The Shattered Realm Pearl

He had died once before. His sworn elder brother and the person beside him in bed had crossed out his name.

When he opened his eyes again, he had become Lin Yue, a sickly wretch from the Lower Third Ward. He could not summon qi, his household register had been publicly revoked, and on his first day, he was beaten. A gray bead in his palm warmed, and he could see how the qi in others flowed.

But this sight came at a price: each glance left him blind for half a breath; looking into someone's body left him blind for a whole night and deaf until dawn. And the cost was deducted from the few years he had left to live.

With no qi of his own, he borrowed the half-breath others let slip and nudged their spells a fraction off course, one by one sending them tumbling into the pile of spiritual dregs.

The higher he climbed, the stranger things became: the qi in the spiritual dregs was weighed; the ledger recorded expenses but not who received them; the ward school’s manual was missing a line; someone had taken several pages from an old register three years ago, and the next day he fell ill.

At the top of the Nine Pillars, who had been rifling through the registers all this time?