Sa-yeong’s deep, sober deliberation didn’t last long.

Hui, who absolutely couldn’t leave Sa-yeong’s serious face alone, quickly spat out a spiteful remark.

“But I suppose throwing that at you out of the blue leaves you at a loss, doesn’t it? It will take you at least ten years—eight at the absolute earliest—to cultivate a truly overwhelming presence. You may be peerless among your generation, but you didn’t come here just to settle for that level of praise, did you?”

This exact behavior was why she couldn’t bring herself to genuinely like him, even after four years of living under his thumb. Just when he managed to command a shred of admiration, he would blatantly scrape at her nerves, only to flawlessly discern the exact moment before her genuine anger boiled over, masterfully soothing her back down. Even Sa-yeong, who had encountered countless facets of humanity, had never met someone who so effortlessly twisted people around his fingers for pure amusement.

Yet, he was always right.

And the fact that he was right only infuriated her further.

For someone as fiercely guarded as Sa-yeong to so openly display her displeasure proved they had grown somewhat close, though she loathed to admit it. The instant her brow furrowed in annoyance, Hui pointed at the dazzling array of jewelry and chirped, his voice bright.

“So, ta-da! I’ve decided to employ a slightly different method.”

“…Which is?”

“As you well know, our specialty is lying,” Hui continued smoothly. “Until you possess genuine composure, we will simply have you fake it. You’ve mastered everything else; all that remains is the specific refinement unique to those with entirely too much money and time. Namely… squandering it!”

“How exactly does squandering equate to elegance? I absolutely fail to understand.”

“I told you, you are far too tightly wound. A little structured idiocy will do you a world of good,” he insisted. “Now, starting today, concepts like ‘frugality’ and ‘tireless self-improvement’ are strictly forbidden. You have nothing left to study, and absolutely zero work to do. Physical training is capped at a maximum of two hours a day! From this moment on, your sole assignment is to waste time in the most spectacularly useless ways possible.”

What in the world is this nonsense?

Sa-yeong’s jaw dropped at the genuinely appalling mandate, her head snapping toward him. Hui merely flashed a wickedly sly grin.

“Waking before sunrise is forbidden. Spending the entire day assisting others is forbidden. Anything physically or mentally exhausting is entirely forbidden! You are to lock yourself here in Guangdong and idle your days away, using gold and jewels as your bedding. Understood?”

Having dropped that bombshell, Hui casually announced he was leaving on a business trip and promptly vanished without disclosing his destination or purpose. While Sa-yeong gaped like a fish plucked from a pond, utterly dumbfounded, rumors of her new “assignment” flooded the Hao Sect.

Surrounded by subordinates chuckling and gently insisting that “it really is time for the Young Lady to take a break,” Sa-yeong found herself completely trapped.

Unable to outright ignore Hui’s bizarre orders, she was forced to squander day after day in agonizing idleness.

One month later, Sa-yeong felt the truth in her very bones.

She had been thoroughly scammed.

“I just want to hit him. Exactly once. No more, no less…”

It was late afternoon.

The warm, brilliant Guangdong sunlight spilled generously through the open window. A briny breeze rustled the meticulously polished orchids, carrying the faint, distant sounds of children playing.

Resting her cheek against the desk, Sa-yeong muttered weakly, her lifeless gaze fixed on the spectacularly opulent seating arrangement occupying one side of her spacious room.

The space—outfitted entirely within arm’s reach with plush silk cushions, rosewood furniture, and various ornate cabinets—was a designated throne designed for someone who spent the vast majority of their life sitting.

Shortly after, a commotion erupted on the ground floor. Sa-yeong’s eyes, which had been glazing over like a dying fish at a market, snapped wide open. She jolted upright, glaring daggers at the closed door. Cheerful laughter and the hum of casual chatter were steadily approaching her floor.

The sliding doors burst open, revealing the very man she had been waiting for.

“I’m back! Did you miss me? It was a rare vacation, you should have gone out to eat something delicious! You had nothing better to do, so why are you cooped up in here?”

“…My Lord.”

“Actually, I heard the news on my way up. I was told you were kicked out of your room? Seriously, why did you spend the entire morning scrubbing the floors yourself? I explicitly told you not to work. Well, your room is entirely spotless now, so you can probably head back soon.”

Hui’s exuberant voice violently shattered the lethargic peace.

Yeowa, the bodyguard who had carried him all the way upstairs, crossed the room with a stony expression. Hui, who had his arms draped comfortably around the guard’s neck from long habit, caught Sa-yeong’s eye and gasped dramatically.

“Good heavens, why do you look so haggard? I distinctly ordered everyone to ensure you rested with maximum efficiency!”

“…”

It’s because of that! That’s exactly why!

Biting back a furious scream, Sa-yeong summoned a superhuman level of patience. She took a deep breath and released her white-knuckled grip on the desk, narrowly avoiding flipping the furniture and throwing a massive tantrum right in front of her superior.

Rest, my ass. 

She would have vastly preferred being crushed under a suffocating schedule that didn’t even allow her time to return to her room.

For someone like Sa-yeong, who lived every single day with desperate urgency, watching precious time and resources evaporate into nothingness inflicted severe psychological torment.

Because of her forced “vacation”—which was essentially a thinly veiled torture session—she had grown incredibly irritable and exhausted. The members of the Jiangxi branch living alongside her now walked on eggshells around her dark aura, and Sa-yeong herself was currently experiencing a profound depression she had never previously had the luxury to feel.

Yeowa gently deposited Hui onto the silk cushions, adjusted his robes, and lifted the heavy wooden desk to place it directly in front of him. Hui’s ring-adorned hand affectionately patted the loyal bodyguard’s cheek and shoulder in thanks.

Smiling brightly as Yeowa retreated to stand by his side, Hui suddenly sighed and massaged his temples. “I suppose this was my mistake. I knew you were addicted to a sense of accomplishment and self-improvement, but I had no idea it was this severe. Telling someone who doesn’t even know how to rest to simply ‘take a break’ was bound to cause a disaster. I’ll have to guide you more specifically from now on.”

“Did you not claim this was part of my elegance training?” Sa-yeong bit out.

“That was part of it… but more importantly, I wanted you to taste true indolence,” Hui explained. “People like you, who do nothing but sprint forward day after day, are prone to collapsing under a sudden avalanche of futility. Or, incapable of forgiving their own stagnation, they simply force themselves to keep grinding until they slowly wither and die.”

You didn’t seem to live this rigidly when you were with the Immortal Healer, so I assumed you’d adapt quickly. How did it get this bad? Hui muttered to himself, shaking his head as if he wanted her to hear.

Sa-yeong, her arms crossed tight to broadcast her extreme displeasure, gripped her own biceps fiercely.

Naturally, back when she lived at Estate of Deep Mists, she had never felt this gnawing anxiety while idling away the hours with her younger brothers. But that was a different lifetime, back when she was just a child. She was over twenty now; she couldn’t compare her current mountain of responsibilities to those days.

And more importantly, I am not the type of person to succumb to some spoiled, luxurious sense of futility! 

Her sharpened nerves throbbed unpleasantly, deeply insulted by his assumption.

Watching the thoroughly bristled Sa-yeong, Hui sighed in resignation before his tone brightened once more.

“Don’t be too angry, Young Lady. You won’t have a moment to rest for the foreseeable future anyway. Have you heard the news? I rushed straight here the moment it concluded, so it probably hasn’t reached you yet.”

“…What news?”

“The Three Treasures Tournament held in Shaanxi Province. Do you know who claimed the ultimate victory?”

So the Guangdong shut-in went all the way to Shaanxi. 

The Three Treasures Tournament, hosted by the Mount Hua Sect and other prominent Daoist factions, was a massive event. Because of its scale, the lengthy preparation period meant Sa-yeong had known about it long before it was officially announced.

The Hao Sect, dealing in information, had spent months managing the promotion, recruiting participants, and secretly dominating the underground betting rings.

There was no way she wouldn’t know.

However, because her mandatory isolation perfectly overlapped with the tournament, she hadn’t received a single operational update.

Not one trivial detail had reached her ears—she didn’t know who had defied expectations to dominate, who had suffered humiliating early defeats, or if any unforeseen incidents had occurred.

Starved for information to cure her month-long boredom, she had spent her time analyzing the winning probabilities of the rising stars from each sect and drafting prediction charts, only to have Hui confiscate them.

“Who is it? Did they hail from the Mount Hua or Wudang Sects as expected? Or perhaps Qingcheng?”

The Three Treasures Tournament, ostensibly designed to unearth promising young talent, maintained an exceptionally narrow age limit. With the prodigious scions of the Namgung Clan—blood relatives of the White Chivalry Alliance Leader—and the vaunted geniuses of the Moyong Clan aged out of the bracket, the remaining competitor pool was reduced to a mediocre crowd of relatively evenly matched youths.

While their martial titles might have sounded grand, they lacked the true capability to overwhelmingly dominate their peers. The chaotic brawling likely provided excellent entertainment for the audience, but the inability to guarantee a clear winner meant that the hidden support and underhanded tactics of their respective sects would heavily dictate the outcome.

In other words, the larger the sect backing a competitor, the greater their advantage.

As Sa-yeong mentally filtered through the most likely candidates, she snapped her mouth shut at the sight of Hui’s deeply meaningful, secretive smile. Experience dictated that he only wore that specific expression when he fully expected her to be shocked out of her mind.

I absolutely refuse to be surprised, Sa-yeong vowed, her rebellious streak flaring. Even if he claims a passing scholar randomly crashed the stage and wiped the floor with everyone, I will merely say, ‘Is that so.’ I will not give him the satisfaction.

But the words that spilled joyfully from Hui’s lips utterly obliterated her meager preparations, blasting her sanity into the stratosphere.

“Congratulations, Young Lady Sa-yeong! The grand champion of the First Three Treasures Tournament is none other than young hero Sa-hyeon. Ah, excuse me, I suppose we should call him the Heavenly Treasure Blade, young hero Lim Sa-hyeon now! You must be so incredibly proud!”