Thousand Dusts Ferry Me - Chapter 78

Hanlu Zi looked at Ci Li and then at Yun Qing in disbelief, asking, “What does he mean? Isn’t your sect practicing the Way of Compassion? Why would your master be a successor of the Way of One Mind? What is his relationship with Yixin Zi?”

Yun Qing spread her hands helplessly. “I can’t explain it clearly either.” She then explained the matter of Emperor Xi’s Wordless Book.

She felt that the immortal in her dream should have known that Emperor Xi’s Wordless Book was in her possession, or rather, he didn’t particularly care who specifically held it—when he wanted to retrieve it, he could take it from anyone’s hands regardless.

He only cared about what content was actually written on it.

Thinking from his perspective, if she were that immortal, she would probably hope this scroll would pass through several owners’ hands—perhaps they might encounter someone with the fate to comprehend the secrets written on it.

Fortunately, regardless of whether she understood the book’s content or not, everything was already memorized in her mind, so since coming down the mountain, she had never once opened this book to read it.

Even if the dream immortal spent twelve hours a day spying on her, he wouldn’t discover that she could see the content written on it.

Having explained the whole story, she generously showed Emperor Xi’s Wordless Book to Hanlu Zi. Hanlu Zi studied it curiously but naturally couldn’t understand it either, so he returned it to Yun Qing.

Then Hanlu Zi sighed. “Senior Brother was friends with Yixin Zi, and now you’ve all gathered together.” He looked at Yun Qing, then at Jiang Baiyu. “In the mysterious workings of fate, there truly is destiny.”

****

The next day, Yu Beiting left behind a letter and departed gracefully, disappearing without a trace.

All his belongings remained in his residence, with the San Qi Sword hanging on the wall. The only thing he took with him was Fang Hongyu’s sword “Hua Qing” from when she was alive.

Jiang Binghe’s sudden death caused great upheaval within the Huayang Sect. Fortunately, he died too quickly to cause large-scale fighting like the Cold Heron Rebellion. What followed was a period of the entire Huayang Sect restoring order from chaos.

Hanlu Zi and Jiang Baiyu returned to the Huayang Sect and found the four great elders (Xing Ge Zi and Ming Xuan Zi had fled overnight, along with Li Xiuzhu, Xie Junze, and other disciples who had participated that night). They roughly explained the whole story of what had happened years ago.

Naturally, they omitted the section about the Golden Frost Jade Dew Lotus, only saying that Jiang Binghe coveted immortal artifacts and the sect master position, so he ambushed Yu Wanzhi.

Then, according to the location mentioned in Yu Beiting’s letter, Jiang Baiyu sent people to find the remains of Ji Yunche and the other two, bringing them back for burial on Huayang Mountain.

Regarding Hanlu Zi and Jiang Baiyu’s account, some in the Huayang Sect believed it while others didn’t.

However, after years of Jiang Binghe’s management, most disciples in the Huayang Sect were “those who understand the times are heroes.” Seeing that in this internal conflict, Hanlu Zi had swept in as the ultimate victor, those disciples would pretend to believe even if they didn’t.

Jiang Baiyu successively held memorial services for Yu Wanzhi, Ji Yunche, Zhang Yinmo, Fang Hongyu, Tan Jingsu, as well as his own birth parents. Afterward, he formally posthumously acknowledged Tuishan Zi Yu Wanzhi as his master.

Since Jiang Baiyu had been quite busy during this period, Yun Qing saw him less often and found herself somewhat unaccustomed to it. However, she herself wasn’t idle either—she organized and connected all the clues she currently possessed:

First, Yixin Zi was an immortal who ascended earlier than Huayang Zi. This immortal enjoyed traveling and was unconventional. After Huayang Zi’s ascension, he met Yixin Zi, considered her a kindred spirit, and they became dao companions.

Later, this dao companion pair somehow offended a powerful immortal. This immortal should have had some understanding of Yixin Zi, as he knew in detail about Yixin Zi’s magic treasures.

This understanding wasn’t just gained through battle, because he knew that the words on Emperor Xi’s Wordless Book couldn’t be seen, indicating he had examined this scroll up close. At the same time, he maintained curiosity about the content written on this scroll.

Later still, both Huayang Zi and Yixin Zi were killed by this mysterious immortal. During this process, Jiang Binghe very likely participated.

As Huayang Zi’s disciple, he coveted the Golden Frost Jade Dew Lotus but feared being purged by Huayang Zi during the process of seizing it, so he struck first and betrayed Huayang Zi.

He possibly sold some information to this mysterious immortal, indirectly leading to Huayang Zi’s defeat. The mysterious immortal obviously didn’t want this matter known by too many people, so he placed a silence curse on Jiang Binghe.

Then, after Yixin Zi was killed, her successor fled to Longshou Mountain with her magical treasures, hiding his identity and calling himself Le Chenzi, establishing an unremarkable small sect.

Due to the mysterious immortal’s overwhelming power, Le Chenzi had to carefully hide all traces of his identity, including the dao intent he cultivated and the magic treasures he possessed.

Therefore, he didn’t teach his two disciples the Way of One Mind, but instead had them cultivate the Way of Compassion. He also didn’t use any of the magic treasures inherited from Yixin Zi, instead refining two new magic treasures after arriving at Longshou Mountain: the Six-Path Sealing Bell and the Thousand-Mile Sound-Transmitting Conch.

However, Emperor Xi’s Wordless Book was too special—his disciple could actually understand this scroll. He felt this was a kind of fate, so he passed this book to his disciple and instructed her not to let anyone know about it.

From this, one could deduce that although the mysterious immortal was powerful, his divination skills were mediocre. Otherwise, with an immortal’s abilities, calculating Le Chenzi’s approximate whereabouts shouldn’t have been difficult.

Later still, since Le Chenzi didn’t know that Jiang Binghe had already betrayed Huayang Zi and still wholeheartedly considered Jiang Binghe one of his own, when he saw Jiang Binghe suffering from qi deviation, he stepped in to help.

Jiang Binghe recognized Le Chenzi and had already learned from the mysterious immortal that the immortal was hunting Le Chenzi.

To curry favor with the mysterious immortal, Jiang Binghe pretended to befriend Le Chenzi. To gain his trust, he even proposed marriage, then turned around and reported Le Chenzi’s whereabouts to the mysterious immortal.

The mysterious immortal arrived quickly, capturing Le Chenzi before he could return to Longshou Mountain. Knowing he would surely die, Le Chenzi desperately lied, claiming he could understand Emperor Xi’s Wordless Book to buy time.

To verify this claim, the mysterious immortal captured his two disciples in their dreams for interrogation.

But this immortal never expected that Yun Qing, whom he regarded as an ant, had a special constitution that could resist interrogation by an immortal’s Truth Incantation.

…

After organizing her thoughts, Yun Qing had a new question: This immortal seemed to hate Yixin Zi extremely, wanting to exterminate even her successors completely.

But logically speaking, she and Fu Xue could also be considered Yixin Zi’s successors. If he wanted to exterminate them all, why did the immortal spare them? Was it simply because they didn’t cultivate the Way of One Mind?

If that wasn’t the reason, then perhaps Le Chenzi himself had also participated in offending the immortal?

However, this matter wasn’t the main point. Yun Qing thought about it and just felt some confusion inwardly, then didn’t continue thinking about it.

She felt the most urgent matter now was to confirm that immortal’s identity. No matter how mysterious he was, as long as he existed, he must have left traces in this world.

Huayang Zi, Yixin Zi, Jiang Binghe, and her master had all had contact with that mysterious immortal. Yun Qing repeatedly pondered matters related to these four people when she suddenly thought of something.

At that time, Jiang Binghe had told Qin Ranqing that the Living Puppet Art wasn’t his original dao technique.

Among the countless techniques in this world, there were roughly two categories: Passage Dao techniques and Original Dao techniques.

Passage Dao techniques like the Truth Incantation and Sword-Tapping Heart-Clearing Technique could be cultivated by anyone practicing dao arts, regardless of whether you followed the Way of Compassion or the Way of Longevity—cultivation efficiency was unrelated to your dao path.

But some techniques, like the Way of Longevity’s Kunlun Longevity Heart Method, the Way of Vajra’s Golden Sinew Iron Bone Technique, and the Way of Bliss’s Joyful Harmony Art, required first comprehending the dao before practicing. They would only be cultivated smoothly with specific dao enhancement.

If practitioners of other dao paths forcibly cultivated them, either the effects would be poor or nonexistent, or they would suffer qi deviation.

The Living Puppet Art should belong to the milder category—cultivating non-original dao techniques wouldn’t cause qi deviation, just inferior results.

That’s why Jiang Binghe had to desperately perform fatherly kindness and filial piety with Jiang Baiyu to gain his trust and accelerate the hypnosis process.

Yun Qing asked Jiang Baiyu: “This Living Puppet Art—what dao path does it belong to? Do you have any clues? Could it have been taught by that mysterious immortal?”

Jiang Baiyu shook his head helplessly. “I’ve searched through many books in the Huayang Sect’s Scripture Pavilion but found no clues.”

So these past days, Yun Qing had also been spending every day in the Huayang Sect’s Scripture Pavilion, trying to find something. She always picked books whose titles looked improper at first glance, thinking these were books Jiang Baiyu probably hadn’t looked through.

Fu Xue, Cheng Suiyan, and Ci Li had also read some together, but none of the three could sit still. Usually, after reading for a while, they’d start daydreaming and then run off.

This day, when Jiang Baiyu found Yun Qing, he saw her sitting by the window, holding a scroll in her left hand and a writing brush between the fingers of her right hand.

Sunlight filtered through the window screen, casting a layer of soft radiance on her body. Her face was hidden in shadow, her expression serene—truly like a fairy maiden in a painting.

Well, it would be more perfect if the book title weren’t so jarring.

“Complete Collection of Ancient and Modern Child-Bearing Miraculous Arts.”

Jiang Baiyu raised an eyebrow, walked over, and sat beside her. Yun Qing looked up to see it was him, paid no attention, and lowered her eyes to continue reading.

After he sat down, seeing half a bowl of tea on the table, he picked it up to drink. Without lifting her head, Yun Qing extended her jade brush handle to press against the back of his hand. “I’ve drunk from that.”

“Oh.” Jiang Baiyu pursed his lips, put down the tea bowl, and poured a fresh cup.

While drinking tea, his gaze swept up and down her face as he asked, “Is it interesting?”

“Not bad. The front part is all about how to make men bear children.”

“…”

Jiang Baiyu nearly spat out his tea. Fortunately, he reacted quickly, promptly raising his finger to tap his lung meridian twice, forcing himself to swallow the mouthful of tea.

Then he took a deep breath. “What about the back part?”

“Let me see, the back part…” As Yun Qing spoke, she flipped toward the back, suddenly freezing with a stunned expression.

After a while, she said incredulously, “No way, right?”

****

In the cage, Le Chenzi held a steel needle as thick as his thigh, trying to mend clothes torn by lightning. Accidentally, he poked several large holes in the garment, making it look even more tattered.

While struggling with this steel needle, he called out to the cage exterior. “Really now, couldn’t you make it smaller before giving it to me?”

That person remained silent. The steel needle suddenly expanded, becoming as long as the birdcage. Le Chenzi accidentally sat on the steel needle, hitting a place he shouldn’t have hit, and he dramatically hissed.

Then he simply stayed sitting on the steel needle without getting down, assuming a heart-to-heart conversation posture, crossing his arms and asking that person:

“Can you tell me where all this resentment comes from? Aren’t they all dead already? Even if there was great hatred, shouldn’t it be written off by now?”

“I treated people with sincerity but was betrayed. Ten thousand deaths couldn’t pay for their sins. Moreover, she even bore you, this cursed offspring.”

“Ah, then I must tell you the truth—I wasn’t born by her.”

“Nonsense, you carry their bloodline.”

“Really, I wasn’t born by her.”

That person fell silent for a long time, then suddenly asked, “Could it be that Wen Zhongming gave birth to you?”

Le Chenzi: “……………………”