Qian Yuliu had let down a lot of people—the title of Number One Lapdog of the Star Engraving Statistical Department wasn't something he'd earned for nothing.

He was just like Yan Tong's silkworm-mouthed scum, framing, arson, murder—he'd done it all except for harassing women. Qian Yuliu had his hands in everything else.

"Sometimes, Le Yuxin even felt that Qian Yuliu dying from a backstab by Yin Yinyin was actually a good thing. Not only did it let White Night posthumously clear his name, it kept Qian Yuliu from facing judgment in the future—good deeds can't offset bad ones; the future can't excuse present crimes. You always have to pay the price in the end."

After Le Yuxin died in Qian Yuliu's place, he basically stopped doing dirty work. Even if he had to get his hands dirty, he wouldn't go for the kill. Everyone he did kill basically had it coming—Lin Jinyao died a hero's death, Lin Xue'en died for her betrayal, Kui Zhao perished from his own venom...

"But does that mean Le Yuxin had a clear conscience?"

He couldn't.

"Lin Xue was easier to rationalize. Her tragic fate was, first of all, thanks to her father and uncle, and only secondarily the result of Le Yuxin, the scapegoat who actually did the deed. Or maybe Qian Yuliu was just a target for Lin Xue to vent her hatred on—when all your family's dead, enemies are all you have left to live for."

"Same deal with Qian Yuya. Le Yuxin had already done his best to follow Qian Yuliu's plan, and if Qian Yuya got Silver Blood disease, it wasn't on him—they were Qian, not Uchiha. There's no way Le Yuxin could've known that Qian Yuya, all riled up, would immediately become a tool-person."

"But when it came to Kui Nianruo, Le Yuxin felt just the slightest bit guilty."

"It wasn't about her father Kui Zhao. If he had a do-over, Le Yuxin would still rip her dad in half. But when he teamed up with Yin Yinyin for the assassination, he screwed up and got taken hostage by Kui Zhao, and Yin Yinyin ended up stabbing Kui Nianruo twice to save him."

"Even if Yin Yinyin just wanted to save him, Le Yuxin still felt kind of shitty about it. He wasn't the kind of guy who could just accept the whole 'hurting others to survive' thing—not unless he wanted to go from being 'Zhengwei, the Shame of Silver Blood,' to the new 'Blackthorn.'"

"And Kui Zhao died because of him—even if Kui Zhao bled out halfway down the road, it was still Le Yuxin's handiwork. He didn't mind carrying that blood debt."

"If, when facing the daughter of someone he'd killed, Le Yuxin could remain unfazed, that meant the world had changed his very nature. But sadly, maybe he just hadn't killed enough people or lived long enough. He still wasn't changed."

"He was still Le Yuxin—carrying a moral crucifix, kind of melodramatic, lazy, gluttonous, all bark and no bite."

"Hello, Kui Nianruo," Le Yuxin smoothed his red bangs, tilting his head to look at the clock in the library, "I wanted to ask, do you have last year's Eye of Omniscience results in here?"

"Eye of Omniscience results?" Kui Nianruo furrowed her brow slightly and shook her head, "Never seen anything like that."

"Not even in the White Box?" Le Yuxin looked a little disappointed.

"The Eye of Omniscience, that's the annual exam coming up, right?" Kui Nianruo thought about it and said, "Juniors and seniors should have seen the scores, some people with good memories might have them written down. But these kinds of exam records are usually all in the third-floor archive, and only the director and the archive manager can get in. Maybe try asking the director."

"So, where's the director?"

"Director's in the third-floor office—I'll take you there!"

"No need, I can go myself..."

"No worries, the White Box is a maze, and since it's your first time here, Professor Qin, let me show you the way."

Even though Le Yuxin declined again and again, Kui Nianruo zipped off toward the stairwell, waved him over, and he had no choice but to follow.

"The White Box is huge. The first floor has all kinds of officially published stuff, like newspapers, novels, and even the Unrivaled List's archived here now..." Kui Nianruo explained as she walked, "Hey, Professor Qin, do you buy the Unrivaled List? That thing's such a scam—there's just different cards, but it tricks people into buying more. The Imperial Court ought to pass a law against that kind of racket..."

Le Yuxin couldn't help but raise his eyebrows at that, "I actually think the Unrivaled List's money-making scheme has its upsides."

"What upsides?"

"It gives people whose wallets outmatch their IQs a chance to put their money back into circulation."

Kui Nianruo gave him a confused look, then just kept explaining, "The second floor is mostly rare manuscripts, one-of-a-kind stuff—absolutely no checking out, you can only read them here..."

"And the third floor is..."

Kui Nianruo suddenly stopped, turned to Le Yuxin with a face flushed red and cheeks puffed in anger—clearly she wanted to say something, but in the end decided to swallow it all and just lowered her head, striding forward in silence without another word to Le Yuxin.

"Really?"

"How could Kui Zhao's daughter be this slow on the uptake? Since when did Wolf Eagle have a sloth for a kid?"

"But at last, Kui Nianruo finally figured out he'd been backhandedly calling her dumb and decided to ignore him. Le Yuxin could finally breathe."

"Being looked at with that respectful stare from Kui Nianruo, being able to even banter together like two teachers—Le Yuxin felt completely oppressed by it all."

"His moral code simply couldn't tolerate being treated like this."

"He'd read some novels for women from time to time—the opening always had the male lead slaughtering the female lead's whole family, then going after her, and yet the heroine would end up in some kind of torment-filled romance anyway—what the hell was that? Hate is hate, why would you even like the guy?"

"Le Yuxin even wanted to just grab Kui Nianruo and shout, 'I killed your father,' let her hate him fair and square, rather than having her even slightly like him."

"This kind of deception felt as scummy as a cuckold story. Le Yuxin felt like he was acting all buddy-buddy with a poor chump, right after sleeping with his wife—he'd rather have an all-out battle with Blue Flame than spend another minute with Kui Nianruo."

Thankfully, the walk wasn't very long.

"Here's the director's office," Kui Nianruo said stiffly, knocking on the door, "Director? Director? Director?"

"Even though I got trolled a bit by Professor Qin just now, I can't help but want to explain," Kui Nianruo added, "The director's hard of hearing—you have to knock and call three times or he won't answer."

"Come in."

A deep male voice came from inside. Kui Nianruo opened the door and brought Le Yuxin in with her.

This looked like a normal office, but the person inside was far from ordinary. Behind the desk sat a young man with round glasses and long, black, shiny hair tied into a dozen braids, decked out in a flashy red-cloud robe and sporting star-blue earrings.

Just sitting there, he lit up the place like the sun in the night.

"And for some reason, that getup looked oddly familiar to Le Yuxin..."

"Hello, I'm Cha Shiyin, director of the White Box," the young man smiled. Noticing Le Yuxin's confused stare, he added, "I'm the principal's distant nephew."

Le Yuxin suddenly realized—yeah, that outrageous fashion sense clearly ran in the family; nobody would believe he wasn't related to Cha Huan. No wonder he was so young and already a director—nepotism at its finest.

"You're Professor Qin Le Yin, right? I've heard you're the only person at this school trendier than I am." Cha Shiyin eyed Le Yuxin's red hair and sighed, "I actually dyed my hair red once too, but my brother scrubbed it all out, said I'd 'scare kids.'"

"Since when did I get tagged as a trendsetter?" Le Yuxin blinked and got right to the point, "Director, any chance you have last year's Eye of Omniscience results?"

"Sure, not just last year—I've got test results from the last three years all ready to go."

Cha Shiyin said lazily, "This time of year, everyone comes by for previous years' exam results, trying to use old rankings to pick ringers for their teams... It'll be a hundred coins."

"Huh?" Le Yuxin said, "You charge for the results?"

"Test results are free, but if you want previous years' Eye of Omniscience candidate analyses, that's a hundred extra." Cha Shiyin said casually, "Not that it's my business—I don't make a dime. I'm just the middleman."

"Still, isn't a hundred coins a bit...?"

"It's on a sliding scale. First copy of the info goes for a hundred, second for fifty, third for twenty, after that, it's always ten." Cha Shiyin said, "And if you believe what you're getting is the first copy, well, that's up to you."

"The director's trustworthy," Kui Nianruo cut in, "If he says he's off tomorrow, he's off tomorrow. Never once lied."

If Le Yuxin didn't know Kui Nianruo's background, he'd almost think these two were running a con. Still, if this was the first copy, a hundred coins was pretty fair—fresh intel was everything.

"Wait, is it just that the Eye of Omniscience exam was so new that nobody's had time to come buy the info yet?" Le Yuxin just paid up, no hesitation, "I'll take it."

"Much obliged." Cha Shiyin pulled a dossier from his drawer, "By the way, if you want to meet last year's top individual Eye of Omniscience performer, I can introduce you."

Top individual scores didn't always mean the highest actual rankings, but it did prove insane depth and breadth of knowledge—the exact kind of hack Le Yuxin's study-slacker cheat squad desperately needed.

"You know them?"

"Of course. He's the White Box's archive manager, and actually compiled the records you have there." Cha Shiyin pressed a button on his desk, and the vibration zipped through copper tubing, ringing a clear chime elsewhere in the building.

"He should be reading at this time—so, five, four, three, two, one."

Snap.

A young man in gray showed up at the director's office doorway—his posture was hunched, almost stunted. Half his face looked burned and twisted, and the glare shining from that ruined skin made everyone uncomfortable with its palpable bitterness and disdain.

He ignored Cha Shiyin, shot the info in Le Yuxin's hand a knowing look, and sneered, "Cheating's forbidden at the Imperial Academy. Teachers helping with it is doubly forbidden."

"I'm just buying some extracurricular material for my students," Le Yuxin replied blandly.

"Wouldn't happen to be Ming Shuiyun, the one who dragged you off that other day? Not that I want to comment on teachers getting too close to students, but since it's not my business, I'll stay out of it."

"Ming Shuiyun, the throne, the Eye of Omniscience."

Shi Wen folded his arms, straightened his back, and raised his chin with a smirk, "So, Professor Qin, looks like you've got your reasons for helping your student game the test."

"Then—do you want help from a wretch like me, whose self-respect depends on everyone else's fear and contempt?"