Chapter 20 - 2#

An Wuxue knew his own condition. The elixirs for replenishing spiritual energy were all but useless to him. He forced his eyes open a little and struggled to sit up, his voice faint: “I—”

Suddenly.

His left arm blazed with searing heat. Every last drop of strength drained from his body in an instant, and the moment he had propped himself upright, his whole body went limp and he crashed hard to the floor.

Bad.

The Cauldron Brand!

He had exhausted his spiritual energy earlier, and his soul was weary. With no spiritual energy flowing to sustain it, the Cauldron Brand had flared up faster than ever before.

Yun Wan startled and rushed over. “You’re awake? What’s wrong?”

She had barely helped him sit up when she let out a sound of surprise: “Why are you running such a fever?”

Her gaze shifted and landed on An Wuxue’s face. Seeing the flush across his cheeks, she was momentarily transfixed — then quickly averted her eyes and stepped back.

An Wuxue drew a slow breath. “My name is Suxue. Do any of you know who I am? By rights, there should be some connection between me and your Cloud Sword Sect…”

Yun Wan and the other disciples all looked blank. Evidently none of them had ever encountered Suxue.

He raised his hand and pushed back his sleeve.

The Cauldron Brand was burning there.

An Wuxue’s head was swimming.

He actually had the Far Reaches Talisman that Xie Zhefeng had given him for sending voice transmissions in his own spirit pouch — but he couldn’t use it.

He could only ask, without much hope: “This brand may have originated within Cloud Sword Sect. Fellow Daoist Yun, do you know of any way to break it, or to suppress it?”

Yun Wan paused.

The other disciples’ expressions shifted as well.

Yun Wan looked at An Wuxue again, then said haltingly: “This is… a Cauldron Brand?”

An Wuxue nodded without hesitation.

“I’ve never seen this method of branding before…”

Of course not.

An Wuxue had already expected as much.

“Senior Sister!” Outside the room, a disciple suddenly called out in alarm.

Yun Wan exchanged a glance with the others. There was no time to deal with An Wuxue. All of them rushed out of the room together.

The Cauldron Brand made An Wuxue’s meridians throb with pain, while heat surged relentlessly through his entire body. The two sensations pulled at him from opposite directions.

He simply smashed the medicine bottle and used a shard of porcelain to slash his arm. The metallic smell of blood and the sharp sting of pain rushed in together, yanking his mind back.

He spread his soul-sense outward immediately, and caught the alarmed disciple reporting to Yun Wan outside:

“I don’t think we can stay hidden here much longer!”

Yun Wan’s voice: “What happened?”

“I just slipped out to keep watch, and I spotted another demon creature controlling the body of one of our senior brothers, patrolling the mountainside — it seems to be looking for something. Do you think the demons know we’re here?!”

Yun Wan said gravely: “Most likely. Fellow Daoist Suxue came in from outside, which must have stirred up some of the demons. And just now when we killed that mirror-demon, we never found the shattered mirror — its core is probably with another demon somewhere. When that other demon saw the mirror was broken, it figured out something was going on here…”

“Then what do we do? If that demon patrolling nearby is at peak Great Completion, the formation won’t hold. Should we just go out and fight?! We’ve been hiding here scraping by for two months — every time I think of Master and the others, I… I’ve had enough…”

“……”

The others were deliberately keeping their voices low, but with his soul-sense to aid him, An Wuxue heard every word from inside the room.

He regulated his breathing for a moment, then gritted his teeth against the weakness the Cauldron Brand was spreading through him, and called out: “Fellow Daoist Yun Wan — could you come back in for a moment?”

Outside, Yun Wan turned at his words. One of the male disciples said irritably: “Senior Sister, of all the times — why are we still fussing over him? We all saw it earlier. That’s a Cauldron Brand. What kind of upright cultivator carries a Cauldron Brand? You gave him elixirs, and we barely have any left for ourselves…”

“Junior Brother!” Yun Wan snapped. “Don’t judge a person’s character by a single spiritual brand. He’s injured and needs help — it’s perfectly reasonable for him to call for me.”

The disciples fell silent at once.

She quickly gathered a few more spiritual energy elixirs and went back inside. The moment she saw the shattered porcelain on the floor and the wound on An Wuxue’s wrist, she exclaimed: “Fellow Daoist Suxue, you…”

An Wuxue only said: “Would you close the door? There are some things I’d like to speak with you about privately.”

Yun Wan hesitated briefly. Seeing the resolute look on An Wuxue’s face and not another word forthcoming, she still shut the door with her spiritual energy, sealing the two of them away from the rest.

Only then did An Wuxue speak: “My current weakness is caused by the Cauldron Brand. The elixirs can replenish only a fraction of what I need. Since you don’t have many left, there’s no need to waste them on me.”

Yun Wan froze, then suddenly realized something: “You heard what we were saying just now? A Bigu stage cultivator shouldn’t have that kind of soul-sense — you—”

“I told you I came here to investigate. Falling Moon Peak is already aware of what happened to Cloud Sword Sect. I’m not the only one who came in. With him here, you can rest easy.”

“…Him? Fellow Daoist Suxue, who do you mean?”

“He’ll find his way here eventually. If he hasn’t come yet, it’s probably because something on his end needs looking into first.”

An Wuxue touched his fingertips to the cut on his wrist, then used the blood still there to draw directly on the surface of the nearby tea table.

He said: “I fear I won’t be able to hold on much longer, so I’ll be brief. I just probed the formation concealing you with my soul-sense. It was laid down by a peak Great Completion cultivator, and it has several weaknesses here — if you modify these four positions in the way I’ve drawn, it will hold even against a demon at the Tribulation Crossing stage.”

Yun Wan took a few quick steps forward and bent to look at the outline of the formation drawn in blood on the table.

As she studied it, her expression grew increasingly stunned.

“You… Fellow Daoist Suxue, this… how…”

An Wuxue asked her: “Have you memorized it?”

He had dropped the gentle manner he’d kept while the other disciples were present, and his tone was slightly sharp. Yun Wan instantly dared not be careless — she nodded reflexively: “I have.”

He swept his sleeve across the table, wiping away the blood.

“Miss Yun,” he said, “from listening to you with your fellow disciples, I can tell you are someone who knows where the line is and when to step back…”

He endured the Cauldron Brand’s flare-up, pausing for a moment, then asked: “So let me ask you — who laid this formation, and why is it capable of deceiving even someone at the Tribulation Crossing stage?”

Yun Wan lowered her head, hesitating: “It was… it was our sect’s elders, in their final moments. They quietly pooled all their strength to lay it in secret. It has nothing to do with you, Young Master Suxue…”

“Shortly after you rescued me, I fell unconscious and was unable to do anything — is that right?”

“That’s right…”

An Wuxue nodded slowly.

“Your hand, Young Master Suxue…” She leaned forward, wanting to apply medicine to his wound.

An Wuxue raised his hand to stop her: “That demon could come at any moment — go reinforce the formation first. And… my condition right now is a little particular. Unless absolutely necessary…”

He had no desire for a junior who had been born a thousand years after his death to see him brought low by the Brand.

“I won’t come in to disturb you, Young Master Suxue.”

She, too, knew what mattered most. She set the elixirs down to the side and withdrew without a sound.

The moment the door closed, the scalding heat crashed over him again like a mountain collapsing into the sea.

An Wuxue leaned against the bed frame, let out a muffled groan, and closed his eyes. His consciousness gradually blurred.

Time slipped quietly by.

Yun Wan used the method An Wuxue had taught her and quietly reinforced the formation.

The demon cultivator who had been patrolling the area truly found nothing. After circling about suspiciously for a while, it left.

The other disciples all let out a collective breath of relief.

Only then did someone think to ask about An Wuxue: “Senior Sister, should we go check on him? That cauldron hasn’t made a sound all this time — ah!”

Yun Wan’s spirit sword was still in its sheath. She gripped the hilt and struck the speaking disciple with the scabbard, her expression unamused. “Can’t you say things properly?”

The disciple’s knees buckled from the blow, and he half-knelt, frightened into stillness by his senior sister’s sudden temper. He murmured meekly: “I was just… worried about Young Master Suxue. He looked completely spent earlier…”

Yun Wan glanced at the tightly shut door, her own worry showing through.

After a moment, she said: “Perhaps he’s only resting. If something were wrong, he would surely call for us.”

As they spoke, the illusory night within Cloud Sword Sect’s constructed phantom world deepened.

An Wuxue had long since lost track of how long he had been enduring.

He had been clenching his fists the whole time, gripping so hard he had twisted creases into his robes. His lower lip had been bitten through.

Drifting in and out of consciousness, burning with unbearable heat, he vaguely heard the sound of the door opening. Two sets of footsteps overlapped — one coming in ahead of the other, a man and a woman.

The one in front seemed to be Yun Wan.

The woman’s voice was tentative: “Senior, are you the one Young Master Suxue said would be coming to help? Young Master Suxue has been unconscious inside for an entire day now, and he doesn’t look well…”

“Who laid the formation that covers this place?”

That was the voice of Xie Zhefeng’s incarnation.

Yun Wan said slowly: “When it happened, our sect was sealed off by the attackers and we couldn’t leave. The Sect Master and our elders held the assailants back and secretly hid us here. The formation was laid then — only the Sect Master and the others seem to have all…”

Xie Zhefeng cast a glance at her.

Yun Wan kept her head bowed deeply.

He asked again: “As I recall, the highest cultivation in Cloud Sword Sect reached only peak Great Completion — and yet they managed to lay a formation capable of deceiving someone at the Tribulation Crossing stage?”

“Yes… we had an elder uncle who specialized in formations…”

Xie Zhefeng withdrew his gaze.

He had reached the bedside.

An Wuxue was curled in a tight ball in one corner, brows knitted together. Below the Cauldron Brand on his left wrist, a cut from something sharp had already scabbed over.

The injured hand gripped the bed frame. The owner of that hand had his eyes squeezed shut, his cheeks flushed crimson — the red spreading from the base of his ears all the way down his neck…

The Cauldron Brand worked on both parties. Xie Zhefeng’s throat moved as he swallowed, and he swiftly averted his gaze.

Yun Wan stood to the side, not daring to move.

Xie Zhefeng sat down at the edge of the bed and reached out to take An Wuxue’s wrist in order to suppress the Cauldron Brand.

He had not yet touched the sleeve when An Wuxue seemed to sense Xie Zhefeng drawing near.

Drawn by the pull of spiritual energy, the person on the bed gave a faint shiver and drifted toward him through the haze of semi-consciousness.

But the instant Xie Zhefeng’s fingers made contact with the sleeve, An Wuxue went rigid — and on pure instinct, shrank away. Every last ounce of will seemed bent on avoiding the approach of the Cauldron Brand’s holder.

Xie Zhefeng’s hand closed on empty air.

He frowned, and for reasons he couldn’t name, something hollow opened up inside him for a moment — as though something had given him a sharp tug.

He reached out again.

The person curled on the bed had nowhere left to retreat. He pulled his body taut and pressed himself into the corner.

The instant Xie Zhefeng’s grip closed over the site of the Cauldron Brand, An Wuxue’s body shuddered, and he began to struggle.

The struggling had no strength behind it at all. Xie Zhefeng held gently, and the person on the bed couldn’t pull free no matter how he tried.

Spiritual energy mingled. Cold breath met warmth.

Xie Zhefeng let his breathing grow quiet, his gaze resting on the bed frame beside him, as he felt the person in his grasp gradually, at last, go still.

The Cauldron Brand subsided. An Wuxue finally fell into sleep. He was still curled in the corner, so Xie Zhefeng simply eased him out and laid him properly on the bed before letting go.

A moment passed.

The flush slowly faded from An Wuxue’s face. In sleep he was considerably more compliant — no longer stirring.

Only after moving him did Xie Zhefeng notice that An Wuxue’s lower lip had been bitten through in several places.

An inexplicable, faintly bitter ache drifted through him.

To have endured until he was in such a state — why hadn’t he sent a voice transmission?

He furrowed his brow, formed the hand seal, and let his spiritual energy wash over every visible wound on An Wuxue’s body. In the span of a blink, both injuries were restored to unblemished wholeness.

The person on the bed seemed, finally, to be free of pain. Quite suddenly, he murmured something in his sleep.

“…It hurts.”

Hurts?

What hurts?

Is there still an injury somewhere?

Xie Zhefeng tilted his head, listening carefully.

“…I hurt so much…”

His expression shifted.

An Wuxue gave no sign of what he was dreaming. He murmured only that one line, and then fell completely silent.

The room settled back into stillness.

The candlelight swayed. The window panel tapped softly against the frame in a gentle breeze.

Xie Zhefeng sat at the edge of the bed and watched for a long while.

An Wuxue’s eyes remained closed.

But Xie Zhefeng suddenly recalled the night they entered Zhaoshui City — these same eyes had been full of the brilliance of a flourishing world, darting curiously from one thing to the next, as though everything in this world that had thrived for hundreds of years was a source of wonder.

And before the gates of Cloud Sword Sect, these same eyes had fixed on the spirit pouch that held the Soul-Nurturing Tree Spirit, filled with unconcealed resistance.

He had told the other to take the Tree Spirit earlier partly because it was inconvenient for him, and partly because Suxue genuinely didn’t seem like someone without experience. It had seemed a fitting test.

But now…

An unfounded, inconceivable thought surfaced.

His expression went blank.

He looked at the spirit pouch hanging at An Wuxue’s waist.

“Come here,” he said.

Yun Wan stirred — but heard nothing else.

She snapped her head up: “Senior, are you speaking to me?”

She hurried over.

Xie Zhefeng unhooked the spirit pouch from An Wuxue’s waist. He considered for a moment, then said: “Take out what’s inside this pouch.”

In front of An Wuxue, Yun Wan had still been able to say a word or two. In front of Xie Zhefeng, she didn’t dare breathe too loudly. She swallowed every question she had and simply did as she was told.

She took the spirit pouch from Xie Zhefeng’s hand and drew out its contents.

It was a small branch, glowing with faint golden light.

Holding it, she felt her soul ease — as though it were something that soothed and calmed.

Yun Wan had no idea she was holding one of the two realms’ greatest treasures. She heard Xie Zhefeng ask: “Has he touched this?”

Yun Wan blinked, and answered without hesitation: “No, he hasn’t.”

“Place it in his hand.”

“Yes.”

Taking it for something to help An Wuxue sleep more peacefully, and afraid to disturb him, she moved forward with great care. It took some effort, but she managed to pry open An Wuxue’s clenched fingers.

She was just about to set it down.

“Wait.” Xie Zhefeng stopped her.

Yun Wan paused: “Senior?”

For reasons she couldn’t explain — she, a small disciple from a minor sect — she caught something in the voice of this unfathomably powerful cultivator from Falling Moon Peak.

A trace of tension.

The hand he had on his companion sword was gripping it with noticeably more force.

Xie Zhefeng waited for a full quarter of an hour.

After that one murmured line, An Wuxue made no further sound. In Yun Wan’s hands, the Soul-Nurturing Tree Spirit glowed with its faint golden light.

The candleflame danced. Like a heart, unsteady.

At last he said: “Put it down.”

Yun Wan leaned forward and gently placed the golden branch into An Wuxue’s palm.

The moment the Soul-Nurturing Tree Spirit was set down, Xie Zhefeng’s gaze fixed unblinking on the golden branch.

He seemed to have been carried back to his youth, before he had reached Great Completion — when the sword in his hand had no weight to it, and any storm could have snapped him in two.

He forgot even to breathe. He only stared, unblinking.

But…

— Nothing happened.

The Soul-Nurturing Tree Spirit continued its faint golden glow, unchanged.

The candles in all four corners continued their slow drip of wax. The night wind did not cease.

Xie Zhefeng’s gaze stilled.

The hand gripping the scabbard of Chunhua suddenly released its tension.

A long moment passed.

Disappointment gradually crept across his face.