Chapter 43

Pei Du first used a handkerchief to wipe the fluffy chest of Shen Jiujiu, who had just drunk some water. Then he folded the handkerchief neatly and set it aside before taking the Little Bird Brush from his pouch and carefully fastening it onto Shen Jiujiu.

Shen Jiujiu lifted his wings. “Chirp chirp chirp chirp?”

Pei Du answered without a care for anyone else. “Mm. You go chat with Madam Xie for now. I’ll handle matters with Yueshi.”

Shen Jiujiu nodded solemnly. Then, wings raised and long tail feathers trailing, he pattered over to Xie Jingtang and gazed up at her with eager, excited bird eyes.

Pei Du pointed to the table and chairs partitioned off behind the private room’s screen, his smile as warm and gentle as a spring breeze. “I’ve prepared paper behind the screen. Madam Xie, why don’t you and Jiujiu have a little heart-to-heart first.”

Pei Du clearly had no intention of letting the Yueshi High Priestess join his conversation with Xie Jingtang, and she was more than happy to oblige. But…

She could certainly entertain the Little Bird Dumpling for a while, but talk?

What was she supposed to say?

And how?

Xie Jingtang was still baffled when Shen Jiujiu, impatient as could be, began lightly batting at her wrist with his wing and pointing insistently toward the screen.

The little bird was dying to shed his disguise!

And so, utterly bewildered, Xie Jingtang scooped up the Little Bird Dumpling and stepped away from the table.

Once Xie Jingtang and Shen Jiujiu had gone, Pei Du lowered his gaze to sip his tea. When he looked up again, his brows and eyes gleamed with unmistakable authority.

“High Priestess, your daring journey into the capital suggests the great drought in the Western Regions is all too real.”

The two kingdoms of the Western Regions stood in opposition, yet both subtly revered the same deity. As that god’s favored kin—legendarily able to commune with the divinities of heaven and earth—the High Priestess commanded immense prestige across both lands.

This generation’s High Priestess hailed from Yueshi. Even after decades, her face remained as fresh and lovely as a young girl’s, and she was said to possess the greatest spiritual power in the Western Regions in nearly a century.

Before encountering Shen Jiujiu, Pei Du had shared the typical scholar’s skepticism toward such matters: a gentleman does not discuss anomalies, feats of strength, chaos, or spirits.

Besides, even if gods and ghosts truly existed, they held no relevance to Pei Du.

Had Shen Jiujiu not been in the picture, the Yueshi High Priestess’s visit would have given Pei Du the perfect chance to flay a layer of flesh from both Western Regions kingdoms, deal or no deal.

A drought beyond the borders was no trifling matter. People cornered by desperation grew more savage than any beast.

With the Great Zhou Dynasty’s internal affairs in turmoil, it was far from an ideal time for war. Yet if some grain could weaken those frontier powers, neither the cautious Emperor and Empress Dowager nor the ease-loving Prince Wu would object.

Pei Du could then siphon a portion through back channels to aid the border garrison.

But now…

He would yield no profits he ought not to, nor pass up a chance to press the Western Regions. Still, atop those calculations, he could afford the people there a slight reprieve.

The High Priestess clearly grasped as much and cut straight to the chase. “Shen Xinian has indeed passed away—but a faint thread of hope remains.”

“There are Great Fortune Bearers in this world, whose very existence bears the destinies of millions. Lord Pei is one. His Majesty is one. Even Prince Wu is one.”

She spoke slowly, each trailing syllable laced with a faint, ethereal quiver, her tone carrying a detached compassion bordering on pity.

“Shen Xinian was a child who should never have been born. Xie Jingtang burned through her own fortune to preserve his soul, but it wasn’t enough to let him grow up safely.”

“That’s why his breaths come labored, his body frail and prone to illness. He cannot be seen by others… No pulse reader or fortune teller sees anything but the mark of an early grave.”

“Lord Pei,” the High Priestess sighed softly, “this world will not allow him to exist.”

“Three years ago, Xie Jingtang was driven from Jiangnan. Without her protection, Shen Xinian should have drowned in the river—never to set foot in the Examination Hall, let alone claim glory on the gold lists.”

Back then, Xie Jingtang had consulted a true master for Shen Xinian’s fate. The seer had discerned the boy’s death calamity in water, with no hope of reaching manhood, and so named him Xinian to suppress the aura of death.

After fleeing the capital, Xie Jingtang had never made Shen Xinian take her surname. Partly to leave him an escape route, and partly for fear it would undermine the name’s protective power.

“But just as that calamity descended, Shen Xinian met someone.”

“A Great Fortune Bearer who granted him temporary shelter.”

Pei Du’s fingers tightened abruptly on his teacup, then eased without a trace.

“This person may not have meant to shelter Shen Xinian. But in that fleeting moment, as he pulled the boy from peril, he sincerely wished for this youth to survive—to take the imperial examinations in peace.”

“And so Shen Xinian’s fortune was renewed, his life strung along a little longer.”

“Isn’t it utterly unreasonable, the way the world dotes on Great Fortune Bearers?”

The High Priestess seemed to smile, though bitterness tinged her lips.

God, if you truly behold your faithful, why do those favored by the world—all of them—hail from Great Zhou soil?

She fell silent there, plainly awaiting Pei Du’s show of good faith.

Pei Du sat motionless and wordless for a long stretch, betraying no tells. No one could fathom his thoughts.

In that moment, a muffled thud erupted from behind the screen.

Xie Jingtang slammed the table and shot to her feet, fury blazing like a lioness whose reverse scale had been trod. “What did you say?!”

“He treats you like a bed-warmer?!”