Where Winds Meet Imperial Palace - June 2026 Events, Campaigns, and Bosses

Where Winds Meet has been moving fast since its November 2025 launch. The free-to-play Wuxia ARPG from Everstone Studio and NetEase Games crossed nine million players after release, and Version 1.7 Imperial Palace continues that post-launch content push. After the three-part Hexi expansion took players through the deserts and cities of the western frontier, the new update opens the gates of Kaifeng's royal court and adds one of the largest content drops the game has received so far.

The Imperial Palace update arrives in two phases and fills most of June with new activities. Players get a new explorable palace zone, two story campaigns, two world bosses, a 10-player dungeon, the Skyward Bond guild challenge, palace minigames, new cosmetics, a Dragon Boat Festival event, and the wider Xbox launch window. Instead of focusing on only one type of player, Version 1.7 spreads content across story progression, exploration, group PvE, seasonal events, and collection systems.

Imperial Palace - The New Zone and What It Takes to Get There

The Imperial Palace is a new explorable area built inside Kaifeng City. Everstone Studio describes it as a living royal court populated by more than 3,000 NPCs, with rival factions operating inside the palace walls, rooftop traversal built into the vertical layout, hidden passages, and side activities spread across the grounds. The zone is not just a backdrop for the main story. It is also the center of the version's exploration events, secret oddities, minigames, bosses, and seasonal activities.

How to Unlock the Imperial Palace and Start Throne and Tempest

Access to the Imperial Palace is gated by progression. Players need to reach Character Level 32 and complete the Kaifeng Main Chapter I quest "New Arrival in Kaifeng - The Welcoming Crowd." After that, the Lost Chapter "Throne and Tempest" becomes available and opens the path into the palace itself.

"Throne and Tempest" is the backbone of both expansion phases. Phase 1 begins with the investigation around the Sealed Treasury, while Phase 2 continues the story through the Confinement Tower and the Water Prison map. The update was split across the May 28 launch and the June 8-9 content window, which gave the main storyline a staggered structure instead of releasing the full arc at once.

Outside the main campaign, the Palace Chronicle exploration event runs from May 28 to June 25. It triggers random travel events across the palace grounds and rewards players who explore the zone instead of rushing only through the campaign objectives.

Sealed Treasury and Confinement Tower - Both Story Campaigns Explained

The Sealed Treasury is the entry point into the Imperial Palace's central mystery. An anonymous letter points toward the heavily guarded royal vault, and following it pulls players into a conspiracy tied directly to the dynasty's power structure. The investigation involves infiltrating the treasury while dealing with the Black-Clad Thief, a figure connected to the court's internal rot.

The campaign does not play out like a straightforward dungeon run. It leans into the palace's intrigue setting, giving players information through eavesdropping, NPC interactions, and staged encounters before the story escalates into direct combat. Players who replay the Sealed Treasury have a chance to drop the Peace Seal accessory, which can also be purchased through the Season Shop, making the campaign worth running beyond the first clear.

Sealed Treasury vs Confinement Tower - What Changes Between Phase 1 and Phase 2

The Confinement Tower continues "Throne and Tempest" during the second content phase and moves the story into the palace's underground prison. The Water Prison map changes the tone of the arc from investigation to confrontation. The familiar stranger the story has been building toward appears again, this time trapped inside a hatred-fueled illusion, and the campaign ends in a boss battle against the Lone Tyrant.

That structure gives the Imperial Palace story a clear two-part rhythm. Sealed Treasury is built around discovery, infiltration, and court intrigue. Confinement Tower is built around escalation, imprisonment, illusion, and a direct boss encounter. Players who are only interested in the main story should still treat both campaigns as one connected arc, because Phase 2 resolves the mystery that Phase 1 sets up.

Gilded Lament and Cat Emperor - New World Bosses in the Palace Grounds

Two new world bosses appear with the Imperial Palace update, both accessible once the zone is unlocked, and both designed around mechanics that go beyond straightforward DPS checks. Gilded Lament is a ghost born from the tragedy of the Cold Palace. Her lore ties her to a figure who died forgotten inside the court's most isolated wing.

In combat, Gilded Lament composes a shield before the main phase change hits, which extends the fight and punishes groups that front-load burst damage without reading the encounter's rhythm. First-time defeat rewards include Gilded Bond, Medicinal Tales x3, Inner Way Note: Custom Chest x5, and Echo Jade x20. Her Avatar is also available through the Trial Bosses menu for players who want to replay the fight for cosmetic and badge rewards.

The Cat Emperor is the stranger of the two encounters, an eerie transformation of a once-auspicious imperial feline that the court considered a good omen. Unlocking the fight requires fishing at a specific time in the palace area, which hides the encounter behind a non-combat activity instead of a standard boss marker.

Once the fight begins, the Cat Emperor locks its stun gauge. That removes the usual crowd-control window and forces the group to adjust its damage approach. First-time rewards match Gilded Lament's structure: the Meow Magistrate cosmetic, Medicinal Tales x3, Inner Way Note: Custom Chest x5, and Echo Jade x20. Both bosses also feed into the Sword Forge challenge system through the Trial interface, where players earn boss Avatars, Trial Badges, and Echo Jade on repeat runs.

Resounding Majesty - Everdeer and Moongazing in the 10-Player Dungeon

Hero's Realm: Resounding Majesty is the expansion's main multiplayer challenge, a 10-player dungeon that sequences two boss encounters back to back. Both Everdeer and Moongazing Maiden are familiar names from the Liangzhou region of the Hexi expansion, but Resounding Majesty reframes them as a coordinated endgame trial rather than open-world encounters that players can approach more casually.

Resounding Majesty Boss Mechanics and Group Roles

Everdeer's fight is built around the Firefly Lamp. The lamp generates a green safe zone that protects the party from a persistent damage-over-time effect covering the arena outside the light. The lamp drains energy continuously, so players must collect green orbs scattered across the arena and deposit them back into the lamp to keep it active.

Each player can carry only one orb at a time. That rule turns the fight into a coordination check, because the group must decide who breaks away from damage to maintain the lamp and who stays on the boss. Healers can help with orb collection during sustained phases to free up DPS, but the encounter can fall apart quickly if the group does not assign roles before the pull.

Moongazing Maiden takes over as the second encounter, shifting the group's focus from resource management to movement and positional play. Her lore frames her as a dragon maiden who fought in silence to protect a fragile peace, unknown to history, now waiting in the Jade-Mirrored Spring. The combat emphasizes speed and strategy in moonlit conditions, creating a mechanical contrast to Everdeer's lamp-focused loop.

The full dungeon also connects to the wider endgame structure of Version 1.7. Skyward Bond gives guilds a separate multi-floor tower that supports up to 10 players and features progressive boss encounters including Twin Lions and Ghost Master. Together, Resounding Majesty and Skyward Bond give organized groups a parallel PvE track during the June content window.

Dragon Boat Festival and the Full June Activity Schedule

The Dragon Boat Festival event launches in June as the seasonal layer on top of the Imperial Palace content. It is tied to the real Chinese holiday and lets players take part in traditional customs inside the game world, including handcrafting gifts for Jianghu companions and completing Five Elements exercises tied to the festival's cultural framework.

The important part is that the event does not require the same structure as the harder campaign and boss content. It gives casual players a separate progress track that can be completed without a regular dungeon group, while still keeping the palace relevant outside the main campaign.

What Players Should Prioritize During the June Event Window

The June schedule stacks several systems on top of each other. Palace Chronicle runs through June 25, world boss resets for Gilded Lament and Cat Emperor refresh regularly, Confinement Tower becomes available during the second phase, and Resounding Majesty and Skyward Bond continue as group-focused endgame activities. Players who want the most efficient route should unlock the Imperial Palace first, finish the available "Throne and Tempest" campaign steps, clear the world bosses for first-time rewards, and then move into Resounding Majesty or Skyward Bond depending on whether they have a coordinated group.

The Forest Sovereign Battle Pass also launched with Version 1.7 and carries through the full month, adding a seasonal progression layer separate from weekly boss and dungeon resets. On top of that, Where Winds Meet expanded to Xbox Series X|S, Xbox on PC, and Xbox Cloud in the June 8 launch window, broadening the player base at the same time the version's second phase became available.

Palace Minigames and Cosmetics in Version 1.7

The Imperial Palace area ships with a full set of minigames that give the zone an identity beyond its story and boss content. Cricket Fighting, Ultimate Slap, Chef Cleaver, Imperial Decree, Step into Bloom, Ice Games, and Meow Meow Challenges are all available inside the palace grounds. These activities reward appearances, inscriptions, and progression materials for players who engage with the palace as a full zone rather than only a quest hub.

The zone also contains four new secret oddities hidden across its layout, rewarding exploration for players who move through the palace without following only quest markers. These secrets fit the update's broader design, where some content is placed behind exploration and side systems instead of being marked directly through the main campaign path.

The Version 1.7 cosmetic additions are among the most varied parts of the update. Graceful Fox, Glassy Expanse, Radiant Majesty, Crimson Cloud, Moonlit Howl, and Imperial Stag are all new appearances, several of which support dyeing and part separation for more granular outfit customization. The Draw System also received a quality-of-life improvement, with dismantling now generating Prime Essence at a better rate than previous versions, making it more practical to manage unwanted pulls.

Final Thoughts

Version 1.7 Imperial Palace is important because it adds content for several player types at once. Story players get Sealed Treasury and Confinement Tower. Explorers get the palace zone, Palace Chronicle, secret oddities, and hidden boss triggers. Group-focused players get Resounding Majesty and Skyward Bond. Casual players get Dragon Boat Festival activities, minigames, cosmetics, and battle pass progression.

The two-phase structure also gives the update a clearer rhythm than a single content drop. Phase 1 introduces the palace, the royal conspiracy, and the first part of "Throne and Tempest." Phase 2 continues the storyline through the Water Prison and adds the next step for players following the main arc. For anyone progressing through Kaifeng, reaching Level 32 and unlocking the Imperial Palace should be the main priority in June, because most of the version's story, exploration, boss, and event content is built around that zone.