Actually, I am a kind person
Still raging, Shang Ya Zi flips the stone chess table, scattering the pieces; it nearly strikes Fang Yuan’s leg before he dodges, while Shang Ya Zi himself staggers back dizzy, blood running from his nose. Fang Yuan tells him to calm down, since the poison vow forbids harming him, and notes dryly that dodging spared Shang Ya Zi worse injuries of his own. Shang Ya Zi only screams louder, vowing to tear him apart, pull out his tendons, and devour his flesh and blood, while Fang Yuan’s smile only widens. ch. 311
Bai Ning Bing warns Shang Ya Zi to shut up or be thrown out by force, reminding him the internal affairs hall’s investigation means he has few days left as a young master at all. The reminder breaks through his rage: saving his position now matters more than revenge, and the only way to do that is to ally with Fang Yuan and deny the fake accounting charge together, which was in fact why he came to the garden in the first place. He is disgusted at having to beg the two people he most wants to devour. ch. 311
Fang Yuan needles him further, calling himself fundamentally a kind man who repays kindness with gratitude and hostility with revenge, and laying the blame on Shang Ya Zi’s own repeated provocations, including the bitter strength Gu snatched from him at the auction. He admits the vow’s loophole is real but points out he never used it in his two years in Shang clan city until pushed to it, then tells Shang Ya Zi to leave, since he fears offending the whole Shang clan but not one young master alone. Bai Ning Bing responds coldly that this generosity is only a tighter grip in disguise. ch. 311
Shang Ya Zi does not leave. He stands frozen, his face changing color, sweat beading on his forehead as he wrestles with whether to hand back a Gu that cost him eight hundred and ten thousand primeval stones, torn between the mockery he expects and his need to prove sincerity. Reading his hesitation, Fang Yuan pretends to leave with Bai Ning Bing, mentioning that Ju Kai Bei and Yan Tu are fighting on the battle stage that day and worth watching. As they turn to go, Shang Ya Zi calls them back and holds out the bitter strength Gu with shaking arms as an apology: a beetle shaped Gu, palm sized, yellow brown, its back lumped and uneven. ch. 311
Bai Ning Bing privately marvels that Fang Yuan read Shang Ya Zi’s behavior correctly. Fang Yuan, instead of simply accepting, pushes back, saying he does not truly need the Gu and can refine his own if he perseveres, and asks whether Shang Ya Zi thinks conflict and peace can be switched on and off so easily. Shang Ya Zi backpedals, swears never to trouble him again, and offers primeval stones, Gu worms, and refinement materials on top of the Gu, since he controls the clan’s shops. Fang Yuan still refuses to commit, saying only that he will keep the Gu and think it over, and Shang Ya Zi leaves relieved, believing this is merely Fang Yuan angling for more, all the while privately vowing to see him killed in agony one day, behind an increasingly sincere smile. ch. 311
As Shang Ya Zi departs, Fang Yuan tells Bai Ning Bing to go report the fake accounting case to the internal affairs hall, and she resolves privately to reread the wording of her own vow to Fang Yuan that night, word by word. Days later, Shang Yan Fei reviews the internal affairs hall’s findings and, with evident disappointment, strips his second son of the young master title and sentences him to three years in the slave capturing group. But he does not consider the matter closed. Seeing his son as the victim of a scheme by two young outsiders, and valuing his own bloodline over the fact that Fang Yuan and Bai Ning Bing had once saved Shang Xin Ci, he sends out a paper crane Gu carrying orders for a test and a reckoning. It reaches Ju Kai Bei and Yan Tu, two rank four Gu Masters whose public rivalry on the battle stage conceals their true role as Shang Yan Fei’s secret agents, kept in reserve to control who rises through the ranks by dominating that stage. ch. 311
