Changliu and Ye Feisheng - Chapter 7

Zhongli Feng fell asleep in the carriage.

My mistress stroked her head, her gaze gentle.

Watching her, I suddenly laughed.

She glanced at me. “What’s funny?”

“You called Immortal Manor a ‘small’ subordinate branch of the Changming Order…”

I covered my mouth and turned away, my shoulders shaking.

She rolled her eyes.

“Modesty. Ever heard of it? Modesty!”

“Too modest! That was much too modest! Hahahaha!”

I laughed so hard I pounded the carriage wall.

Zhongli Feng opened her eyes blearily. “Is that thunder…? Is it raining?”

My mistress had nothing to say.

—

Back at Immortal Manor, she handed Zhongli Feng to Jingxian.

“Take good care of her.”

Jingxian nodded. Without asking a single question, she carried the girl away.

My mistress asked me to take her to the Pavilion of Secrets.

Fresh intelligence from across the land was already piled high.

She sat at her desk and began her daily work.

Not daring to disturb her, I slipped out to make tea.

—

Immortal Manor was not a small branch of the Changming Order.

Quite the opposite. It was the Order’s most important component. Calling it the heart of the Order would be no exaggeration.

Once, the Divine Sovereign had kept that heart beating. Now my mistress did.

Few people knew that Immortal Manor had no real repository of intelligence.

Yingshi recorded and filed things every day, but none of the information passing through her hands was particularly important.

It was for show.

Even so, from the day it was established, her archive had suffered countless break-ins and thefts.

Outsiders all assumed that was where Immortal Manor stored its secrets.

They were wrong.

All the realm’s intelligence resided in one person.

Ye Feisheng.

Through her eyes and into her mind, beyond anyone’s reach.

The young masters of Nethermarsh and the Guixu Bureau resented her. Why had she been granted the surname Ye? Why did she control the all-important Immortal Manor? Why should she stand above them?

If they knew what she did every day, they wouldn’t think that way.

When Lady Jinzhu said my mistress most resembled the Divine Sovereign, people thought she meant her looks, temperament, and bearing.

She didn’t.

She meant that the Divine Sovereign, too, had once kept all that intelligence in her own head.

With her extraordinary memory, she had created the illusion of a goddess who knew everything under heaven.

After she retired, no one could attain that same height.

Until my mistress appeared.

She, too, could hold countless pieces of intelligence in her mind alone.

When Lady Jinzhu discovered this, her eyes lit up with astonishing intensity.

She immediately appointed her young mistress of Immortal Manor.

Soon afterward, the Divine Sovereign bestowed the surname Ye upon her.

The Divine Sovereign’s intentions were already perfectly clear.

Only my mistress had been granted that surname. Was there really any question whose hands the Changming Order would ultimately pass into?

Besides, she governed Immortal Manor.

Nethermarsh and the Guixu Bureau appeared to be its equals. In reality, everyone knew Immortal Manor could requisition their personnel whenever it needed them.

Those two organizations were merely its blood supply.

And their young masters were still squabbling. What was there to fight over?

Did they really have no idea how far beneath her they stood?

I couldn’t stand people with no self-awareness.