A soft voice, a low murmur, yet possessing a thousand twists and turns of enchantment.

*Hou ren xi yi.*

This is the first love poem of Shenzhou.

It directly inspired the use of the exclamatory particle *xi* in the *Book of Songs* and the *Chu Ci*.

It means, I am waiting for you.

Truly, said to King Yu, this would be a delicate and beautiful love poem, but when these words were spoken at this moment, the Tu Shan spy who had quietly come to Chi You's sealed land only felt a chill rising up his back, his pupils constricting violently.

I've been waiting for you...

What could shock the heart of a spy more than these words?

He turned abruptly and saw the sole master of the Tu Shan clan, the Tu Shan goddess whose beauty from her youth was comparable to that of the Western Queen Mother, inheriting the bloodline of the Nüxi clan of the Wa Emperor, and holding the Shennong Whip in her hand, sitting on a chair, her white hair tied up, a pair of eyes flashing with a faint blood-red light.

Tu Shan clan, nine-tailed fox.

Wa Emperor's blood, Nüxi clan.

Tu Shan Nü Jiao, surname Tu Shan, clan name Nüxi; she should be of the Tu Shan Nüxi clan.

"Is there anything else you wish to say?"

Nü Jiao did not question with the gentle warmth, nor tease and tempt with the playfulness that Wei Yuan was familiar with.

Soft-skinned women with lamps emerged from either side, illuminating the area. If Wei Yuan were here, he would recognize that these lamp-bearing women were the next generation of the Tu Shan clan who lived next door to the museum, and that this spy was the esteemed gatekeeper of the Tu Shan clan, who had often exchanged pleasantries with Wei Yuan.

The old fox of Qingqiu looked at the surrounding array and sighed,

"My Queen, I thought you would invite the heads of all the major families to expose me in public."

Nü Jiao propped her chin with one hand, toying with a strand of white hair, and said indifferently,

"Is there a need?"

The old fox was stunned, then smiled wryly, "I... I overthought it."

"You don't need any evidence to kill me."

"Because no one can question your decision."

She was, after all, the sole ruler of the Qingqiu kingdom of the Tu Shan clan.

Life and death, she held in a single thought.

"A spy from Kaiming... coming here, I suppose you wanted to see if Chi You still exists?"

Nü Jiao said, "If I let you in, then the secret would naturally be known to Him."

"If I kill you, it would mean that the information inside cannot be known to Him. My killing you represents that Chi You has not actually awakened. Either way, only you will suffer, and He will have a win-win strategy."

"Really, could it be that He is also a relative of our Qingqiu?"

The white-haired woman said jokingly.

The old fox smiled, "Lord Kaiming's predictions are naturally accurate."

"And I have no dissatisfaction in being His pawn."

"Please."

The old fox spread his arms and closed his eyes. With the strength of the first nine-tailed fox between heaven and earth before him, killing him would be a matter of a moment. Nü Jiao said, "Kaiming Beast's methods are very powerful. Even if I imprison you, He can calculate that I was the one who did it. I am practically the old ancestor of fox spirits; how could I fall for such a trick?"

Her voice paused, and the white-haired beauty added, "I'm not A-Yuan."

The fox girl next to her couldn't help but laugh.

The white-haired beauty flicked Hu Mei's forehead with her finger and muttered to herself,

"Prudence, prudence; after all, A-Yuan is also an ancestor of the Tu Shan clan."

"Back to the main topic, Kaiming Beast, ah, His methods are indeed very ruthless."

"But He still miscalculated one thing; should I say it's arrogance, or indifference..."

"What?"

The old fox demon opened his eyes.

Nü Jiao gestured to Su Yu'er next to her to throw over a booklet.

After the old fox flipped it open, his expression slowly solidified, and the determination and calmness on his face fluctuated violently. He saw photos and records, his friends, his wives and children, scattered all over the world, all within her grasp, with pictures of them growing up, living, and learning.

"All beings have feelings."

Nü Jiao said indifferently, "You have gained quite a lot in my place for over a thousand years."

Her words seemed to have a deeper meaning.

She waved her sleeve, and Su Yu'er next to her handed over a box.

"This is considered your last gift. There is an orchard on the back mountain of the Qingqiu kingdom, said to have been planted by you when you were young and came to Qingqiu. From a single fruit tree back then, it has now turned into a forest of fruit trees, the taste of which is very good; you must try it."

"Your descendants rarely return to the Qingqiu kingdom; you can go and see them."

The graceful white-haired woman rose and turned to leave.

The old fox opened his mouth in a hoarse voice, "I want to ask, Your Majesty, why is it that even though I have memorized all the array diagrams, even more than the heads of the ten major families, why can't the array be opened?"

Nü Jiao's tone was calm and playful, "Because there is no array diagram at all."

The old fox was stunned.

Nü Jiao turned and left, her tone indifferent,

"From beginning to end, there are only two people who can enter here."

Only two people...

The old fox murmured, thinking of how each time the array was opened and strengthened, after the ten major families combined their respective parts of the array inscriptions to form a truly complete array inscription, this reclusive Queen of Qingqiu would appear.

He had previously thought it was a ritual, but now he knew that she herself was the reason for opening the seal.

He couldn't help but laugh sadly, his laughter growing louder, tears streaming down his face.

So it was all just a smokescreen.

So this was deceiving the heavens.

So he had never known the truth from beginning to end.

So the entire Qingqiu kingdom, the infighting among the ten major families for five thousand years, the ancient array inscriptions that they regarded as the foundation of their families, all the love and hatred that they had pursued for five thousand years, were just a simple scheme in the hands of this Queen of the Qingqiu fox kingdom.

Tu Shan Nü Jiao had only used this non-existent thing to make the ten major families check each other.

Allowing her to hide in the dark and easily control the stability of the entire Qingqiu.

The sadness of a pawn is seeing the vastness of the chessboard.

He was extremely grief-stricken.

He turned and staggered away.

He saw those descendants of his. They didn't even know him, their ancestor, but they were indeed his bloodline, the traces of him and that woman from back then. The young dead soldier from the Great Wilderness had met a Su family girl from the Qingqiu fox kingdom. How much of their eventual feelings were real and how much were fake?

And how much of it was part of the chess game?

In the end, he went to the orchard he had planted with his own hands. The foxes along the way respectfully saluted him.

The old fox sat next to the orchard.

Sitting alone for several days.

When he overlooked the Qingqiu kingdom, he realized that he had overlooked one point: when he was staring into the abyss, the abyss was also staring at him. He had gone deep into the Qingqiu kingdom to be a spy, but every bit of the Qingqiu kingdom had also bound him.

Kaiming had indeed miscalculated one thing. In His eyes, all beings were pawns.

But He had not thought about whether the pawns might also develop feelings.

The old fox sat on the bluestone, overlooking the Qingqiu kingdom below. He saw the black fruit box next to him. When he opened it, he saw that it was empty. The old fox was stunned and murmured to himself, "No fruit in the box..."

"Please pick it yourself."

"Please commit suicide..."

"Heh, hahahaha... so that's it, so that's it!"

The old fox suddenly laughed loudly.

This was indeed the only way to break Kaiming Beast's game. Even if he went to deliver false information, he would never be able to hide it from Kaiming Beast, and he himself might not be willing to betray Kaiming Beast, but he couldn't bear to harm Qingqiu.

The difficulty of breaking this scheme lay in its overtness.

Whether the Qingqiu kingdom stopped him or not, Kaiming Beast could get what He wanted.

However, as Nü Jiao had said, "Kaiming Beast miscalculated one thing."

What if the spy, who was regarded as a pawn, took the initiative to leave the chess game?

As for why he didn't betray Kaiming, it was of course because he didn't have the intelligence and strategy to hide it. By dying himself, he represented that the pawn had developed its own will, and from then on, a Tu Shan person had died, not a bloodless and tearless pawn.

This was not necessarily a kind of resistance to the aloof and indifferent god.

"It's just that, in the end, he's showing the nature of all things to Kaiming, the god who denies the value of humanity. This is no different from slapping him in the face. Choosing this method instead of others, he would rather slap Kaiming Beast's face hard on the spot than pursue longer-term interests."

"Your Majesty, you're no different from back then, still so willful."

"Or is it because the humanity that Kaiming Beast denies is King Yu's lifelong effort?"

"And you value this more than anything else?"

The old fox sighed, then looked at the Qingqiu kingdom and cut off his own heart meridian and died.

This was the only bottom line that could not be crossed in the relaxed rules of the Tu Shan kingdom.

Betrayal will never be forgiven.

The reason was also because of the pottery maker's disciple who had betrayed the human race back then.

However, two people are qualified to enter Chi You's secret realm, one is Tu Shan Nü Jiao, and the other...

In his last consciousness, he thought of that potter.

So that's how it is...

His aura dissipated.

Leaving only a doubt—

According to Tu Shan Nü Jiao's way of handling him, her game with Kaiming had actually started two thousand years ago, but although she was intelligent and quick-witted, and passionate, did she really have the calmness and wisdom to lay out a plan that spanned thousands of years?

……………………

The white-haired woman seemed to sense the death of the old fox, paused, and said,

"Say that he died of old age and bury him with the next-level standard."

"Yes."

Nü Jiao murmured to herself, "Really... why do we have to fight? Watching old friends wither away one by one is not a good thing."

"Yes, why..."

Hu Mei and Su Yan'er were both a little sad.

After all, he was an elder who had watched them grow up, had taken them around to play, and had protected them from mountain demons and monsters. And strictly speaking, they were the reason that the dead soldier was bound, turning the dead soldier into a Tu Shan person with feelings.

This could not but make them feel lost.

Nü Jiao replied, "Because the dignity of the human race is above all else."

The white-haired woman paused slightly, rubbing the heads of these little foxes one by one, with a smile,

"This is the reason why humans are human."

"You can be weak, and it doesn't matter if you give way on some unimportant things."

"But dignity and bottom line must be defended with a sword. A person who has lost his dignity is no different from a thinking beast, even if this dignity needs to be defended with death, it is worth it."

She watched these children leave, understanding vaguely.

Finally, she entered a place that ordinary people could not enter, far away from the main structure of the Qingqiu kingdom.

Holding a lamp in her hand, she walked into the tunnel, the light illuminating the left and right.

Walking down layer by layer, as if to walk into a place where the sky does not shine, amidst the sound of footsteps, the voice of the first nine-tailed fox between heaven and earth was gentle, "Transcending the years, seeing the ten directions, one can see all living beings, and therefore, the will of all living beings cannot leave a trace in one's heart, so one will naturally ignore the will of living beings, taking all things as pawns, taking the years as the chessboard, and seeing the ages."

"This is the limit of strategy and indifference."

"And only humanity and human feelings can break the ruthless calculations."

"Your predictions were not wrong."

The white-haired beauty's voice was calm, but she received no response. She placed the lamp on the copper pillar next to her. In front of her was a white-haired back. Nü Jiao said softly, "But even if the spy has been removed and the plan has been in place for thousands of years, the crisis you foresaw has already appeared, you still have to stay in this place that shields the secrets of heaven, a place where it is dark and sunless."

Her voice paused, and she spoke the name,

"Won't you go see A-Yuan?"

"Qi."

ps: Today's second update... 3600 words~

Regarding what I said before, Guan Yunchang is not considered a reckless man, and Lord Wu'an has strong personal strength.

Of course, that's true, but Guan Erye's strategy is really somewhat inferior compared to Lord Wu'an; and Lord Wu'an's personal bravery, compared to Guan Yu who shook China and the overlord who was brave for all ages, also has a considerable gap. The strengths of both sides depend on comparison.

Also, when Lord Wu'an appeared, he was compared to the god who supported the sky. At that time, it was in the First Emperor's Mausoleum, commanding the Qin terracotta warriors to fight. Moreover, Wei Yuan had already used the terracotta warriors before, and there was a misjudgment in the estimation of combat power, and he was directly broken through.