"That works too. Otherwise you and your father won't have much to do anyway — better to put it into a business of some sort." Tang Yun nodded.

"Three million. Put it in the bank and that's a hundred thousand a year in interest alone. What could you do that would earn that much?" Tang Jucheng, however, had figured it to the last penny, and thought a bank deposit the surer course — at least you could not lose it.

"That's true..." Mother Tang wavered as well, at a loss what to do. "Yun'er, your father has a point. If we just leave the money in the bank, that's quite a nice sum in interest every year!"

"Well... I don't really understand these things either. Shall we ask Wei Zhao tomorrow and see what he says?" Where had Tang Yun ever seen so much money? She knew nothing of managing it, and did not dare offer advice of her own. Better to ask Wei Zhao first.

The night passed without incident. Early the next morning, Wei Zhao was jolted awake by Qiu Lingshan's call. He glanced at the time on his phone: half past five. He was fit to be tied — he had been cultivating beautifully inside the jade pendant, and now this.

"Are you out of your mind, calling at this hour?" Wei Zhao howled into the phone.

"I..." Qiu Lingshan felt a little aggrieved. Half past five was not early — for anyone who trained in the martial arts, rising at dawn to practise was of the first importance. She had kept to it for twenty-odd years without a single break. "Don't you get up early to train?"

"Train your sister." Wei Zhao was vexed. "Stop measuring me against yourself. I sleep until I wake, as a rule."

"Uh... you're interested in my sister?" Qiu Lingshan blinked.

"I've never even met her — interested in what?" Wei Zhao was rendered speechless by her logic. "Do you have a reason for calling or don't you?"

"I do. Didn't you promise to come to the hospital and look at Liu Bojia?" Qiu Lingshan said carefully. "Everything is already prepared..."

"Then wait for me at the hospital." Wei Zhao yawned; yesterday's conversation with Qiu Lingshan came back to him, and so he got out of bed. "I'll be there shortly."

"All right then. You haven't had breakfast, have you? Shall I have the silly little girl make you something?" Qiu Lingshan was afraid that later on Wei Zhao might not give his best — or, even if he could bring about a cure, might find it tiresome and tell her it was beyond him — and so she did her utmost to court his favour.

"Fine, make something then." Wei Zhao said, and hung up. He was long since used to Qiu Lingshan's attentiveness.

Once up, Wei Zhao rummaged something out of the kitchen, set a small pot of lean-meat congee simmering for Gu Mengyao and Shen Yushu, programmed the timer, and went out the door.

Today Wei Zhao had also promised to go house-hunting with Tang Yun's family, so he had to get to the hospital and settle that Liu Bojia as quickly as possible. There was no time to stay at home and wait for the congee to finish.

Driving the van to First People's Hospital, Wei Zhao dialled Qiu Lingshan's number.

"You're here?" Qiu Lingshan lit up with surprise. She had not expected him so soon. It seemed Wei Zhao really did give her face — he would not let her lose standing in front of Chen Yutian!

Chen Yutian, too, had arrived at the hospital early that morning. He had not slept well the whole night; the knowledge that Qiu Lingshan had an admirer had left him low. He knew he had virtually no hope left, so he meant to see for himself just how formidable the man Qiu Lingshan admired really was — and of course he reserved the right to challenge him, should the day ever come when he could surpass him.

"I'm here, in the hospital car park. Where are you?" Wei Zhao asked.

"I'm in the Third Inpatient Building — top floor, the intensive care unit, room 2119," Qiu Lingshan said.

"Right, I'm on my way." Wei Zhao stepped out of the car and set off towards the Third Inpatient Building.

Beside Qiu Lingshan, Chen Yutian heard that the man she was pursuing would be here at any moment, and could not help feeling a prickle of nerves: "Qiu Lingshan — he's coming?"

"Any minute now." Qiu Lingshan nodded, thoroughly displeased by Chen Yutian's jitteriness. Why could he not behave like a man for once? Even if the other's strength was greater, there was no need to be quite so tense.

Chen Yutian nodded. He felt such a failure — all these years pursuing Qiu Lingshan, and it had ended in nothing after all.

It was only that he had chosen the wrong road from the very beginning. He had played the dandy, and Qiu Lingshan had no regard whatsoever for that sort of playboy young master; and when at last he set out to surpass her through sheer strength, he discovered he had begun far too late. Had he not had the fortune to meet a master to guide him, he might never have broken through to the Yellow Rank in this lifetime.

Yet disappointed as Chen Yutian was, he did not regret it. At the very least, but for a single sentence from Qiu Lingshan he would never have roused himself, never have chosen the path he walked now. Among all the scions of the great families he was not the strongest — but early Yellow Rank was nothing to scoff at. Above all, his grandfather had not been disappointed in him.

He was the only male heir of the Chen family's third generation. Shen Yushu could hardly be expected to train in the martial arts; if he himself had no strength to show for it, then in a few years' time the Chen family might well be struck from the ranks of the Four Great Families by the Yu family.

So Chen Yutian's sense of crisis ran deep. In his younger days, while he was busy being a dandy, he had never troubled himself with such thoughts — but now he had no choice but to consider them. In three generations of the Chen family, apart from the old master, who had once been a figure of fearsome renown, there was not one who could hold his footing.

In his youth the old master had cultivated external techniques. External methods differ from internal ones: with the internal, the older the practitioner grows, the purer his inner force becomes; but with the external, once a man is old and his body begins to fail, his strength fails with it, ever more swiftly.

Old Master Chen's health was poor these days. Though his peak had been mid Mysterious Rank, how much of it remained now, who could say? For years Wu Gonggao of the Wu family had been leaping about and blustering, all but posturing for a challenge against Old Master Chen — though in truth he meant only to sound out the Chen family, to see how much strength they really had left.

After this long period of settling, some of the great families were due for a change. The Wu family naturally wished to destroy the Chen family and then raise up a clan on good terms with their own in its place; had not the Kang family lately attached itself to the Wu family? Chances were the Wu family meant precisely that.

So for all its glittering surface — one of the Four Great Families, alongside the Five Minor Families — the Chen family's standing was in fact precarious.

Chen Yutian knew this only too well; so did Old Master Chen.

That was also why Old Master Chen supported Chen Yutian's pursuit of Qiu Lingshan. Once the Chen and Song families were joined by marriage, those scheming vermin who coveted the Chen family would not dare be so brazen as they were now.

Yet Chen Yutian simply would not give them cause for pride — Qiu Lingshan would not spare him so much as a glance. Chen Yutian had called the old master at home the night before, and what else could the old man do but sigh that his grandson had woken up too late? RO

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