Chao Jinsui had just gotten up early this morning when she heard the system nagging, so she asked the system what unlucky fool meant.

The system told her to look in the mirror.

Chao Jinsui: …

However, the system soon stopped bantering. To maintain its energy, it would fall into dormancy from time to time.

Chao Jinsui did not pay it much mind. Carrying the Fumo Sword, she flew straight toward the nearby wasteland.

Not long ago, at dawn, at the entrance of Kunlun Mountain, the gatekeeping child’s scream startled the white birds in the mountains into flight.

Chao Xiaotu collapsed at the gate, covered in blood: “Save… save Senior Brother Su!”

Three days ago, the trial team from Kunlun Sword Sect that had gone down the mountain accidentally entered the Demon Realm. The trial task of collecting Feishuang Grass was only basic coursework, yet for some reason, Chao Xiaotu’s group had mistakenly strayed into the barren land at the border of the demon clan. Among their group, aside from Chao Xiaotu and Su Liuyun, who were both at the Golden Core stage, the rest were junior disciples of the Ling generation, barely at the Foundation Establishment stage.

The barren land lay at the boundary between the human realm and the Demon Realm—thousands of li of wasteland, covered in swamps, where only creeping demonic vines grew. If Chao Xiaotu had not been carrying many protective artifacts given by Chao Taichu, she likely would not have been able to return at all to deliver the message.

The situation was urgent. Chao Jinsui took up the Fumo Sword and went to the Demon Realm to rescue them.

An hour later, she finally found them.

In the pitch-black swamp, the Kunlun Sword Sect robes stood out starkly. The disciples curled in the crevices of rocks raised their heads at the sound, suddenly stirring in agitation.

Seeing the familiar figure, they cried out in surprise: “Young Sect Master!”

Su Liuyun leaned against the rock wall regulating his breath. His clothes were stained with blood, and he looked extremely disheveled. He lifted his eyes as that white figure split open the mist. He had just been about to go forward to greet her when his steps halted. His gaze shifted to the blood seeping through the white sleeve on her arm—that was a wound just inflicted by demonic vines during the search.

“Young Sect Master, you’ve worked hard.”

Su Liuyun extended his hand and passed over the last remaining bottle of Blood-Replenishing Pills.

Chao Jinsui paused, then nodded toward Su Liuyun.

She asked, “What happened?”

Lingxi stood beside them, her voice trembling slightly: “Young Sect Master, we… we encountered…”

Before she finished speaking, from the darkness not far away came a hissing sound, like a cold reptile slithering across one’s spine. Everyone shuddered, their hair standing on end.

In the swamp, everything fell into dead silence in an instant. In the damp air, an invisible pressure spread, like a mountain pressing down on everyone’s hearts. They held their breath, trembling slightly with fear.

They saw an enormous Jiao snake, its massive head raised high, a pair of blood-red vertical pupils staring at them, its tongue flicking with a hiss. Yet even more chilling than the Jiao was a pair of pale hands.

Those hands lazily patted the snake’s head. A tall young man wearing a black cloak leaned against a giant rock, one long leg bent. He watched the people on the ground with interest, while casually and absentmindedly soothing the great Jiao beside him, patting its head.

A smile rested at the corner of the young man’s lips. His figure was tall and slender, carrying an indescribable sense of oppression. The two somewhat broken demonic horns atop his head added a hint of beast-like ferocity.

He shifted his gaze. His sinister yet beautiful phoenix eyes looked toward Chao Jinsui, a mocking smile on his lips:

“Ah, the meddlesome one has arrived.”

The people of Kunlun Sword Sect trembled all over, not daring to make the slightest sound—clearly, they had nearly become food for the great snake.

The one who had come was the Demon Venerable, Yan Xueyi.

Even his pet was unique—a gigantic Jiao that devoured people by choice.

Yet Chao Jinsui looked at the Demon Venerable with complete calm: “Long time no see.”

She shook her sword, signaling for Su Liuyun and the others to leave first.

“Senior Brother Su, do you think… it’s not very appropriate for us to leave the Young Sect Master alone?”

Halfway through their escape, the group hesitated.

Su Liuyun stopped. “You all go ahead. I’ll wait here for a while.”

This was the only route out of the dense forest. Having Senior Brother Su, the one with the highest cultivation, receive the Young Sect Master here was the most foolproof plan.

Yet no one noticed that Su Liuyun’s tone when he spoke was very strange—carrying a peculiar gentleness and anticipation.

✦ ─ ˗ˋ ୨୧ ˊ˗ ─ ✦

Chao Jinsui was not surprised at all to meet the Demon Venerable here.

She and Yan Xueyi had long regarded each other with hatred; the grudge between them could be traced back a hundred years.

Over the past century, this fiend had fought her countless times. The two of them could be said to be mortal enemies—each meeting burning with fury.

They had fought so often that, in the end, she even became familiar with his snake.

Yan Xueyi was a man who was vicious, cruel, and born a demonic seed.

She had known since childhood that he was extremely petty and hated her to the bone; if she died at someone else’s hands, he would revive her—only to stab her to death himself.

Hundreds of years ago, the cultivation world had suffered a great calamity that nearly overturned it entirely and fell under the rule of the demon clan. Ever since, the cultivation world had somewhat “turned pale at the mention of demons.” Not only did they seek to exterminate the demon clan completely, they also held an indescribable disgust and fear toward them. As a result, in books that recorded the demon clan, demons were always portrayed as especially savage and terrifying.

And Yan Xueyi was the very best among those who could stop a child’s night crying.

The demon clan had endless, wildly imaginative ways of torturing and killing people. It was said he liked to throw people into mountains of blades and seas of fire, grind their bones and scatter their ashes; he had even created a tongue-pulling hell, specifically to rip out people’s tongues and feed them to snakes.

She had understood one thing very early on: she must never fall into this fiend’s hands.

However, Chao Jinsui, the Young Sect Master of Kunlun Sword Sect, was not someone to be trifled with either. Over the years, though the two fought each other to the death, she had never fallen into a disadvantage. Thus they continued on—hating each other, sabotaging each other.

Today was nothing more than the most ordinary of their countless confrontations. Yet only when her qi and blood churned violently and every limb and bone felt as though being gnawed by ants did she realize something was wrong.

She was nearly struck by that fiend. The Fumo Sword almost slipped from her grasp as she retreated quickly. Suppressing the surge of her qi and blood, she suddenly remembered the Blood-Replenishing Pill Su Liuyun had handed her earlier.

Damn it. The medicine was tampered with.

Gritting her teeth, she stopped fighting and turned to leave.

But how could the Demon Venerable easily let his sworn enemy go? The young man still wore a smile at the corner of his lips, like a cat toying with a mouse, filled with cruel malice.

“What, can’t lift your sword anymore?”

Yan Xueyi noticed something unusual about his nemesis today. For this, he felt a vigorous curiosity. Gloating, unhurried, he followed after her.

As Chao Jinsui hurried to shake off that fiend, countless possibilities flashed through her mind. She did not understand why Su Liuyun had drugged her, but she had no time to investigate—she only wanted to find a way to counter it as quickly as possible.

Yet only when her whole body burned with heat did she finally understand what it was: the ferocious aphrodisiac of the Hehuan Sect.

She nearly bit her teeth to pieces.

Su—Liu—yun!

But she had no time left to think. Forcibly suppressing the surging qi and blood, she flew backward, only just managing to find a hiding place. Bracing herself against the hard rock wall, she spat out a mouthful of blood.

She leaned inside the cave, enduring the gnawing pain that burned through every limb and bone. Outside the cave was pitch-black. Listening to the sounds outside, she tried to control her breathing.

Sure enough, outside the cave, that life-demanding sound of footsteps came.

Yan Xueyi let out a soft laugh outside. “Found you.”

Cold and sinister.

The great fiend whose name was feared far and wide was no longer the trapped beast once confined in a cage. Many years ago, he had already become a terrifying opponent—like a poison that clung to the bone.

She swore he was absolutely thinking of a hundred ways to torture her.

Ahead was a venomous mortal enemy.

Behind was the culprit who had poisoned her.

Although she had not figured out why he had drugged her, Su Liuyun was a man of deep scheming, meticulous and flawless in everything he did. If it truly was his doing, he would certainly be waiting for her along the only path she had to take.

Enduring the immense pain, she had just tried to forcibly circulate her qi to expel the poison—

The slumbering system was jolted awake: “Don’t!”

Chao Jinsui paused.

The next second, her vision went black, and she fell unconscious.

✦ ─ ˗ˋ ୨୧ ˊ˗ ─ ✦

She fell into a long dream that spanned hundreds of years.

In the dream, she lived out a complete lifetime.

In the dream, she had not been stopped by the system and had successfully forced out the medicinal effects. She had thought the drug was merely ordinary Hehuan powder, yet it turned out to be the Hehuan Sect’s secret love gu.

She had forcibly circulated her qi, but after returning to Kunlun Sword Sect, her meridians reversed, her dantian¹Dantian — A core energy center in traditional Chinese cultivation and Daoist internal practice, located in the lower abdomen, where spiritual energy (qi) is stored and circulated. burned, and she fell into a three-month coma.

For three months she was unconscious. To save her, her elder brother Chao Zhaoyue went in search of spirit herbs and from that moment on, he vanished without a trace.

When Chao Jinsui awoke, she learned of Chao Zhaoyue’s disappearance and that his soul lamp was flickering on the verge of extinguishing.

After hearing the news, she dragged her weakened body to kneel before Chao Taichu’s great hall for three days and three nights, begging him to save Chao Zhaoyue.

But at that time, Chao Taichu made a demand: she had to swear to guard Kunlun Sword Sect and protect Chao Xiaotu, even if it meant sacrificing her life.

In the wind and snow, she raised her head to look at the man called father, cold fury burning within her. She knew clearly that her father wanted to bind her here, to make her the most loyal sword of Kunlun Sword Sect. But in the end, she still said yes.

Chao Zhaoyue was the last person in this world who cared for her and loved her.

But Heaven did not show her mercy. They went too late—Chao Taichu only brought back a cold corpse. In this dream, Chao Jinsui knelt before the body, her sword-holding hand trembling, yet too afraid to lift the white cloth covering her elder brother.

She began to hate winter and heavy snow.

Later, she spent two years recuperating and finally regained her cultivation, yet a severe chronic ailment remained.

There was hatred in her heart, resentment as well. She hated Chao Taichu—but the countless innocent disciples of Kunlun Sword Sect were not at fault.

During that darkest time, under her protection, casualties in Kunlun Sword Sect were minimal. Perhaps her brother’s death hurt too deeply—she never allowed meaningless sacrifice. She always carried her sword, standing in front of her sect’s disciples.

She knew Kunlun was complicated. Countless cultivation families were entangled within it, along with endless webs of interests—but she did not care. At that time, the Demon Realm and the human race were irreconcilable, like fire and water. If she wanted to save more people, she could only rely on the strength of the sect.

When Chao Zhaoyue had once asked her why she walked the path of the sword, she answered: to cut down all the evil demons under heaven.

She had promised her brother that in the time of crisis in the cultivation world, she would guard Kunlun and protect the human race.

Peace across the seas and clear rivers, tranquility under heaven.

That was the vow she and her brother, both still small back then, made shoulder to shoulder.

Her brother died, and on this path only she remained. The wind and snow were fierce, and walking alone was difficult but she would keep going.

Even when she was repeatedly met with suspicion, wariness, and blame; even when she was forced to leave Kunlun countless times, she would still return—firm and unwavering—to protect the common people.

Even in death, she would never regret it.

Chao Taichu thought it was because of that heaven-and-earth oath, but he was wrong.

She only wanted to see the day when spring returned to the earth.

Year after year, she lived as the living protective grand formation of Kunlun Sword Sect.

The human realm and the Demon Realm fought endlessly. Later, after being severely wounded once, she finally withdrew to recuperate. Yet when she heard the news that Kunlun Mountain had been breached, she still returned to Kunlun.

For the first time, Chao Taichu smiled at her. Chao Xiaotu wept uncontrollably. Her junior brothers and sisters cheered with joy, as if as long as she returned, Kunlun would have its backbone.

She did not disappoint their expectations. She went to face her fated opponent, her enemy: the Demon Venerable, Yan Xueyi.

The time they had been enemies seemed almost as long as their lifetimes.

She and that person fought a battle to the death.

But year after year, her body had been worn down. Facing Yan Xueyi at the height of his power, she had not the slightest chance of victory.

She went prepared to die, yet she never imagined—

After exhausting all her cultivation to seal that world-destroying fiend, she did not die.

That gloomy and mad demon vanished inch by inch into the air.

At the end, he smiled and lowered his head to ask her, his breath still carrying the scent of blood:

“You sword cultivators… do you have no hearts?”

But the wind was too loud, his voice too soft—she could no longer hear him.

He dissolved into countless fragments that passed through her body—

It was the first time in her life she had touched that fiend.

It felt as though something was missing from her heart.

She thought, with the demon clan’s assault repelled and the world-destroying fiend sealed, Kunlun would no longer face mortal threats. From then on, the cultivation world would enjoy peace across the seas and clear rivers.

Yet when she turned and walked toward Kunlun, she saw at the city gates—thousands upon thousands of arrows aimed at her.

Familiar faces, familiar names.

Some were crying. Some turned their faces away.

She was not killed by her mortal enemy, yet just half a step away from the place she had once regarded as home, she was pierced through the heart by ten thousand arrows.

She fell into the snow.

Snow drifted down from the sky. In that pure white world, it seemed that only the sound of her own broken breathing could be heard.

The world went completely dark.

Footnotes

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  Dantian — A core energy center in traditional Chinese cultivation and Daoist internal practice, located in the lower abdomen, where spiritual energy (qi) is stored and circulated.