Chapter 6: 006: The National Seal, Word Spirit

Shen Tang steadied her nerves and looked the young man straight in the eye with a calm expression.

She asked him, "Does sir have a grudge against the Gong clan?"

To her surprise, the young man's answer was completely unexpected.

The young man simply kept his hands tucked into his sleeves, half-leaning against the tree trunk, and said indifferently with his eyelids slightly lowered, "No grudge."

Shen Tang: "..."

If you have no grudge, why are you joining in the fun?

And why did you want to kill someone the moment you encountered a male descendant of the Gong clan?

Perhaps Shen Tang's expression was too difficult to describe, as the young man looked displeased.

"What kind of look is that?"

Naturally, it was the look one gives when reading the medical records of a psychiatric patient!

Shen Tang complained internally, but aloud she said, "Since there is no grudge, where does sir's such great malice come from?"

The young man sneered, "Since you are a descendant of the Gong clan, how could you not know?"

Shen Tang: "..."

I told you not to force strange character settings on me.

She took a long breath, exhaled the foul air from her chest, and pulled out a "kind and amiable" smile.

"I am deeply grateful for sir's life-saving grace, but there are a few things I hope sir understands."

"Speak."

"First, I am not a descendant of the Gong clan." After saying this, Shen Tang saw a flash of surprise in the young man's eyes. Ignoring whether he believed her or not, she continued, "Second, I truly do not know the reason for sir's malice. Third, I am even less of a male descendant of the Gong clan..."

She was clearly a genuine female.

Although she was still young and her body hadn't started developing, showing no obvious secondary sexual characteristics, one wouldn't mistake her gender just by looking at this face!

The young man carefully scrutinized Shen Tang's face, looking into her eyes, as if cautiously weighing the truth of her words.

After a long while, he nodded and said, "I believe this little gentleman's words."

Shen Tang: "..."

Believe my foot!

(╯‵□′)╯︵┻━┻

I said I'm not a man, why is this guy so stubborn!

Does she have to take off her pants and pull something out for him to believe it?

The young man teased, "Although your skills are passable, abusing your literary heart like that and fighting wildly certainly doesn't look like you've received a proper education."

No respectable scholar would go head-to-head with a martial artist.

Considering that the prisoners being exiled were not only from the Gong clan, he guessed that this little gentleman might be one of the outsiders, who, thanks to having a feminine appearance, was classified as a female dependent, thus escaping the fate of having his Danfu destroyed.

Shen Tang: "..."

For a moment, she didn't know where to start complaining, only managing to grasp one key point.

"You said... a literary heart? I have a literary heart?"

This body possesses a literary heart?

She rubbed her hands together in excitement!

She had finally seen a bit of the treatment a transmigrator deserved.

"You actually didn't know?"

Seeing that her expression didn't seem fake, it was the young man's turn to be surprised.

Shen Tang shook her head sincerely.

She hadn't even been in this world for twenty-four hours.

Not only did she lack the original owner's memories, but she had also been "robbed" of her home; how was she supposed to know these things?

The young man pressed, "Since you didn't know you had a literary heart, what was that 'word spirit' from earlier?"

"'Word spirit'... what is that?"

"It was that part about 'the sword in the merciful mother's hand, slashing at the wandering son'; that is your literary heart's word spirit."

As the young man spoke, he furrowed his brows, his expression quite strange.

A merciful mother slashing her son with a sword—it didn't sound like a proper word spirit, but the world was vast and full of wonders; perhaps he was just too inexperienced.

Shen Tang said truthfully, "...I was thinking of a way to save my life, and it suddenly appeared in my mind."

The young man: "..."

That was absurd!

Shen Tang steered the conversation back.

"Sir still hasn't said why you dislike the Gong clan so much."

If a problem isn't solved, it's like eating a melon without getting to the follow-up; that heart-wrenching feeling is not easy to bear.

The young man glanced at Shen Tang and said expressionlessly, "Although there is no personal grudge, there is the hatred of a fallen nation."

Hearing this, Shen Tang immediately gave up on the gossip.

This was no laughing matter; if she accidentally annoyed him, he might fight her to the death. She didn't know that in the current era of a hundred kingdoms, wars were constant, and the destruction and founding of nations were common occurrences. If a generation lived long enough, they could change their nationality more than twice on average.

The young man had feelings for his former nation, but not to that extent.

"Then, what about the word spirit?"

Shen Tang didn't stand on ceremony, treating the young man as a free "tutorial NPC."

If she could get answers from him, why run around asking others?

Who doesn't like a free ride?

The young man: "..."

He confirmed repeatedly that Shen Tang really knew nothing and that her questions were very basic, so answering one or two wouldn't hurt.

It was just that the questions were so basic it made one wonder what remote mountain wilderness this savage had emerged from, so the young man had to start from the source.

His explanation was much more complete than the strange memories surfacing in Shen Tang's mind.

Years ago, a falling "thief star" shattered into pieces and scattered across the Central Plains. People were busy cultivating literature and martial arts to absorb the energy of heaven and earth and refine themselves; except for merchants looking for "rare goods," no one paid it any mind. It wasn't until a craftsman carved one of the thief star's fragments into a seal and presented it to the monarch that things changed.

The moment the monarch received the seal, purple light burst forth, and countless strange characters drifted out from it, some of which merged with the officials' Danfu. Only then did they realize that certain characters within the seal, when combined with specific literary hearts or martial spirits, could unleash incredible power.

These characters were "word spirits."

For example, the phrase the young man had said earlier, "The teeth are hard and fall out first, the tongue is soft and survives later; softness can overcome hardness, and the weak can defeat the strong," was used to buff or restore one of the two opposing sides. The same word spirit had different effects in different hands.

From then on, thief star fragments became standard for the national seals of every country.

The word spirits contained in the national seal directly influenced the strength of the country. If the monarch activated the national seal, it could even be transformed into a heavy weapon of the state to guard the national destiny and borders.

At this point, the young man paused, secretly glancing at Shen Tang's expression with his peripheral vision, and said indifferently, "The capital of Chongtai was breached, and the national seal was lost. There are rumors in the streets that the Gong clan hid and embezzled it. However, even after the Gong clan's home was raided, the whereabouts of the national seal were never found..."

Shen Tang didn't care about the national seal, but rather—

"Chongtai?"

As her voice fell, the young man's expression became quite colorful and complex.

"...It is the former Xin State. There is news in the streets that it is to be renamed 'Chongtai'."

He thought Shen Tang asked this because she was ill-informed on the road of exile and didn't know that the current Chongtai was the Xin State, not knowing that she simply thought the name was a bit strange.

"Renaming a country after destroying it..."

What kind of tactic was this?

The young man said, "For humiliation."

"Humiliation?"

"Those who are slaves to slaves are commonly called 'Chongtai.' To the survivors of the Xin State, it is naturally a great shame."

What is meant by "those who are slaves to slaves"?

In layman's terms, it means the slave of a slave, the lowest of the low.

And as one of the culprits behind the fall of the nation, how could the Gong clan not be hated?

As long as that national seal didn't appear, this storm wouldn't stop.

These were just interesting stories to listen to; they had nothing to do with Shen Tang. She was more concerned about what her own literary heart looked like.

The young man suggested, "You might as well test it."

There are nine grades of literary hearts; only by knowing the specific grade can one find a suitable word spirit.

Shen Tang: "How do I test it?"