Chapter 81 - A New Divine Thread

"My soulmark?" Jiang Ying Yue asked as confusion settled over her after listening to Silver's weird suggestion.

Her hand moved on its own accord to touch the mark on her shoulder and even though there were a few layers of clothes separating her mark from her fingers, she did feel its warmth against her fingers.

She closed her eyes and let the mark consume her mind, heart, and soul. It didn't take her long to notice the faint signs of a new divine thread around her heart, one that belonged to Wu Xie.

When she opened her eyes after a few minutes, her gaze immediately landed on the Third Prince who was looking at her as if he was waiting for something, probably to find out what Silver was talking about.

The sign of a divine thread attached to her heart meant that a base had already been developed for her bond with the Third Prince. A single physical touch between the two of them now could create the soulbond of the initial stage. 

Now, she could clearly see why Silver seemed so happy. Once there was a soulbond initiated between her and Wu Xie, she and Silver would no longer need to keep their distance from each other. Though they would still not be able to finalize their bond, they would be allowed to have intimate moments without worrying about each other's safety.

"How did you create it? With your powers?" She asked Silver while completely ignoring the curious gazes of the Princes. Her questioned was about the Grill stand that she had noticed previously.

Thankfully, Silver didn't try to pursue the topic of the soul mark as he put down the axe that he had been using to chop the woods before he picked up his shirt and moved towards the Grill stand.

"Yep! It's made of magic. I think it will only last for a couple of hours so we should better hurry up." He answered while checking the stand to make sure that it was still as solid as before.

Jiang Ying Yue nodded her head in understanding as she watched everyone returning to their works. Wu Xie started chopping the rest of the woods while Silver left to take a bath. Wang Shu was still inside the house while Qing Shan had also disappeared somewhere.

Since she was left on her own, Jiang Ying Yue decided to test the theory that she had come up with during her research in the past few days.

- - - - 

Jiang Ying Yue made her way through the dimly lit halls of the manor as she tried to find what she was looking for, or more like whom she was looking for.

It took her some time but the soulbond did lead her to the First Prince who was busy with his work in a huge room filled with shelves. Books, scrolls, paintings, and murals were filling the entire room while a single wooden table was placed in the middle of the room where the Prince was currently sitting.

He looked up at her when she entered the room which was probably the study if she guessed it correctly. 

"You are here." He said while closing the scroll that he had been reading and putting it aside before standing up from his seat. It didn't look like he was surprised to see her there. Instead, it seemed like he was waiting for her.

"There's still a little time left before they will come looking for you. Let's go." He told her before coming closer to her and placing his hands around her waist.

Jiang Ying Yue was surprised by his behavior. He was giving her the impression like he already knew what she had planned. But how could that be possible? Did he finally learn how to take advantage of their second-stage soulbond? 

"Where are you taking me?" She asked instead. Not trying to be so obvious about her plan. If he knew then it would be great because it would save some time and if he didn't know, then she would just tell him later. But first, she wanted to know what he was planning to do.

"A place where we can find the perfect amount of spiritual qi to start with your plan." Qing Shan answered as he pulled her body closer to his before pulling both of them into the teleportation array.

So, it seemed like he knew her plan!

****

The setting sun brought the darkness that was going to quickly descend over the world, bringing another sort of beauty for people to enjoy as stars filled the night sky and the moon also appeared from behind the light clouds that were traveling through the sky.

The Imperial Palace shone brightly due to hundreds of the lanterns that were hanging around the huge palace, or probably their strength was in thousands considering that the Imperial Palace wasn't a small place.

However, in that entire glowing palace, two particular areas were filled with darkness. While one of them was clearly the Cold Palace, the other one was located completely on the other side of the palace. It was a small courtyard situated in the far northeast corner of the Imperial Palace. The place had been abandoned for over twenty or so years, making it become one of the most desolate places inside the Imperial Palace.

However, at the current moment, a disturbance could be seen going on in that usual desolate area.

"Your Grace, there's no trace of the prophet Fuan in the entire courtyard. We have searched everywhere." One of the guards came forward to report to the Empress Dowager who was looking too furious to listen to anyone at the moment.

"All if you are a bunch of useless things! How come that old Prophet succeeded in escaping? Didn't I ask you all to keep your eyes, nose, and ears pinned here all the time? Then how did that man disappear?" The woman shouted at the team of shadow guards that she had personally selected to watch over the man who had been her only way to learn about Jiang Ying Yue.

She still remembered the day five years ago when the prophet first told her that the girl would be going to become the biggest hurdle in her plan of getting rid of her three sons.

The worst thing was to find out that she did not possess the ability to kill that Jiang girl, not like she didn't try. She did try even after the prophet told her that she could not kill her. She just wanted to know if the prophet was really speaking the truth or not. That was why she kept trying to kill the Jiang Girl until she became too tired to keep going.

She first used poison, mixing it in her water, drink, food, tea, but nothing worked. She then sent assassins after her but that also didn't work because they got killed even before reaching her. She even tried the lame trick of making one of the servants push her into the pond but that also didn't work because she didn't fall in the pond. 

The last trick that she tried was to personally kill her on the day before her marriage with one of her sons, but even then she ended up failing. And only then did she realize that the prophet was not lying to her. As soon as the relation hit her, she decided to plan a conspiracy to keep everything under her control.

She created the scandal to imprison the girl while she sent all three of her sons to the border, not only she found a solution to keep her sons away from the girl but she also got rid of those three men who were born as her sons in the mortal realm. 

She tried various ways to make the prophet tell her a way to kill the girl and her sons without disturbing her plans, but the old man refused to say anything. No matter how much she tortured him, he never budged. 

According to him, she was forbidden from killing her sons as they were not mere mortals but someone just as Important as the Gods and Goddesses living in the Heaven Realm. The problem here was not that she couldn't kill them, rather, it was that she should not kill them because killing them meant a punishment from Heaven itself. She would have lost her chance of going through another Heavenly Trial for the next seventy thousand years if she had killed her sons. 

As for that Jiang girl, the prophet told her that she should better try to become a friend of the girl instead of an enemy because due to some twisted fate, that girl held the power of changing the future of their world in her hands. 

"Your Grace, we will find him. No matter what, we will surely find him." The head guard of the team of shadow guards moved forward to kneel as he promised to find the old prophet.

"You better should, or you won't be able to live past tonight."