Chapter 45#

For the past few months, after Qi Xun arrived at Zhaoshui City, he had begun his search starting from the portrait and the two words “Su Xue” that Xie Zhefeng had given him.

The portrait was painted by a mortal artist in Zhaoshui City, and the identity of Su Xue also had an origin—he was a mortal who had grown up near Zhaoshui City, both of whose parents were deceased.

Previously, after a brief investigation, he found that Su Xue’s life history and friends were all very clear; he could find out whom Su Xue was close to and where he used to live.

After a slight probe, Qi Xun had originally thought that Xie Chuhan was being paranoid and had fallen into a delusion.

But just as he was planning to leave, he thought of Song Buwang, who was guarding the array here.

Song Buwang was the son of his old friend and also the disciple of Qin Wei—a child whom An Wuxue had protected until his fall, even without telling him the truth.

Therefore, he went to the Zhaoshui Sword Array before leaving.

Before his departure, Song Buwang proactively mentioned Su Xue.

“…Speaking of which, Young Master Su can be considered my benefactor,” Song Buwang said with a smile. “If it weren’t for him giving me a hint, I wouldn’t have thought of what to do. I heard that before he went up to Luoyue, he was just a mortal from Zhaoshui City, not even twenty years old. I’ve been cultivating for hundreds of years, yet my state of mind is not as good as his; I’m truly ashamed.”

Song Buwang’s casual words, however, aroused Qi Xun’s suspicion.

Because in the life history of Su Xue that he had investigated, Su Xue did not sound like such a sophisticated and mature young man.

Ultimately, he turned back once more and started investigating from the beginning.

Last time, he had almost returned empty-handed, so he changed his method. He no longer asked about Su Xue’s life history, but instead asked what kind of person Su Xue was in the eyes of different people.

This investigation indeed revealed something wrong—the Su Xue in the eyes of these people didn’t have the same personality at all. It was more like they knew different people, and those memories had been subjected to an illusion technique by someone with high-level skills, altered to piece together Su Xue’s life history.

Right now.

Using an array, he extracted the aura from that portrait and once again found himself at the artist’s doorstep.

“Knock, knock, knock—”

“Who is it?” The artist pushed the door open and was stunned. “Why has the Immortal Master returned? Are there further instructions?”

With a flick of his hand, Qi Xun once again unfurled that portrait of Su Xue.

“Do you still remember this object?”

“I remember, I remember. The Immortal Master asked me before if I had painted it. This painting was done about half a year ago. The person in the painting is named Su Xue, also a native of Zhaoshui. At that time, an Immortal Master surnamed Yun brought him to me to have it painted. I told the Immortal Master all of this; is there…”

“You need not be alarmed,” Qi Xun said slowly. “I just want to ask one more question—this painting is detailed, and the time required to complete it should not have been short. Do you still remember if this person named Su Xue had any additional reactions while you were painting? What kind of person was he?”

The artist pondered for a moment, but his expression became increasingly bewildered.

“This, I…” The artist was a bit troubled. “Now that the Immortal Master asks, I really can’t say.”

“Oh?”

“It’s not that I’m trying to fool the Immortal Master; I really can’t think of the character of this young master.”

The artist pointed at the portrait, squinting his eyes as he recalled carefully. “When he came back then, he just sat there, very quiet. From beginning to end, it was that Immortal Master surnamed Yun who brought him who conversed with me. Now that the Immortal Master asks, I do recall that I felt something was strange at the time.”

He scratched his head. “This old man has been painting people for decades. The time it takes to paint isn’t short, and customers usually don’t have that much patience; no matter what, they won’t be able to resist moving a bit or talking, right? But this Young Master Su was truly excessively quiet. From the moment I started my brush until the moment I finished, he didn’t move an inch and didn’t say a word—”

The artist slapped his palms together and raised his voice, saying, “Let me tell you, that look… he didn’t seem like a young man, but more like a soulless object…”

Listening to the artist’s every word fall exactly on the suspicion he had anticipated but didn’t dare to anticipate, Qi Xun stared blankly ahead, his gaze scattered and his thoughts drifting.

He recalled being on the Burial Frost Sea, beneath the tall pines, where the only moonlight visible on Luoyue Peak covered the long corridor. A familiar figure followed behind a Shuanghai disciple, neither humble nor arrogant, neither conceited nor proud.

Whether in spirit or appearance, a single glance made him feel as though he had returned to those years.

At that time, he seemed to have smiled.

“Ha…” Qi Xun shook his head, and at this moment, he also smiled. “Hahaha—!!!”

The laughter contained no mirth, only a sense of desolation.

The more he laughed, the redder his eyes became. His whole body lost its strength from laughing, and the hand holding the scroll loosened.

A light breeze came, blowing the scroll so that it drifted down.

Seeing that the scroll was about to fall into the muddy dust, he suddenly came to his senses, ceased his laughter, and raised his hand. With a light movement of his fingertips, spiritual power lifted the scroll and sent it back into his hand.

A mortal might not see a cultivator wielding spiritual power with a wave of their hand in their entire life. The artist was frightened by his appearance and hurriedly said, “I, I, I really only know this much. I… did I say something wrong…? I didn’t mean that the young master was an object…”

The mirthless smile on Qi Xun’s face stopped abruptly as he murmured, “No matter… you’ve already said enough.”

“What did the Immortal Master say?”

Another gust of wind.

This time, the artist only blinked his eyes, and the Immortal Master before him, who was dressed like a graceful young master yet was exceptionally flamboyant like a raging flame, was gone.

A bag of spirit stones was tossed toward him.

He hurriedly caught it and heard a voice drifting from afar: “Many thanks. But for everything related to the person in the painting, I trouble you to forget it. Just act as if that person never came, and you never painted this portrait.”

“Keep the gift well.”

Northern Abyss, Twenty-Seventh City.

In front of the City Lord’s Mansion.

Xie Zhefeng had pointed out that An Wuxue had never cultivated his divine sense, yet his state of mind and divine sense cultivation seemed to have no deficiencies.

This was indeed something An Wuxue could not explain.

He could hear that by saying this, Xie Zhefeng had essentially confirmed that there was something wrong with him.

Since Su Xue had a mark even more complex than those crude puppet marks, and since he had rushed to the late stage of Dacheng without any bottlenecks after receiving the opportunity gifted by Lou Shuiming, and the puppets outside the Twenty-Seventh City also indicated that Yun Zhou’s book was actually a complete puppet technique…

His only possible explanation now was to admit that he was a lonely soul using a puppet as a body.

Such an explanation would be extremely easy to get wrong the more he said.

The situation was unclear and others were present; Xie Zhefeng knew what was important and wouldn’t waste time negotiating with him at this moment.

He looked at his feet, hiding his gaze, and simply remained silent.

He wondered, if his junior brother truly found out, what would happen?

At Zhaoshui City, Qin Wei already knew his identity, and Su Xue was no longer someone unrelated to An Wuxue. Even if his junior brother knew, Qi Xun knew, or even Shangguan Liaoliao knew… the sky wouldn’t fall.

What was he afraid of?

Before, he was afraid of returning to the situation of his previous life, having to deal with those grievances for which he had no way to defend himself.

Now…

He thought of what Qin Wei had done after returning to Luoyue Peak.

He seemed to be afraid that his junior brother would be like Qin Wei, saying “I’m sorry” to him, mourning like he did in the Bramble River a thousand years ago, and displaying before him the guilt and regret that only existed because he was a dead person.

He didn’t want to see it.

Kunkun looked up at him, its round eyes blinking, seemingly sensing his unease. It stuck out its tongue and gently licked his wrist.

Neither Pei Qian nor Qiao Yin understood the meaning behind Xie Zhefeng’s words. After looking at each other for a moment, Qiao Yin took the lead and said, “Please follow me into the mansion first, you three.”

Xie Zhefeng nodded.

Qiao Yin led the way. The interior of the City Lord’s Mansion was actually as desolate as the mortal houses and streets in the city; aside from Qiao Yin, not even many at the Dacheng stage could be seen.

Even cultivators whose cultivation wasn’t low were walking in a hurry. Seeing the unfamiliar faces of An Wuxue and the others, they only showed wariness. Because Qiao Yin was present, they didn’t say anything, just gave a greeting and left.

They weren’t conversing as they had been when they first arrived; instead, the atmosphere was eerie.

Even Pei Qian was sensible enough not to say much.

It wasn’t until they reached the hall, where a young attendant brewed immortal tea for them and Qiao Yin dismissed those nearby, inviting them to sit around the table, that Xie Zhefeng broke the silence.

“Young City Lord Qiao,” he asked in a deep voice, “exactly what is the situation in the Northern Abyss? Can you tell us now? We’ve flown all this way, yet aside from the Young City Lord, we haven’t seen any Dujie stage cultivators. I took the liberty of probing with my divine sense, and the spiritual power fluctuations are all in the center of the city—are all your city’s cultivators in the sword array? Did this disaster start from the sword array?”

He asked the question that An Wuxue also wanted to ask.

When An Wuxue had established the sword array in the Northern Abyss, the method he used was different from the other three cities.

The Northern Abyss was vast, and the heavenly pillar of the Northern Abyss had also vanished because the Northern Abyss Immortal Lord had proactively destroyed it. The difficulty of placing the Northern Abyss Sword far exceeded that of the other three cities.

Although the Northern Abyss Sword sounded like only one sword, in reality, like the forty-nine cities of the Northern Abyss, there were forty-nine swords in total. Each one was established within a branch city, forming its own array, which in turn served as the array eye for the main sword array in the First City of the Northern Abyss.

Therefore, a single move would indeed affect the whole body.

An Wuxue also felt that if something happened to the Northern Abyss Sword right under Shangguan Liaoliao’s nose, it was likely because the person behind it had quietly tampered with these small sword arrays.

Qiao Yin’s answer confirmed what he and Xie Zhefeng had thought: “The sword array is being disturbed by turbid qi, humming every day. The experts in the city are all injecting spiritual power to stabilize the sword array. Otherwise…”

She glanced outside, looking up at the sky, and said gloomily, “The nearby turbid qi would likely be more than what you’ve seen… Fortunately, City Lord Shangguan used her half-step ascension power to establish a barrier covering the entire Northern Abyss, trapping this turbid qi so it wouldn’t leak into the two realms and cause more people with insufficient willpower to fall into the demonic path.”

Pei Qian raised an eyebrow. “The cities of the Northern Abyss are closely connected. If something happened to the sword array of the Twenty-Seventh City, why didn’t the Young City Lord send word to the surrounding areas or directly seek help from the First City?”

Qiao Yin sighed. “Since City Lord Shangguan established the barrier and its range covers the entire Northern Abyss, I imagine the situation in all forty-nine cities is about the same. We don’t even know what state the First City is in. Besides, you’ve seen the turbid qi in all directions; it’s difficult for immortal cultivators to extend their divine sense, and ordinary transmission talismans can’t be sent very far at all.”

She paused. “We’ve been at a stalemate with the Great Demon for several days. Even if we had transmission talismans, that Great Demon would intercept them; they’re useless regardless.”

“Great Demon?” Pei Qian let out an “Aiya.” “A Dujie stage demonic cultivator that appeared out of nowhere? Your city’s immortal cultivators are truly lacking in skill; a Great Demon appeared, and you only noticed when something major happened.”

Qiao Yin’s face darkened, unable to find any words to refute him.

Hearing this, An Wuxue cast a glance at Pei Qian.

They had seen the situation of the Twenty-Seventh City for themselves; even he couldn’t stop worrying. Pei Qian was from the Northern Abyss, and although he was also concerned about the reasons, he didn’t seem to have much of a sense of sorrow; he was just discussing the facts as they were.

This person seemed to have a passionate nature, but upon closer inspection, it was as if one couldn’t find the bottom of him, making him feel exceptionally distant.

Xie Zhefeng had left behind Qi Xun, who had personally participated in the Northern Abyss Sword Array, and instead brought Pei Qian into the Northern Abyss. Did he have other considerations?

As he thought, his gaze involuntarily fell on Xie Zhefeng.

But this man was actually still looking at him. Just as he turned his eyes, he happened to meet Xie Zhefeng’s gaze again.

His junior brother, however, was even more flustered than him, as if he had been caught, and hurriedly looked away.

An Wuxue’s eyes shifted, maintaining his expression, while his hand beneath the table trembled slightly and clenched unconsciously.

Kunkun gave a soft “wuu,” its wings flapping as it flew between the two of them and lay down on the table.

Qiao Yin’s expression softened. “This must be Daoist Su’s spirit pet, right? I see it’s always sticking to you; it’s quite obedient and cute.”

Pei Qian muttered, “It’s quite fierce…”

An Wuxue hurriedly said, “No, this… this is Daoist Xie’s spirit pet. I just often hold it, that’s all.”

“Wuu wuu…”

Xie Zhefeng’s lips moved.

Immortal Venerable Chuhan rarely had such hesitant and apprehensive moments. After being at a loss for words for a good while, he said one word at a time, “You want to distance yourself from it? It seems to be a bit…”

“No, it’s very sad.”