Chapter 58

On the crumbling stone wall, a dazzling, enormous bloom blazed with color.
Cheng Yan walked up and declared, “Hey, I saw this in the Study of Beasts last night! That’s a Titan Flower, it’s native to the Demon Spirit Realm… mmph.”
Before he could finish, the five petals snapped shut, swallowing him whole, leaving only his feet flailing outside as muffled yells rang from within.
Zhuo Yu conjured a ball of fire and set the blossom alight, fire trumps wood, after all. With an irritated noise, the flower spat the guy back out, muttering in disdain, “Ugh, tastes awful.”
Then it clung to the stone wall and zipped straight upward, vanishing in a flash.
“That’s not a Titan Flower, it’s a beast shaped like one. They’re called Florae,” Mu Xue said.
“Weird, did I mess up?” Cheng Yan muttered, peeling the gooey slime off himself, thoroughly dejected.
Everyone burst out laughing at him.
Just then, a soft voice called warning from the back, “Incoming.”
The quiet reminder came from the demonic cultivator who always brought up the rear. The single word sent the group into a practiced tense silence; hands instinctively went to weapons, all eyes on the thick mist covering the road ahead.
Moments later, the fog came alive with a skittering, creeping sound. Holding their breath, everyone braced themselves.
Out of the white mist thrust several bamboo-thick legs, then eight scarlet, glowing eyes. A giant, eight-legged, flower-backed spider emerged from the haze.
Lin Yin gagged, waving frantically, “Nope, nope, I’m out. Absolutely not.”
Cheng Yan let fly with all he had, summoning golden light over his skin as his body surged in size, then charged straight at the monster with a yell.
Vivid green vines burst from the ground, writhing upward to ensnare the beast’s limbs. Roaring flames leapt skyward, burning through the giant monster as it flailed and shrieked.
Mu Xue’s crimson figure appeared at the tail of the spider. With a flash, the Wangchuan Sword was drawn, snow and frost flaring in its wake, and her blade sliced through the air with a dazzling arc of icy light, cleanly severing the spider’s body at the waist.
Venomous green blood spattered across the ground, and as flames licked at it, a poisonous smoke hissed up into the air.
The monster, now split in two, curled its long legs tight and rolled in agony through the roaring fire, a sickening stench of charred flesh soon rising from the flames.
"What was that? Your sword intent’s leveled up again," Zhuo Yu said, eyeing Mu Xue.
Mu Xue, sword in hand, hovered above the clouds. The battle still thrummed through her chest, heart and blade attuned, her spirit surging, she felt like throwing her head back and howling in triumph.
"Wow, that was over fast! I didn’t even get a chance to help out," Ding Lanlan cheered, clapping her hands. Like most girls, she loathed spiders, so if someone else did the fighting, all the better. "Guess we really do work together a lot better these days!"
No one had time to enjoy the victory. Once again, that sinister rustling echoed through the thick fog. Mu Xue spun around and saw more hulking shapes, just like the last one, slowly looming out of the mist.
On top of a low wall, the little puppet Qianji was anxiously pacing. The battle below was fierce, several people were already injured, but its master simply stood there, arms folded, silently observing.
"Are you sure we shouldn’t step in? Master, some of them are hurt pretty bad."
"No need. Only real combat can temper them," Cen Qianshan said calmly.
Back on the field, Lin Yin’s flying artifact got snared by a strand of spider silk, yanking her out of the air. A drifting cloud swept by, and Mu Xue reached out to catch her.
"I don’t need your help. Who asked you to butt in?"
"Oh, should I let go, then?"
Lin Yin looked down, only to see a long-legged, hairy monster with its gaping maw wide open right beneath her.
"No, no, no, fly, fly higher, hurry! Don’t let go!" Lin Yin shrieked, clutching Mu Xue’s hand with all her strength.
Mu Xue dragged Lin Yin through a forest of monstrous legs, dodging a barrage of sticky white webs, slicing off two venom-tipped pincers that lunged within reach. Poisonous green blood spattered straight at her. Mu Xue raised her arm to shield them, knowing she’d have to take a minor hit for it.
In the blink of an eye, a black-clad figure appeared in front of her, raising a single hand to conjure a crimson barrier. The blood sprayed against it, falling harmlessly away.
He turned to look her up and down, his gaze suddenly cold and stormy.
Back atop the wall, little Qianji was still talking. "Guess that makes sense. These people probably have it way too easy, they look so soft. Definitely overdue for a real workout."
But before the words were even out, its master’s figure disappeared from sight.
So, as it turned out, it’s not ‘getting hurt is fine’, it’s ‘getting hurt is fine for everyone except Master Mu.’ Seriously, could you be a little clearer next time?
Grumbling, Qianji leapt from the wall and charged toward the fight.
Lin Yin followed Mu Xue down from the Reflecting Sky Cloud.
Spiders freaked her out more than just about anything, but she gritted her teeth and faced off against monstrous, supersized ones anyway. No way was she letting everyone think she was a scaredy-cat, even if she could barely keep her knees steady.
What had moments ago been a desperate, chaotic battlefield was now an utter massacre. Who could have guessed that the adorable little tin puppet would suddenly transform into a towering, six-armed, three-eyed war god all in black iron?
The avatar of rage, this mechanical deity stood amid curling smoke, a beam of unwavering light bursting from the eye at his brow, shredding and incinerating every massive spider writhing in the haze.
"You know, I’ve noticed, Cen Qianshan hasn’t once gone out of his way for anyone but you," Lin Yin observed. "You two know each other from way back, yeah?"
"Yeah. We met ten years ago, when I went to the Dongyue Temple with Senior Brother Fu."
Ten years ago, Mu Xue had only been six. Lin Yin found herself a little sour at the thought.
She’d joined the sect the very same year as Mu Xue; this soft-spoken little junior, who was a few years younger, always seemed harmless. But every time Lin Yin tried to give her a hard time, somehow she was the only one who ended up in trouble.
And, as if that weren’t enough, Mu Xue’s luck was ridiculously good, elders and senior brothers alike all doted on her.
Now, even this infamous demonic cultivator seemed to have her back, no matter what.
Lin Yin simmered with jealousy, thinking: That’s it, I’m ignoring that girl from now on.
Only for Mu Xue to grab her, holding out the back of her hand, where a tiny spot of venom had splashed onto her skin.
"Really? You’re going to complain about such a tiny scratch?" Lin Yin huffed, stomping her foot. But in the end, she used the Rain Nourish Art a couple times, restoring the skin until not a mark remained.
Above, sunlight broke through the clouds at last, chasing away the lingering shroud of mist.
When the smoke of battle cleared, only mountains of monster corpses remained. The man who’d become a reaper incarnate sheathed his blade and walked back from that sea of blood and bodies; behind him, the fierce war god shrank back into an adorable tin puppet, hopping cheerfully after him.
The Guiyuan Sect disciples were seeing the true power of a demonic cultivator for the very first time, along with a real, bloody battlefield.
"Daoist Cen, with your skills, I bet you’re unstoppable when it comes to hunting demon beasts. I bet there’s not a single monster in the entire Demon Spirit Realm you couldn’t wipe out," Cheng Yan said during a break, sidling up to Cen Qianshan.
"You say that because you’ve never seen the real battlefields of the Demon Spirit Realm," he answered quietly.
By now, they’d reached the city wall. The massive rampart stretched up into the clouds, but a colossal section had been torn away, sunlight streaming through it onto piles of half-rotted beast bones and human remains. The brutality of the monsters’ attack all those years ago needed no explanation.
Cen Qianshan gazed at the crumbling wall. "Here, people die every single day. No matter how strong you are, it could all be over in an instant. If I’ve made a name for myself, it’s only because I haven’t died, yet."
Cheng Yan fell silent. Ever since he was a child, he’d loved reading about strange beasts and magical creatures, imagining a world full of humans and spirits coexisting in dazzling variety.
It wasn’t until he found himself truly here that he began to grasp just how grueling life was, facing monstrous horrors day in and day out, gambling with your life in battles that teetered on the edge of death at every turn.
Back at Tiezhu Peak, their Master used to assign them shifts down at the Chongxu Temple, watching over the noodle shop. As youngsters, they’d always found that job painfully dull. Now, though, he almost missed the cozy, fragrant warmth of the noodle house.
Cen Qianshan flipped his hand and called out a long flute, his gaze barely shifting toward a certain corner as he set the mouthpiece to his lips.
Faint wisps of cloud, slivers of sunset, notes flowed cold and pure, like water running over snow and ice.
The flute’s cry shivered into the night: distant and clear, with a depth both alluring and haunting. The melody twisted with longing, heartache lingering in every note, as if someone stood alone in a frozen courtyard, lost to sorrow no words could name.
Yet there was tenderness too, like a lover’s arms inside billowing curtains, pink with the haze of wine, and the ache of spring fading in the snowfall. How many loves had been lost like this?
Only those who had truly loved, deeply enough to cut to the bone, could play such a tune. Only someone who’d endured could shape this into music.
The rowdy encampment gradually grew quiet, every listener falling silent, sharing in the spell, one more cup of bitter wine, one more thread of tangled emotion drawn together by the melody.
A group of girls huddled around the fire. Ding Lanlan wiped at her eyes,
“Ugh, why does this music always make me cry?” she said with an embarrassed laugh. “It’s just… so heartbreakingly sad.”
Mu Xue poked quietly at the fire, saying nothing.
“You know, I used to read stories like this and think, ‘eh, just fiction, kind of cute, even.’ But now you see a real person living it out and… damn, a hundred years alone, guarding these empty ruins, how do you even get through that?” another girl whispered, glancing toward the direction of the flute’s sound.
“I’m dying to know what kind of woman Master Mu really was. Look at that guy, talented, good-looking, probably awesome at everything. How did Mu Xue not fall for him back then? If someone tried that hard for me, I honestly don’t think I’d last two seconds,” someone else chimed in with a conspiratorial grin.
“Same! But, honestly, where are you ever going to find another Mr. Lovesick-Mountain like him?”
“I heard Master Mu actually tried the goods before tossing him away,” a third giggled.
“So why didn’t she at least give him a title? Still called him her disciple? That’s cold, even for a scumbag.”
The conversation took off in a weird direction after that.
The song lingered in the air long after the last note faded.
Cen Qianshan lowered his lashes, running his fingers along the flute. For a heartbeat his eyes filled with the swirl of falling snow.
Snow danced through the night, free, never stopping for anyone. When, he wondered, could he finally hold it in his palm, and wait for it to melt?
Qianji scampered from the huddle of girls, darting over to him and flashing a thumbs-up.
That heavy darkness in his gaze splintered with a glint of hope.
“You crushed it! I heard the whole thing, those girls were totally in their feelings. Bet Master Mu’s heart’s skipping too,” Qianji chirped, flipping open a tiny booklet and ticking off checkboxes with its metal fingers. “First step, bring her flowers. Second step, show off your talents. All according to plan!”
Cen Qianshan asked, “And the third step?”
“Then you’re supposed to take your,Oh, mmph-mmph!”
Make up your mind, Master! You ask and then tell me to shut up, what do you want from me?!