Under the heavy heat of afternoon sun, the training grounds of Bai Zhan Peak trembled beneath the weight of exhausted bodies. Disciples knelt in staggered lines, foreheads nearly touching the stone floor as they struggled to remain upright. Their chests heaved, arms quivered, and some tasted iron as they swallowed back the urge to collapse completely. Liu Qingge stood at the center of the field as if forged from a purer metal than mortal flesh, unbothered and unbent. No sweat marked his brow, no uneven breath betrayed exertion. His gaze—sharp and narrow, like the promise of a drawn sword—swept over the trembling group with unmistakable disappointment.

Punishment in Bai Zhan Peak was a sacred thing, a lesson written not by words but by pain and discipline. Today’s offense had not been minor. Once again, his disciples had sought out students of An Ding Peak and mocked them for their lack of martial talent, for their “cowardice,” for their focus on logistics and trade rather than steel and combat. It was an old arrogance, one Liu Qingge had spent years purging from the bones of his peak. A necessary culling of pride, because Bai Zhan disciples were not weapons set loose upon the world without reason. They protected, or they became nothing.

They had learned long ago not to mock the students of Qing Jing Peak. That instinct had been carved out of them early, when Liu Qingge’s favor toward Shen Qingqiu became impossible to ignore. Bai Zhan children did not dare raise a hand or blade against those who lived beneath Qing Jing bamboo. Even they knew better than to provoke the peak lord whom Liu Qingge watched with an alertness far sharper than temper or rivalry. And they all knew why. Shen Qingqiu spoiled children. He spoiled them until they bloomed like silk flowers under spring rain, even as he scolded them, lectured them, threatened to make them copy manuals twice over for reckless behavior. Liu Qingge called it spoiling; Shen Qingqiu called it cultivating potential. Whatever it was, Bai Zhan disciples had learned to stay away unless they wished to be glared at by their own peak lord until they regretted every choice they had ever made.

But those from An Ding Peak had apparently seemed fair game.

Not anymore.

Liu Qingge’s presence pressed down upon the field. Disciples wavered like trees in a typhoon.

Then, a shift in the air.

Not the kind that accompanied danger, but something subtle, like the scent of green tea carried on drifting wind. Footsteps approached—light, measured, elegant. The children nearest the entrance lifted their heads, just enough to glimpse pale robes moving with the casual grace of leaves descending through a quiet bamboo grove. Shen Qingqiu did not rush. He never rushed, even when the world cracked open beneath him. His posture was an effortless poem, every movement refined yet deceptively unassuming.

Liu Qingge did not turn at first, though his shoulders eased by a fraction—too faint for any disciple to measure, except that they all sensed it, like the air no longer strangled them. Shen Qingqiu’s presence was not loud, but it carried weight, a different kind of authority than Bai Zhan Peak understood. Where Liu Qingge was the blade, Shen Qingqiu was the fan, sharp in ways silk could hide.

Even from a distance, it was obvious why Bai Zhan children feared and adored Qing Jing Peak’s lord, why they delivered captured spiritual beasts to his door, why they carried themselves with care when he passed. He noticed them. He remembered their names. He treated their stumbles as opportunities, not failures. To Liu Qingge, it was spoiling. To everyone else, it was something dangerously close to love.

The disciples tried to straighten, driven by desperate instinct, but their limbs shook too violently. Shen Qingqiu’s gaze swept over them—cool, unreadable, but never cruel—and landed at last on Liu Qingge.