If I, a death row inmate, am not to become a demon, am I to become a member of the Imperial Guard?

Half of the snow in the capital had melted, and the melted snow mixed with mud felt sticky and irritating when stepped on.

Zhou Yang stood before the side gate of the Northern Garrison of the Embroidered Uniform Guard, looking up at the peeling black lacquer on the plaque. A corner of the gold characters on the plaque was missing, as if someone had cleaved it with a knife. He adjusted his brand-new officer's uniform, the flying fish pattern embroidered on the cuffs still stiff from being starched.

"New here?" The doorman was an old man missing a front tooth, glancing sideways at the tooth tag on his waist.

"Zhou Yang from Jianghuai has come to report for duty." Zhou Yang smiled broadly, casually pulling out a piece of loose silver and handing it over. "Please inform him."

The old man took the silver, gritted his teeth, and his expression softened slightly: "Go to the west wing, find Clerk Liu. But let me make this clear first, the yamen is short of rooms lately, your quarters are in the northwest corner."

"Northwest corner?"

"Yes, those bungalows next to the imperial prison." The old man grinned, revealing his dark, gaping gums. "I heard they're so noisy at night that the previous emperors were all scared into hysteria."

Zhou Yang sneered inwardly, but his face showed a pained expression: "This... could we change rooms? I'm a light sleeper and can't stand any noise."

"Dislike bad luck?" the old man scoffed. "Then you'll have to talk to Liu the Clerk. But he's in a terrible mood today; he just had two incompetent captains flogged to death, and the blood hasn't even been wiped clean yet."

Zhou Yang shrank back and lowered his eyes: "The northwest corner is fine, it's quiet, that's good."

He turned and entered the yamen, walking deeper along the blue brick path. The captains and strongmen he encountered along the way kept their distance, their eyes filled with disdain. In the eyes of these arrogant imperial guards in the capital, a commander who had climbed up from a small border county was no different from a peasant.

In the office of the west wing, Liu, a short, stout middle-aged man, was blowing on the foam from his teacup. Zhou Yang handed him some documents, which he glanced at and then tossed onto the table.

"That Jianghuai region, with its poor mountains and harsh waters, breeds unruly people." Liu, the scribe, scratched the rim of his teacup with his fingernail. "You're in this position, I heard? By women?"

Zhou Yang bowed even lower: "It is thanks to Commander Qin's patronage that I am so grateful."

"That girl from the Qin family?" Liu Jingli scoffed. "She's gotten too big for her britches. Fine, your quarters are number seven, here's the key. Report for duty tomorrow; if you're even a quarter late, you'll get ten lashes."

Zhou Yang took the brass key, thanked him, and left. Once outside, the fawning expression on his face vanished instantly, replaced by an icy coldness in his eyes.

Number 7, with its name ending in Wu, was indeed out of the way. One had to pass through three corridors and walk through a grove of withered plum trees before finally seeing the row of low bungalows. The exterior walls of the houses were covered with dead vines, the window paper was tattered and rattled in the wind. Yellowed talismans were pasted on the door frames, the patterns drawn with cinnabar already faded.

Zhou Yang pushed open the door and entered, a musty smell mixed with a faint stench of blood hitting him. Inside, there was a peeling desk, a rickety chair, and a wooden bed covered with a straw mat in the corner. He walked to the bed and kicked the bed board, receiving a hollow echo from underneath.

"He's really fierce." He muttered, drawing a line on the table with his finger.

Not long after I sat down, a shrill voice came from outside the door.

"Is the new commander here?"

Zhou Yang quickly stood up, opened the door, and bowed: "Yes, yes, yes, please come in, Father-in-law."

An old eunuch in a brown-red python robe stood outside the door. He had a fair complexion, wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, and held a string of Buddhist prayer beads in his hand. Behind him were two young eunuchs in blue robes, carrying whisks and incense burners.

The old eunuch stepped across the threshold, his gaze sweeping around the room before finally settling on Zhou Yang's waist.

In that instant, Zhou Yang felt the dragon spine fragment in his arms suddenly become hot, as if it had been burned. He resisted the urge to look down and examine it, but his fingers secretly pressed against his chest. The fragment trembled slightly under his clothes, emitting a buzzing sound that only he could hear.

"You certainly know how to pick a spot," the old eunuch sneered. "Three commanders have died in this room, all of them suddenly. You've got some nerve."

"I'm used to being poor; I'm content with just a place to shelter from the wind and rain," Zhou Yang said with a forced smile. "My father-in-law is..."

"My family name is Feng, and I work for the Directorate of Ceremonial." The old eunuch tapped him with his prayer beads. "His Majesty is taking attendance and, remembering your merit in suppressing bandits, has bestowed upon you a special reward of one hundred taels of silver. Take it well, and don't waste His Majesty's favor."

The young eunuch handed over the silver ingot. Zhou Yang accepted it with both hands, his knuckles turning white from the force: "Thank you for your great kindness, Your Majesty. Thank you, Eunuch Feng."

Eunuch Feng stared at him for a long time, his gaze lingering on his chest for a moment, before finally turning and leaving. Even as he walked away, Zhou Yang could still hear his shrill voice: "...He's a sensible one..."

Once the footsteps had completely disappeared, Zhou Yang straightened up and took out the fragment of the dragon's spine from his robes. The grayish-white bone fragment now gleamed with a faint golden light and was hot to the touch. He squinted, watching the direction where Eunuch Feng had left.

"So it was with you." He muttered to himself, carefully putting the fragment back in his pocket.

As evening approached, Zhou Yang had just finished tidying up the house when someone else came to the door.

This time, it was a butler in his forties, with a square face and a jade pendant jingling at his waist, dressed in a brocade robe. He didn't sit down upon entering; he simply dusted off non-existent dust from the hem of his robe.

"Zhou Qianhu?"

"It is I." Zhou Yang, who was wiping the table with a rag, quickly put it down.

"From the Prince Zhao's residence." The steward pulled a note from his sleeve. "The young master says that the capital is not peaceful, and outsiders are prone to disaster. Send five hundred taels of silver for tea money to the Prince's residence on the third day of each month to ensure your safety."

Zhou Yang took the invitation, his hand trembling slightly: "Five hundred taels...this...I've just arrived in the capital, and I'm short of money..."

"That's your problem," the steward sneered. "The second day of the month is in three days. Remember to prepare the silver in advance. The young master's temper is colder than the winter in this capital."

He turned and left, his robe billowing in the wind. Zhou Yang chased after him, bowing and scraping as he watched his retreating figure: "Take care, sir. I will, I will, see you off."

Only after the figure disappeared at the edge of the plum grove did Zhou Yang straighten up. He touched his face, the fear he had shown moments before completely gone. He returned to his room, closed the door, and dragged a cloth bag from under the bed. Inside the bag were the Imperial Preceptor's blood-stained robes and a small bottle of dark red essence blood.

"The Crown Prince of Zhao..." He licked his lips, pulled out a small notebook from his robes, and circled a mark in it. "He does have distinctive features; he has a black mole on his left cheek."

As night fell, the yamen gradually quieted down. In the distance, faint screams could be heard from the imperial prison, but soon silence returned.

Zhou Yang didn't light a lamp. He squatted in the center of the room, slashing his fingertip with a dagger, the blood dripping onto the ground and drawing eerie patterns. Those were the talismans of the Corpse-Raising Array, one of the legacies left to him by Fang Tian. He poured the National Preceptor's essence blood into the array's core, then took out the fragment of the dragon's spine and gently pressed it onto the bloodstain.

The bone fragments emitted a faint glow, the array patterns lighting up little by little before quickly dimming. A slight rustling came from beneath the floor, as if something was turning over in the soil.

Zhou Yang sat cross-legged at the front of the formation, his hands forming a mudra, chanting incantations. A quarter of an hour later, he suddenly opened his eyes and shouted, "Rise!"

A small bulge appeared on the ground, then subsided. In a place unseen by the naked eye, a phantom formed from blood and corpse poison slowly materialized, conforming to the shadows on the ground. It had no physical form, yet it could devour living souls.

Zhou Yang breathed a sigh of relief, fine beads of sweat appearing on his forehead. He wiped his face, took out the two hundred-tael silver ingots that he hadn't even warmed up yet, and weighed them in his hands.

"You've invested a lot of capital; don't disappoint me with the interest."

No sooner had he finished speaking than a very soft knocking sound came from outside the window.

Zhou Yang quickly put away the silver ingots and placed his hand on his waist knife: "Who?"

\"I.\"

It was Qin Shuang's voice. Zhou Yang got up and opened the window, letting in a gust of cold wind carrying snowflakes. Qin Shuang, dressed in night clothes, slipped into the room, carrying the chill from outside. She glanced at the furnishings and frowned: "They put you here?"

"A haunted house, cheap." Zhou Yang closed the window. "Got something?"

Qin Shuang removed her mask, her expression grave: "The Crown Prince of Zhao is holding a flower-viewing banquet in three days; he has sent you an invitation."

"I know, the housekeeper came this afternoon to collect protection money."

"That's not the point," Qin Shuang lowered her voice. "The banquet is at the Tingyu Pavilion in the Prince's mansion. The invitations are gilded and inked with ink soaked in the blood of condemned prisoners. This is a trap; he wants to use you to establish his authority and show the newly rich in the capital who are waiting to see what happens."

Zhou Yang stroked his chin: "Admiring flowers... I'm not interested in flowers right now, I'm only interested in how much silver my life is worth."

"You can still laugh?" Qin Shuang glared at him. "The Prince of Zhao is the Emperor's uncle, and the Crown Prince has three thousand private soldiers and two True Yuan Realm retainers. Your little tricks won't work in the capital."

Zhou Yang walked to the bedside and sat down, patting the straw mat beneath him: "So what do you suggest we do?"

"Escape." Qin Shuang pulled out a fake travel permit. "Leave the city tonight and head to the northern border. I have..."

"I'm not leaving." Zhou Yang interrupted her, his fingers tapping on the bed frame. "He invited me to admire the flowers. If I don't go, how am I supposed to collect protection money in the capital?"

"Are you crazy?"

"I'm not crazy." Zhou Yang looked up at her, his pupils deep and unfathomable in the candlelight. "He wants my face, I want his substance. If we're going to do business, we have to meet and talk. But..."

He paused, then flashed that greedy smile: "It'll cost more."

Qin Shuang looked at him and suddenly felt a chill run down her spine. She had seen Zhou Yang with this expression before; the last time he smiled like that, Fang Tian was dead, and the Imperial Advisor was dead too.

A gust of wind picked up outside the window, causing the withered vines to whip against the windowpane with a crackling sound. The invisible corpse puppet twitched in the shadows, as if it had caught a whiff of blood.