The girl— Lily, as he’d later learn— didn’t come around for a week after his first lesson, which while a little disappointing, was a bit of a blessing in disguise. He’d been scared for a moment he’d just done his first ‘hidden master imparts secret celestial knowledge’ thing, but— thankfully— after he checked on one of the library’s computers, he found that formations weren’t restricted to cultivators only. He’d kinda figured given the reactions he’d gotten in his various attempts at getting hired, but still— it’d actually been a bit of an interesting topic to delve into. Apparently formations were a key component in the dataslates, and certain public services, all designed by mortals and… well, that was besides the point.

  He allowed himself to imagine for a second what the Patriarch of the sect he’d grown up in would’ve thought of mortals being one of the primary driving forces behind formations studies, then laughed. He’d have undergone qi deviation immediately. Well, more than he’d already undergone qi deviation. Good riddance. Mingtian shook his head— there were whole universes younger than the man’s corpse, and he still couldn’t help but be petty towards him.

  What a bastard.

  Anyways.

  Eventually, Lily did come back, which was both good and bad— good in that he finally had someone other than Janus who wanted to spend any significant time with him, which he was pretty sure was an integral to Normal Mortal Activities, and bad because she was incorrigible when it came to trying to get him to teach her secret techniques. Worse than his worst disciples, which really said something— though maybe that was in part due to his own restrictions on the matter. He couldn’t just tell her how to string together a grand formation, or how to format an array— those were sect secrets, and because he was a mortal (definitely) he didn’t have access to them.

  It took him a little while, but eventually he managed to scrounge up at least a little bit of a solution— he’d give her a worksheet every morning, which she’d chew on for most of the day, then give it a small grade and get it back to her before she left before sunset. It was a pretty neat way of teaching her a variety of runes and their crucial interrelations that didn’t rely on him actually sitting down and teaching her.

  She was smart, too. Not that there was any shortage of smart, driven kids attending East Saffron’s 32nd Preparatory Academy, but even amongst them, she stuck out. It was that refusal, he couldn’t help but think— that refusal to be anything else but successful. To reach out and grasp every opportunity, and then carve even further some more—

  It was probably unhealthy, but he really didn’t have a good enough grasp of mortal psychology to form an opinion either way on that. Janus, at least, seemed subtly displeased at how much work she did constantly. Once, when they were on break, he’d complained about how she never did anything fun, which Mingtian found patently absurd. After all, there was little that was more fun than playing with formations.

  Finally, as summer break drew to an end, Lily made her first talisman. A simple explosive tag, the sort that wouldn’t be able to do more than deliver a nasty kick given it was relying on the ambient qi…

  It was still an achievement though… and Mintian found himself being called up to Lexi’s office.

  He gave Lily his congratulations and another worksheet to work on— the first in a set of energy modifying runes, which were some of his favorite— and followed Janus up to Lexi’s office. It was just as he remembered from the last time he’d been there, months back, filled with clutter, tomes shoved into bookshelves behind the desk, a shaft of sunlight slanting through the window to strike the wood of her desk.

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  Lexi folded her hands together, giving him an inscrutable look for a long moment. “You know formations.”

  “I have some skill—”

  “You’re good at them. Good enough that you could have probably gotten hired by, I dunno, a pest control company or something. There’s never any shortage of wardstones that need repairs. Heck, our wardstone is behind on its repairs, if you’d be willing to take a look at it.”

  “I doubt that’s why you called me up here, though.” Else she wouldn’t have waited for him to guide Lily all the way through the steps of talisman creation.

  She was silent for a moment, before she sighed and— simply— nodded. “It’s dangerous, to study formations so deeply. Especially when you’re not affiliated with a licensed institution. If it’s something you’re truly passionate about…” she hesitated— but only for a moment. Mingtian had long since pinned her as a woman of decisiveness, and that determination held true as she reached up behind her and pulled out a single, worn tome, bound with leather made of vellum. He passed his spiritual sense over it, and almost recoiled at the weight of age, the coiled power than rested in each and every one of its vellum pages—

  He gently, almost reverently took it from her, and opened it, and— had to remind himself that for however much he was pretending to be a mortal, he was still vastly better at formations than even their Immortal Ascension masters. It was interesting, he supposed— a few slightly more complicated connections, a handful of spiritual imprints of various three-dimensional runes, and some other things, but it was all so elementary. Still, he supposed that— especially to a mortal— a book like this would be an incomparable treasure. “I can’t take this.”

  “Well, obviously.” Lexi snorted. “All the various cultivation manuals and resources this library has aren’t allowed to be removed from the top floor of this library— and even then, that’s only if I use my token to check them out for you. I’ll let you borrow this one, though… if you do something.”

  Instantly, he was wary. “What?”

  “I’ve been talking with the principal, and while it was initially going nowhere— now that I know that you have formations skills, I was able to convince him to offer up a deal. He’ll fund your salary to senior librarian like Janus, and sign off as a second sponsor for the formations book, if you agree to teach formations in the academy.”

  For a moment, he was incredulous. To buy not just a formation from him, but his instruction? With money? The idea was so absurd he almost stormed out on the spot— but, then, he reminded himself that Lexi had no idea who she was talking to. That, and he’d much prefer to keep his job, if at all possible.

  She had no idea she was asking the Immortal Sovereign of Boundless Radiance to teach in a preparatory academy in exchange for what was, essentially, nothing at all. Actually, now that he thought about it, that would be pretty funny— but, no. He did not sell his formations so easily, and certainly not his knowledge. Mortal or not, he would not betray himself so. “No.”

  Lexi blinked. “No? Are you sure? I’m not sure you understand how good of a deal this is for you—”

  He gave her a soft smile, shaking his head. “No, I will not teach formations. Not for any price.” He slid the book on formations back to Lexi, trying his best to appear like he actually cared about the opportunity it represented to anyone who wasn’t secretly an immortal in disguise. “I’ve been helping Lily because she both interests me and has a drive that I find admirable. That doesn’t extend to anyone else.”

  “I see.” Lexi was silent for a long moment. “An unexpected response, and the principal’s not going to be happy— he’s been trying to get someone with formations knowledge to teach here for years— but I respect that. You remind me of some of the sect-associated craftsmen I’ve met before— fiercely protective of their secrets, and just as proud.” She even smiled, weakly— “I wish you the best in that route.”

  Then she kicked him out of her office, leaving him standing there— hoping, at least, that he hadn’t messed everything up.

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