After Qing Feng Yuelian left the City Lord’s manor, she headed for Heavenly Melody Academy, cutting through the city like moonlight slicing mist.

The Academy’s teachers were the city’s steel spine, nearly seventy percent of its elite force, and nobles clustered there like jeweled birds; left unchecked, they’d become a hornet’s nest later.

So from the start, she cast a net. Her people were told to pen the Academy’s members inside the city, by force or by shade, snaring every road like a web until she arrived.

The Flower of the Other Shore had sent many hard-edged elders this time; even without Qing Feng Yuelian lifting a hand, a straight clash would grind the Academy like stone on stone.

Fan Chen’s pact with the Flower of the Other Shore was simple and cold. They’d help him do what he wanted: lure out that monster under the sea, a shadow groaning beneath the waves.

He, as City Lord, would open Starfate City’s gates for Edgar and Qing Feng Yuelian, and lead the Shadow Guards to aid the Flower’s work, moving like dusk across alleys.

But Fan Chen set terms, thin as paper yet firm as ice. No city-wide slaughter. Withdraw once the goal was met. No more harm to the people, like closing a blade in its sheath.

Maybe it was pity that tethered him, a soft leaf over a hard flame; at least those limits eased the ache in his own heart for a moment.

Yet no balm could change the fact: he’d led wolves into the fold, a pack with hunger stitched into their bones.

No massacre doesn’t mean no killing; in corners where lanterns don’t reach, who can swear flawed cultists won’t slake their craving with blood like rain?

He couldn’t police the shadows; at best, he could keep corpses from appearing in front of his eyes, a blindfold over a storm.

Right then, Fang Zhe stood at Heavenly Melody Academy’s gate, locked in a chilly stalemate with an elder of that Flower, like two blades touching.

“Hundred Ghosts Devour Souls.” He frowned at the sky, where specters swarmed like ash-white moths. “Domain of Blazing Winds.”

“Heh-heh… Fang Zhe, the Radiant Empire’s famed peak mage. The High Priest tossed me a troublesome pebble, didn’t they?” the elder croaked, laughter like dry reeds.

“To be valued by the Flower of the Other Shore’s Ghostfiend Elder—what an honor,” Fang Zhe murmured, eyes narrowing, studying the venerable ghost-handler like a hunter watching fog.

Before he joined the Flower, tales of him drifted across the continent like smoke. They said his ash-gray hair came from long years steeped in spirits.

He’d touched too many unclean things in his early practice; later, with a master’s guidance, he walked the path of harnessing ghosts, forging exorcism arts like iron runes.

He rose to fame, then vanished like a star swallowed by dawn; when he returned, he wore the mantle of the Flower’s Ghostfiend Elder.

By raw strength, Fang Zhe couldn’t be sure he’d win; by grit, the elder couldn’t break him either. They could only lock eyes like winter and stone.

“This much fuss, several elders deployed—did you come to Starfate City just to stir mud?” Fang Zhe asked, voice cool as snowmelt.

“Fishing for words? Fine.” The elder’s smile bent like a sickle. “I’m here to stall until the High Priest arrives. We’re not the main act. Watch with us.”

“…The main act?” Fang Zhe’s breath tightened, like frost creeping over glass.

“No more chat. The High Priest is here. Our task ends. Slip, slip.” Black robes laughed and faded, melting into air like smoke.

The fighters guarding the gates froze, their blades hanging like wilting leaves; for a moment, no one knew which way the wind blew.

“A priest above the elders… To make that Ghostfiend Elder bow, it must be a quasi-divine or higher,” Fang Zhe muttered, a cold prickle across his scalp. “But that woman, Kerlinveil Xuewei, isn’t here… What a neat coincidence.”

“Hmph. Never thought the Empire bred a mole,” he growled, raking his hair, irritation fluttering like trapped sparrows.

“So annoying! Why did I say yes to that old lady and teach at this busted Academy? I should be on my honeymoon, not herding clouds. Ugh.”

“Wait—what?!” While his thoughts scattered like leaves, a terrifying awareness wrapped the entire Academy, a veil over roofs and hearts, invisible to most.

To a spirit-sensitive like him, it felt like being stripped under a cold gaze, a mirror showing bones; his skin crawled like ants under frost.

“Hold on… This spiritual force exceeds quasi-divine. Divine sense?!” His pulse thudded like drums in a hollow hall.

To turn consciousness into divine sense, you need True God strength, a crown whose weight changes with an era, yet always sits highest like a sun.

True Gods are few; the plane itself rations them like winter grain, because they hold initial permissions—law stamped in the world, heaven to mortal eyes.

“Beneath gods, all are ants.” The old saying slid in like a knife’s gleam; it wasn’t wrong.

If the Flower truly sent a True God, only Her Majesty the Queen could cut this knot, a blade answering a storm.

When that divine sense locked fully over Starfate City, Fang Zhe tasted despair, bitter as iron; wrapped in it, he felt like prey swallowed whole.

Life or death hung on her single thought, a petal falling or a blade dropping.

“…I’d love to toss you into the sea to feed the fish,” a cool, elegant woman’s voice drifted from every corner, like winter wind through chimes. “But I don’t want to kill you now.”

Thin threads of dread climbed hearts like ivy, slow and relentless.

“We’re done for… She’s truly at True God level,” Fang Zhe said, a wry smile cracking like old lacquer.

“This is Fan Chen.” His voice cut across the city like a bell. “Everyone, fall back. I’ve got something to say.”

“Sigh.” Fan Chen looked toward a point in the city, a shadow among rooftops, and his breath fell like rain. “If I guessed right, they came for her.”