Chapter 153

Birds chirped in the distance, one call after another, relentless, grating against her aching head.

The two of them had fallen from the floating stone into the mountains. Yun Shuchen had used a wisp of spiritual energy she'd managed to store to protect herself and her disciple, cushioning their fall, yet they still tumbled far down the slope, and now she had no idea where they had landed.

Yun Shuchen flexed her fingers. When she woke again, her limbs ached and felt weak, every bone seemingly about to fall apart.

But beneath her body was a layer of something soft—when she pressed on it, it was quite springy. Yun Shuchen fumbled around for a while, finally managed to prop herself up by the waist, and squinted down—

Qing'er?

Qing Zhouxue lay on the ground, her chest rising and falling rapidly. Catching a sliver of light from the setting sun, Yun Shuchen sensed something off about her complexion.

She reached out and gently touched her forehead, and her heart turned to ice.

Qing Zhouxue's brow was scorching hot, like a branding iron, burning fiercely, and her whole body trembled with chills.

However, this place was desolate and remote. Spiritual energy was extremely thin, almost negligible, rendering all their cultivation useless.

The storage ring on Qing Zhouxue's hand had been flung off somewhere, and the jade bracelet had not been brought in the first place.

Even if it had, it would have been useless—the treasures could hardly be opened in such a barren land.

Yun Shuchen was silent for a moment. Fortunately, she had already sent a message to the Taichu Sect; the Sect Leader and the others should be searching in this direction. It was not entirely hopeless.

As long as they were one step ahead of the Liuyun Sect.

The lack of spiritual energy was also a natural cover. In such harsh conditions, even if one's cultivation were heaven-reaching, one would be like a hawk or hound that had lost its sense of smell.

Qing Zhouxue kept trembling, her consciousness hazy. Yun Shuchen called to her several times but got no response. She had no choice but to hold her disciple tightly and, by the dim light, look around.

They lay at the foot of a waterfall, beside what should be a river.

By the waterfall stood a towering ancient tree, its branches twisted and tangled, indistinct in the gloom. Beyond that were layers of overgrown weeds, hiding who knew what.

The sun would soon set, and the last glimmer of light was already dying out. The surroundings grew darker. The night was bitingly cold; combined with the moisture kicked up by the waterfall's spray, the chill was enough to seep into one's bones.

Yun Shuchen felt a momentary blankness.

She had never spent the night outdoors—without cultivation, like a mere mortal.

The girl in her arms burned with fever, unconscious, and as the night wind blew, she shivered all the more violently.

Yun Shuchen felt that this could not go on. She laid Qing Zhouxue flat for the time being, then went to survey the surroundings.

The light was dim at this moment.

But the Demon Realm was also perpetually dark and sunless, so her eyes could see reasonably well at night—a small advantage.

Heaven never seals off all exits: behind the ancient tree, a gap seemed to have opened, quite narrow, but just enough to block the cold wind blowing from the east.

Yun Shuchen, leaning on her weary body, went back and lifted her disciple again—half-carrying, half-dragging, slowly moving.

She had never felt Qing Zhouxue this heavy.

Finally, bit by bit, she carried her back to the tree hollow. She kicked out the dead branches and rotting leaves, then squeezed in beside Qing Zhouxue, and felt noticeably warmer.

Qing Zhouxue was murmuring in her sleep, muttering indistinct words.

Yun Shuchen touched her back—it was damp. When she lifted her hand, it was covered in blood.

That red stung her eyes. She froze for a moment, then carefully drew Qing Zhouxue closer and lifted the tattered pieces of her clothing.

The sword wound was deep enough to show bone.

Its healing had slowed considerably, as if the flame were guttering out—sporadic, fading.

Yun Shuchen's heart ached at the sight. She wondered why her disciple was like this... Could such healing power have a limit?

She searched her own bosom and took out a pill—forged from the demonic core they had obtained when they killed the mother insect last time, extremely precious, even capable of protecting one during tribulation.

Yun Shuchen always carried it on her person, never revealing it to others.

She pinched the pill between her fingers; the hardness dug into her palm, a little painful.

By her calculations, plus the fortune told years ago, her lifespan had been severely reduced. She had few years left to live.

The only path to survival was to break through to the Tribulation stage.

And she had too much blood on her hands—each tribulation was extraordinarily difficult.

This pill was the life within that life. If she gave it away, she would hardly find another suitable demonic beast within a few years, nor be able to refine such a pill again.

Perhaps she would truly stop here.

She held the pill, as still as a statue.

Yun Shuchen looked at Qing Zhouxue's face, and suddenly recalled her own youth—the frantic, desperate cultivation. For a moment she was dazed, and her grip on the pill loosened slightly.

But she clutched the torn cloth of her disciple, feeling the faint blood seep into her hand. The wound, stark and terrible, was closing more and more slowly, until it stopped altogether.

She could not delay any longer.

Yun Shuchen lowered her eyes, closed them tightly, placed the pill on her tongue, found Qing Zhouxue's mouth, and gently pushed it in.

The pill slid down Qing Zhouxue's throat, and she swallowed instinctively.

Yun Shuchen's kiss muffled whatever murmurs remained, leaving Qing Zhouxue unable to make another sound. Qing Zhouxue's brows gradually knitted, and she instinctively clutched at the person before her.

Yun Shuchen did not pull away. Her hand circled to Qing Zhouxue's back, hovering over it. The medicine took effect quickly; within a short while, she could feel that the wound had stopped bleeding and was slowly closing.

They lingered, mouth to mouth, exchanging breath. Yun Shuchen pressed her forehead to Qing Zhouxue's and studied her for a long moment. A hundred complex emotions surged through her, but in the end, she simply smiled, resigned.

Did she regret it? There was indeed some regret.

But a person only lives for what they willingly give.

In that manner they barely made it through until morning, when the sky began to show a hint of light.

There was still little light, but just enough to see.

Qing Zhouxue had burned all night, barely breathing. Even now, there was no sign of waking; the fever still had not broken.

The only comfort Yun Shuchen could find was that she was no longer trembling.

But her lips were cracked from dryness, with faint traces of blood seeping out.

Yun Shuchen frowned and walked to the riverbank. With a rip, she tore a strip from her sleeve, dipped it in cold water, moistened Qing Zhouxue's parched lips, then placed it over her scorching forehead.

Qing Zhouxue had hardly ever been sick since childhood.

What was more troublesome was her own body—if the weather shifted even slightly, she would be laid low several times a month.

Long illness made one a healer.

She vaguely knew that once the trembling stopped, the fever would not rise higher. Yun Shuchen took the cloth away, dipped it again, and wiped Qing Zhouxue's body over and over.

This tree hollow was small, snug, and warm—a fine place to shelter from the wind. As she wiped, her own eyelids grew as heavy as lead. Her movements slowed, and before long, leaning into that warmth, she fell asleep against Qing Zhouxue again.

Qing Zhouxue's long sleep was no sweet dream.

At first, her world was a formless chaos.

There was no light, nor darkness—if there had been darkness, at least there would have been space. There was no beginning, nor any sense of when it might end—if there had been an end, at least there would have been time.

But she knew she existed, like a lone leaf adrift in the wind, trembling, yet so vivid and out of place compared to the surrounding chaos.

Aside from consciousness, there was nothing—no joy, no sorrow, only waiting.

Until this world gradually became clear, like Pangu splitting heaven and earth, and voices began to babble, clamoring around her day and night.

Sword whistles, rising and falling. When she tried to make any sound, the world answered in chorus.

In the endless cacophony, one day a crack split the chaos. For an instant, she felt utter silence, then deafening sword cries burst out all at once.

The world began to tremble, to collapse, to change heaven and earth. Ten thousand swords emerged, and Qing Zhouxue felt their eager excitement.

Qing Zhouxue kicked out, tumbling out of the dream, and opened her eyes to darkness again.

The sight made her stomach clench; she trembled instinctively, then realized someone was leaning against her.

Yun Shuchen had barely fallen asleep when she was suddenly shoved awake. She opened her eyes in bewilderment—Qing'er was curled up in a corner of the hollow, hugging herself tightly.

Awake?

The spark of joy had not yet risen before it was crushed by the fear in her disciple's eyes.

"What's wrong?" Her hand halted in midair, then she carefully leaned closer and touched Qing Zhouxue's forehead.

She could feel Qing Zhouxue shaking, like a withered flower in autumn wind.

Yun Shuchen assumed she was still feverish, but her forehead was clearly not hot. So she said softly, "Qing'er, look at me. Who am I?"

"You..." Qing Zhouxue seemed still dazed. She squeezed her eyes shut again, then whispered, "Shizun."

"Shizun." She called it over and over, as if numbed, until Yun Shuchen wrapped her arms around her, and only then did the dampness at the corners of her eyes slowly spill out.

She came to herself, hugged Yun Shuchen back, clinging tightly, and would not let go easily. Yun Shuchen stroked her back. "Is anything else still hurting?"

"...Hurts."

Yun Shuchen tensed and ran her hands over Qing Zhouxue, but found only shallow scars, no open wounds.

"Where does it hurt?"

Yun Shuchen felt tears on her shoulder, drop by drop, scalding to the heart. "...All over. Everywhere."

Only then did Qing Zhouxue begin to sob, trembling with fear, managing only a few words: "Shizun, it hurts."

Yun Shuchen smoothed the fabric of Qing Zhouxue's clothes. There were holes pierced by knives, sections charred by lightning, and burn marks—this was clothing woven from mermaid silk, yet it had been ruined like this.

When those people saw they could not kill her, they realized that pain would cause this sword spirit to lose her will and slow her healing. Once they figured that out, they devoted themselves to tormenting her.

Yun Shuchen could only be grateful she had steeled herself to divine the truth. She and Fan Yin had pinpointed the direction, even before the Taichu Sect arrived, and quickly broken through a hidden formation beneath the Liuyun Sect—she had come as fast as she possibly could.

If she had been one step slower, a few days later... what would it have looked like?

The Liuyun Sect.

To her, they were a grievance piled upon grievance.

Yun Shuchen opened her eyes, a cold light flashing through them. But sensing Qing Zhouxue pressing closer to her, she softened everything again.

"Don't think about it. Don't think of anything," she said softly. "Close your eyes. If you're tired, sleep a little more."

Qing Zhouxue suddenly clutched Yun Shuchen tighter. "...Should I not have participated in the Immortal Ascension Assembly?"

Although the Immortal Ascension Assembly was hosted by the Liuyun Sect, it was fundamentally a recognized competition of the cultivation world, with little direct connection to the Liuyun Sect.

Yun Shuchen had reasoned it out later. She could not keep Qing'er locked away on Heyi Peak forever because of a possible threat, letting a jewel lie buried in the dust.

If she could only keep a close watch during the Assembly, surely the Liuyun Sect would not dare to snatch someone right under the nose of a Taichu Sect elder.

But misfortunes never come alone—when it rains, it pours.

Fan Yin's deeds were on the verge of being exposed, Tang Wuyue had begun to stir up trouble, and Yun Shuchen had to go to the Demon Realm.

This inevitably affected the Taichu Sect. Tang Wuyue had been sending demons to harass them recently, so the Sect Leader and the other elders were stationed at the six directions within the sect to guard against the demonic race and protect the disciples.

For such a grand occasion as the Immortal Ascension Assembly, they could send only two elders, and in haste.

Two matters that might have been handled properly had collided, leaving both sides stretched thin.

It was fate.

The only thing Yun Shuchen regretted was letting Qing Zhouxue return alone. At the time, she had been badly injured... exhausted in body and mind, and she had miscalculated one step.

"Forget all that too."

Yun Shuchen stroked Qing Zhouxue's back.

She felt the person against her nod, and more tears soaked through in a wide patch. They sat quietly together for a while, until Qing Zhouxue tensed up again against her will and whispered, "I want... to hear you talk."

On the first day Qing Zhouxue was awake, she would periodically slip into those painful memories; only when Yun Shuchen spoke to her could she temporarily pull free.

Yun Shuchen did not know how many stories she told—ancient ones, recent ones—until finally she scraped the bottom of her memory and could think of no more amusing tales, so she hummed a nursery rhyme that had been passed down among the Nü Xi tribe.

That day she did nothing else. When the sky showed the first signs of light again, Qing Zhouxue's mind had finally steadied, and some spirit had returned.

Gradually, she lifted her head from Yun Shuchen's shoulder and squinted toward the outside. Qing Zhouxue exhaled, then suddenly felt a burning ache in her stomach. Listening closely, she heard faint gurgling sounds from both their stomachs.

Yun Shuchen was taken aback too.

Spiritual energy was scarce here, rendering them like mortals—clothes, food, shelter, all necessities.

Qing Zhouxue had been feverish for two days, and Yun Shuchen, having been a cultivator for so long, had forgotten a rather important matter.

They had no food—none at all.