But the moment she said it, the corners of Shangguan Yunying’s mouth curled up, rising so high she couldn’t press them down no matter how hard she tried.
She nervously glanced around—to her left, a corridor pillar; to her right, a threshold; ahead, an empty courtyard.
No one heard.
If no one heard, it was as good as never having been said.
Shangguan Yunying let out a breath of relief, then quietly spat.
Even softer than before, so soft that only her lips moved, making no sound at all.
Then she took a deep breath, forcing the heat still burning on her face to cool bit by bit.
She gradually pulled back the corners of her mouth, that stubborn curve that refused to fade.
She straightened her spine, smoothed her lapels, and adjusted her hair bun.
When she lifted her head again, she had already regained the demeanor befitting the First Lady of the Court.
Only the light kindling deep in her eyes betrayed her.
Shangguan Yunying stepped forward and followed Gu Chengyin into the main hall.
Inside the hall, sunlight filtered through the gaps in the latticed window frames, casting a warm, golden glow across the brick floor.
Luo Zhao sat in the seat of honor, dressed in the formal black robes of a Crown Princess, her golden crown perfectly set atop her bun.
Her face was calm, her features serene, like a finely carved jade statue.
Her gaze landed on Gu Chengyin as he entered through the hall’s entrance.
She didn’t speak, only nodded slightly.
On the left, in the guest seat of honor, sat one person.
Cui Shifan.
Senior Grand Secretary of the Grand Secretariat, Head of the Qinghe Cui Clan.
Today, he wore a simple dark brown robe, without his court attire.
He had no official hat, looking just like an ordinary old gentleman.
As Gu Chengyin stepped in, Cui Shifan’s eyes met his.
Briefly, so briefly—only the span of a single breath.
But the weight hidden in that glance was heavier than all the court memorials and dialogues of a full year’s governance.
It wasn’t hostility, nor was it testing.
More like an old chess master watching another player enter the room.
Knowing the game ahead wouldn’t be easy, but not impossible, either—a calm, measured recognition.
After all, Cui Shifan had arrived long ago, but neither he nor Luo Zhao had yet turned the conversation to matters of substance.
They were waiting. Waiting for Gu Chengyin to return.
And now, Gu Chengyin was back.
Only then did this confrontation truly begin.
After exchanging that glance with Cui Shifan, Gu Chengyin smiled.
His smile bloomed without warning, like flowers bursting open overnight in spring—so dazzling it made eyes widen.
His entire face radiated the surprise of reuniting with an old friend after years apart.
His eyes curved into crescent moons, and his lips stretched into the widest grin possible.
He seemed to glow from within, the light making even the color of his robes appear brighter.
Gu Chengyin extended his hand and strode quickly toward Cui Shifan.
His steps were fast and long, stirring the air so that the tea’s surface in the cup on the table rippled in faint circles.
“Ah!”
Gu Chengyin’s voice echoed through the hall, loud and warm, carrying a gaiety impossible to refuse:
“If it isn’t my old elder brother!”
At that moment, Cui Shifan was drinking tea—or rather, he had just raised the cup to his lips.
He intended to take a sip, buying himself an excuse not to respond immediately.
But Gu Chengyin’s outburst made his hand tremble.
The tea cup swayed near his lips, and a few drops splashed onto his chin.
Cui Shifan didn’t choke—his decades of experience in court gave him composure far beyond being startled by a mere shout.
But his hand did shake. Not from fear, but from a physiological reaction to such wildly unconventional friendliness.
Like walking a smooth road and suddenly stumbling over an extra step.
You wouldn’t fall, but you’d stumble for an instant.
Yet Cui Shifan reacted quickly.
So quickly that by the time he set down the teacup, his startled expression had already switched to one of equal delight.
He shot up from his seat, moving three times faster than usual—faster than a man his age had any right to be.
A radiant smile spread across his face, wrinkles gathering around his eyes.
His whole face seemed pulled taut by invisible hands from both sides, stretched smooth and free of any reluctance.
The next moment, a young hand and an old one clasped tightly together.
Gu Chengyin’s hand was long and strong, with distinct knuckles.
Cui Shifan’s hand was wrinkled and thin, with protruding veins.
But when their hands met, it was like a green vine entwining itself around an old tree.
Bound tightly, impossible to tell who held tighter or who would let go first.
“Junior Preceptor Gu! It has truly been a long time!”
Cui Shifan’s voice dripped with profound sincerity, every word steeped in emotion.
Gu Chengyin tightened his grip on Cui Shifan’s hand a little more.
Pretending to look him over with surprise, he remarked:
“Let me have a good look at you… Ah! Pavilion Elder Cui, how you’ve thinned! The cares of state affairs have worn you down!”
Luo Zhao sat in the seat of honor, watching this ‘reunion of old friends’ unfold.
Her expression shifted, from ‘You’re finally here’ when Gu Chengyin entered, to ‘What are you doing?’
Then from ‘What are you doing’ to ‘I don’t know this person.’
Finally, it settled into an expression that clearly said, ‘Why on earth is this man my Royal Tutor?’
The corner of Luo Zhao’s mouth twitched once, and then it twitched twice more.
Finally, she closed her eyes and turned her head to the side.
She took a deep breath, but on her beautiful face, the words “too shameful to behold” were practically written in bold letters.
Shangguan Yunying, meanwhile, kept her head down as she walked past Gu Chengyin and Cui Shifan.
Her steps were steady, her back straight, her expression calm.
As if this scene was nothing more than an ordinary day at court in her eyes.
But if anyone looked closely, they would see that the corner of her mouth was also twitching—even more violently than Luo Zhao’s.
Luo Zhao kept her eyes shut.
She didn’t want to look.
She really, truly didn’t want to look.
That man standing in the center of the hall, holding Cui Shifan’s hand and grinning like a blooming flower, was her Royal Tutor.
He was the core member of the Crown Princess’s faction, the man about to take office as the Minister of Rites.
He was also the same man who had spent the entire night at the Heavenly Master’s residence the day before, only to return and put on this performance for her today.
Luo Zhao didn’t even want to admit that she was Gu Chengyin’s student—let alone acknowledge that…
The methods Gu Chengyin used were ones she couldn’t even learn if she tried.
Though she was utterly disgusted by his shamelessness, disgusted enough to wish a crack in the ground would swallow her whole.
Disgusted enough to want to shout to the entire court that this man had nothing to do with her.
Disgusted enough that at this moment, all she wanted was to close her eyes and pretend she was an emotionless jade statue.
But that, precisely that, was Gu Chengyin’s brilliance.
A man like him would succeed anywhere.
Luo Zhao kept her eyes closed and sighed inwardly.
Then she opened her eyes and looked at the two hands still clasped together in the center of the hall.
At the flower-like smile still blooming on Gu Chengyin’s face, and at that layer of cold, icy chill hidden beneath the warmth in Cui Shifan’s eyes.
Even though her face remained expressionless, as if none of this had anything to do with her,
a voice drifted in from somewhere far away inside her heart and whispered:
Learned it.
One more trick learned.
. As long as he maintains the villain image and follows the plot to the grand finale, he can obtain generous rewards and return to the real world. So Gu Chen'an entered the role and began to act as a scumbag villain, but who would have expected that the female leads could hear his inner thoughts. Miss Su from the Su family was shocked: "I originally thought Gu Chen'an was a scumbag, but I didn't expect he turned out to be a gentleman! What? You said I have to call off the engagement? I definitely won't, I'll piss you off!" Bai Yuan Tian was dumbfounded: "Young Master Gu is usually unreasonable and a complete brat, but he actually calls me little sweetie in his heart? What, Young Master Gu even said he likes me?" As the female leads' images collapsed more and more, the plot also collapsed with it. Gu Chen'an looked at all this chaos. "Ladies, don't aggro me, if you keep this up the male lead really will stab me, I still need to survive to the grand finale!"
s + Rent Collection Wealth】 At the start, he inherited a rundown house in the urban village from his grandfather. The house had no tenants, but the moment he was diagnosed with a terminal illness, a self-proclaimed empress from the Tianxuan Continent arrived as his first tenant. Ye Chuan soon discovered that with every new tenant moving in, not only did he receive massive daily payments, but he also obtained unique items related to their backgrounds. 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Tiger Strength Pill—dramatically enhances physical power!】 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Deer Blood Pill—significantly boosts vitality!】 …… From that day on, all sorts of bizarre tenants began appearing in the house: the empress from Tianxuan Continent, an apocalyptic sorceress from the Magic Realm, a mysterious scientific girl who fell through a spacetime rift… Every single day, he received strange, powerful items and endless money. Then one day, he suddenly realized—he had become invincible. Enough, enough! Stop giving me more!
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
uld barely embark on the path to immortality. Just as he was on the verge of death, his golden finger awakened. No matter whether it was poison, drained blood and vital energy, diminished lifespan, or any other physical debuff caused by paying a price—once midnight passed, everything would be refreshed. From then on, whenever someone asked what kind of person Chu Ran was, the answer was simple: Forbidden arts that other cultivators dared not learn? Chu Ran would learn them. Prices that even demonic cultivators dared not pay? Chu Ran would pay them. Lifespan that even righteous cultivators dared not burn? Chu Ran would burn it. All the blood essence in his body? Take it. Want both his hands and feet? He would cut them off and send them to you. You say he’s finished? He wasn’t built to sit idle. You think he’s gone mad? No—he was simply waiting for midnight. From that day onward, Chu Ran would respect neither Heaven nor Earth, bow to neither gods nor ghosts. He had only one wish: For midnight to arrive a little sooner.
