Chapter 16#
Chapter 16#
It’s all the same person.
The speaker seemed to be saying a most ordinary phrase, his low voice drifting away with the sound of gongs and drums beside the float, dissipating into the laughter of children.
These words came too quickly and left too quickly.
So quickly that An Wuxue almost thought he had misheard.
He had heard Xie Zhefeng mention an “old friend” several times.
Except for the last time when he realized it was himself, he had never paid it any mind.
Life is fleeting; those who could be called an “old friend” by the Chuhan Sword Sovereign were countless, and among them, he was the most unlikely.
But now Xie Zhefeng told him that everything mentioned and said referred to a single person.
How could that be possible.
How could it be.
He stood there in a daze.
Xie Zhefeng seemed to have other matters on his mind and didn’t notice his abnormality.
After the float passed, this person looked toward the Zhaoshui Sword in the center of the city, which reached into the clouds, his gaze deep.
A moment later.
Xie Zhefeng turned and walked toward the inn.
An Wuxue followed blankly behind Xie Zhefeng.
Zhaoshui City was filled with music and dance, with vendors lining both sides during the day and pedestrians bustling about.
In a place where mortals and cultivators coexisted, cultivators generally wouldn’t fly through the air for no reason. They walked back to the inn one after the other, separated by the flow of people.
Until Xie Zhefeng reached the door of his room.
An Wuxue was still standing halfway up the stairs.
He looked up at Xie Zhefeng’s back and suddenly asked, “Fellow Daoist Xie, you said you wanted to help your old friend see more of Zhaoshui City’s mortal world—is he no longer around?”
Xie Zhefeng’s back seemed to stiffen for a moment.
This person didn’t answer.
Even if the Chuhan Sword Sovereign was traveling in disguise with a clone at the Great Completion stage, how could he possibly answer every question from a Bigu stage furnace?
But he already had the answer.
The old friend Xie Zhefeng spoke of was indeed him.
He gave a light chuckle.
The haze in his heart dissipated, replaced by an irrepressible sense of absurdity.
What was Xie Zhefeng doing?
Was this some moment of sentimentality at the heights of a thousand years of loneliness, after everything had settled, remembering this senior brother who had once exhausted his heart and soul for his junior brother but ultimately went astray and died a miserable death?
He once thought Xie Zhefeng’s refusal to let go of any clues about the talismans in his hand was just to drive him to total destruction.
But looking back now, with what kind of mood did this person personally go to the Yunjian Sect to investigate?
He would rather Xie Zhefeng forgot him.
What was the point.
In this world, be it love or hate, or even remembrance or resentment, they are all forms of being remembered and bound.
He didn’t want it.
He didn’t want any of it.
He walked up the steps.
As he brushed past Xie Zhefeng, he paused and said slowly, “Mortals live a lifetime between dawn and dusk, and when they die, their souls perish. Cultivators are no exception; dead is dead. Since the old friend is no longer here, no matter how much Fellow Daoist Xie sees, he cannot see through that friend’s eyes. In the end, it’s just self-deception.”
“And, he might not—”
Might not wish to see this so-called remembrance picked up only when occasionally thinking of the past.
He didn’t finish, stopped speaking, bypassed Xie Zhefeng, and returned to his own guest room.
As soon as the door closed, he let out a sharp breath, turned around, leaned his back against the door, and slowly slid down, sitting on the floor in a daze for a long time.
It was silent outside.
Not long after, soft footsteps came from the hallway.
Xie Zhefeng had also entered his room.
An Wuxue also got up, cleansed the dust from his body, went to the table, and brewed a pot of warm tea for himself.
He poured the hot tea into a cup; the tea filled the cup and overflowed onto the table, but he still maintained the pouring posture until a large pool of hot tea spread across the table and no more water came out of the spout.
He shook the white jade pot; there was no sound of water inside.
So he set it down.
That night.
The moon rose, and the lights of thousands of homes went out one by one. The entire Zhaoshui City slowly fell into a deep sleep.
Only a small lamp remained outside the busy inn; the main door was slightly ajar, and no shadows of people could be seen inside.
In the dim room.
Xie Zhefeng was meditating on the bed.
He had been like this for a whole day.
After returning to the inn from the City Lord’s Manor, whether it was because he had seen the giant Zhaoshui Sword too much, or the fragrance from the float lingered, or Suxue’s few harsh but true words were too flawless, the inner demon sealed deep in his sea of consciousness finally found an opportunity to quietly emerge.
As soon as he closed his eyes, a voice identical to his own rose from his sea of consciousness, trying to pull him into the abyss.
“You are already the head of the two realms, why do you still cling to that meager hope of resurrecting your senior brother? For hundreds of years, you searched for the Soul-Nourishing Tree Spirit, sought methods of resurrection, and wanted to investigate the truth of that year to clear your senior brother’s name, but what did you get?”
“Senior brother has been dead for a thousand years. There is nothing left in this world for you to care about. Why not re-establish the Path of No Emotion and explore that higher level that no immortal has ever touched?”
“…Is what Suxue said not right? What ‘peace and prosperity’? No matter how much you see, your senior brother can’t see it anymore, can he? Since he can’t see it, rather than deceiving yourself, why not destroy it all! Why should these common people, who enjoy the protection of the Four Seas Ten Thousand Swords Array, be able to see it while senior brother cannot?”
“You will never experience how cold the Canggǔ Tower is, never meet someone willing to step into the Extreme North Realm and the Galaxy Path for a single piece of clothing for you, never be able to finish a game of chess, never return to the youth of embracing each other to sleep and slaying demons. You will never see him again.”
“Aren’t all of these your own doing?”
“…”
Every word was a most biting interrogation.
Xie Zhefeng was very familiar with this.
Over a thousand years, he had heard the clutter of his inner demon countless times.
He had refuted, questioned, and self-reflected.
He had once frantically searched through all the ancient texts of Luoyue just to find a soul-seeking method.
When the same wound is cut open many times, it’s not that it doesn’t hurt, but that one becomes accustomed to the pain.
He sat motionless in meditation, waiting to circulate the Heart-Clearing Formula to suppress the stray thoughts.
The inner demon realized these words could no longer move his state of mind.
Another voice, as if coming from his own mouth, drifted from another ethereal place: “Don’t you think you’re giving too much attention to that Bigu stage furnace?”
The Heart-Clearing Formula stopped abruptly halfway.
“Back then, when the Yunjian Sect brought Suxue up to Luoyue Peak, you weren’t willing to let him become someone else’s furnace while carrying senior brother’s face, so you kept him—that’s what you told yourself, right?”
His slightly relaxed brow suddenly furrowed.
When Yun Zhou and Yun Yao brought Suxue to Luoyue Peak, he just happened to be heading out to find clues about the source of the turbid air.
The portrait was presented before him, and Suxue stood below the long steps, head lowered, seemingly in fear.
The appearance of the person in the portrait was exceptionally similar to his senior brother.
And Suxue had already been branded with a furnace mark by the Yunjian Sect. If he didn’t keep him, who knew whose furnace he would become while wearing that face.
Therefore, he channeled his aura into the furnace mark and kept the person, thinking that Luoyue Peak would just be supporting an extra idle person in the future.
At that time, Suxue had his head lowered from beginning to end, and he didn’t care about what kind of person Suxue actually was. He left in a hurry and didn’t look closely.
Until he returned to the mountain, that moment in front of the mountain gate when the veiled hat was taken off…
“…The second time you saw him after returning to Luoyue Peak, you clearly understood he couldn’t be senior brother, yet you still hoped he was. You asked him to play chess, listened to his conversation with Yun Zhou—all of this you could tell yourself was because he looked too much like An Wuxue, and you just hoped that one ten-thousandth of his soul was related to senior brother. But what have you been doing since coming to Zhaoshui City?”
“You feel he not only looks like senior brother, but you’re also looking for senior brother’s shadow in him. Suxue is not An Wuxue; you are drinking poison to quench your thirst, delusional!!!”
“Shut up.”
Instead, the inner demon laughed arrogantly: “Can you tell the difference? Do you really think there’s that minuscule possibility he’s related to senior brother, or do you want to deceive yourself and just treat Suxue as senior brother?”
Xie Zhefeng’s body froze.
In a thousand years, the number of living beings was like the sand of the Ganges; it wasn’t as if people similar to senior brother hadn’t appeared.
He had never stopped for them.
Senior brother was senior brother; others were others.
But Suxue…
Why Suxue…
Why?
No…
It shouldn’t be so. No!!!!
“Se-nior, bro-ther.” The inner demon seemed to place these two words in its mouth to savor them slowly.
“A single lantern can make you confused, and a similar person can sway your emotions. Do you really love your senior brother?”
“Is the one you love really that person who actually existed, or is it a bubble of regret and unattainable longing created after the evil deed was done?”
“Hahahahahahahahaha!!”
“…”
The main body of his soul was still at Luoyue, and the inner demon was suppressed within his soul. It couldn’t chaos the world, but it could uniquely chaos his heart.
Far away above the Frost Sea, the main body standing in the wind and snow seemed to sway slightly.
Beneath the barrier, the wind was sharp and the snow was heavy.
The Chuhan Sword trembled, showing signs of unsheathing.
In Zhaoshui City, on the bed, Xie Zhefeng’s previously resting hands gradually clenched into fists.
The surroundings were clearly as silent as death, yet he felt as if he were surrounded by a thousand words.
“Knock knock knock…”
“Knock knock knock—”
A knocking sound suddenly came.
Someone outside the door asked him softly, “Fellow Daoist Xie, are you asleep?”
The voices coming from all directions in his sea of consciousness were suppressed at this moment.
The surroundings were deathly silent.
Xie Zhefeng loosened his hands and slowly opened his eyes.
The person knocking seemed to be in a hurry. Getting no response for a moment, they knocked several more times and called out, “Fellow Daoist Xie?”
A trembling voice drifted through the door, very soft.
Suxue?
Xie Zhefeng stood up.
“…Fellow Daoist X—”
The door opened with a “creak.”
The person knocking was actually leaning against the door. With him suddenly pulling it open, the newcomer fell straight forward as if they had no strength!
Xie Zhefeng was standing right behind the door and immediately reached out to catch the other person.
Zhaoshui City was clearly not in the height of summer, yet he felt like he had caught a heater, his arms full of burning heat.
The person in his arms murmured softly.
The face that was ninety percent similar to his senior brother’s was covered in a layer of haze by the moonlight. The flush on his cheeks spread behind his ears, his eyes were teary and misty, looking up at him as if half-awake.
In his memory, he seemed to have seen such a look before.
His hand holding the other person involuntarily stiffened.
The inner demon’s words just now floated to his heart.
“…Se-nior, bro-ther.”
“…A similar person can sway your emotions. Do you really love your senior brother?”
He abruptly withdrew his hand and stepped back.
An Wuxue also realized something.
His thoughts were a mess, both dizzy and hot, but the moment he touched Xie Zhefeng and felt the slight coolness of the other’s hands, he suddenly thought of how cold the Chuhan Sword’s light was.
His heart jumped, and he supported his limp body to step back quickly.
Xie Zhefeng: “You…”
“Fellow Daoist Xie…” An Wuxue’s voice was hoarse, “I have the Immortal Sovereign’s furnace mark on me. Since Fellow Daoist Xie is…”
He stood beside Xie Zhefeng, leaning against the wall. It felt as if countless hands were scratching at his heart. He had to pause for a moment and take a deep breath before continuing, “Since Fellow Daoist Xie is the Immortal Sovereign’s confidant, do you happen to know… a method of suppression?”
This sentence exhausted all his strength. His legs went soft, and he almost slid down.
Xie Zhefeng flicked his sleeve and softly closed the door.
This person still had a stern face. He took a prayer mat and sat down in meditation by the window, saying to him, “Come here. Your furnace mark flared up; why didn’t you use the ‘End of the World’ talisman I gave you?”
Of course, it was because the ‘End of the World’ talisman couldn’t be used, and Xie Zhefeng was right next door.
But…
Xie Zhefeng stopped pretending with him?
He leaned against the wall and pretended to be surprised: “…Immortal Sovereign!?”
“You don’t look very happy.”
“…”
Indeed, he wasn’t mistaken.
Compared to Xie Zhefeng, he would rather face “Xie Chunhua.”
In a few breaths, his spiritual power circulated through his arm, and another wave of burning heat hit him.
An Wuxue gritted his teeth and stumbled toward Xie Zhefeng, intending to take a prayer mat and sit down.
The flare-up of the furnace mark gradually drained his strength. As Xie Zhefeng’s aura enveloped him, he suddenly tripped.
Unable to reach the prayer mat, he simply knelt down on the long mat nearby and rolled up his sleeve to reveal the burning furnace mark.
He reached out his hand and said with a slightly trembling voice, “I didn’t know it was the Immortal Sovereign before…”
Xie Zhefeng silently raised his hand, his fingertips forming a spell, and placed two fingers together on the mark on his left hand.
There was no further movement.
This person seemed to have spaced out.
He had no mind to care about what Xie Zhefeng was thinking and urged: “…Immortal Sovereign.”
The man’s gaze focused, and a burst of icy spiritual power came from his fingertips, flowing into the mark and traveling through his entire body’s meridians.
The restless, burning sensation dissipated instantly.
Moonlight filtered through the window paper, casting a haze.
They were currently sitting almost side-by-side by the window. An Wuxue could even smell the cold breath on Xie Zhefeng that came from being immersed in wind and snow year-round.
Such close proximity instantly triggered many bad memories.
Sleeping together in the Nameless Mountain, the giant clam at the bottom of the sea, the receding back in the frost and snow…
His whole body stiffened, and he immediately pulled down his sleeve, wanting to retreat.
At that moment—
Outside the window, a long sword from nowhere pierced the moonlight, carrying the sound of breaking wind, and rushed straight toward them!
An Wuxue’s retreat movement stalled imperceptibly.
He could feel it, but Suxue could not.
Xie Zhefeng suddenly grabbed his retreating arm and pulled him aside, both of them falling toward the other side together.
The long sword pierced through the window paper.
An Wuxue cried out softly, “Immortal Sovereign!”
The sword tip brushed past the top of Xie Zhefeng’s head, disheveling his neat hair. It rushed into the room, turned around, and actually continued toward Xie Zhefeng with residual spiritual power.
This sword was here to kill Xie Zhefeng!
An Wuxue: “…”
The owner of this sword is truly a talent.
In the blink of an eye, the long sword was before Xie Zhefeng’s eyes.
This person actually didn’t dissolve the attack with thunderous force but instead used only a cultivation level barely at the early stage of Tribulation Transcendence to block the long sword with spiritual power.
The long sword was knocked back by the spiritual power, and the spiritual power it carried gradually wore away.
Only then did Xie Zhefeng manifested sword intent and shatter the long sword whose owner couldn’t be identified.
The night wind blew in through the hole, stirring the man’s hair.
An Wuxue quickly broke free from Xie Zhefeng’s hand and backed away several steps, widening the distance between them. Only then did he pretend to be shaken and say, “Why would someone sneak attack us… Will the Immortal Sovereign not investigate the sword’s owner?”
“The one who attacked is at the early stage of Tribulation Transcendence,” Xie Zhefeng said.
An Wuxue naturally saw it too.
To dare attack Xie Zhefeng at the early stage of Tribulation Transcendence, the person behind it must not know Xie Zhefeng’s true identity—they were coming for the identity of “Xie Chunhua,” the Luoyue Peak disciple sent to investigate the Yunjian Sect’s affairs.
Xie Zhefeng stalled that long sword for a while, also intentionally creating the illusion that his cultivation wasn’t too high.
He didn’t speak, pretending not to understand.
Xie Zhefeng then said: “Since the opponent wants to kill and silence us, it shows we’re investigating in the right direction. No need to investigate; by continuing in this direction, the attacker will naturally show their true colors.”
This person sat back on the prayer mat again, “Since you’ve seen it, I don’t know if the attacker will target you again. Stay here tonight.”
An Wuxue: “…”
He didn’t really want to.
But…
If the person behind it really attacked him too, with Xie Zhefeng by his side, no matter how many ways he had to deal with it, acting would only expose his identity.
Xie Zhefeng would remember a dead senior brother, but what if he knew he was still alive?
Staying was indeed the safest.
Xie Zhefeng also had no intention of approaching and was already meditating with his eyes closed on the prayer mat.
Forget it.
No need to trouble himself.
He didn’t want to meditate beside Xie Zhefeng, so he simply headed for the bed.
Not long after lying down, he fell asleep under the soothing influence of the Soul-Nourishing Tree leaf.
He didn’t see that after his breathing became steady, the man meditating by the window slowly opened his eyes and looked at him for a while.
After a moment, Xie Zhefeng’s gaze wavered, and he abruptly turned his head back.
A night of silence.
Morning.
An Wuxue was awakened by urgent knocking.
“Fellow Daoist Xie! Is Fellow Daoist Xie awake?” Yun Zhou shouted, “The Zhaoshui City Lord found the person who visited the Yunjian Sect within three months. That person is waiting for us downstairs! It’s actually that Northern Abyss cultivator we saw yesterday, named Jiang something—”
The door opened.
Xie Zhefeng stood at the door, his robes neat, but his hair was somewhat messy—caused by the sneak attack last night.
Yun Zhou’s gaze bypassed Xie Zhefeng and landed on the bed.
He saw An Wuxue wearing his sleeping robes, slowly sitting up on the bed, rubbing his eyes, looking drowsy.
Yun Zhou took another look at Xie Zhefeng.
Then he looked at An Wuxue.
Then at Xie Zhefeng again.
He suddenly raised his hand to cover his eyes and whispered sneakily, “Fellow Daoist Xie.”
“Hmm?”
“Rest assured, I won’t tell the Immortal Sovereign about what’s between you and Suxue!”