On the surface, the Great Li capital of Shangyang City looked no different from how it had been before Li Musheng's departure. But beneath that surface, the entire imperial capital had already been quietly churning with enormous waves.
Li Musheng, however, returned as he always did, heading first to the Tianjin Guards main headquarters upon entering the capital.
His own residence was still being renovated, and was not yet ready to move into.
The Tianjin Guards headquarters remained imposing and formidable as ever. Armed guards stood at the entrance, and pedestrians and carriages passed along the main road in front without pause. To all appearances, everything was perfectly ordinary.
Cao Gaoshan brought the carriage to a gradual halt, and the guards at the gate immediately swept the carriage with a cautious gaze.
They did not recognize Li Musheng's carriage, nor did they recognize the coachman Cao Gaoshan.
One of the guards stepped forward to ask their purpose.
But right at that moment, a figure burst out from within the gate, arriving before the carriage and bowing from the waist without a moment's delay.
The guards froze at the sight, then looked at the Tianjin Guards Commissioner Yu Jin who had come running out.
"Your subordinate respectfully welcomes Your Highness's return."
Yu Jin clasped his hands and bowed deeply toward the carriage, his voice trembling with excitement.
From the moment he had received the message from Commander Fu Qiwen, he had been standing guard at the Tianjin Guards headquarters every single day, waiting for Li Musheng to come back.
And now, at last, he had.
At that moment, a big black cat leaped out of the carriage first and landed on the street surface, its green eyes looking curiously in every direction.
Yu Jin blinked, but then from the corner of his eye he saw Li Musheng and Shen Anran step down from the carriage.
"Commissioner Yu need not stand on ceremony."
Li Musheng waved a hand.
Yu Jin's voice carried a slight tremor as he said, "Thank you, Your Highness."
He then straightened slowly, though his gaze kept drifting with great difficulty toward Li Musheng.
In those eyes were reverence, excitement, astonishment, and more.
He still remembered clearly that when Li Musheng had first come to the Tianjin Guards, he had been the one to receive him.
At that time Li Musheng had not yet been formally recognized as a prince, and Yu Jin had not paid the man much particular attention.
Then Li Musheng had been recognized as a prince by Emperor Yuanwu and his standing had risen accordingly, but even then, Yu Jin's respect for the Eighth Prince had been largely one of position and rank.
But now everything was different. From the moment word came back that Li Musheng had led the Tianjin Guards to destroy Falling God Peak, the news had shaken the entire city like a stone thrown into still water.
Yu Jin had never for a moment imagined that Li Musheng, who had come from a border town and appeared to have no martial cultivation whatsoever, could possess strength this staggering and terrifying, enough to single-handedly cut down five of Falling God Peak's most powerful figures.
Honestly, when the news first arrived, his mind had gone completely blank. He had even thought he had heard it wrong.
But reality had told him, every word of it was true.
In a very short time, the news of Li Musheng destroying Falling God Peak had spread throughout all of Great Li and the wider martial world.
For the past several days, every street and alley in the imperial capital had been talking about it, and there was genuinely no one who had not heard.
"Commissioner Yu, stop staring. Let us go."
Seeing the man suddenly unable to walk because he was looking at him, Li Musheng raised an eyebrow.
At those words, Commissioner Yu Jin snapped back to himself immediately, and apologized with an anxious expression.
But after he saw that Li Musheng was not angry, he let out a long and relieved breath.
The figure standing before him was no longer merely the Great Li Eighth Prince. He was an existence who could crush Yu Jin to death with one finger. No amount of care in his presence was too much.
Yu Jin immediately bowed and moved ahead to lead the way, "Your Highness's quarters are cleaned every day. You may rest at any time."
Li Musheng gave a nod, cast a glance at the big black cat peering around with curiosity, then walked into the Tianjin Guards headquarters with Shen Anran.
The big black cat naturally caught Li Musheng's glance, and even though this was its first time in such a bustling capital city and everything before it was new and fascinating, it did not dare wander off, and obediently followed step for step.
As Li Musheng and the others went inside, the guards at the door looked at each other, and in each other's eyes could see clear shock.
They had heard everything Commissioner Yu Jin had said. The man had addressed the young person who stepped out of the carriage as "Your Highness," and this Highness had quarters in the Tianjin Guards headquarters.
Without any doubt, the answer leaped to the forefront of every mind.
"It is the Eighth Prince... that person is absolutely the Eighth Prince!"
One guard murmured the words, and every one of them felt a surge of emotion, barely able to contain their excitement.
None of them had ever imagined they would be this close to the Eighth Prince whose name had shaken the world, and moreover that it would happen to fall during their shift. It was as if they had struck the most extraordinary luck of their lives.
And while the guards were overwhelmed with excitement, the covert observers that each of the various forces in the capital had stationed around the Tianjin Guards headquarters, all there because of Li Musheng, had naturally also detected the unusual activity. One by one they quietly moved into action, slipping away to send word to their respective masters.
At that, Li Musheng returned to his quarters, then had Yu Jin arrange a small courtyard nearby for Shen Anran as well.
There was no other way. This impossibly beautiful girl who had her head full of romantic notions had clung to him without fail for the entire journey, and he could hardly send her off to an inn.
All of which, he privately decided, was entirely the fault of his face being too handsome, leaving her helplessly drawn in.
As for what came next, Li Musheng had things to do. Beyond waiting for the Hidden Kill Pavilion to make its move, there were the two Tianqi Secret Treasury keys still somewhere in Shangyang City that he needed to go and retrieve.
Beyond that, there was the matter of arranging for the Tianjin Guards to help him search for the divine beast Fire Qilin, for the Azure Dragon True Qi, and for other such extraordinary things. This was an important matter in the longer term.
After all, finding things like these was unlikely to yield results overnight and would require patience.
Of course, Li Musheng had also considered mobilizing the full weight of the Great Li court to help him search for what he needed.
But thinking it through, a move like that would present far too large a target. If some person or power working in the shadows decided to interfere, or caught on to his intentions and deliberately gathered or concealed the things he was looking for just to make things difficult for him, the disadvantages might outweigh the benefits.
With that thought, Li Musheng shook his head and merely reflected that Emperor Yuanwu was not pulling his weight. If the old man had already unified the other four nations before Li Musheng's identity as a prince had been confirmed, what concern would he have about any of this?
He could simply have the full resources of Great Li concentrate on finding Tianqi Secret Treasury keys, Fire Qilin, or whatever else was needed throughout the world, and it would be effortless.
"Spending a little more time is not the end of the world. I can only hope that good things come to those who wait."
Li Musheng let out a quiet inward sigh, then took comfort in the fact that his pursuit of martial transcendence had turned up several promising threads by now. If they could all be pursued in parallel, the gains should still be considerable.
"Your Highness, should your subordinate notify the imperial palace that you have returned to the capital?"
At that point Commissioner Yu Jin hesitated a moment, then spoke up.
Technically, reporting a prince's whereabouts to the Great Li imperial palace required no approval from the prince himself.
But the Eighth Prince Li Musheng was a different matter today than he had been before. Since the destruction of Falling God Peak, his name carried enormous weight in the Great Li court and among the people, already exceeding all other princes. And beyond that, his martial cultivation was beyond fathom, surpassing even Commander Fu Qiwen of the Tianjin Guards. On those two counts alone, the Great Li imperial palace was not in a position to push him around lightly.
At those words, Li Musheng raised an eyebrow and asked, "Has Emperor Yuanwu come out of seclusion yet?"
Yu Jin shook his head, "To the best of your subordinate's knowledge, His Majesty has still not left seclusion. Even the news of Falling God Peak's destruction being sent back did not bring His Majesty to court."
Li Musheng considered briefly, then waved a hand, "I am not planning to stay long this time, and I have no interest in getting involved in the tangled affairs of this capital. Do not pass word of my return. It will save trouble."
Of course, Li Musheng also understood that news of his return could probably not be kept quiet for long in any case.
But he did not particularly mind, and his tone shifted as he smiled, "That said, you may pass word of my return to my adopted sister. Tell her to come and pay her respects to this elder brother of hers who has now made his name known throughout the world, and not to neglect the proper courtesies."
At those words, Commissioner Yu Jin blinked, but said nothing further. He acknowledged the instruction and immediately withdrew.
...
At the same time, the imperial capital that had appeared so calm on the surface had already quietly begun to boil beneath it.
The eyes that various forces had placed inside and outside the Tianjin Guards headquarters were there specifically because of Li Musheng, and so the moment Li Musheng stepped through the Tianjin Guards gate, the various factions of the city had already learned of his arrival before the Tianjin Guards needed to say a word.
The first among them to learn of it was naturally Great Li's Right Minister Ji Song.
With Emperor Yuanwu still in closed-door seclusion, the Third Prince's funeral had been handled in a perfunctory manner. His body had been sealed in black ice to prevent decay and placed in the Third Prince's residence, awaiting the Emperor's emergence from seclusion so that he could see his third son one last time before burial in the imperial mausoleum.
Ever since Li Zhu's death, Right Minister Ji Song had been living almost continuously at the Third Prince's residence.
He had been consumed by the desire to avenge Li Zhu, and had not only brought in Second Prince Li Que but had also called in his last remaining debt of personal favor, reaching out to the Heavenly Mechanism Pavilion master, the man known as Youshan, asking him to help take Li Musheng's life.
But no news of success had come back, not even from the Heavenly Mechanism Pavilion.
Ji Song had sought out the Heavenly Mechanism Pavilion master several times during that period, but since Li Musheng had been traveling toward Falling God Peak without significant stops, and the Pavilion did not know his destination, it had been difficult to position capable fighters to act. They had done nothing but track his movements, waiting for an opening.
From first to last, the only capable fighter who had moved was the Formless Elder, who had died in the Shen family residence in Sheng Province without a sound, leaving only a body behind. Afterward no one had even learned his true identity.
And so Ji Song's grief and fury had been building through those days, layered over the investigation he was still pursuing into his daughter Consort Ji's death, while his health had been declining steadily.
Ji Song had once believed that with his power and his connections, avenging his daughter and his grandson would be manageable.
But all those illusions had been shattered by the news that came back from Lan Province some days ago.
It was only then that he had learned the truth. The person he had been so certain was responsible for his grandson's death, the person he had been willing to engage even the Heavenly Mechanism Pavilion to kill, had not fled the capital to escape. He had secretly taken the Great Li Tianjin Guards to Lan Province to destroy one of the four great forces of the martial world, Falling God Peak.
And what had struck Ji Song like a bolt from the sky, what he had been utterly unable to accept, was that Li Musheng had succeeded. And he had done it by turning the tide entirely on his own, singlehandedly cutting down five of Falling God Peak's top fighters.
As Great Li's Right Minister, he understood very clearly what Falling God Peak was, and he also understood that Emperor Yuanwu had long wanted to bring down these martial world sects but had not dared move against a single one of them.
And yet all of it had been done by Li Musheng.
After the thunderbolt of that news, Ji Song had already been able to confirm without any remaining doubt that it was Li Musheng who had killed Li Zhu.
But the despair he felt was in understanding that even knowing his enemy's name, he was powerless to seek revenge.
Setting aside the enormous merit Li Musheng had earned by destroying Falling God Peak, even if Emperor Yuanwu confirmed that he had killed Li Zhu, the Emperor would not order his death.
And given the terrifying level of martial cultivation that placed Li Musheng among the absolute top tier of the martial world, virtually no one who knew the target was Li Musheng would dare move against him.
Take Second Prince Li Que as an example. When Li Zhu's death first came to light, he had worn the face of a man shattered by grief, insisting with righteous conviction that he would kill Li Musheng and avenge Li Zhu.
But the moment the news of Li Musheng destroying Falling God Peak reached him, he severed all contact with Ji Song without a word and never set foot in the Third Prince's residence again.
Even when Ji Song went in person to call on him, Li Que refused to see him and made every effort to distance himself from Ji Song and Li Zhu, treating the association as something to be avoided like a venomous snake.
Clearly he was afraid of bringing disaster down on himself, and had no nerve whatsoever to provoke Li Musheng, who now carried a name that shook the world.
The situation with the Heavenly Mechanism Pavilion was not much better. Youshan had always considered himself a man who repaid every kindness and always followed through on his word.
But after the news came in and Ji Song reached out to him again, the attitude of the Pavilion master was clearly not what it had been.
Though the man had not entirely abandoned what he had agreed to, he had become visibly reluctant, and his words had grown vague and uncommitted.
In the past several days, Ji Song had dragged his increasingly aged and weakened body to seek an audience with him, only to find the man never showing himself, and with no way of knowing what the Pavilion master was actually thinking.
Before the coffin of Third Prince Li Zhu, Ji Song sat on the cold floor wearing only his single inner robe, the news of Li Musheng's return to the capital ringing in his ears.
His entire face was sunken and hollow, his eyes murky and dim, and his emaciated body shook with helpless trembling.
Then from within the white-draped mourning hall came the sound of coughing that could not be stopped.
Ji Song looked down at the blood he had coughed onto his own chest, his eyes full of grief, pain, and a powerless fury directed at himself.
A long time passed like this.
And then, within the vast and hollow silence of the mourning hall, a distant, drifting voice suddenly spoke.
"Minister Ji, do you still wish to seek revenge?"