The mountains stretched like an ocean as the moon shone like frost.
A large figure followed a meandering mountain ridge alone. To either of his sides was a bottomless chasm. The deep, dark night wind whistled through the valley. One wrong step and he would be smashed to pieces, but he strode away with his eyes shut, even muttering something to himself.
“As the soul follows a dear friend, you would actually forget that you’re dead already… Rarely do you ever meet a person again, where you can only sigh to your own shadow; born too proud for your own good, you refuse to relent and fit in… Among all those who grieve so painfully throughout history, only Bian He is like you; all of the foolish and virtuous in the world reversed, where be the intelligent Bo Le now? Those who do not cherish talents are not dependable! Tossing and turning, the seas remain hazy, with no place of belonging… Living in this world, all you can do is walk on with your eyes shut, accepting the arrangements of the creator!”
He suddenly opened his eyes and let out a long sigh. “Yeah, how lonely!”
He had arrived in this world in complete confusion, trapped within a mountain hamlet, within the body of a child. No one understood or sympathised with his predicament, incapable of fitting in and blamed for everything he tried. All he had for company was an ox, muttering to the ox, like he was insane. Compared to that, the hunger and cold, the abuse from his brother and sister-in-law, was instead relatively more bearable.
It was exactly because of an experience like that that he advanced with such determination, never to look back.
However, today was an exception. He had originally come to this world to let his heart run free so that he could have some fun, but for some reason, it had led to all this melancholy.
Gazing into the distance alone, the matters of the past could not be looked upon.
“Why am I also doing something this foolish as someone who never looks back?”
He shook his head, but he also gave up on his stubbornness, allowing his thoughts to run free.
For a moment, the winds whistled, sweeping through the sky.
The god willed; the world responded.
The winds swept up the water and tore through the trees. The entire mountain range began to rock.
Dark clouds surged and spread, swallowing the moon. Snowflakes drifted down from the sky quietly, landing on his shoulders. In the blink of an eye, snow had already filled the air.
Various scenes flashed before his eyes, weaving between his past and present life, all so blurry and indistinguishable.
“Perhaps this is just a huge dream. When I wake up, I’ll be lying in a warm bed.” When he first arrived in this world, that thought had occurred to him countless times.
But now, when he raised his head, there was only snow and wind, a precipitous path through the mountains.
Wind and snow like this always reminded him of that difficult and despairing climb up Ice Sword cliff. It felt like he had never come back down again, spending the entire time climbing upwards.
Even when he recovered his human appearance later on and returned to human society—entering Jiaping city, joining the Hawkwolf Guard, killing Zhuo Zhibo, battling the elders of the three mountains… this snowstorm had never stopped.
The snow fell harder and harder, gradually amassing on his shoulders and swallowing the precipitous path. The mountains all turned white.
All of the scenes gathered and condensed together. A pair of moist eyes belonging to an ox gazed at him quietly, listening to his mutterings.
“Brother ox, are you also this lonely?”
At that moment, he suddenly understood that feeling, just like when he gazed at Xuanyue, like when he placed his expectations on Li Long.
Before he knew it, the broad figure of that man was already within arm’s reach. He only needed to take another step forward. With that, he could pat him on the shoulder and say, “Brother ox, I’m here.”
He spread his arms and embraced the wind and snow, praising, “What heavy snow!”
In his heart was a relentless snowstorm, but in the dreams of others was an unceasing drizzle.
Outside a small city, the gloomy sky weighed down on the bleak wilderness.
“Chenglu, hold on. I won’t let you die. I’ll definitely kill the daemon. I’ll save you and everyone else!”
Her delicate face was filled with gloom, but her eyes were as resolute as steel, shining dimly with violet light. She placed her good friend who struggled in pain on the ground gently and removed the hundred treasures pouch from her waist, turning around and approaching the small city enveloped in daemon qi.
Behind the speckled, earthen wall, all sorts of people lay strewn on the streets and alleyways. Their faces were blank and their eyes were empty, like they were corpses, except their chests clearly heaved as they breathed. From time to time, a black speck would drift through the whites of their eyes.
A black smoke permeated the air above the city, composed of countless tiny, black insects. It was an extremely rare kind of daemon, a miasma daemon.
When she entered the city again, the black smoke raised a fuss. “You actually returned? Then you can stay here as my food!”
Everyone stood up, forming a dense crowd, without budging at all. Only their eyes swivelled as she moved, deathly silent and eerie. With the miasma daemon’s order, they all let out hysterical howls, completely ignoring the fact that their vocal chords were ripping as a result. It was even more shrill than the bellow of beasts.
The city was small, but it still had several tens of thousand residents, so the sound was like an avalanche, enough to frighten cowards to death. It even shook up the low-hanging clouds, making it drizzle.
The drizzle fell, but she did not move, standing with her head down and gripping her sword firmly. Niu Juxia had once told her that as a person, she had to be decisive. She could not afford to be soft-hearted. She had never forgotten that.
He had also once said, “Violet is a colour of great respect, while the sword is the lord of all weapons. With the propitious omen of violet qi from the east, a wise monarch sweeps through the world, kills millions, and unites the entire world under them, leading to eternal peace and becoming a figure of great virtue and benevolence.”
As a result, she raised her head, and her eyes shimmered with violet light, radiating with the spirit of a lord.
“The daemon has controlled everyone in the city. If I want to save her, I need to kill them!”
The sea of people surged forth, but with a sweep of sword qi, several dozen heads flew into the air. Their blood sprayed several metres into the air with wisps of black smoke.
A few droplets of blood splattered onto her fair face, which stood out dazzlingly. She was unfazed. She had to conserve every bit of her true qi. She could not afford to do something so meaningless.
The crowd under the miasma daemon’s control did not fear death. They stepped over the headless corpses as their knees popped and crackled, lunging over with a speed that regular people did not possess.
She rose up and crushed a head with her foot before landing gently on a tiled house by the side of the street.
The crowd immediately gushed over like the tide. She twisted her body and split several people in half by the waist behind her. Their organs rolled out and their blood sprayed everywhere, causing a few more plum blossoms to bloom on her violet clothes.
Within the turbulent howls, the roof she stood on was like a lone island as the “tide” constantly slammed against it.
She did not bother with any exquisite swordsmanship. She did not even have the courage to use sword qi, purely relying on the sharpness of the Nine Yang sword to slash about, like it was a woodcutter. Wherever the sword reached, flesh separated and bones broke. Broken limbs filled the air, immediately dyeing her violet clothes red.
The house under her foot suddenly swayed, making her lose her footing. From the pushing and shoving of countless people, the house was on the brink of collapse. A middle-aged woman behind her used this opportunity to lunge at her.
Without even looking back, she leaned backwards after bracing herself. A bang followed. With the crackling of broken bones, the woman was knocked away, her organs ruptured and her bones shattered. A wisp of black smoke emerged from her mouth.
Rumble! The house collapsed and dust filled the air. She had already landed in the alleyway on the side. From the corner of her eye, she took in everything in her surroundings before casually swinging her sword to kill a few more people.
Kicking off her toes, she flipped over a wall and landed in a small courtyard paved from tiles. She loosened her body and caught her breath slightly.
By the time the tide of people had pushed over the brick wall and scrambled over, she used the opportunity to kill a few more, retreating to another courtyard before she was completely surrounded.
She fought and moved through the city, carrying out a massacre by relying on every single house and wall. She made use of every single spare moment available to her to recover her spiritual qi.
Men, she killed. Women, she killed. Old people, she killed. Children, she killed.
The small city turned into a slaughterhouse with corpses everywhere and blood flowing freely.
She was also soaked in blood, but her gaze was bright and clear, without any sympathy, without any hesitation. Her actions were filled with a sense of order and efficiency. She was neither cold and heartless nor was she brutal and bloodthirsty. All of this was for the sake of saving someone, even if the only person she would save in the very end was Hua Chenglu.
Did she feel sorrow? Did she feel anger? Did she feel fear? Perhaps she did, but something else filled her mind and sword, manifesting a certain nature that had been hidden away extremely deeply.
This was the exact thing she relied on several years later when she faced the powerful Daemon General that had transformed from a Rock of Slaughter, Strongboulder. It allowed her to remain immune to his innate ability without sinking into a mad massacre, yet it also left her courageous enough to swing her sword at Strongboulder, leaving Li Qingshan amazed.
She had fallen into a depression for a very long time before that, where others thought she was filled with regret over the slaughter today—of course, she did feel that—but only she was aware that she was fearing the person she had become today.
Even Niu Juxia did not know about that.
Who knew how many lives her sword had claimed already. Several hundred? Several thousand? She only remembered that she had butchered the entire city alone with her sword before finally slaying the miasma daemon. That year, just how old had she been? And just how many people had she killed now?
Thinking up to there, she suddenly lowered her sword and ignored the surging sea of people, looking up at the sky and smiling. “Niu Juxia, it’s not very nice to barge into someone’s dream without notice.”
Li Qingshan descended from above with his arms folded. “Long time no see, Zijian, or perhaps I should refer to you respectfully as the master of the Sword Collection palace, or perhaps the Violet Clouds Sword Sovereign!”
