Even the most beautiful of pieces had an end.

Though the strings slowly released their last reverberations, Jiang Chen’s audience felt the music echo still in their hearts.

Si Tong and Yao Guang traded an astonished look. They had been completely unprepared for the possibility that Jiang Chen could play such moving pieces. They hadn’t expected much of his musical prowess. The style of the pieces themselves were the only thing they had looked forward to.

Yes, the melodies were stunning, but his playing even more so. He’d started plucking the zither with an unpracticed hand—almost inept, in their eyes.

But it didn’t take long for him to get markedly better....