Chapter 57 – Half-Demon Blood
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Song Qingshi’s alcohol tolerance was so bad that he soon felt dizzy and fell sound asleep…
Yue Wuhuan carried him on his back and took him back to the inn. He washed his face for him, untied his robe and covered him with the quilt. For a long while, he sat by his bedside, feeling at a loss. He found his drunken state to be very delicious but his drunken behavior fairly quite a handful. It challenged his self-control. In the end, he still decided it would be best for him to drink a little less.
What happened tonight was unexpected.
Outside the window, several Gu’s with the light of fireflies were flying about. It was a signal from that person.
Now that the Master has fallen asleep and the map has been unrolled and the dagger has been revealed, it was time to deal with this delightful matter.
Yue Wuhuan gathered together his long hair, tidied up his clothes and followed the markers given by the Gu’s, proceeding towards the place where he should go.
In an abandoned mountain temple on the outskirts of Nanhai city, Gu’s and poisonous snakes densely covered the entire floor, crawling and shifting, hideous and strange. It was like the most terrifying torture of legend, the Poison Pit. The aura of death permeated everywhere. As soon as An Long’s demonic nature began to break out, the Luminous Dragon had been thrown into a barren mountain lest it sense the unusual situation.
An Long sat quietly in the center of the Poison Pit. No emotions could be seen in his long, narrow, blood-colored eyes.
Yue Wuhuan walked without the slightest hesitation into this mountain temple dominated by terror. He stepped into the pile of Gu’s. The poisonous snakes and Gu’s crawled up on his legs. The silky itchiness was herd to bear. He was subjected to stab after stab of pain. This was a road to hell that even the most terrifying nightmare could not conjure but he seemed to be walking on a sea of flowers, walking on clouds, feeling not the slightest bit of fear.
An Long finally spoke, his voice hoarse and grating, “You are a lunatic.”
Yue Wuhuan gave a very soft and gentle smile. “You’re actually a half-demon.”
The little Foundation Building cultivator, covered entirely with Gu’s, looked provokingly at the king within the darkness who had a hold over his life.
He didn’t know fear, nor was he afraid of death. He liked to scheme and liked even more to gamble recklessly.
An Long had already thoroughly investigated early on all his experiences during the past ten years. Never before has there been anyone as crazy as him, using his life and his weaknesses to set up one trap after another. The moment you felt like victory was within your grasp was when he would reveal his true poison fangs, biting down ruthlessly on your weakness, causing unendurable pain.
The most terrible poison…
An Long asked coldly, “When did you start to doubt my identity?”
“Initially, I felt that your acquaintance with Master was very deliberate.” Yue Wuhuan saw through his thoughts. Patiently, he slowly narrated, “You deliberately attracted his attention and then you accurately matched his interests and hobbies, becoming ‘friends’. Master isn’t good at expressing himself. He never takes the initiative to express his preferences. The outside world has a lot of misconceptions about him. So, how can you understand his thoughts so well?”
Of course, this was but a little suspicion…
There were also many coincidences in the world, such as two people who just happened to be perfectly suited to each other.
But there was now a crack in his heart and the more he thought, the more there were; the more he thought, the bigger they became.
Song Qingshi had the good habit of filing medical records for every one of his patients. During the past ten years, he has searched through all the records and hadn’t found anything suspicious.
He also investigated An Long’s past and found that before entering the Myriad Gu Sect, it was a complete blank. He had no parents, no friends, no past. He seemed to have appeared out of thin air. Because of his innate ability to control Gu’s, he was taken in by the previous sect master of the Myriad Gu Sect, making him one of his direct disciples.
Finally, he had accidentally found the half-demon’s medical record.
Because of the controversy regarding half-demons in the immortal realm, this record had been sealed and hidden in a corner of the library; an extremely valued record.
Song Qingshi’s medical records never contain anything related to emotions. They were all cold data, including daily medications, the development of the disease, so on and so forth. He seemed to have been a young and inexperienced doctor at the time and many of his treatment methods were imprecise, even his records weren’t very comprehensive. However, it could be seen that the treatment process lasted for nearly two whole years. The two had been alone together and they accompanied each other day and night. It was enough time to see that this outwardly indifferent person was in his heart, gentle and soft; enough time to understand his true tastes and preferences.
But this was not enough…
“The foul and lowly half-demon and the noble and powerful Myriad Gu Sect Master, how could I possibly dare to connect the two? I have never heard of a half-demon that could climb to such a high position.” Yue Wuhuan’s voice carried with it ridicule. “However, when Master talked about the half-demon in the mountain temple, you seemed to hate this topic. I had a vague feeling that there was something strange about it and when we were caught in the Heart-Eating Nightmare Formation, Master thought it had been my nightmare. But I knew it wasn’t, which meant that it could have only be yours. Why was the deepest place in the majestic Gu King’s memory a stinky swamp?”
The half-demon and Song Qingshi met in a swamp and An Long’s nightmare memory was also a swamp.
However, he was still missing that little bit of evidence.
An Long suddenly noticed a faint scent. He quickly shielded his breathing but it was too late. The scent stimulated his demon blood to seethe. Vertical pupils appeared in his blood-colored eyes once again. Black scales gradually emerged on his face, covering most of it. The limbs on one side of his body began to change. The arm tattooed with the five evils turned into a black shell. His fingers stretched out. They resembled the jointed limb of an insect. His fingertips were as sharp as knives.
His back mutated and barbs emerged. A long scorpion tail stretched out, a poisonous hook at the end.
Yue Wuhuan exclaimed, “Your true face is as ugly as I thought.”
An Long said coldly, “Soul Captivating Incense? What did you add in it?”
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An Long should have been able to suppress this derangement by virtue of his cultivation but today, he was emotionally unstable. Under the stimulation of the Soul Captivating Incense, all his emotions and desires were magnified. Finally, he was unable to control his own body and he exposed a side of him he never wanted anyone to see.
“The Western Forest’s Gu King, so high above the masses,” Yue Wuhuan spread his arms wide and smiled happily. “If you kill me, my last testament will inform Master of this matter. It will inform the Night Rain Pavilion, the Myriad Gu Sect. It will inform everyone in the entire world.”
In the realm of cultivation, everyone was all too willing to put a half-demon to death.
No one would allow him to sit on the throne of the Western Forest.
No matter how strong Western Forest’s Gu King was, could he fend against the entire world out for his blood?
Yue Wuhuan was a lunatic. He had nothing. He had nothing he was afraid of losing. He wasn’t afraid of excruciating punishment, of torture, of death. He wasn’t afraid of anything. For his opponent, choosing to perish with him would merely be getting caught in a most painful choice.
An Long took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the chaos in his mind provoked by the Soul Captivating Incense. He stood up, murderous intent covered him from head to toe. “He won’t be tempted by you.”
He has already made his choice.
“You would kill me even if you were to lose everything? I didn’t expect the Gu King to have such deep feelings and attach such great importance to my Master, to be so mad as to be unable to help himself.” Yue Wuhuan showed an even more enchanting smile. And then in the twinkling of an eye, he tore off that smile and turned into the ice-cold and terrifying lunatic. All the Blood King Vines stretched out. He unsheathed his sword. Accentuating each word, he asked, “But…in the Golden Phoenix Manor, why did you kill him?!”
An Long’s murderous aura solidified. After a long while, he asked in return, “How do you know this?”
Then, he suddenly understood. Yue Wuhuan had been the mortal slave with Gui Yuan Xianzun. At that time, he had made a mistake, his thoughts were in a flurry and he only noticed Gui Yuan Xianzun’s prying eyes. In order to completely erase this matter, he killed Gui Yuan Xianzun and eradicated the Can Tong Sect. However, he was unable to find the lowly blindfolded slave, whose face he hadn’t been able to see clearly.
There were truly too many slaves in the Golden Phoenix Manor and a mortal wouldn’t have the ability to spy on what he had done.
Therefore, after he confirmed that Gui Yuan Xianzun wasn’t clear on what he had done, he let this matter go.
This incident was the biggest thorn and the deepest pain in his heart.
“Let me guess,” Yue Wuhuan walked forward step by step, a smile on his face. “Could it be that you expressed your love to my Master? Then my Master rejected you. Your half-demon blood’s lust for killing and wrath erupted and you killed him by mistake? You suspected that Gui Yuan Xianzun had seen your half-demon form and so you killed him to silence him?”
“No,” An Long muttered to himself, as though explaining to himself. “I don’t know what had happened at that time. It was all so confusing. When I woke up, he was already dead…”
“Yes,” Yue Wuhuan closed in. “You went out of control. Your Gu killed him.”
An Long retorted, “He is not dead!”
“I saw his lifeless body with my own eyes. You too thought he was dead at the time. So you laid him down in his favorite medicine garden, didn’t you?” Yue Wuhuan’s expression was extremely sad. “Master is so pitiful. There was no trace of any resistance on his body. I guess he never expected his own “good friend” to be so cruel to him and he was caught off guard.”
An Long felt his head begin to hurt again. “I don’t remember anymore. But he didn’t die, he came back to life…”
Yue Wuhuan said, gratified, “That Master managed to come back to life, is thanks to his good luck and not by your mercy.”
An Long took a deep breath. “Qingshi forgave me.”
“He forgave you?” Yue Wuhuan laughed madly, as if he heard the funniest joke. He was like a fiend from hell who found the stupidest prey, a pitiable soul he could take away with as much effort needed to blow away a speck of dust.
An Long suddenly felt fear. He realized that something was wrong. Maybe he should kill this person immediately. He didn’t want to face the truth…
However, it was too late.
In a gentle tone, Yue Wuhuan said the cruelest truth, “Master has forgotten that memory. He forgot that you killed him.”
An Long said angrily, “Impossible! That Gu couldn’t have attacked his sea of consciousness!”
“Unfortunately, something happened to his soul, which caused a portion of his memory to be lost.” Yue Wuhuan looked as him as if he was looking at a pitiful creature. “When he said he had forgiven you, for which incident was he referring to? Has he ever mentioned anything about what happened that day? Don’t be stupid, how could someone forgive the person who murdered him?”
An Long kept backing away. He felt his head hurt even more.
When he’d seen Song Qingshi, he’d been a little out of control. He only remembered confessing his feelings, throwing himself at his mercy, begging for a little bit of affection. But was ruthlessly rejected. He then sunk into rage and despair. He lost his rationality and when he was sober once again, Song Qingshi had already fallen to his Gu.
He had a total mental collapse and he left the Golden Phoenix Manor in a panic. When he learned later on that that Song Qingshi wasn’t dead, he felt a little bit better. He knew that he had commit a grave mistake and he dared not ask for forgiveness. His entire being felt muddled and he was like a walking corpse for a long time after. Then, he received a letter from Song Qingshi. The content of the letter was the same as usual, telling him the solution to a difficult problem he had posed. He made no mention of the events of that day, seeming as if he hadn’t taken it to heart.
Song Qingshi had agreed to have him at the Medicine King’s Valley as a guest.
Song Qingshi had smiled and said he’d forgiven him.
Song Qingshi never once mentioned what happened that day.
The loss of the utter joy he’d once regained was a blow that almost caused him to pass out…
He dared not think about that day anymore, trying to hide in the sand like an ostrich, erasing all traces of his crime.
There was even a faint happiness in his heart. Qingshi knew of his feelings and was willing to forgive his crime. Didn’t that mean that he was a unique existence in his eyes? That he felt something different for him? That night, when he knocked on his door in an unlined robe for the first time, he had almost swooned from happiness, thinking he had come to agree to his request.
Although it had been a misunderstanding, being able to return to being his good friend was also good…
In order to atone for his crime, he was willing to do anything.
Even if a sharp blade was plunged repeatedly into his heart…
He was still perfectly willing to do so…
Because of his lineage as a half-demon, his desire to kill was stronger than that of an ordinary person’s. No one could provoke him and remain alive. That is, except for Yue Wuhuan. He suppressed his murderous intent again and again, allowing this weak mortal to survive in his sea of anger. Because he was afraid. If he made another mistake, he would lose everything.
It turned out, that he had already made a mistake?
It turned out, that he had never been forgiven?
An Long held his head in agony. The effect of Soul Captivating Incense grew deeper and deeper. He felt a buzzing sound begin in his head once again. The auditory hallucinations were about to appear.
“Let go of Master, alright?” Yue Wuhuan approached slowly, his beautiful eyes were filled with entreaties, his voice, weak and pitiful. “I won’t hurt Master. I just want to live a quiet life with him in the Medicine King’s Valley. We will spend the years peacefully, away from all worldly affairs. I’m asking you to help us, okay?”
Several Blood King Vines slowly grew out of the dark. Bringing with them the highly-toxic poison prepared long ago, they approached this confused prey, on the verge of collapse.
“You have already hurt him. He cannot forgive you,” Yue Wuhuan used the cruelest words, hacking his heart into pieces, provoking his soul. “How could you still return shamelessly to his side? How can you thicken your face and be his friend once more? Could it be that you mistakenly thought that he had forgiven you, that you hold a special place in his heart?”
The sword in his hand slowly approached. On its blade was a faint blue light from the poison smeared upon it.
An Long gasped and pleaded, “Stop talking, stop talking…”
“You are really ridiculous,” Yue Wuhuan shook his head softly, his voice full of pity. “How do you pray for forgiveness for killing the one you like? How about…you go to hell and confess your sins?”
He had hardly finished speaking, when his sword thrust out like a swimming dragon. At the same time, the Blood King Vines launched an attack on the weakness they’d been targeting.
Hard scales quickly appeared on An Long’s body. Like the toughest shield, it automatically blocked the poisonous attack.
Yue Wuhuan took back his sword. He took two steps back, and sneered, “The Half-demon lineage, how truly troublesome.”
He successfully disrupted his heart’s defenses and every position he attacked was a weakness. But his cultivation base was too low to pierce the defenses of the half-demon Nascent Soul. It truly was too difficult.
An Long knelt on the ground. The noise in his head was getting worse, making him collapse, rendering him unable to think.
The Gu’s all over the floor lost their directive and began to indiscriminately attack any living creature.
If he were to let this chance slip by, he was afraid he would never get another as good as this. Yue Wuhuan used the Blood King Vine to continuously whip away the surrounding insects and still, his body was bitten by the poisonous snakes and Gu’s. He swallowed down some medicine to delay the onset of the poison. He then took out the Black Death Butterflies, their highly-toxic poison could permeate through contact with the skin. He had already used the Blood King Vine to mark the Black Death Butterfly’s prey.
He threw out a talisman and several talisman arrays spread out, forming a chain of formations, completely blocking off An Long’s retreat.
A number of Black Death Butterflies flew out of the sealed bamboo tube, rushing towards their marked enemy, out to drag his soul into the abyss.
Yue Wuhuan smiled with satisfaction, waiting to reap this long-awaited happiness.
An Long raised his head. Looking at the black butterflies, he said slowly, “Qingshi cultivates the Way of the Heartless.”
Yue Wuhuan was stunned and then his smile grew even brighter. “It’s just as I want.”
Although a slight deviation had appeared, he would find a way to correct it.
He never wanted to let his Master actively desire.
An Long couldn’t help cursing, “Lunatic.”
He stood up; black demon aura spread throughout his body. The scorpion tail stretched out, ready to rip apart the formation.
Suddenly, thunder rang out from the sky…
Lightning leapt wildly like a snake. A violent bolt of lightning smashed open the roof of the mountain temple, breaking the formation, and separated the two of them. Immediately afterwards, the torrential rain poured down, drenching everything and knocking down the wings of the Black Death Butterflies, intercepting this fatal attack.
Yue Wuhuan looked up in astonishment, staring at this inexplicable change in weather.
He felt like he was back to the days when he was made a fool of by fate. He couldn’t even understand just what this was.
An Long disappeared in the heavy rain, taking away all the Gu’s and poisonous snakes.
Their fight had been interrupted and his goal could not be fully achieved.
“Why? Why? Why?”
Yue Wuhuan was furious. The Blood King Vine went berserk, beating against the rainstorm, beating the ruined eaves and dilapidated walls, beating everything that could be beaten. Tall trees were chopped down, huge boulders were smashed. He wished he could destroy everything in the world.
The rain dimmed his vision, his body was wet, and there was a foul smell everywhere.
He hated the world right down to the marrow of his bones.
…
An Long walked into the dense forest and lay in the mud.
The auditory hallucinations in his mind were getting more and more severe. He could no longer think, could no longer fight.
“Despair. So what if you had crawled out of the filthy mud and attained a standing well-suited to his?”
“Despair. He would rather die than accept your heart…”
“Despair. Your disguise has already been torn down. Your true face is so hideous and your heart is so filthy…”
“Despair, He never forgave you…”
“…”
An Long listened blankly to these constantly repeating words but what appeared before his eyes was the young man who had scooped him up from the dirty swamp so many years ago. He covered his stinky body with the fragrant white robe and after that, he carried him away, step by step. He washed his rotting wounds clean, eliminated the painful poisons from his body, and cured all his ailments for him. And then, he heartlessly sent him away.
At that time, he was still so young, he didn’t understand this emotion, the way he took it so to heart.
He was very angry, furious, resentful.
But he remembered him, thought of him every day.
When he ran into him in the secret realm, he deliberately threw a hideous bug, trying to provoke him into anger.
The young man picked up the bug, looked at it for a long time, then walked up to him. He smiled and told him, “Insects are very cute.”
At that moment, he understood what it meant to mind.
He deliberately caused trouble for him, pretended to be stupid and foolish. He attracted his attention. He wrapped himself tightly in human skin, climbed up to a high position in order to match him.
Even though he knew that he cultivated the Way of the Heartless that what awaited him was despair, he still couldn’t let go.
He wanted to hide everything, deceive the world, deceive Qingshi’s feelings, deceive his own feelings…
However, he failed.
It’s over, it’s all over.
In the end, dirty bugs must return to the dirty mud.
…
“Despair. Give up your human emotions and turn entirely into a demon.”
“Just…what are you?”
“I am your fate.”
Chapter 57 – Half-Demon Blood
Sponsored Content
Song Qingshi’s alcohol tolerance was so bad that he soon felt dizzy and fell sound asleep…
Yue Wuhuan carried him on his back and took him back to the inn. He washed his face for him, untied his robe and covered him with the quilt. For a long while, he sat by his bedside, feeling at a loss. He found his drunken state to be very delicious but his drunken behavior fairly quite a handful. It challenged his self-control. In the end, he still decided it would be best for him to drink a little less.
What happened tonight was unexpected.
Outside the window, several Gu’s with the light of fireflies were flying about. It was a signal from that person.
Now that the Master has fallen asleep and the map has been unrolled and the dagger has been revealed, it was time to deal with this delightful matter.
Yue Wuhuan gathered together his long hair, tidied up his clothes and followed the markers given by the Gu’s, proceeding towards the place where he should go.
In an abandoned mountain temple on the outskirts of Nanhai city, Gu’s and poisonous snakes densely covered the entire floor, crawling and shifting, hideous and strange. It was like the most terrifying torture of legend, the Poison Pit. The aura of death permeated everywhere. As soon as An Long’s demonic nature began to break out, the Luminous Dragon had been thrown into a barren mountain lest it sense the unusual situation.
An Long sat quietly in the center of the Poison Pit. No emotions could be seen in his long, narrow, blood-colored eyes.
Yue Wuhuan walked without the slightest hesitation into this mountain temple dominated by terror. He stepped into the pile of Gu’s. The poisonous snakes and Gu’s crawled up on his legs. The silky itchiness was herd to bear. He was subjected to stab after stab of pain. This was a road to hell that even the most terrifying nightmare could not conjure but he seemed to be walking on a sea of flowers, walking on clouds, feeling not the slightest bit of fear.
An Long finally spoke, his voice hoarse and grating, “You are a lunatic.”
Yue Wuhuan gave a very soft and gentle smile. “You’re actually a half-demon.”
The little Foundation Building cultivator, covered entirely with Gu’s, looked provokingly at the king within the darkness who had a hold over his life.
He didn’t know fear, nor was he afraid of death. He liked to scheme and liked even more to gamble recklessly.
An Long had already thoroughly investigated early on all his experiences during the past ten years. Never before has there been anyone as crazy as him, using his life and his weaknesses to set up one trap after another. The moment you felt like victory was within your grasp was when he would reveal his true poison fangs, biting down ruthlessly on your weakness, causing unendurable pain.
The most terrible poison…
An Long asked coldly, “When did you start to doubt my identity?”
“Initially, I felt that your acquaintance with Master was very deliberate.” Yue Wuhuan saw through his thoughts. Patiently, he slowly narrated, “You deliberately attracted his attention and then you accurately matched his interests and hobbies, becoming ‘friends’. Master isn’t good at expressing himself. He never takes the initiative to express his preferences. The outside world has a lot of misconceptions about him. So, how can you understand his thoughts so well?”
Of course, this was but a little suspicion…
There were also many coincidences in the world, such as two people who just happened to be perfectly suited to each other.
But there was now a crack in his heart and the more he thought, the more there were; the more he thought, the bigger they became.
Song Qingshi had the good habit of filing medical records for every one of his patients. During the past ten years, he has searched through all the records and hadn’t found anything suspicious.
He also investigated An Long’s past and found that before entering the Myriad Gu Sect, it was a complete blank. He had no parents, no friends, no past. He seemed to have appeared out of thin air. Because of his innate ability to control Gu’s, he was taken in by the previous sect master of the Myriad Gu Sect, making him one of his direct disciples.
Finally, he had accidentally found the half-demon’s medical record.
Because of the controversy regarding half-demons in the immortal realm, this record had been sealed and hidden in a corner of the library; an extremely valued record.
Song Qingshi’s medical records never contain anything related to emotions. They were all cold data, including daily medications, the development of the disease, so on and so forth. He seemed to have been a young and inexperienced doctor at the time and many of his treatment methods were imprecise, even his records weren’t very comprehensive. However, it could be seen that the treatment process lasted for nearly two whole years. The two had been alone together and they accompanied each other day and night. It was enough time to see that this outwardly indifferent person was in his heart, gentle and soft; enough time to understand his true tastes and preferences.
But this was not enough…
“The foul and lowly half-demon and the noble and powerful Myriad Gu Sect Master, how could I possibly dare to connect the two? I have never heard of a half-demon that could climb to such a high position.” Yue Wuhuan’s voice carried with it ridicule. “However, when Master talked about the half-demon in the mountain temple, you seemed to hate this topic. I had a vague feeling that there was something strange about it and when we were caught in the Heart-Eating Nightmare Formation, Master thought it had been my nightmare. But I knew it wasn’t, which meant that it could have only be yours. Why was the deepest place in the majestic Gu King’s memory a stinky swamp?”
The half-demon and Song Qingshi met in a swamp and An Long’s nightmare memory was also a swamp.
However, he was still missing that little bit of evidence.
An Long suddenly noticed a faint scent. He quickly shielded his breathing but it was too late. The scent stimulated his demon blood to seethe. Vertical pupils appeared in his blood-colored eyes once again. Black scales gradually emerged on his face, covering most of it. The limbs on one side of his body began to change. The arm tattooed with the five evils turned into a black shell. His fingers stretched out. They resembled the jointed limb of an insect. His fingertips were as sharp as knives.
His back mutated and barbs emerged. A long scorpion tail stretched out, a poisonous hook at the end.
Yue Wuhuan exclaimed, “Your true face is as ugly as I thought.”
An Long said coldly, “Soul Captivating Incense? What did you add in it?”
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An Long should have been able to suppress this derangement by virtue of his cultivation but today, he was emotionally unstable. Under the stimulation of the Soul Captivating Incense, all his emotions and desires were magnified. Finally, he was unable to control his own body and he exposed a side of him he never wanted anyone to see.
“The Western Forest’s Gu King, so high above the masses,” Yue Wuhuan spread his arms wide and smiled happily. “If you kill me, my last testament will inform Master of this matter. It will inform the Night Rain Pavilion, the Myriad Gu Sect. It will inform everyone in the entire world.”
In the realm of cultivation, everyone was all too willing to put a half-demon to death.
No one would allow him to sit on the throne of the Western Forest.
No matter how strong Western Forest’s Gu King was, could he fend against the entire world out for his blood?
Yue Wuhuan was a lunatic. He had nothing. He had nothing he was afraid of losing. He wasn’t afraid of excruciating punishment, of torture, of death. He wasn’t afraid of anything. For his opponent, choosing to perish with him would merely be getting caught in a most painful choice.
An Long took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the chaos in his mind provoked by the Soul Captivating Incense. He stood up, murderous intent covered him from head to toe. “He won’t be tempted by you.”
He has already made his choice.
“You would kill me even if you were to lose everything? I didn’t expect the Gu King to have such deep feelings and attach such great importance to my Master, to be so mad as to be unable to help himself.” Yue Wuhuan showed an even more enchanting smile. And then in the twinkling of an eye, he tore off that smile and turned into the ice-cold and terrifying lunatic. All the Blood King Vines stretched out. He unsheathed his sword. Accentuating each word, he asked, “But…in the Golden Phoenix Manor, why did you kill him?!”
An Long’s murderous aura solidified. After a long while, he asked in return, “How do you know this?”
Then, he suddenly understood. Yue Wuhuan had been the mortal slave with Gui Yuan Xianzun. At that time, he had made a mistake, his thoughts were in a flurry and he only noticed Gui Yuan Xianzun’s prying eyes. In order to completely erase this matter, he killed Gui Yuan Xianzun and eradicated the Can Tong Sect. However, he was unable to find the lowly blindfolded slave, whose face he hadn’t been able to see clearly.
There were truly too many slaves in the Golden Phoenix Manor and a mortal wouldn’t have the ability to spy on what he had done.
Therefore, after he confirmed that Gui Yuan Xianzun wasn’t clear on what he had done, he let this matter go.
This incident was the biggest thorn and the deepest pain in his heart.
“Let me guess,” Yue Wuhuan walked forward step by step, a smile on his face. “Could it be that you expressed your love to my Master? Then my Master rejected you. Your half-demon blood’s lust for killing and wrath erupted and you killed him by mistake? You suspected that Gui Yuan Xianzun had seen your half-demon form and so you killed him to silence him?”
“No,” An Long muttered to himself, as though explaining to himself. “I don’t know what had happened at that time. It was all so confusing. When I woke up, he was already dead…”
“Yes,” Yue Wuhuan closed in. “You went out of control. Your Gu killed him.”
An Long retorted, “He is not dead!”
“I saw his lifeless body with my own eyes. You too thought he was dead at the time. So you laid him down in his favorite medicine garden, didn’t you?” Yue Wuhuan’s expression was extremely sad. “Master is so pitiful. There was no trace of any resistance on his body. I guess he never expected his own “good friend” to be so cruel to him and he was caught off guard.”
An Long felt his head begin to hurt again. “I don’t remember anymore. But he didn’t die, he came back to life…”
Yue Wuhuan said, gratified, “That Master managed to come back to life, is thanks to his good luck and not by your mercy.”
An Long took a deep breath. “Qingshi forgave me.”
“He forgave you?” Yue Wuhuan laughed madly, as if he heard the funniest joke. He was like a fiend from hell who found the stupidest prey, a pitiable soul he could take away with as much effort needed to blow away a speck of dust.
An Long suddenly felt fear. He realized that something was wrong. Maybe he should kill this person immediately. He didn’t want to face the truth…
However, it was too late.
In a gentle tone, Yue Wuhuan said the cruelest truth, “Master has forgotten that memory. He forgot that you killed him.”
An Long said angrily, “Impossible! That Gu couldn’t have attacked his sea of consciousness!”
“Unfortunately, something happened to his soul, which caused a portion of his memory to be lost.” Yue Wuhuan looked as him as if he was looking at a pitiful creature. “When he said he had forgiven you, for which incident was he referring to? Has he ever mentioned anything about what happened that day? Don’t be stupid, how could someone forgive the person who murdered him?”
An Long kept backing away. He felt his head hurt even more.
When he’d seen Song Qingshi, he’d been a little out of control. He only remembered confessing his feelings, throwing himself at his mercy, begging for a little bit of affection. But was ruthlessly rejected. He then sunk into rage and despair. He lost his rationality and when he was sober once again, Song Qingshi had already fallen to his Gu.
He had a total mental collapse and he left the Golden Phoenix Manor in a panic. When he learned later on that that Song Qingshi wasn’t dead, he felt a little bit better. He knew that he had commit a grave mistake and he dared not ask for forgiveness. His entire being felt muddled and he was like a walking corpse for a long time after. Then, he received a letter from Song Qingshi. The content of the letter was the same as usual, telling him the solution to a difficult problem he had posed. He made no mention of the events of that day, seeming as if he hadn’t taken it to heart.
Song Qingshi had agreed to have him at the Medicine King’s Valley as a guest.
Song Qingshi had smiled and said he’d forgiven him.
Song Qingshi never once mentioned what happened that day.
The loss of the utter joy he’d once regained was a blow that almost caused him to pass out…
He dared not think about that day anymore, trying to hide in the sand like an ostrich, erasing all traces of his crime.
There was even a faint happiness in his heart. Qingshi knew of his feelings and was willing to forgive his crime. Didn’t that mean that he was a unique existence in his eyes? That he felt something different for him? That night, when he knocked on his door in an unlined robe for the first time, he had almost swooned from happiness, thinking he had come to agree to his request.
Although it had been a misunderstanding, being able to return to being his good friend was also good…
In order to atone for his crime, he was willing to do anything.
Even if a sharp blade was plunged repeatedly into his heart…
He was still perfectly willing to do so…
Because of his lineage as a half-demon, his desire to kill was stronger than that of an ordinary person’s. No one could provoke him and remain alive. That is, except for Yue Wuhuan. He suppressed his murderous intent again and again, allowing this weak mortal to survive in his sea of anger. Because he was afraid. If he made another mistake, he would lose everything.
It turned out, that he had already made a mistake?
It turned out, that he had never been forgiven?
An Long held his head in agony. The effect of Soul Captivating Incense grew deeper and deeper. He felt a buzzing sound begin in his head once again. The auditory hallucinations were about to appear.
“Let go of Master, alright?” Yue Wuhuan approached slowly, his beautiful eyes were filled with entreaties, his voice, weak and pitiful. “I won’t hurt Master. I just want to live a quiet life with him in the Medicine King’s Valley. We will spend the years peacefully, away from all worldly affairs. I’m asking you to help us, okay?”
Several Blood King Vines slowly grew out of the dark. Bringing with them the highly-toxic poison prepared long ago, they approached this confused prey, on the verge of collapse.
“You have already hurt him. He cannot forgive you,” Yue Wuhuan used the cruelest words, hacking his heart into pieces, provoking his soul. “How could you still return shamelessly to his side? How can you thicken your face and be his friend once more? Could it be that you mistakenly thought that he had forgiven you, that you hold a special place in his heart?”
The sword in his hand slowly approached. On its blade was a faint blue light from the poison smeared upon it.
An Long gasped and pleaded, “Stop talking, stop talking…”
“You are really ridiculous,” Yue Wuhuan shook his head softly, his voice full of pity. “How do you pray for forgiveness for killing the one you like? How about…you go to hell and confess your sins?”
He had hardly finished speaking, when his sword thrust out like a swimming dragon. At the same time, the Blood King Vines launched an attack on the weakness they’d been targeting.
Hard scales quickly appeared on An Long’s body. Like the toughest shield, it automatically blocked the poisonous attack.
Yue Wuhuan took back his sword. He took two steps back, and sneered, “The Half-demon lineage, how truly troublesome.”
He successfully disrupted his heart’s defenses and every position he attacked was a weakness. But his cultivation base was too low to pierce the defenses of the half-demon Nascent Soul. It truly was too difficult.
An Long knelt on the ground. The noise in his head was getting worse, making him collapse, rendering him unable to think.
The Gu’s all over the floor lost their directive and began to indiscriminately attack any living creature.
If he were to let this chance slip by, he was afraid he would never get another as good as this. Yue Wuhuan used the Blood King Vine to continuously whip away the surrounding insects and still, his body was bitten by the poisonous snakes and Gu’s. He swallowed down some medicine to delay the onset of the poison. He then took out the Black Death Butterflies, their highly-toxic poison could permeate through contact with the skin. He had already used the Blood King Vine to mark the Black Death Butterfly’s prey.
He threw out a talisman and several talisman arrays spread out, forming a chain of formations, completely blocking off An Long’s retreat.
A number of Black Death Butterflies flew out of the sealed bamboo tube, rushing towards their marked enemy, out to drag his soul into the abyss.
Yue Wuhuan smiled with satisfaction, waiting to reap this long-awaited happiness.
An Long raised his head. Looking at the black butterflies, he said slowly, “Qingshi cultivates the Way of the Heartless.”
Yue Wuhuan was stunned and then his smile grew even brighter. “It’s just as I want.”
Although a slight deviation had appeared, he would find a way to correct it.
He never wanted to let his Master actively desire.
An Long couldn’t help cursing, “Lunatic.”
He stood up; black demon aura spread throughout his body. The scorpion tail stretched out, ready to rip apart the formation.
Suddenly, thunder rang out from the sky…
Lightning leapt wildly like a snake. A violent bolt of lightning smashed open the roof of the mountain temple, breaking the formation, and separated the two of them. Immediately afterwards, the torrential rain poured down, drenching everything and knocking down the wings of the Black Death Butterflies, intercepting this fatal attack.
Yue Wuhuan looked up in astonishment, staring at this inexplicable change in weather.
He felt like he was back to the days when he was made a fool of by fate. He couldn’t even understand just what this was.
An Long disappeared in the heavy rain, taking away all the Gu’s and poisonous snakes.
Their fight had been interrupted and his goal could not be fully achieved.
“Why? Why? Why?”
Yue Wuhuan was furious. The Blood King Vine went berserk, beating against the rainstorm, beating the ruined eaves and dilapidated walls, beating everything that could be beaten. Tall trees were chopped down, huge boulders were smashed. He wished he could destroy everything in the world.
The rain dimmed his vision, his body was wet, and there was a foul smell everywhere.
He hated the world right down to the marrow of his bones.
…
An Long walked into the dense forest and lay in the mud.
The auditory hallucinations in his mind were getting more and more severe. He could no longer think, could no longer fight.
“Despair. So what if you had crawled out of the filthy mud and attained a standing well-suited to his?”
“Despair. He would rather die than accept your heart…”
“Despair. Your disguise has already been torn down. Your true face is so hideous and your heart is so filthy…”
“Despair, He never forgave you…”
“…”
An Long listened blankly to these constantly repeating words but what appeared before his eyes was the young man who had scooped him up from the dirty swamp so many years ago. He covered his stinky body with the fragrant white robe and after that, he carried him away, step by step. He washed his rotting wounds clean, eliminated the painful poisons from his body, and cured all his ailments for him. And then, he heartlessly sent him away.
At that time, he was still so young, he didn’t understand this emotion, the way he took it so to heart.
He was very angry, furious, resentful.
But he remembered him, thought of him every day.
When he ran into him in the secret realm, he deliberately threw a hideous bug, trying to provoke him into anger.
The young man picked up the bug, looked at it for a long time, then walked up to him. He smiled and told him, “Insects are very cute.”
At that moment, he understood what it meant to mind.
He deliberately caused trouble for him, pretended to be stupid and foolish. He attracted his attention. He wrapped himself tightly in human skin, climbed up to a high position in order to match him.
Even though he knew that he cultivated the Way of the Heartless that what awaited him was despair, he still couldn’t let go.
He wanted to hide everything, deceive the world, deceive Qingshi’s feelings, deceive his own feelings…
However, he failed.
It’s over, it’s all over.
In the end, dirty bugs must return to the dirty mud.
…
“Despair. Give up your human emotions and turn entirely into a demon.”
“Just…what are you?”
“I am your fate.”
