Shen Haoran was walking alone along a long, desolate hallway within the labyrinthine depths of the Spirit Hall palace, his slow, rhythmic footsteps echoing softly against the towering obsidian pillars.

The marble beneath his boots was polished to a mirror-like sheen, reflecting the faint, gray morning light filtering through the high, arched windows.

For the first time in as long as he could remember, he was completely by himself, and a peculiar, nagging sensation was beginning to worm its way into his consciousness.

Uncomfortable.

Yes, he was feeling incredibly, profoundly uncomfortable.

This was the first time in his entire life that he found himself walking without a single soul stationed directly beside or behind him.

Usually, no matter where his travels took him across the vast star systems, there was always someone designated to occupy his shadow.

When he was navigating the cutthroat politics and danger of the Central Region, there was Qing’er, his loyal maid and shadow whose presence was as constant as his own reflection.

When he walked that completely mediocre and laughable trials inside the Bright Silver Emperor Realm, there was Xueli, desperately trying to get his recognition and wanting to prove she can stand by his side.

Even when he descended into that dirty and polluted, ancient depths of the Saint Burial Realm, he had been surrounded by a phalanx of absolute loyalty consisting of Qing’er, the icy and calculating asura, Ling Luochen, and the insatiably hungry demoness, Shangguan Mu’er.

He had gotten so thoroughly used to having someone by his side, a shield, a weapon, or simply a presence to accompany him to pour him tea, that this sudden, absolute vacuum was starting to make his skin itch with discomfort.

He stopped dead in his tracks, his brow furrowing into a sharp, cold line as he stared down the empty, silent corridor as a dark, intrusive thought crossed his mind, causing his golden eyes to narrow.

Was the Heavenly Dao somehow, someway, subtly influencing his mind?

Was this the reason why he suddenly started feeling uncomfortable? Before Qing’er was his assigned as his personal shadow guard, before he even met those girls, he was alone, and he prefered it that way.

So why now?

He shook his head, a dismissive, mocking smirk playing on his lips as he broke the thought. No way, right?

Shangguan Mu’er had departed for the Wilderness to claim her demonic inheritance, and the rest of his retainers were scattered across the sectors completing his mother’s directives.

It’s not like they won’t see each other, they just have their own lives and opportunities, and he also prefer them to not have their lives revolve only to him, as he don’t want them to end up as nothing more than his woman.

If they stayed with him, he can indeed make them strong and famous, but ultimately, they will just be his women, nothing special. After all, with the resources of the Shen Clan, he can pick any random woman and they can also make her strong.

But Haoran doesn’t like that.

Women who braved the winds and storm, enduring countless tribulations, and emerging stronger through them are so much more charming in his opinion.

For now, he decided he would simply find Huo Yue later in the residential quarters, wrap his arms around her waist, and spend the absolute rest of the week indulging in her fiery, obsessive devotion until his soul was entirely satisfied.

But before that... he had an appointment to keep.

Haoran resumed his stride, arriving at the end of the long gallery.

He stood directly in front of a pair of massive, heavily reinforced double doors carved from ancient ironwood.

He stared at it for a moment before he extended his hand and pushed them wide open, entering the room with the quiet authority of a sovereign entering his own court.

Inside, the chamber was arranged like an ordinary, high-tier administrative office.

Stacks of leather-bound ledgers, ancient scrolls, and heavy books were piled neatly on jade bookshelves that lined the walls.

On the far end of the room, positioned directly in front of a spectacular floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked the sprawling, rebuilding city, sat Lu Xinglan behind a large desk of polished mahogany.

Standing rigidly beside her, her posture stiff but respectful, was her daughter, Qian Yunxi.

If Haoran remembered it correctly, this girl, the Saintess of the Spirit Hall, was actually heavily and severely injured after her desperate, earth-shattering battle with the demonic traitor Tang Shan just yesterday.

She should have been confined to a specialized medical array, surrounded by alchemical healers trying to knit her fractured meridians back together. Yet, here she was, standing on her own two feet, her silver robes concealing the heavy bandages wrapping her torso.

Although she was battered, she had achieved her ultimate goal. She did kill Tang Shan.

A cold, amused thought flickered through Haoran’s mind as he observed the girl.

It seems like Tang Shan’s protagonist luck had completely and utterly run out in the end, allowing a well-prepared villain and a regional genius to actually step up and execute him like a dog in the dirt.

"Young master Shen," Lu Xinglan spoke instantly, standing up from her chair the moment his golden robes cleared the doorway as she gestured gracefully toward an empty velvet armchair positioned across from her desk. "Please, take a seat. We have been waiting for your arrival."

Qian Yunxi bowed deeply at him, her hands folded in her sleeves, before quietly stepping toward a side table to prepare a fresh pot of premium spirit tea.

Haoran sat down, leaning his back against the plush velvet, his expression completely blank, calm, and collected as he crossed his legs, his golden eyes scanning the faces of the mother and daughter with a clinical, unbothered focus.

"So? What exactly did you call me here for? Those tribal giants from the wilderness have all been turned to ash, and the rest of my people are helping your city be rebuilt. Our business in this region should be concluded."

Lu Xinglan nodded, "We couldn’t thank you enough for your help. But...there is just something I wanted to ask. Personal one."

Haoran raised an eyebrow, "Is that so? Then, tell me, what do you want to ask."

"...Young master Shen... I know this may sound incredibly inappropriate, and perhaps even presumptuous given our lower standing," Lu Xinglan began, her hands clasping together over her desk as she chose her words with extreme, political caution as she leaned forward, her eyes locking onto his. "But I want to ask a fundamental question... what exactly is the nature of you and your clan’s relationship with the Imperial Family in the Capital?"

At that exact moment, Qian Yunxi quietly approached the desk, and with practiced, silent grace, she placed two delicate jade cups in front of them and poured the steaming, fragrant tea, the scent of spiritual herbs filling the small office.

Shen Haoran crossed his arms, a low, dismissive chuckle escaping his lips at the mention of the royal bloodline. "Them? The Xu lineage? If you want the unvarnished truth, our clan were the ones who personally supported their ancestors and established their throne tens of thousands of years ago. We did it simply because the previous Imperial Family grew arrogant and offended our elders over a minor boundary dispute, so we wiped them out and placed a more compliant dog on the seat. But honestly, in the grand scheme of things, we couldn’t care less about them. They are nothing more than administrative managers for the mortal sectors."

Indeed, to the ancient, immortal lineages that walked the higher paths, the existence of an Imperial Family was not a matter of divine right or absolute supremacy.

The only real reason why a central Imperial Family is even needed in the mortal plane is so that it can act as a massive, centralized lightning rod to gather the world’s luck and worldly karma.

That accumulated destiny would then automatically flow downward, benefiting the great sects and ancient clans stationed under their jurisdiction without forcing the cultivators to waste time managing tax records and peasant rebellions.

Not to mention being the official Imperial Family carries an immense number of cosmic restrictions and heavenly oaths.

They are bound by the laws of governance, tied to the wealth and prosperity of the empire, and constantly scrutinized by the Heavenly Dao.

Because of this, no ancient clans or supreme sects who truly, honestly want to break through the mortal coil and reach for absolute immortality would ever care about replacing the Imperial Family and becoming the official rulers.

It was a golden cage, a distraction from the true Dao.

Lu Xinglan and Qian Yunxi looked visibly delighted hearing that blunt revelation as the tension in the Pope’s shoulders completely vanished, replaced by a sharp, calculating brightness in her eyes.

"Then... young master Shen," Lu Xinglan spoke, her voice dropping into a low, confidential whisper as she leaned across the desk. "What do you think... just as a completely hypothetical question, of course... what would happen if the Eastern Region were to break away from the central throne and form its own independent empire?"

"Destruction," Haoran said instantly.

The single, cold word dropped into the room like a block of ice, completely stunning the two women.

Lu Xinglan’s breath hitched, and Qian Yunxi’s hand trembled slightly as she held the tea pitcher.

"The Imperial Capital wouldn’t even need to waste their own resources or send a single platoon of their golden guards to deal with you," Haoran explained, his golden eyes reflecting their sudden panic with a cruel, amused clarity. "The three cardinal regions alone, the North, the South, and the West, would willingly annihilate the entire Eastern Region within a month, simply to divide your territory and curry favor with the throne. Your foundation is too shallow, your experts are too few, and your resources are a drop in the ocean compared to the center."

The mother and daughter remained completely silent, the weight of his absolute realism crushing their secret dreams into dust.

Haoran observed their pale faces, his mind operating with a cold, detached precision as he leaned back into his chair.

From this short, tense conversation alone, he can already tell with absolute certainty that these two women possessed an insatiable, roaring ambition to completely break away from the empire’s shadow.

Many years ago, he could already see the early warning signs of this trajectory.

After all, right after he had first emerged from his seclusion inside the Bright Silver Emperor Realm, he had learned that the Spirit Hall had been systematically conquering neighboring mortal kingdoms and aggressively unifying the fractured factions of the region under a single, religious banner.

From that aggressive expansion alone, their true, underlying ambition to establish a sovereign state had long since been obvious to anyone with a brain.

Unfortunately, no one actually cares enough about the Eastern Region to actually see this. And even if there are, no one would take them seriously.

The Eastern doesn’t even have a Saint Expert, much less a Supreme, so what trouble could they cause?

’And then there is Xu Jingshan,’ Haoran thought, his smirk widening.

The Fourth Prince was also a protagonist, a righteous hero possessed of a seven-colored destiny who wanted to reform the empire from within.

If the Spirit Hall truly did separate and declare open rebellion, it would instantly turn Lu Xinglan and Qian Yunxi into the tragic, doomed villains of his story arc.

The script was already writing their execution.

"Then, young master Shen..." Lu Xinglan spoke up once more, her voice trembling slightly with a desperate, final gamble as she clutched the edges of her mahogany desk. "What if the scenario changes? If the Eastern Region were to somehow receive the direct, official backing and military help of your supreme Shen Clan... and they were to then form their own empire... what, exactly, would happen then?"

Shen Haoran leaned his head back against the velvet cushions, his golden hair catching the morning sun as a dark, majestic aura completely saturated the office, making the bookshelves groan under the sudden pressure.

He looked down at them with a smirk that could humble gods.

"The Empire is like a dog. And as a dog, even if we take its food, they would have to lick our hands and wag their tail for us."