The days after the correction were calm.

  Too calm, some thought.

  Lin Yue resumed patrol with slightly longer routes.

  Not out of paranoia.

  Out of instinct.

  When something presses once, it can press again.

  She found Bai Tusu alone near the upper terraces at dusk.

  “You’re monitoring the soil again,” Lin Yue said.

  “Yes.”

  “You think it will repeat?”

  “No.”

  “Then why?”

  “Because it changed.”

  Lin Yue stepped closer.

  “…You’re not afraid?”

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  Bai Tusu considered the question.

  “No.”

  Lin Yue studied her expression carefully.

  “Confident?”

  “No.”

  That answer surprised her.

  Bai Tusu finally looked up.

  “I simply do not see it as an enemy.”

  Lin Yue exhaled slowly.

  “I do.”

  The silence between them was not tense.

  It was thoughtful.

  Two interpretations of the same sky.

  Lin Yue rested the base of her spear lightly against the ground.

  “When it pressed,” she said quietly, “I wanted to strike it.”

  “I know,” Bai Tusu replied.

  “You didn’t.”

  “There was nothing to strike.”

  Lin Yue laughed faintly.

  “You and him are alike.”

  Bai Tusu did not respond immediately.

  “Not alike,” she said after a moment.

  “Aligned.”

  Neither spoke his name.

  They did not need to.

  For the first time, Lin Yue looked at Bai Tusu not as another elder.....

  But as someone who had stood under the same pressure and chosen differently.

  Respect shifted.

  Subtle.

  Unspoken.

  Later that night, Lin Yue approached Lui Ming.

  “The next one won’t be that mild,” she said.

  “No,” he replied.

  She studied him.

  “You didn’t hesitate.”

  “There was no decision to make.”

  She nodded slowly.

  “I would have forced it.”

  “Yes.”

  “…Would that have been wrong?”

  “No.”

  She blinked slightly.

  “Then why didn’t we?”

  “Because force was unnecessary.”

  Lin Yue walked away with more to consider than she expected.

  Bai Tusu, watching from a distance, said nothing.

  But she understood something quietly dangerous:

  They were not competing for affection.

  They were calibrating interpretations of strength.

  And that calibration would shape the future.

  No confession.

  No jealousy.

  Only shared weight.

  End of Chapter 37