The drawing room of the old mansion was filled with gentle light and the fragrance of red tea. The high quality tea from India perfectly covered the bitter smell of the other medicine, but it could not change the painful flavor. There was nothing to critique about how Lola drank the tea though. She did not even wrinkle her brows and was pleasingly beautiful. She was like a true noble lady—elegant, graceful and impossibly perfect. Whenever Ye Qingxuan saw this, he would involuntarily wonder where the evil Professor that he knew had gone.
"You’ve taken another large portion of the Pyramid King’s resources." Lola glanced at Ye. "Are you trying to take over the illegal trade market from the East?"
"Just helping you hide your tracks." Ye Qingxuan glanced back at her and replied in annoyance, "Even if you’re using the Pyramid King’s channels, there’s no need to use your own name for orders, right?"
"I can’t help it. The name ‘Professor’ has some power amongst the smugglers. Some risk is worth it." Lola patted the iron box between the two. "I used a lot of connections to get this stuff. I’m praising the Lord that it arrived safely."
"What’s in it?"
Lola raised her teacup and glanced at him. "You don’t want to look for yourself?"
Ye Qingxuan curled his lips and flipped the lid off, but then he froze. The giant iron box had been filled to the brim. There was a pipa with broken strings, a broken guqin, a huqin bored through by termites, a cracked xiao, a flute covered in hairline cracks…This entire iron box was…filled with broken instruments.
"Yes, all these instruments are broken," Lola stated. "They’re cheaper and have deeper resentment."
"Resentment?" Ye Qingxuan asked. "Inanimate objects have resentment too?"
"Of course not. It’s just something placed upon them by humans. If it’s positive, it can be known as its ‘spirit,’‘spirituality’ or something else…But there are still debates over whether this thing actually exists. Otherwise, the School of Choir and Revelations wouldn’t keep arguing about the existence of a soul every year. But it doesn’t matter. Some things feed on it…"
"Feed on thoughts?"
Lola smiled. Lifting a broken pipa string with her finger, she studied it. The pipa had been used for many years and multiple places had been worn smooth. It was clear that it had not been treated well and was damaged under aether stress. Parts of the inner layer had cracked apart. Two words were carved into the bottom of the pipa: Green Willow. This was its name.
"This should have been handed down through generations and used by musicians for centuries. Its spirit was born naturally and grew with the music scores for decades. That’s why it has deep resentment after being abandoned." Lola studied the instrument and suddenly tossed it at Ye Qingxuan. "Catch."
Ye Qingxuan panicked and caught it clumsily. The pipa landed in his arms with a slap. The instrument’s neck vibrated and a crack appeared. Then an endless chain of cracks and pops sounded. The paint on the pipa cracked too and grew dull. In the end, an entire layer of the pipa had broken off and fell to the ground like snow. It smelled like the dirt from an ancient tomb, with an eerie dampness.
"Uh, that’s not my fault." Ye Qingxuan panicked. "It’s all Jiu Xiao Huan Pei. I don’t know…"
"I know. No need to explain," Lola explained. "I bought these to help develop Jiu Xiao Huan Pei’s spirit. After being damaged for so many years, its spirit is pretty much all gone. Since you can’t use music scores to nourish it, it can only steal other people’s things."
"Its…spirit?"
"Instruments have spirits. A good instrument’s spirit can even resonate when in distress. Musicians need to use suitable music scores to nourish it, otherwise the spirit will disperse. I found all these abandoned instruments with deep resentment so Jiu Xiao Huan Pei can recover soon." Lola paused and glanced at Ye Qingxuan. "If it recovers during Deva sensing, it might even let you see what it sees."
"Really?" Ye Qingxuan strummed the instrument. Its sound spread out in all directions like a ripple and echoed within the old mansion. Everything in its path revealed a blurry silhouette, as if he was staring at them with his eyes.
Unlike the blurriness from before, Ye Qingxuan’s perception of the world had become clearer. He could even vaguely recognize the material of the objects.
"The recovery of its spirit will make Jiu Xiao Huan Pei more applicable. If it undergoes targeted absorption, it can improve its imitation of related instruments. Have you felt that it can’t do as much as you want when you use its modified versions? It’s not that easy to cross the chasm between Eastern and Western instruments."
Ye Qingxuan nodded in agreement. He had felt its limits when he changed Jiu Xiao Huan Pei into other instruments.
"It’ll change for the better after its spirit’s recovery. But with that, the operational difficulty will rise too. If you can’t reach the Musician level quickly, Jiu Xiao Huan Pei will ignore your playing after it absorbs all these instruments."
"…Then why would I still want it?"
"A millennium of the Ye family’s history is in this instrument. If you really don’t care, you can just let it die." Lola’s words made Ye Qingxuan speechless.
"Okay, okay, let it absorb more. Come on baby, eat slowly…" Ye Qingxuan picked up the instruments one by one and gave it to Jiu Xiao Huan Pei to nourish its spirit. He could feel that there really was something inside the instrument that was slowly recovering, but he still could not touch it.
It was a strange and fleeting feeling. No matter how many times he tried, he still could not touch a shred of the spirit. After trying dozens of times, he was sad enough to cry.
After the resentment in the third instrument was ingested, Ye Qingxuan felt his vision go black and he almost passed out. The flute in his hand fell back into the iron box.
"You should slow down. It uses your energy to ingest the resentment. Be careful you don’t get sapped dry."
"…Why didn’t you tell me something that important?!"
"It’s not too late yet."
-
Interrupted by her, Ye Qingxuan almost forget his other reason for coming. After resting for a bit, he pulled out a folded piece of paper and handed it to Lola. "Here, look at this."
"What is this?" Lola opened it and her brows quickly furrowed. "You want this?"
Ye Qingxuan nodded. "Do you have any scores that meet these requirements? It’s best if it’s easy so I can learn quickly."
"You really want to learn this?" Lola’s lips curled into a smile. It was clear she knew about Ye Qingxuan’s situation. "Seems like your school’s trial has made you desperate."
"I helped you so much and let you suck my blood every week like I’m a buffet. Can’t you pay me back?" Ye Qingxuan asked straightforwardly, "Do you have it or not?"
"Of course." Ye Qingxuan’s eyes brightened at Lola’s answer, but his heart dropped at her next words. "I know a bunch of similar effects, but as for ones that you can learn there’s…not much."
"Stop joking. I’m seriously desperate now," Ye Qingxuan sighed.
"For the sublimation ritual and Heart Mark music score?" Lola looked at him with a smile. "If you really want it, you can ask me for it. Or do you think that I don’t have enough money, or can’t create a Heart Mark? If you ask, I might be able to give you the nirvana that Mind musicians can only experience once in a lifetime."
Ye Qingxuan rolled his eyes. "Why don’t you just send two girls to warm my bed?"
"Are you being serious?" Lola leaned down and cocked her head at him with flirty eyes. She raised a pale finger and hooked her long hair behind her ears. Leaning over, she exhaled in his ears. Even her voice had become moist, with a charming yet lazy sweetness. "How can little girls be better than me? The moon spirits care much more about pleasure than humans…"
"I was wrong, I surrender. Stop playing." Ye Qingxuan raised his hands in defeat. "Just say you don’t have any. It’s okay. It’s rare for me to want to work hard, so why do you have to beat me down?"
Lola smiled. The dignity and calmness returned to her surface and she sat back down in the chair. She uttered the name of a music score and Ye Qingxuan froze, a bit doubtful.
"Are you sure I can learn it?" he asked.
"That depends on how much you put in." Lola toyed with the small conch in her hands and looked up at him. "Are you ready for nightmares?"
"Great." Ye Qingxuan sighed, suddenly feeling a headache coming. "I can’t wait."
-
Soon, Ye Qingxuan flipped through the extra resources in the library. Looking at the checklist, he realized something. "You’re still researching the parliament?"
"Yes. After the robin disappeared, the parliament went underground. Or rather, most of their businesses are still going on, but there’s not much that’s worth our attention."
"So everything they do has become legal?" Ye Qingxuan nodded. "They move stuff."
"That’s why they are dangerous. For centuries, they’ve become one with the city and can hide in the darkness whenever and wherever. We don’t even know where their true weaknesses are." Lola sighed. "For a while, the entire city was controlled by the parliament, until the Shaman appeared and destroyed their monopoly. But now, they’ve retracted and become even more careful. It’s harder to find anything that can be used against them."
"You’re still researching the robin?" Ye Qingxuan flipped to another book of information. "Did he really not die? You know how powerful the moonlight is. I don’t think Satan’s follower could withstand it."
"I cast a curse on him. The Originator will tell me if he dies, but there’s still no news."
Hearing this, Ye Qingxuan’s lips twitched. "Seems like getting lucky is the trend this year. But since I’m here, let me help. Get me some related accounts and information on import companies. Maybe we can do something with the equity."
"Now?" Lola looked up at the clock and shook her head after seeing it was ten at night. "It’s rare for us to meet up. Don’t say those boring things after we finished discussing such a mentally exhausting topic."
Ye Qingxuan froze, but she pulled the youth up with a smile and walked toward the candlelit dining room.
"Didn’t we say that we would eat together?" She gave an anticipating smile. "I made my special risotto with red wine. Teacher really liked it. You should try it."
Ye Qingxuan let her pull him around, but seeing her rare happiness, he could not help but feel a bit dismal. "Lola, I’m not my father," he said lightly. "Don’t get us mixed up."
"I know." Lola turned back. Seeing his shocked expression, she laughed and reached out to caress his cheeks. Her eyes softened. "We’re family, aren’t we?"
The drawing room of the old mansion was filled with gentle light and the fragrance of red tea. The high quality tea from India perfectly covered the bitter smell of the other medicine, but it could not change the painful flavor. There was nothing to critique about how Lola drank the tea though. She did not even wrinkle her brows and was pleasingly beautiful. She was like a true noble lady—elegant, graceful and impossibly perfect. Whenever Ye Qingxuan saw this, he would involuntarily wonder where the evil Professor that he knew had gone.
"You’ve taken another large portion of the Pyramid King’s resources." Lola glanced at Ye. "Are you trying to take over the illegal trade market from the East?"
"Just helping you hide your tracks." Ye Qingxuan glanced back at her and replied in annoyance, "Even if you’re using the Pyramid King’s channels, there’s no need to use your own name for orders, right?"
"I can’t help it. The name ‘Professor’ has some power amongst the smugglers. Some risk is worth it." Lola patted the iron box between the two. "I used a lot of connections to get this stuff. I’m praising the Lord that it arrived safely."
"What’s in it?"
Lola raised her teacup and glanced at him. "You don’t want to look for yourself?"
Ye Qingxuan curled his lips and flipped the lid off, but then he froze. The giant iron box had been filled to the brim. There was a pipa with broken strings, a broken guqin, a huqin bored through by termites, a cracked xiao, a flute covered in hairline cracks…This entire iron box was…filled with broken instruments.
"Yes, all these instruments are broken," Lola stated. "They’re cheaper and have deeper resentment."
"Resentment?" Ye Qingxuan asked. "Inanimate objects have resentment too?"
"Of course not. It’s just something placed upon them by humans. If it’s positive, it can be known as its ‘spirit,’‘spirituality’ or something else…But there are still debates over whether this thing actually exists. Otherwise, the School of Choir and Revelations wouldn’t keep arguing about the existence of a soul every year. But it doesn’t matter. Some things feed on it…"
"Feed on thoughts?"
Lola smiled. Lifting a broken pipa string with her finger, she studied it. The pipa had been used for many years and multiple places had been worn smooth. It was clear that it had not been treated well and was damaged under aether stress. Parts of the inner layer had cracked apart. Two words were carved into the bottom of the pipa: Green Willow. This was its name.
"This should have been handed down through generations and used by musicians for centuries. Its spirit was born naturally and grew with the music scores for decades. That’s why it has deep resentment after being abandoned." Lola studied the instrument and suddenly tossed it at Ye Qingxuan. "Catch."
Ye Qingxuan panicked and caught it clumsily. The pipa landed in his arms with a slap. The instrument’s neck vibrated and a crack appeared. Then an endless chain of cracks and pops sounded. The paint on the pipa cracked too and grew dull. In the end, an entire layer of the pipa had broken off and fell to the ground like snow. It smelled like the dirt from an ancient tomb, with an eerie dampness.
"Uh, that’s not my fault." Ye Qingxuan panicked. "It’s all Jiu Xiao Huan Pei. I don’t know…"
"I know. No need to explain," Lola explained. "I bought these to help develop Jiu Xiao Huan Pei’s spirit. After being damaged for so many years, its spirit is pretty much all gone. Since you can’t use music scores to nourish it, it can only steal other people’s things."
"Its…spirit?"
"Instruments have spirits. A good instrument’s spirit can even resonate when in distress. Musicians need to use suitable music scores to nourish it, otherwise the spirit will disperse. I found all these abandoned instruments with deep resentment so Jiu Xiao Huan Pei can recover soon." Lola paused and glanced at Ye Qingxuan. "If it recovers during Deva sensing, it might even let you see what it sees."
"Really?" Ye Qingxuan strummed the instrument. Its sound spread out in all directions like a ripple and echoed within the old mansion. Everything in its path revealed a blurry silhouette, as if he was staring at them with his eyes.
Unlike the blurriness from before, Ye Qingxuan’s perception of the world had become clearer. He could even vaguely recognize the material of the objects.
"The recovery of its spirit will make Jiu Xiao Huan Pei more applicable. If it undergoes targeted absorption, it can improve its imitation of related instruments. Have you felt that it can’t do as much as you want when you use its modified versions? It’s not that easy to cross the chasm between Eastern and Western instruments."
Ye Qingxuan nodded in agreement. He had felt its limits when he changed Jiu Xiao Huan Pei into other instruments.
"It’ll change for the better after its spirit’s recovery. But with that, the operational difficulty will rise too. If you can’t reach the Musician level quickly, Jiu Xiao Huan Pei will ignore your playing after it absorbs all these instruments."
"…Then why would I still want it?"
"A millennium of the Ye family’s history is in this instrument. If you really don’t care, you can just let it die." Lola’s words made Ye Qingxuan speechless.
"Okay, okay, let it absorb more. Come on baby, eat slowly…" Ye Qingxuan picked up the instruments one by one and gave it to Jiu Xiao Huan Pei to nourish its spirit. He could feel that there really was something inside the instrument that was slowly recovering, but he still could not touch it.
It was a strange and fleeting feeling. No matter how many times he tried, he still could not touch a shred of the spirit. After trying dozens of times, he was sad enough to cry.
After the resentment in the third instrument was ingested, Ye Qingxuan felt his vision go black and he almost passed out. The flute in his hand fell back into the iron box.
"You should slow down. It uses your energy to ingest the resentment. Be careful you don’t get sapped dry."
"…Why didn’t you tell me something that important?!"
"It’s not too late yet."
-
Interrupted by her, Ye Qingxuan almost forget his other reason for coming. After resting for a bit, he pulled out a folded piece of paper and handed it to Lola. "Here, look at this."
"What is this?" Lola opened it and her brows quickly furrowed. "You want this?"
Ye Qingxuan nodded. "Do you have any scores that meet these requirements? It’s best if it’s easy so I can learn quickly."
"You really want to learn this?" Lola’s lips curled into a smile. It was clear she knew about Ye Qingxuan’s situation. "Seems like your school’s trial has made you desperate."
"I helped you so much and let you suck my blood every week like I’m a buffet. Can’t you pay me back?" Ye Qingxuan asked straightforwardly, "Do you have it or not?"
"Of course." Ye Qingxuan’s eyes brightened at Lola’s answer, but his heart dropped at her next words. "I know a bunch of similar effects, but as for ones that you can learn there’s…not much."
"Stop joking. I’m seriously desperate now," Ye Qingxuan sighed.
"For the sublimation ritual and Heart Mark music score?" Lola looked at him with a smile. "If you really want it, you can ask me for it. Or do you think that I don’t have enough money, or can’t create a Heart Mark? If you ask, I might be able to give you the nirvana that Mind musicians can only experience once in a lifetime."
Ye Qingxuan rolled his eyes. "Why don’t you just send two girls to warm my bed?"
"Are you being serious?" Lola leaned down and cocked her head at him with flirty eyes. She raised a pale finger and hooked her long hair behind her ears. Leaning over, she exhaled in his ears. Even her voice had become moist, with a charming yet lazy sweetness. "How can little girls be better than me? The moon spirits care much more about pleasure than humans…"
"I was wrong, I surrender. Stop playing." Ye Qingxuan raised his hands in defeat. "Just say you don’t have any. It’s okay. It’s rare for me to want to work hard, so why do you have to beat me down?"
Lola smiled. The dignity and calmness returned to her surface and she sat back down in the chair. She uttered the name of a music score and Ye Qingxuan froze, a bit doubtful.
"Are you sure I can learn it?" he asked.
"That depends on how much you put in." Lola toyed with the small conch in her hands and looked up at him. "Are you ready for nightmares?"
"Great." Ye Qingxuan sighed, suddenly feeling a headache coming. "I can’t wait."
-
Soon, Ye Qingxuan flipped through the extra resources in the library. Looking at the checklist, he realized something. "You’re still researching the parliament?"
"Yes. After the robin disappeared, the parliament went underground. Or rather, most of their businesses are still going on, but there’s not much that’s worth our attention."
"So everything they do has become legal?" Ye Qingxuan nodded. "They move stuff."
"That’s why they are dangerous. For centuries, they’ve become one with the city and can hide in the darkness whenever and wherever. We don’t even know where their true weaknesses are." Lola sighed. "For a while, the entire city was controlled by the parliament, until the Shaman appeared and destroyed their monopoly. But now, they’ve retracted and become even more careful. It’s harder to find anything that can be used against them."
"You’re still researching the robin?" Ye Qingxuan flipped to another book of information. "Did he really not die? You know how powerful the moonlight is. I don’t think Satan’s follower could withstand it."
"I cast a curse on him. The Originator will tell me if he dies, but there’s still no news."
Hearing this, Ye Qingxuan’s lips twitched. "Seems like getting lucky is the trend this year. But since I’m here, let me help. Get me some related accounts and information on import companies. Maybe we can do something with the equity."
"Now?" Lola looked up at the clock and shook her head after seeing it was ten at night. "It’s rare for us to meet up. Don’t say those boring things after we finished discussing such a mentally exhausting topic."
Ye Qingxuan froze, but she pulled the youth up with a smile and walked toward the candlelit dining room.
"Didn’t we say that we would eat together?" She gave an anticipating smile. "I made my special risotto with red wine. Teacher really liked it. You should try it."
Ye Qingxuan let her pull him around, but seeing her rare happiness, he could not help but feel a bit dismal. "Lola, I’m not my father," he said lightly. "Don’t get us mixed up."
"I know." Lola turned back. Seeing his shocked expression, she laughed and reached out to caress his cheeks. Her eyes softened. "We’re family, aren’t we?"
