul?

Without needing to think much, Su Mu already had his answer. What a mess this was. He gave a bitter laugh.

In the past, he had watched movies about ghosts and delighted in seeing all sorts of objects used to counter them. Now look at him.

Now that he was the ghost, he could not even look at someone else's writing from a distance. Just looking made him feel as though he would go blind.

"It really reached five inches! Mingze's calligraphy actually leaped all the way to five inches!"

Just as Su Mu lowered his head, a clamor rose around him.

"A five-inch calligraphy piece should be more than enough to help an ordinary Golden Core cultivator weather the Nascent Soul Tribulation, right?"

"Of course! A five-inch piece is enough to handle it!"

"From the looks of things, Mingze is going to become the foremost of the Seven Talents!"

Su Mu heard every word of the constant whispers around him clearly, but he did not dare look.

Still, from their words, Su Mu could more or less make out their envy.

"This calligraphy piece alone is probably worth close to ten thousand Spirit Stones."

The maid's eyes were also full of envy as she watched. "Unfortunately, it's only five inches. The tribulation the eldest princess must weather will require a calligraphy piece of at least six inches."

With that, she shook her head and led Su Mu downstairs. They had finished watching, so there was no need to linger.

In the distance, quite a few cultivators were already seeking an audience with Mingze, naturally for the calligraphy piece in his possession.

The two went downstairs, where many people around them were still discussing the calligraphy.

"This is wonderful. Now that the talented Mingze has advanced another step, our Great Liang can be a little more secure."

"Exactly. These past few days, I've heard that quite a few evil demons have emerged and injured many commoners. If there were more calligraphy pieces like Mingze's to distribute, they would be enough to deter those evil demons."

"Yes. I've heard that even some thousand-year-old demons have sensed Great Liang's declining national fortune and begun to emerge. Do they really think our Great Liang has no one left?"

The voices continually rising around them seemed to affect the maid. Her expression grew somewhat downcast, and her eyes lost their focus. Clearly, her mind was wandering.

Su Mu heard these words too, and his heart sank slightly.

Listening to them, he could also tell that Great Liang's situation was somewhat grim.

About an incense stick's worth of time later, the maid brought Su Mu back to the imperial palace. Only then did she remember that she had yet to ask him about the result.

"You've seen the literary display now. Well? Is there anything you can do to help the eldest princess?"

At this, the maid's eyes immediately lit up, and she stared fixedly at Su Mu.

Su Mu's heart sank at her question, but having already prepared his words, he hurriedly said,

"I can't look directly at that Righteous Qi, so I didn't get a clear look at everything just now. Tell me what you saw."

In truth, Su Mu had seen it clearly, but he genuinely could not look at Righteous Qi either. For now, he could only make something up.

The maid paused at his words, suspecting nothing. "Right. You're a soul now, aligned with yin, while Righteous Qi is intensely yang. You really can't look directly at it."

"Very well. I'll recite that calligraphy piece for you."

The maid paused briefly, then softly recited, "The flying dragon's spirit seed is spring's light; riding a crane, long at leisure, as though borne by wind. In the secluded palace's furthest reaches, only the moon remains; lingering rain in sparse woods gives way to a clear breeze."

Su Mu had been listening with the utmost attention, but when he heard the end, he froze. A trace of disbelief appeared on his face, and he stared blankly.

At that moment, only two words filled Su Mu's mind: That's it?

This was the calligraphy piece? The piece with five inches of Righteous Qi, the one so many people sought after?

"What's wrong?"

Seeing that something was off about Su Mu's expression, the maid was somewhat puzzled, unsure what his look meant.

Su Mu opened his mouth, wanting to say that he might be able to write something like that himself, but after thinking it over, he held back.

He had not tested it, and he still did not know whether what he wrote would actually work. Better to hold back for now and try it himself first.

"Could you make rubbings of some other calligraphy pieces for me? I'll take another look. Perhaps I can find some leads."

Su Mu spoke earnestly. Having her make rubbings of other calligraphy pieces and then read them aloud to him would let him learn the characters. Then he could try writing something himself.

When the time came, he would know whether it worked or not.

The maid thought that since she had already spent those fifty taels of silver, she naturally could not let the effort go to waste like this. She could only agree.