“Hey, Wū Sù, I’m heading out to see the lantern festival tonight, so… could you take my shift for me? Pretty please?”
From behind the lush, verdant trees and shrubs of the courtyard in early summer came a voice as sweet and lilting as the song of an oriole.
Wū Sù’s bedroom door was flung open without warning. The visitor hadn’t even knocked.
She paused mid-stroke, her hand still holding the comb against her hair, and turned around.
The window behind the vanity mirror was open wide, and the brilliant afternoon sunlight poured in, falling across her serene, gentle face.
Wū Sù’s gaze drifted toward the doorway.
Wèi Lì’s pert, sweet little face appeared at the door, and she grinned at Wū Sù.
“I made plans with someone and I can’t just cancel on them. Come on, Wū Sù, just cover for me!”
She batted her eyes in a coaxing, wheedling sort of way.
Wū Sù’s dark, clear eyes narrowed ever so slightly.
The corners of her lips lifted a fraction. She thought this was probably what a friendly smile looked like.
“Su~re—” she said, drawing out the last syllable, hitting the rising-falling tone with a slightly heavy emphasis, with the awkward quality of someone still learning a language.
“Hehe, Wū Sù, you’re the best! I’m off then!” Wèi Lì pulled the door shut with a bang.
Wū Sù held a white wooden comb in her hand. When Wèi Lì had come in, she’d only been half done with her hair.
Now, her hand moved slowly downward, the white comb sliding through her dense black hair all the way to the ends.
She knew Wèi Lì was a maidservant in a wealthy household, the most ordinary kind, without even the standing to serve her master directly.
Wū Sù remembered that this residence was called the Jìng Prince’s Estate, and she had never once laid eyes on its master.
But none of that mattered. She only needed to work diligently and earn her keep.
The capital city of Yún Dū had been lively these past few days, though she hadn’t felt much of it herself. She was a yāo; human emotions were something she had limited capacity to understand.
{Notes: Yāo (妖) is a Chinese character and concept referring to a supernatural, often malevolent being with eldritch, seductive, or sinister qualities. While often translated as “demon” or “monster,” yāo specifically connotes supernatural allure, enchantment, and deviation from natural order. It is not inherently evil but is typically dangerous. In Chinese mythology, yāo creatures often originate from animals (like foxes, snakes, or tigers), plants, or even inanimate objects that have lived for centuries and achieved self-awareness through Taoist cultivation (修炼).}
Wū Sù was a yāo born of primordial chaos-energy. She was unable to absorb the ordinary spiritual energy that filled the world.
Instead, she could only absorb the undifferentiated yin-yang energy that living beings released at the moment of death. In exchange, she would fulfill the dying soul’s final earthly obsession.
The reason she had come to stay in the Jìng Prince’s Estate was to fulfill the last wish of a deceased human; this was how she made her living.
Wū Sù gazed quietly at her reflection in the mirror.
She possessed no breathtaking beauty; nothing that would leave a deep impression on the hearts of others.
Her features were soft and delicately defined, as though drawn by the careful, deliberate hand of a painter.
Wū Sù blinked. Her eyes were strikingly clear: the contrast between the bright white of her sclera and the pure black of her irises was sharp, giving her gaze an inhuman, crystalline coldness.
She sat there in a daze for a moment. Before long, the steward in charge of managing the maidservants sent someone to deliver supplies to the room.
Wū Sù heard the noise outside the door, rose from her seat, and went to collect the uniform she would need for tonight’s shift.
The west courtyard of the Jìng Prince’s Estate, where she lived, was exceedingly strict when it came to receiving guests.
In order to ensure that noble visitors could find no fault, every servant was required to wear a uniform set of clothing and accessories.
When attending guests, the servants were also required to take a Qiānyán Dān, a pill that altered one’s appearance, so that everyone wore the same standard face: a handsome man’s or a beautiful woman’s, all identical.
Today was not originally her shift, but her fellow maidservant Wèi Lì, who lived in the same courtyard, had asked her to fill in. And so, Wū Sù went.
To outsiders, Wū Sù seemed honest, easy to push around, and not terribly bright, so whenever something needed doing, it got piled onto her.
She had done extra work for them time and again without so much as a word of thanks.
But then, if she wasn’t working, Wū Sù simply sat idle and blank anyway, she didn’t particularly mind.
Wū Sù stepped out of her room, her long hair still loose, falling over the shoulders of her white garments.
She saw Wèi Lì in the courtyard, using the fading twilight to do her makeup, carefully weaving small flower branches into her braids.
She understood that Wèi Lì was going to meet her sweetheart among the estate’s guards and stroll with him through the evening lantern festival.
There was another young woman in the courtyard named Lín Mèng. Wū Sù and she were to work the same shift tonight.
When Lín Mèng saw Wū Sù come out, she drifted over toward Wèi Lì’s side.
Wū Sù picked up the brocade box left on the courtyard table. Inside were the standard uniform and accessories of the west courtyard of the Jìng Prince’s Estate, far finer in quality than anything Wū Sù usually wore.
“Lín Mèng, shall we go together tonight?” Wū Sù asked, her voice soft, her eyes fixed on Lín Mèng.
“I’m seeing Wèi Lì out of the estate first. Go on your own.” Lín Mèng glanced at her briefly, her expression carrying a subtle distance.
Wū Sù couldn’t read that distance at all.
She went back to her room, took the pearl earrings from the brocade box, and unhurriedly clipped them onto her earlobes.
On the hand she raised, there hung a strange-looking ring, shaped like a black-and-white moth.
All of a sudden, the moth’s wings trembled, struggling as though trying to fly.
But its wings were broken. A trickle of primordial chaos energy appeared at Wū Sù’s fingertips, gently supporting the moth as it beat its wings.
“It’s getting dark, go play,” Wū Sù said, her voice light and soft, like a gentle hand soothing a dying soul.
She narrowed her eyes and watched quietly as the moth circled around her, making every effort to fly.
Wū Sù could also absorb the dying energy of plants and small creatures.
The moth that had rested on her finger had only recently broken free of its cocoon, yet it was already near death.
Its wings had been broken from birth. It could not fly. It would not survive more than a few days.
Earlier that day, Wū Sù had picked it up and made a small exchange with it.
She used her magic to help the little moth move its wings. When the moth died, it would give her its final energy in return.
By now the dusk was deepening. Wū Sù draped a gauze shade over the lamp by the table and lit it.
“Look, the moon is outside,” she said, pointing to the moonlight beyond the window, speaking to the moth.
“I have things I need to do. I won’t keep you company.”
The moth’s wings were wound round with black and white energy, and it fluttered and stumbled its way outward.
Wū Sù lent it a strand of her own essence to sustain its flight.
And so, as Wū Sù sat at her mirror finishing her preparations, she could also receive impressions through the moth’s perspective.
The lanterns in the Jìng Prince’s Estate were being lit one by one. Two young women walked arm in arm, whispering secrets to each other.
“Ā Mèng, what a shame, you’re working tonight too, so you can’t come out with me.”
Wèi Lì leaned affectionately into Lín Mèng’s arm as she spoke.
“Honestly, I feel sorry for you, having to work alongside Wū Sù. I’m worried she’ll drag you down.”
“Ha! Tonight the Jìng Prince’s Estate is hosting very important guests, I’ve never seen Steward Lù take things this seriously. They’re even using the Qiānyán Dān. If she’s as clumsy as usual, hopefully she’ll make a mess and get thrown out by the steward.”
“She really should be thrown out. Someone like her, how is she the same as us, staying in the Jìng Prince’s Estate? I saw her passing a message to the kitchen the other day, and she’d written a character wrong. Obviously she’s barely had any schooling at all. She’s just an ordinary country girl.”
“She’s not sharp, and she’s not efficient either. I have no idea how she managed to stay in the Jìng Prince’s Estate. I heard our Steward Lù has a… soft spot for her…”
Wèi Lì gathered her skirt, touched the flower branches braided into her hair, and made a hushing sound.
“Don’t go saying things like that. We got in on our own merit. Not like her.”
She held a delicate flower lantern in her other hand. The broken-winged moth released by Wū Sù spotted the light inside the lantern and dizzyingly lurched straight toward it.
“Ahh—!” Two shrill cries rang out. Wèi Lì and Lín Mèng recoiled from the grotesque-looking insect.
Lín Mèng swatted it with her folding fan, knocking the moth to the ground. The black-and-white energy Wū Sù had threaded through it dissipated in an instant.
An embroidered slipper came down on the body of the broken-winged moth. The two beauties gathered their skirts and ran off screaming.
Back in her room, Wū Sù sat alone at her mirror and suddenly opened her eyes. Her calm gaze was utterly still; not a ripple.
She stuck the tip of her tongue out toward the mirror. In her mouth was a Qiānyán Dān she had just swallowed.
The pill dissolved, and an invisible current of energy washed across her cheeks.
The plain, gentle face in the mirror was replaced by a standardized beauty.
Wū Sù went to the spot where Lín Mèng and Wèi Lì had just been standing.
She crouched down and leisurely pinched up a bit of sand and gravel from nearby, covering the moth’s little body.
At the same time, an extremely faint trace of near-death energy settled onto her fingertips. Wū Sù parted her lips and absorbed it.
She felt a little more sated, but only just. In a few days, she would have to go find something else small and dying.
That night, Yún Dū welcomed back a great figure. With the Ceremony of Heaven Worship approaching, the legendary Ninth Imperial Highness would, as was customary, return to Yún Dū to preside over the rites.
There were many stories about this Ninth Highness. From the Emperor down to the common people, all of Yún Dū held him in admiration and reverence.
Before his return, the eight princes and princesses above the Ninth Highness in seniority had quarreled bitterly over who would host his welcome banquet.
In the end, the matter was decided by drawing lots. The Fourth Prince, Jìng Wang, emerged victorious, and the Guānlán Pavilion, his estate’s grand reception hall built in the west courtyard, finally had its moment to shine.
Péi Jiǔ Zhī returned to Yún Dū without any fanfare or procession.
Within the capital, the colorful lanterns lit for blessings turned the night as bright as day. A single white horse made its way through the bustling streets.
The rider wore a clean, sharp blue-green robe and a wide-brimmed bamboo hat, his head tilted slightly forward as he gazed ahead.
What showed below the hat’s brim was a pale, refined lower face, thin lips carrying a trace of cool detachment, pressed together in grave solemnity, forming an arc of deep, quiet authority.
On his back, a long sword gleamed with clear, brilliant light, its scabbard wrapped in a strip of plain white silk that concealed the blade’s radiance.
In the streets of Yún Dū, a girl with flower-braided hair walked hand in hand with a young man behind her.
The tide of people flowed endlessly back and forth. The sound of hoofbeats receded into the distance, passing through it all like a breath of cool wind and continued on, toward the Jìng Prince’s Estate.
This was Wū Sù’s first time inside the Guānlán Pavilion.
The entire magnificent structure was built upon an artificial lake dug into the earth.
The moon in the sky was reflected in the water below, glimmering in distant conversation with the banquet hall crowning the pavilion above.
Wū Sù thought the great pavilion looked like a radiant, enormous beast. She glanced at it once and looked away.
A winding nine-bend gallery bridge connected the shore to the Guānlán Pavilion, and Wū Sù walked along it at an unhurried pace.
The food box she carried in her arms was scalding hot, its bottom filled with water to keep the dishes warm. She didn’t dare be careless, holding it with careful, deliberate hands.
Ahead of her and behind her, maidservants with identical faces walked with their heads bowed.
In the Prince’s Estate, a striking appearance was not what was needed. Making no errors was the safest way to conduct oneself.
Once inside the Guānlán Pavilion, Wū Sù presented a dish to the guest seated at the far end of the table, then lowered her head and eyes and withdrew, rested briefly, and went back in to serve the next course.
The singing and dancing inside the pavilion was light and melodious; the guests were in high spirits. Wū Sù had no idea who was at the banquet — she only knew it was a very grand affair, and that it went on until deep into the night.
Behind the Guānlán Pavilion, a full moon hung high. Its cool silver light poured in through the latticed floor-windows, swallowed by the blazing warmth of the lanterns inside.
Wū Sù held her dish and waited for the master’s order to serve it.
This was her final serving round, the work after this belonged to other attendants.
She stood in an unremarkable corner of the hall and quietly yawned.
The Jìng Prince’s Estate had seen few deaths of late, and she had been feeling hungry more often than not. When she was hungry, she grew drowsy.
The master of the Guānlán Pavilion, Jìng Wang, sat in the guest-of-honor seat, attending upon Péi Jiǔ Zhī at his lower right. Behind the Prince stood a strikingly handsome man dressed in black robes, who bowed respectfully toward Péi Jiǔ Zhī.
He presented an incense burner, withdrew a stick of incense, and carefully lit it. In an instant, a wonderful, exotic fragrance suffused the entire Guānlán Pavilion.
Jìng Wang smiled. “Jiǔ Zhī, this is a renowned incense master from a foreign land. I called on him again and again before he finally agreed to come.”
Péi Jiǔ Zhī lowered his gaze, glanced briefly at the incense master tending the burner, and gave Jìng Wang only a faint nod. His manner was distant and indifferent.
“Ah…” Jìng Wang sighed.
“Jiǔ Zhī, ever since you began your study of the sword, you’ve grown colder and colder.”
“I have not,” Péi Jiǔ Zhī replied, his voice low and shadowed, like the moon obscured behind a layer of clouds.
As the strange fragrance drifted through the Guānlán Pavilion, Wū Sù was privately noting that the incense really did smell extraordinary.
But she had only breathed in a few extra lungfuls before she began to feel light-headed.
She was not ordinarily the sort to pay attention to what went on around her.
Yet when Péi Jiǔ Zhī spoke inside the hall, she lifted her eyes, trying to make out his face. She didn’t succeed.
Several layers of sheer, gauze-draped curtains kept the servants’ prying gazes at bay.
Wū Sù felt a peculiar sensation welling up inside her. She furrowed her brow then heard the call to serve the next dish, and hurried out with it.
She could feel her body slipping somewhat out of her control, as though she had been poisoned.
Acting on the instinct to avoid danger, she made her way out of the Guānlán Pavilion as quickly as she could.
Inside the pavilion, the fragrance still drifted through the air. The incense master in black robes kept his eyes lowered, fanning the stick in the burner so that it burned more brightly.
The fire in the incense burner had been kindled using an old possession of Péi Jiǔ Zhī’s. A faint smile surfaced on the incense master’s face.
He dimly recalled the moment he had received this particular stick of incense and the voice that had spoken to him, like the murmuring of a dream:
“This incense is called the Yǐqíng Incense. Using a personal object belonging to Péi Jiǔ Zhī as the ignition point — light one end, and by the time it burns to the other end, it will draw every fearsome and wicked yāo within eight hundred lǐ to come without hesitation… and spend the night with him in passionate union. The more powerful the yāo that comes, the less Péi Jiǔ Zhī will be able to resist. How many yāo lie hidden beneath Yún Dū, I think you already understand.”
Wū Sù stepped outside the Guānlán Pavilion. With some distance from the incense, a measure of her clarity slowly returned.
She gulped in mouthfuls of air, but the fragrance would not dissipate — it had even seeped out here.
The night was deep. The shadows beneath the Guānlán Pavilion swayed. Midnight had just passed when the world in front of Wū Sù went dark, she could suddenly see nothing at all.
She was a yāo born of primordial chaos, and had no natural seven orifices from birth.
After taking on human form, she lost one of her five senses for four days each month in rotation: sight, hearing, speech, smell. Tonight she had lost her sight.
Being a yāo, she could still perceive the world around her through her other senses, and her ability to move was unaffected.
She smoothed down her skirt, straightened the pearl earring at her ear, and paid no mind to the strange fragrance. She prepared to leave.
Her work was done, after all.
But at that moment, Lín Mèng grabbed her arm.
“Wū Sù, I want to go back and rest early. Will you take the last dish up for me?”
Wū Sù turned back. She furrowed her brow faintly, her voice soft as a night-time ghost: “Lín Mèng, I can’t tonight.”
The fragrance was strange and dangerous. She also couldn’t see. Going back into the Guānlán Pavilion wasn’t wise.
“You switched shifts for Wèi Lì without a second thought, so why won’t you help me with this one little thing?”
Lín Mèng complained: “What do you mean you can’t?”
“…Give it here, then.” Wū Sù let out a quiet sigh.
Using warmth and the feel of the air around her, she sensed the rough outline of Lín Mèng’s form and gave her a small nod.
She knew the incense in the Guānlán Pavilion was dangerous.
And yet, there was something inside the Guānlán Pavilion that seemed to draw her in as well, pulling at her, making her agree to Lín Mèng before she even knew it.
Wū Sù took the food box from Lín Mèng’s hands and once again walked toward the Guānlán Pavilion.
Translation Notes
{Note: Jìng Prince’s Estate (靖王府 — Jìng Wáng Fǔ)} In imperial China, a wáng (王) was a prince of the highest non-imperial rank, typically a son of the Emperor granted a title and a noble domain. Their official residence was called a wáng fǔ (王府) , Prince’s Estate or Prince’s Mansion. Jìng (靖) means “tranquil” or “to pacify.” These estates were large, walled compounds housing not only the prince and his family but dozens to hundreds of servants, stewards, guards, and dependents arranged in strict hierarchies. Maidservants at the bottom of this hierarchy, like Wū Sù, might never interact with the prince directly.
{Note: Qiānyán Dān (千颜丹 — “Thousand-Face Pill”)} A fictional magical drug unique to this novel’s setting. Qiān (千) means “thousand,” yán (颜) means “face/appearance,” and dān (丹) is the classical word for an alchemical pill or elixir — a staple of Daoist cultivation lore and xianxia fiction. The dān tradition stems from centuries of Daoist alchemy (liàn dān shù 炼丹术), where immortality-seekers attempted to concoct life-extending elixirs. In xianxia fiction, dān of all varieties — for healing, power, disguise — are commonplace.
{Note: Jìng Wang / The Fourth Prince (靖王 / 四皇子)} Wáng here functions as a title: “Prince Jìng” or “the Jìng Prince.” He is also referred to as the Fourth Prince (Sì Huángzǐ), indicating his birth order among the Emperor’s sons. Chinese imperial succession and court politics were frequently organized around the numbered ranking of imperial children, making birth order a charged political fact.
{Note: Ceremony of Heaven Worship (祭天大典 — Jì Tiān Dàdiǎn)} A grand state ritual in which the Emperor (or his designated representative) offered sacrifices to Heaven (Tiān) to affirm the imperial family’s divine mandate to rule — known as the Tiānmìng (天命, “Mandate of Heaven”). These ceremonies were deeply serious affairs in Chinese imperial governance, with the Emperor acting as the intermediary between humanity and the cosmos. In xianxia fiction, such ceremonies often carry additional supernatural weight.
{Note: Guānlán Pavilion (观澜阁 — Guānlán Gé)} Guān (观) means “to observe/gaze,” lán (澜) means “waves” or “ripples,” and gé (阁) denotes a multi-storied pavilion — a refined architectural form associated with scholars, nobles, and scenic overlooks in classical Chinese settings. The name evokes “gazing upon the rippling waters,” befitting its location on an artificial lake.
{Note: Nine-Bend Gallery Bridge (九曲回廊缦桥 — Jiǔ Qū Huíláng Màn Qiáo)} A jiǔ qū qiáo (九曲桥, literally “nine-bend bridge”) is a traditional Chinese garden feature — a zigzagging bridge built over water. The bends are said to ward off evil spirits, who can only travel in straight lines. Such bridges are iconic in classical Chinese garden design, most famously found in Yu Garden in Shanghai.
{Note: Jiāo Xiāo Ruǎn Zhàng (鲛绡软帐 — “Gauze curtains of shark-silk”)} Jiāo xiāo (鲛绡) is a mythological fabric woven from the tears of jiāorén (鲛人) — mermaid-like beings in Chinese legend. It is an extremely rare and precious material, a byword for the finest, most diaphanous silk imaginable. Using this material for curtains signals the extraordinary wealth and status of the Jìng Prince’s Estate. The term appears frequently in classical Chinese poetry to evoke ethereal beauty and rareness.
{Note: Qī Qiào (七窍 — Seven Orifices)} In traditional Chinese medicine and cosmology, the human head has seven openings (qī qiào): two eyes, two ears, two nostrils, and one mouth. These orifices are considered the channels through which a person perceives the world and through which vital energy (qì) flows. The phrase qī qiào shēng yān (七窍生烟, “smoke rising from all seven orifices”) is a common idiom for extreme rage. For Wū Sù — a chaos-born yāo — to lack these orifices from birth marks her as fundamentally non-human, having had to construct her human form piece by piece.
{Note: Yǐqíng Incense (旖情香 — “Enchantment-of-Love Incense”)} Yǐ (旖) carries a meaning of soft, graceful, and romantically enchanting; qíng (情) means feeling, love, or desire. Together yǐqíng evokes a languid, irresistible romantic spell — the name itself signals that this is a love-manipulating magical drug in incense form, a classic xianxia plot device.
{Note: Bā Bǎi Lǐ (八百里 — “Eight Hundred Lǐ”)} A lǐ (里) is a traditional Chinese unit of distance, approximately 500 meters. Eight hundred lǐ equals roughly 400 kilometers — signaling the enormous supernatural potency of the Yǐqíng Incense, capable of drawing yāo from an entire vast region.
{Note: Bā Shān Yún Yǔ (巫山云雨 — “Clouds and Rain of Mount Wū”)} A classical literary euphemism for sexual union, derived from a famous fù (prose poem) by the Warring States–era poet Sòng Yù. In it, a king dreams of a goddess on Mount Wū who declares she becomes the morning clouds and the evening rain. The phrase entered the language as one of the most enduring poetic metaphors for romantic and sexual intimacy, and remains widely recognized in Chinese literature and culture today.
