Cheng Xueyi darted from bow to stern, avoiding Shen Nanyin like a plague god.
That the Qiantian Sect’s Eldest Senior Brother, whom everyone wanted to get close to, was someone she fled like a viper was a problem in itself, but there was no good solution for it now.
Her pulse throbbed erratically. Cheng Xueyi leaned against the stern, worried something had gone wrong in the Heart-Devouring Valley.
This time it wasn’t Shen Nanyin who’d gone to perform the spirit-suppression rite — it was Daoist Lord Guangwen, Yu Buran. Could it be the latter who’d made some mess of things?
Damn that second senior brother.
Just as she was gritting her teeth over it, she suddenly heard women’s voices talking, and the conversation seemed to mention the Heart-Devouring Valley.
Cheng Xueyi immediately pricked up her ears, quietly edging closer to catch the conversation clearly.
“You shouldn’t have taken that attitude toward the Qiantian Sect’s female disciple just now. Lucky there was no one else on the flying boat — if anyone else had seen, they’d say our Desireless Heavenly Palace looks down its nose at everyone.”
“An obscure disciple who does odd jobs — letting her board, even settling her in — what if she harbors ill intentions and tries something against the Saintess? I’m thinking of the Saintess’s sake.”
Cheng Xueyi didn’t recognize the first voice, but she knew the second one — it was A Wu.
“Senior Brother Shen was the one who called her up. What ill intentions could she possibly have? Even if you don’t trust her, surely you trust Daoist Lord True Martial.”
A Wu said, displeased, “It’s precisely because of Daoist Lord True Martial’s attitude that I’m unhappy. What ‘her health matters’ — with his status, how would he even know that an outer disciple’s health was poor? I thought that disciple’s complexion looked quite good! When she had trouble boarding, Daoist Lord True Martial personally reached out to pull her up himself — have you ever seen him get that close to the Saintess?”
“You’re overthinking it. You know Daoist Lord Shen’s character as well as I do — he’s always looked after the younger generation, taken great care of his fellow disciples. The moment he pulled Junior Sister up, didn’t he let go right away?”
A Wu seemed somewhat persuaded, but still not quite satisfied. “I still feel it wasn’t quite ordinary. I hope it’s as you say, or the Saintess might end up heartbroken.”
“The Saintess’s feelings might not be what we’re guessing at all. We should worry about it less.”
“How could the Saintess not feel that way? You know as well as I do — in three years the Heavenly Palace will choose someone to offer up to the Way of Desirelessness. If by then the Saintess still has no one she’s set her heart on, by the old rule of choosing a woman first if there is one, and only choosing a man if there isn’t — it’ll have to be the Saintess who’s offered up!”
Once every hundred years, the Desireless Heavenly Palace would select a Saint Son or Saintess to sacrifice to the Way of Desirelessness.
In three years it would be exactly a century’s mark — meaning one of the siblings Fu Jinghua and Fu Xiaoran would inevitably have to be sacrificed to the Dao.
This sacrifice wouldn’t cost a life, but it would mean losing one’s freedom for the rest of one’s life — locked inside a high tower, facing a single blue lamp in solitude day and night, endlessly feeding spiritual energy into the relic bead within the lamp, until the five signs of celestial decay finally claimed them, whereupon the newly chosen Saint Son or Saintess would be sent in to replace them.
Fu Xiaoran doted on his sister and couldn’t bear for her to endure the rest of her life facing nothing but a lonely lamp, so these past years he’d been searching for a suitable Dao companion for Fu Jinghua — and naturally, Shen Nanyin had become the top candidate.
Whether it was him or anyone else in the cultivation world, everyone felt that aside from Shen Nanyin, no one else was truly worthy of Fu Jinghua.
“It really can’t be helped,” the first voice sighed. “Daoist Lord Shen truly is the best choice — he wouldn’t shortchange our Saintess. I heard Daoist Lord Shen just went into the Heart-Devouring Valley and subdued the raging great demon inside — that Heart-Devouring Valley that no one’s set foot in since it was built. Daoist Lord Shen went in single-handedly, and successfully quelled the demonic chaos. As soon as he came back, without even resting, he set off for the Ghost Market to find Moon-Mending Grass to heal Daoist Lord Guangwen’s injuries. Whether in ability or character, he’s simply the best there is.”
“……”
Shen Nanyin had gone into the Heart-Devouring Valley? — B L A C K L O T U S Novel Archive · Black Lotus
No wonder… no wonder his expression hadn’t looked right, and he’d suddenly asked her so many questions.
She’d found it strange at the time, kept wondering if she’d let some flaw slip again somewhere — she never imagined it was because he’d gone into the Heart-Devouring Valley!
Then had he already discovered the passage she’d used to leave, five years ago?
Did the Jingci Fazong know yet?
What would the Qiantian Sect do?
The source of the heart-wound that hadn’t fully healed all this season had finally been found — Shen Nanyin must have done something in the Heart-Devouring Valley.
If she’d known this would happen, she should have killed him the last time she caught him!
Cheng Xueyi’s emotions stirred with some agitation, and the silver bell at her waist rattled and clashed. She immediately pressed a hand over it, forcing herself calm.
No. She still couldn’t kill Shen Nanyin.
He was the inner disciple she’d been closest to in five years, and the person most likely to hold the trail of the White Marsh Chart.
Shen Nanyin was the next sect master — even the Jingci Fazong’s Qingxu Pavilion let its guard down around him. If he didn’t know where the White Marsh Chart was, who would?
At the very least, she’d have to wait until she’d gotten her hands on the White Marsh Chart before she could kill him.
Cheng Xueyi’s heart went cold halfway through, and recalling his string of questions just now, she felt an endless, lingering dread.
He was already suspicious of her — she absolutely could not let any flaw slip in front of him again.
The tiniest thread, the faintest trace, and he’d follow it all the way up, tearing every one of her secrets open.
This man was too terrifying.
But then again, if someone like that could be made to serve her — if she could addle his mind — was there anything that couldn’t be accomplished?
Night fell, and the flying boat drew close to the Water Cloud Expanse. Cheng Xueyi made her way to the bow under cover of darkness; Shen Nanyin was no longer there.
Cheng Xueyi recalled that the people from the Desireless Heavenly Palace had also mentioned Moon-Mending Grass — she hadn’t expected Shen Nanyin to be after Moon-Mending Grass on this trip to the Ghost Market too. Why did he keep crossing paths with her at every turn?
Like some kind of natural nemesis.
Cheng Xueyi clutched the bell at her waist, a knot of frustration in her chest, dearly wanting to take Shen Nanyin down a peg.
Rationally, she knew what she ought to do was bring this man under her control, but emotionally, she couldn’t bear to wrong herself any further.
After all, the last time she’d let herself be wronged, the result had been getting deceived by a face-changing demon.
Then she’d try a different method.
Who said taming wasn’t a form of conquest?
Taming Shen Nanyin — now that task sounded quite interesting to her.
The moment the thought crossed her mind, the flying boat suddenly shuddered violently and plunged straight down from the sky.
The intense sensation of weightlessness threatened to displace one’s very organs. Fortunately everyone aboard was a cultivator, so no one would lose their life to the weightlessness alone — but it was still miserable.
Cheng Xueyi’s cultivation was sealed, so she could only draw on Qi Refinement-level strength to resist the plummeting fall. She bit down hard on her lip until it bled, the silver bell at her waist shaking ceaselessly — its ring lost among the roaring and chaos, all but negligible. But someone’s senses were keen enough to catch it.
An afterimage flickered before Cheng Xueyi’s eyes; the fierce wind flung her toward the mast, her hands clinging desperately to it as she was nearly blown away.
A snow-white light flared in the darkness. Beneath the bright moon, a beauty came treading through the light, a warm, soft hand seizing her arm and pulling her steadily to his side.
The next instant, the flying boat finally came to a stop, the enormous impact of inertia sending everyone and everything on board flying into the air.
In that moment, time seemed to slow. Cheng Xueyi opened her eyes and, swallowing back nausea, looked at the profile so close beside her. Shen Nanyin’s long hair whipped through the air, his robes fluttering, his hand gripping the immortal sword passed down from the ancestors of the Qiantian Sect — that snow-white light flaring in the darkness came from this very blade.
She knew this sword’s name. It was called Red Dust.
Shen Nanyin said to her, “Hold onto me.”
Cheng Xueyi tightened her arms around him on reflex, clutching his waist.
She could feel his body stiffen for an instant, his gaze flicking swiftly across her face. Then he freed his hands, forming a sword array, pulling everyone who’d been flung out by the impact back onto the boat.
The flying boat had been struck nearly to pieces, held together only by the Fu siblings’ forced effort.
Shen Nanyin could only bring everyone back aboard, because what the flying boat had crashed down onto wasn’t land — it was a sea of blood stretching to the horizon.
“It’s a water wraith,” Fu Xiaoran said, brow furrowed, standing on the boat’s railing. “What is the Yujing Shenzong even doing? Can’t even handle a single water wraith, and they let a flood spread all the way out here?”
“It’s not just a flood.”
Shen Nanyin landed on the deck, glancing lightly at Cheng Xueyi — Xueyi immediately let go of the arms she’d been clutching so tightly.
Only then did Shen Nanyin walk to the edge, gazing out at the sea of blood. “The water wraith has been corrupted into a demon.”
“What?”
Everyone on board, Cheng Xueyi included, stared at him in shock.
The night was deep, the moon heavy as a thousand pounds of gold. Shen Nanyin leapt onto the sea of blood; Cheng Xueyi hurried to the boat’s edge, looking down to examine it. · B L A C K L O T U S Novel Chapters | Black Lotus Novel
Sure enough, amid the churning crimson, there was indeed a thick, heavy demonic aura.
Impossible.
How could it be possible.
The demonic race was all sealed inside the Heart-Devouring Valley — she was the only one seeking a way out, and even if someone else had managed to emerge afterward, it shouldn’t have caused a disturbance this large.
Who could it possibly be — could someone be here looking for her?
Cheng Xueyi’s first thought was Yu Fuguang, but she dismissed the guess immediately.
Even if Fuguang were worried about her and forced his way out through the Heart-Devouring Valley’s seal, he wouldn’t stir up trouble this big and bring her more grief — and besides —
By the time she was swept into the sea of blood, Cheng Xueyi was a hundred percent certain this demon-corrupted water wraith had nothing to do with her.
To want to swallow even her — what nerve. Wasn’t it afraid of choking to death?
The stench of blood filled her nose, and the precariously suppressed state of Cheng Xueyi’s spiritual meridians was on the verge of collapse. She held her breath and saw Fu Jinghua, the flying boat’s owner, clutching Shen Nanyin’s arm with tears streaming like pear blossoms in the rain, flanked by her own elder brother and countless disciples of the Heavenly Palace.
With such a scene playing out, being left alone at the edge of the boat, dragged down by the water wraith, made for a rather pathetic sight.
Cheng Xueyi opened her eyes beneath the bloodied water, and it occurred to her that parting ways with Shen Nanyin like this wouldn’t be a bad choice either.
He clearly had no time to spare to save her again.
Since they were bound to part anyway, there was no need to hold back so much.
Cheng Xueyi pressed down on her pulse gate; a faint tinge of blood-red crept up her fair, smooth arm. Just as the suppression on her meridians was about to break wide open, someone she hadn’t expected to come appeared in the water.
Shen Nanyin, like a snow-pale sea spirit, swam toward her, his dark hair drifting in tangled disarray.
The water wraith’s massive maw, about to devour her, loomed right behind her, yet the Daoist Lord of True Martial and Bright Splendor showed not a trace of urgency. Calmly and steadily, he formed a seal in the water, and a great whirlpool immediately appeared behind her — she was nearly sucked into it herself, but Shen Nanyin caught her just in time.
He’d calculated everything down to the last detail, certain there’d be no mistake — which was why he felt no urgency.
But he probably hadn’t accounted for Cheng Xueyi suffocating.
Forcibly sealing back the suppression that had been about to break open, Cheng Xueyi lost the strength to regulate her breath underwater, and bubbles quickly began forming at the edge of her lips.
Cheng Xueyi couldn’t breathe, yet she found herself smiling — she saw Shen Nanyin raise his hand, summoning his life-bound sword.
He surely had a way to get her back to the surface before she suffocated completely.
But she didn’t want that method.
Sword of Red Dust — what a fitting name.
She was going to drag him into the red dust of the mortal world with her.
Cheng Xueyi wrapped her arms around Shen Nanyin’s neck, closed her eyes, and pressed her lips to his, stealing away every last breath he had.
