“Today is a fine, sunny day, suitable for fishing.”

That was the only sentence on the jade paper. It was as out-of-the-blue as it seemed meaningless.

Wei Yuan turned it over and over in his hands in search for additional hints, then searched around in hopes of asking the woman herself what she meant. Of course, Grandmaster-Junior Zhu was nowhere to be found.

If Zhu Yuanjin didn’t want to be found, even Wei Yuan with his extraordinary senses would struggle to detect her. Still, he had learned something about his grandmaster-junior from this latest interaction: she had to be a part of the Traditional Party.

Members of the Traditional Party were fond of playing word games and speaking in half-truths, saying one-part and leaving nine-parts unsaid, dropping riddles everywhere and expecting their disciples to figure things out on their own. 

Back when Wei Yuan was still receiving centralized tutelage, and the Reform Party and Traditional Party were locked in a fierce struggle, both sides often engaged in daily verbal sparring and showed each other...