Great character-driven chapter.
There, lounging on the railing was a beautiful woman with long golden hair and fair features, wearing a scandalous pale rose gown that left her shoulders bare and displayed a near indecent part of her generous chest. The hem of the gown barely fell past her knees, and rode almost halfway up her thigh thanks to the position she was seated in. Ling Qi barely had time to pause and take the sight of her in, along with the unsettling fact that she had not felt her presence at all, before the woman vanished in a flash of light, leaving a fox with pale golden fur and five tails to leap down from the railing then trotted off into the interior of the pagoda.
"It is just sir Lin's spirit companion," Cai Renxiang said from beside her, having not paused at all. "She is likely going ahead to announce us and rouse him from his labors."
This visit is going to be a little too much for Meizhen's heart.
Ling Qi had just turned back to look at Cai Renxiang, opening her mouth to ask if they should take seats, when the faint rattle of sliding doors opening cut off her words. Across the room, the doors slid apart, and dark purple mist billowed out, crawling along the floor and rising in churning strands of fog. Then lights, a beam of solar radiance that shot from the lantern overhead only to split into four smaller beams that carved a channel through the mist for the figure that emerged.
Tall and thin as a willow whip, the man that strutted from the mist had features far more fine and delicate than even most women. His long black hair was like silk, and faded to a dark purple color in the ringlets that reached his bare shoulders. He wore a billowing open chested violet, with a thick layer of feathery material around the low cut of the top, partially concealing his shoulders and chest. Ling Qi felt herself flush darkly as her gaze slipped down, and she immediately fixed her eyes on his face, rather than the skin hugging black silk pants he was wearing.
Yep, this man certainly knows how to make an entrance.
Even then, she couldn't help but notice further strange details, like the hint of color on his lips or the thickness of his eyelashes, if she had just looked at his face in isolation, she would have been almost sure that it was the face of a woman. As she contemplated that, the lights swung back in to illuminate him, then exploded into motes of light, scattering the purple mist and leaving only a few streamers curling around his sleek boots.
And this is the moment where I began to suspect.
"Lady Ren!" Greeted Lin Hai, for who else could it be. The man stood with one hand on his hip and the other cupping his chin. A golden jeweled claw that encased his pointer finger rose to tap against his cheek. "How was the entrance? I believe I have improved since last time."
"It was very impressive," her liege replied. "A very controlled display."
"Of course that is the part you would compliment," the man said with a chuckle. "Still, I was not wholly certain how much your companions would be able to handle."
A casually familial display, shortening her name (just like I tend to do). Clearly fond of our liege, though she is quite restrained in return.
The strangely dressed man before her rippled then, space seeming to stretch and warp for a bare instant as she glimpsed his unrestrained qi, vast and placid. Sights and sounds and smells crawled along the edge of her senses, a decadent riot, an endless festival of sensation just out of reach. Then it was gone, and only the man remained.
"You are preparing to take the next step then?" Cai Renxiang asked. "Mother will be pleased."
"I will not boast until my first star has bloomed, and my Elder's seal received," the peak fifth realm cultivator replied easily
Aaaand a Peak Indigo and soon-to-be Elder? I'd though that Elder tier was Indigo and up, not Violet and up. I can't recall if he's a part of the Sect structure already.
"Of course not Miss Bai," he dismissed, inspecting her carefully. He flicked his golden clawed finger at the air above her shoulder, and shimmering spectral threads rose, dancing around the man's fingers. "At yet the impression of this child's experiences will allow me to determine the best way to improve upon the original weave."
"...Are our gown's alive already then?" Ling Qi asked tentatively, thinking back to what her gown had done in the dream, and a few other moments of odd reaction.
"That is a more difficult question than you might think young lady," he replied not looking up from the complex weave that had formed over her friends shoulder. "There are many degrees of life, you will find, but in the traditional sense no. I am not my Master, such craft is beyond me for the moment, but their potential lies closer to the surface than most." He flicked his fingers again and the spectral threads dissolved. "You are a redoubtable young woman indeed Miss Bai. It seems this child is a good match. I know just the materials to use for your improvements and custom pieces."
He turned then to Ling Qi and repeated the motion, with his fingers, however, the threads he drew from her shoulder sparks and snapped like oil from the pan as they wrapped around his fingers. Lin Hai's eyebrows climbed to his hairline. "...I see you have met my Master as well," he said mildly. "Lady Ren?"
"She is a direct retainer of Cai, Mother granted me certain dispensations," Cai Renxiang replied carefully. Bai Meizhen glanced at Ling Qi with pursed lips, but did not ask the obvious.
Ling Qi just remembered the thread of Liming she had accepted back then and looked down at her gown uncomfortably.
"Well, Master does as Master wills," Lin Hai said cheerfully, peering down with narrowed eyes at the incomprehensible pattern of sparking and snapping threads that curled around his fingers. "So I am afraid that I will not be able to improve on your gown directly Miss Ling. This girl has a seed of self , and I will not alter that. But my, what a jealous daughter, I will have to be careful in fixing your accessories so that she does not take offense."
Cannot wait for for our treasured gown to start talking to us. But if it starts asking us for our blood, we need to slam the "KLK References Are Getting Too Extensive" Alarm.
"I should certainly hope that my gown does not develop into a man," Bai Meizhen said, with a voice as dry as a desert.
"Unlikely as it is, I will not preclude the possibility," Lin Hai shot back, his painted lips curving slightly up. "It would not do to confuse the poor dear before they are even developed enough for there to be a difference. It is not my way, nor my Master's way to repeat the mistakes of nature in our work."
Ling Qi's eyebrows drew together in confusion, she wasn't really sure what to make of that statement. She glanced to Renxiang, who merely shook her head very slightly. Some kind of private matter then?
And this was the clue that made me very confident in my guess that Lin Hai was a trans man.
"I am glad that Lady Ren's description of you was so exacting. Darker hues most definitely fit you," Lin Hai said idly as he lead her to into a forest of dark cloth and silk. "Now, I have heard of your troubles. What sort of image is it that you wish to present?"
"I had thought that you would be the one to tell me that," Ling Qi replied wryly. "I've been told that my taste is somewhat lacking."
"Nonsense, nonsense," the core disciple replied with a dismissive flick of his fingers. "Oh, I can certainly advise you on trends. Court fashion is trending toward lighter garb and away from the swimming in silk look popular under his honored Highness An, and that is in no small part thanks to my Master, but my role is ultimately to guide one to destination that my customers choose. Sometimes that means guiding my clients to whatever fashion will give them an advantage in the game of court, but…" He paused, meeting her eyes with a thin smile on his painted lips. "You do not seem like the sort for masks and self deception. The Argent Mirror is a little troublesome like that."
And I will literally never regret slotting Argent Mirror. Self Deception is dangerous.
Ling Qi flicked her eyes away from his. Well, this was someone on the cusp of becoming an Elder in the Argent Sect. "...I am not really sure to be honest," she pondered how to speak her thoughts. "This gown… I love it," she admitted. "It's the nicest thing I have ever owned, and it reminds me that I am not weak anymore, that I don't have to be. I don't want to cause trouble for Lady Cai though, and wearing the same thing all the time apparently does that."
This paragraph hit me a bit, she's being very open about what this means to her.
"I was thinking of some kind of hand jewelry, with moon imagery maybe? I use many sustained constructs and techniques in battle, so I need something that will help defend me from an enemies efforts to dispel them."
"Been sparring with the Young Miss quite a bit I see," Lin Hai chuckled.
"...Yes," Ling Qi admitted.
"Hmm, I believe it should not be difficult to whip up something of the sort," he mused, gesturing idly toward a display case which held a plethora of gleaming jewelry, rings and bracelets and charms rose into the air like a glittering school of fish and swam through the air toward them.
Ren's sparring is definitely driving her to shore up the vulnerabilities of her general style.
"Though that does bring me to the other matter. What do you think of Lady Ren, miss Ling."
Ling Qi blinked, then blinked again, glancing across the room, to where Cai Renxiang stood stiffly, discussing something with another Lin Hai, as she watched, the copy struck another pose as a winding belt of thick gold links slithered off of a display shelf to circle around him. "I… am not sure what you mean, Sir Lin," she replied carefully.
"I mean what I said. Lady Ren is dear to me, but I cannot say that the feeling is mutual," he said with a sad smile. "I am glad to see that she has finally made a true friend in your other companion, but in the end, you are the one who will be standing at her side."
Ling Qi restrained herself from looking around nervously. She was reminded that this man was an apprentice of Cai Shenhua, was this some kind of test. "I am glad to serve Lady Cai, she has been very generous to me."
Oh shit, it's time for personal interrogation time from someone who cares deeply about our liege.
"Not precisely what I mean," Lin Hai struck a thoughtful pose, cupping his chin with his clawed hand. "Hm, let me share a secret then, so that you might share yours," he leaned in lowering his voice conspiratorial. "It was I who was charged with Lady Ren's safety as an infant, and fended off those who sought to extinguish the Cai in the crib. I watched her first steps and her first words, and I watched as my Master, great though she is, erred terribly in introducing that bright girl into her presence for the first time at such a young age, when she could not hope to withstand her mother's attention and inspection."
The man's cheerful and irreverent tone had faded with very quickly, becoming quite grim by the end. Ling Qi only felt her nerves grow though, she remembered the terrible radiance of the duchess' gaze and the weight of her presence. Something like that wasn't something she wanted to know.
"Young Lady, my Master knows my thoughts quite well, it is not as if I could keep them from her," Lin Hai chuckled. "My Master is merciless indeed, but it not dissent that she punishes. So understand, when I ask you what you think of Lady Ren, it is as a fond uncle whose niece no longer trusts him for his part in certain events."
Daaaamn. Is this the moment when Ren was fitted with Liming, and her worldview was restricted into seeing systems the way she does? Or was it before that, and Shenhua just met her directly, causing mental damage and traumatizing her? How old was she?
I do like how Shenhua isn't stupid enough to punish disagreement, that is the territory of foolish cartoon villains who are too prideful to ever improve their decisions.
Ling Qi calmed herself, forcing herself to forget the duchess for the moment. This was not the time for courtly prevarication. "...She is someone who I trust, and I believe in the path she wants to walk," she replied after a long pause. "I… don't know how to approach her any further though."
"Understandable," Lin Hai sighed, absently gesturing to the swarm of jewelry swarm over head, three silvery reflective discs darted out to circle around his fingers. "Still, I must ask you, please try, whatever she might say of herself, she remains a girl like any other. The damage is done, but it is not something which Master can fix."
I've always said that, Ren needs a true friend.
Ling Qi remembered the fear she had sensed from her liege when her mother had announced that they would be spending the evening together. "...You make it sound like she wants to fix it," Ling Qi replied warily.
Lin Hai paused in his inspection of the discs. "Perhaps. Master does not know regret in the way that you or I might. She does not and cannot hold back, her nature does not allow it, and so a child has the full weight of her expectations carved into their bones, before they can even comprehend such concepts fully, but Master does recognize the need for support. Diao Linqin, Wang Jun, Jia Hong; without them, Master could not have accomplished her coup."
"...Then why the impossible tasks," Ling Qi asked in frustration, thinking of her own concerns over Sect rank, and Gan Guangli's seemingly untenable task.
"Because mediocrity cannot be abided," Lin Hai replied. "Master does not seek to hurt, but she will do so without hesitation if she judges it to be beneficial."
Shenhua is currently a Duchess without a gigantic top-tier noble clan filled with families and branches of comparable strength (like every other Ducal family does), if her heiress is ever going to maintain that after she's gone, she needs to go far beyond the usual expectations of noble heiresses.
"...How do you speak so fondly of her then?" Ling Qi asked, troubled.
"There is no grand reason," he said self deprecatingly. "Only that without her, I would still be a sullen and mediocre lady of the court, amounting to nothing. It is quite a selfish reason, but as you said of Lady Ren… I believe in her."
Someone better pick up that phone.
Because I fucking called it.
Ling Qi wasn't sure of how to respond to any of that and so she lapsed into silence as his attention turned back to her talisman. She glanced back over to Renxiang, and lost herself in thought.
Sorta surprised that Qi didn't make any realization, or even note what he said. Sixiang's gender-fluidity / neutrality has become normal for her and she never noted much about it, but I think this is definitely the first time she's encountered a non-cis human. She was even noticing odd things she didn't understand, does she still not realize?
