Zetian flees Sima Yi's office as Qin Zheng pursues her, enraged by the leaked audio that has revealed Yizhi's six-month deception keeping him imprisoned through lies. She races to find Yizhi before Qin Zheng can kill him, reasoning through Yizhi's spirit signature that he is somewhere on the palace grounds.

Qin Zheng catches up to her in a roofed walkway by a pond, donning Di Renjie's reclaimed armor and demanding she stand aside. Despite knowing she cannot defeat him—qì-exhausted and outmatched—Zetian engages him in combat to buy Yizhi time. Qin Zheng ensnares her scythe with a spirit-metal whip and seizes her throat, but she breaks free and slashes at his blind side.

Yizhi appears down the walkway, sees that Qin Zheng knows, drops a bundle of papers, and flees. Qin Zheng freezes the pond's surface to cut across and chase him. Yizhi throws smoke spheres releasing a paralytic chemical agent; both Qin Zheng and Zetian collapse, muscles convulsing.

Wearing a gas mask, Yizhi emerges, kneels over Qin Zheng, and presses a dagger to his throat, drawing blood. Zetian, terrified he will kill the emperor they need to fight the gods, cannot speak. Instead, Yizhi tells Qin Zheng to remember why he was spared, orders him to end the terror and blame everything on Yizhi, then disappears into the smoke, glancing back at Zetian as she loses consciousness.