Chapter 83
Chapter 83: The Bureau of Astronomy Returns
After the night she’d laid everything bare in the dream, Little Man spent the next day wandering the estate like a restless ghost.
She waited. She prowled. She searched high and low.
Not even a shadow of Lin Qing Xuan.
Where was he?
Avoiding her?
Surely not.
Still muttering to herself, she caught a familiar page as he passed.
“Stone,” she demanded, “where did Eldest Young Master go?”
Stone was carrying a stack of clean monk robes. He stopped, scratched the back of his head, and answered with that painfully honest face of his.
“Reporting to Miss Little Man—Eldest Young Master left early this morning with our Fa Hua Temple’s old Abbot. The Observatory Director and an official from the Bureau of Astronomy came and took them away.”
He hesitated, then added, “They said it was… to discuss important matters.”
The Bureau of Astronomy?
Little Man’s nose for trouble twitched.
She pressed her palms together and bowed toward the sky, sincere for once. “Peace for the realm. Peace for the realm.”
Please, no disasters. She still planned to leave this place one day, find somewhere quiet and beautiful, and lie flat until the end of time.
Lin Qing Xuan was gone for three full days.
Little Man sat in the courtyard counting on her fingers, bored enough to wilt.
One day. Two. Three.
She was pinching her nose in her head—complaining that he probably smelled stale by now—when footsteps sounded outside.
Familiar footsteps. Heavy with exhaustion, but steady.
Lin Qing Xuan.
He stepped through the gate, and before he could even take in the courtyard, her thought drifted to him as clearly as spoken words.
Lin Qing Xuan paused, caught between laughter and helplessness.
He cleared his throat and called out, “Stone, prepare hot water. I need to bathe.”
Then, after a brief pause, he added, voice hoarse with fatigue, “Miss Little Man, brew me a cup of jasmine tea.”
Little Man’s eyes lit like lanterns.
She dashed out, quick as a rabbit, and there he was—standing under the old tree in the courtyard, travel-worn and dust-stained.
His pale monk robe was wrinkled. Deep shadows lay under his eyes. Even his clean jaw had sprouted a faint stubble.
The cold serenity he usually wore like armor had been dulled by exhaustion, leaving him looking oddly lonely.
Something in Little Man’s chest tightened.
She answered too brightly, as if speed could hide the ache. “Got it! Tea’s coming. Go wash first—by the time you’re done, it’ll be ready.”
She spun toward the small kitchen, steps almost skipping.
And yet that uninvited tenderness kept spreading, sour and swelling in her ribs.
Lin Qing Xuan’s ear tips twitched.
He felt it—the soft pulse of her concern—wash over him like warm water, rinsing away days of fatigue and the heavy gloom clinging to his bones.
His body was still tired.
His heart, suddenly, was not.
He lowered his head and hid the smile he couldn’t stop behind his wide sleeve.
No. Not like this.
He couldn’t let her see him in such a sorry state.
He made a decision on the spot: a proper hot bath, shave the stubble, change into fresh robes—then go to her as himself, clean and steady, and talk.
On the wall, the black cat Tuan Tuan lounged, tail swinging lazily, golden eyes filled with bored, judgmental amusement.
Inside the bathhouse, steam rose in thick curls. Water murmured.
Lin Qing Xuan sank into the warmth and let out a long breath.
The fog blurred his features, and for a moment, blurred the weight he’d been carrying.
From the sleeve of his discarded monk robe, he drew out a sealed letter wrapped in bright yellow silk.
When he opened it, the handwriting was sharp, forceful—each stroke like a blade.
The contents made the scalp prickle.
“This subject, Fang Li, while observing devoutly from the observatory, witnessed sudden changes in the heavens. It signals unrest within the inner palace. I fear it may disturb the sacred person.”
It was a memorial personally submitted by Fang Li, the Director of the Bureau of Astronomy, to the Emperor.
When the Emperor received the secret report, his expression changed completely.
That very night, Fang Li was summoned into the palace by secret edict and brought into the Imperial Study. There, he presented the reading he’d calculated through the night.
“The Purple Forbidden Enclosure grows dim. The Emperor Star trembles. The ominous star presses close to the imperial carriage—within arm’s reach!”
“The Heavenly Market Enclosure churns. Scandal stirs. The Supreme Palace Enclosure is struck—power will split and crack!”
Each line drove the Emperor’s face darker.
And the words “the Emperor Star trembles” struck him like a hammer. He surged to his feet from the dragon throne, eyes wide, and didn’t sleep at all that night.
Even the toothache that had plagued him for so long worsened, as if his body, too, had decided to join the panic.
The calming decoction sent by the Imperial Physician’s Court became useless the moment it touched his lips.
In the end, the Emperor had no choice but to summon the venerable Abbot Ru Hai of the Fa Hua Temple, the Dharma Master held in the highest regard—and to demand he bring his prized disciple, Lin Qing Xuan, into the palace.
If the heavens were angry, perhaps Buddhism could soothe them.
So Dharma Master Ru Hai led Lin Qing Xuan to the palace’s highest observatory.
For three days and three nights, they performed rites without rest.
Scriptures were chanted again and again. Ritual instruments rang, then rang again.
But what truly kept the Emperor from eating or sleeping wasn’t the rite.
It was another line in the reading, one that gnawed like teeth on bone:
“The ominous star presses close to the imperial carriage—within arm’s reach!”
His eyes, reddened by sleeplessness, were filled with bloodshot suspicion.
He clutched Lin Qing Xuan’s sleeve with a grip that trembled.
“Buddhist Scion!” he demanded, voice shaking. “Tell me!”
“Who is this ominous star?!”
“Is it… is it hidden among my own flesh and blood?!”
Faced with the Emperor’s near-collapse, Lin Qing Xuan only lowered his eyes, prayer beads sliding between his fingers, and recited the Heart Sutra again and again—calm, steady, refusing to answer.
He had seen too much of the imperial family tearing itself apart.
Then came midnight of the third night, after the rites ended.
Fang Li led Lin Qing Xuan alone into a secret room beneath the observatory.
Inside, star charts and compasses covered every surface. Candlelight flickered, casting shadows that looked like crawling things.
Fang Li pointed to the center of the star plate, where a strange, deep-blue track cut through the map like a scar.
“Buddhist Scion… please look.”
His voice shook despite his effort to control it.
“This star’s path crosses the Purple Forbidden, the Supreme Palace, and the Heavenly Market enclosures. Its force is vicious beyond precedent.”
He drew a hard breath, as if he needed his entire body to speak the final conclusion.
“It is neither demon nor devil…”
“It is a woman.”