Edited by Ea
Lin Xuanzhi and Yan Tianhen’s courtyard was surrounded by flowing streams and pools, along with dry water lotuses that were grown in the North Land. However, because they became infected by evil Qi, all the beautiful lotus flowers in the pool dried up and withered very quickly.
It was hard to know what Yan Tianhen was thinking all the way. He said nothing and let Lin Xuanzhi lead him, as if he were leading a puppet. Walking on the corridor of dry lotus flowers, Yan Tianhen suddenly stopped. Lin Xuanzhi looked back at him.
Yan Tianhen said, “Wait a minute.”
He turned his hand upward toward the broken branches and leaves in the pool, and gradually formed a purple Qi mass in the palm of his hand. If you concentrated and looked carefully at the air mass, you could find that they were wisps of evil Qi that had been extracted from these dry lotuses.
As the Qi mass grew larger and larger, the dry lotus flowers began to slowly stretch their branches and leaves, and the dead trees returned to spring. Unexpectedly, they gradually recovered their quiet and brilliant appearances. The breeze blew gently, and the lotus flowers swaying in the pool were full of fragrance. They had a unique scent.
“I remember there were also many lotus flowers in Spirit Sect’s Heavenly Snow Pool,” Yan Tianhen said.
“They were in full bloom all year round — pure and elegant.” Lin Xuanzhi said faintly, “However, ever since you left, the pond full of lotuses no longer bloomed.”
Yan Tianhen was stunned and looked sideways at Lin Xuanzhi.
Lin Xuanzhi looked at him calmly. “It’s because they remember their old master, thinking that he hasn’t come to visit them all year round, so the flowers don’t know who they are blooming for. Rather than being admired by no one, it would be better to simply not bloom.”
The white lotuses in the Heavenly Snow Pool of those days were planted by Yan Tianhen himself. Although he possessed demonic Qi and came from the deadly Seventh Region in the demon world, he had his own method of planting flowers.
He was willing to pour his spiritual Qi into the flowers and plants. Although it was a waste, he was happy when he saw those flowers and plants with delicate and charming appearances, so he made the best of everything.
On the day he left the Spirit Sect, the lotus flowers in the Heavenly Snow Pool withered one by one and never bloomed again, which seemed to be a stubborn farewell for him. Since then, Chang Sheng had never seen such beautiful lotus flowers again.
Even plants can miss someone, people moreso.
Yan Tianhen lowered his eyes. “Too bad about those Snow Feather Weeping Lotuses. Originally, I was waiting for them to produce lotus seeds, then refine them into pills so that I can give them to Shixiong as a snack. But I didn’t expect that they wouldn’t give me any face. I raised them for decades, but they wouldn’t even produce a single lotus seed.”
Lin Xuanzhi couldn’t help but smile. “If you let your lotus flowers know that you actually want to give me their lotus seeds as snacks, I’m afraid they won’t produce any seeds, no matter what.”
Now, the Snow Feather Weeping Lotus had long since disappeared, and it had become a sacred object mentioned only in ancient legends. Even back then, the Snow Feather Weeping Lotus was also a miracle medicine that could heal the flesh and bones of people.
To use them as snacks instead — the word “extravagant” was no longer enough to describe that. It was simply extravagant in the extreme and made people sigh. But this kind of thing really was something Lingyu would do.
Yan Tianhen also smiled. “Anyway, these things would just gather dust if left alone, so I’m happy to give them to Dage.”
“Naughty.” Lin Xuanzhi pinched the tip of Yan Tianhen’s nose, his voice full of pampering.
Yan Tianhen put his arms around Lin Xuanzhi’s waist, leaned against his arms and said with a muffled voice, “Dage, from now on, everyone else will know that I have cultivated evil Qi, and they will suspect I am a bad person and that I’m even colluding with evil Qi cultivators. In the future, wherever evil spirits pass by, people will think of my name. I–“
“Their suspicions are their business.” Lin Xuanzhi’s voice was both comforting and very domineering, “There is no evidence. If anyone dares to say something bad about you, I will tear apart their mouth.”
Yan Tianhen said, “You can’t stop the leisurely mouths of the whole world.”
Lin Xuanzhi replied, “If I am the only one, of course I can’t stop it, but there are also your parents, my dad, and the senior martial brothers and masters of Fuyao Sect. Even those who know you in Myriad Dao Academy will speak up for you. What’s more, as long as you’re alive, there will always be critics. You just have to care about those people who care about you. They will believe you, love you, protect you, and help you. That’s already good enough. Who cares what nonsense other people say?”
Yan Tianhen was stunned and said with a smile, “This doesn’t sound like something Chang Sheng Sword Venerable, who is praised all over the world, would say.”
One should know that people of Spirit Sect must uphold the rules of Spirit Sect, and when they were away from the sect, not a single strand of hair could be messy. If they encounter injustice on the road, they must help people as much as they are able to. They need to treat others courteously and properly. Their behaviors must be so perfect that outsiders will not have any ammunition to use against them; otherwise it will be greatly inappropriate.
As the chief disciple of Spirit Sect, Chang Sheng, who was born with a sword bone, was a paragon of virtue praised by thousands of people, because no one could find any flaws in him. His every word, deed, and move could be considered an example for people to work towards.
At that time, Dao Zu and Sheng Ren were unreachable gods, while Chang Sheng Sword Venerable was a real leader who could mobilize a great number of people at his command. Chang Sheng always restrained himself and observed proprieties. Was there a single arrogance or rudeness in his speech and behavior?
However, today’s Lin Xuanzhi had repeatedly broken Yan Tianhen’s understanding of his old friend, as if this person was breaking out of the cocoon as a butterfly and becoming more beautiful and dazzling.
When Lin Xuanzhi heard this, he only said, “I haven’t been Chang Sheng for a long time. The people of that era should have been buried in that era. Spirit Sect has long since ceased to exist, and its admonitions have already been corrected and abandoned. What’s more, I have never been a good-tempered person.”
Some people dared to bully Yan Tianhen wantonly right in front of his face. Did they really think he had a good temper and wouldn’t quarrel with a young woman just because he was a Grandmaster?
He’d never cared about exercising restraint just because Grandmasters shouldn’t abuse their powers.
Yan Tianhen was his, and even if he had done something wrong, he should be the one to discipline him. As for those around him, especially those outsiders, who dared to brazenly say that they had this qualification?
The former Chang Sheng could not protect Lingyu, and he regretted it for the rest of his life. He died with hatred.
Today’s Lin Xuanzhi, however, will never let history repeat itself.
They hugged each other for a moment, and Yan Tianhen looked up at him. “I had a fight with Lord Yuxu in the Dragon God’s burial site. Dage, his tricks and moves look very familiar. I can confirm that those were moves that I used before, and he doesn’t seem to be doing it intentionally. Moreover, he insisted that I was a fake, and he was the real Lingyu. I guess there must be some unspeakable secret behind all this.”
Lin Xuanzhi suspected that Lord Yuxu was an imposter before, because firstly, he trusted Yan Tianhen, and secondly, the temperament of Lord Yuxu was really different from Lingyu. As for where specifically their temperaments differed, not even Lin Xuanzhi could say for the time being.
However, if even Yan Tianhen was fooled into confusion, it showed that there was a problem.
Lin Xuanzhi did not answer directly, but thought for a moment and said, “There is one thing that is very important. I hope you can answer it truthfully after thinking it over.”
Yan Tianhen blinked. “Dage, you are suddenly so serious, which makes me a little nervous.”
Lin Xuanzhi asked, “What is your relationship with Cangdi Fenglang? How did he treat you?”
Yan Tianhen was surprised that Lin Xuanzhi would mention this man, but even though he was confused, he replied, “Cangdi Fenglang was brought back by you, and you also deliberately used him to annoy me. Naturally, I don’t like him very much. As for him… he liked to rub in my face how well you treated him, like what you bought for him or what you taught him. Seriously, I always think this rascal is deliberately trying to anger me. He pretends to be pitiful, clever, and sensible in front of you, but behind your back, he shows his teeth and claws. Anyway, I find him extremely annoying.”
Yan Tianhen was very blunt, and his eyes also showed some disgust.
Lin Xuanzhi looked at him and asked again, “You didn’t kill him just because I treated him well, did you?”
Yan Tianhen looked up at Lin Xuanzhi. “Of course not. I’m not that stingy, but Dage, you’ve never asked these things before. Why are you suddenly asking today?”
“You always have a reason to kill people.” Lin Xuanzhi said faintly. “I didn’t ask before because I was afraid of disappointment and thought that you would take the initiative to tell me one day, but now I can’t wait. Ah Hen, let me ask you, did you kill him because he was actually the evil Qi cultivator that everyone wanted to kill?”
Yan Tianhen blurted out, “How did you know?”
Lin Xuanzhi said, “So it’s really true.”
Yan Tianhen suddenly realized something, gasped, and said with wide eyes, “Maybe that fake Yuquan is Cangdi Fenglang? No! That’s impossible!”
“Why is it impossible?”
“I killed him thoroughly and threw him into the black abyss of the Seventh Region. Even if other evil Qi cultivators reappear in the world, it can never be him!”
“But he did come back to life.” In Lin Xuanzhi’s mind, a man with half face like a ghost and half face like an immortal came up. “He was the culprit who caused the events inside the Dragon Tomb. He said that he died wrongly and with grievances, so he wants to drag the world down with him and avenge himself.”
Yan Tianhen’s hands and feet grew cold, and his heart suddenly sank.
He didn’t know how much effort he wasted before he finally destroyed Cangdi Fenglang, so that he could never revive again, lifting the biggest crisis in the Nine Lands. In order to kill Cangdi Fenglang, he lost half his life and became an abomination that was neither human, ghost, demon, nor evil spirit. Only after much difficulty did he finally complete the task Dao Zu entrusted to him.
He was ready to fight Cangdi Fenglang’s former subordinates to the end, but he never thought that the root cause of all that would come back from the dead and climb out of the dark abyss where not even grass grew.
And his cultivation was entirely unharmed as well.
This was the most terrifying thing.
Whether it is Lin Xuanzhi or him or Lian Hua, they had experienced reincarnation. When they recognized each other again, they all started from scratch, building their cultivation foundations for the sake of slow and steady progress and had not yet reached half of their peak state’s cultivation.
But the cultivation of Cangdi Fenglang seemed to be outrageously high.
Even though the Dragon Tomb Holy Land was sealed again, even until this time, Zhan Fengting still hadn’t come out from the inside. According to reason, all the evil spirits in the Dragon Tomb, including the evil Qi cultivators, would be buried in the giant seal, but Lin Xuanzhi had such a hunch–
Cangdi Fenglang would soon escape the Dragon Tomb’s seal, then make a comeback.
After a long silence, Yan Tianhen said with difficulty, “Cangdi Fenglang is an evil Qi cultivator. I can confirm that he was responsible for the seven sect massacres that year. When Dao Zu discovered this, he wanted to kill Fenglang as an apology to the people all over the world.”
Lin Xuanzhi raised his eyebrows slightly. “Dao Zu never mentioned this.”
