Two bright mirrors hung high in the sky.
Beneath the bridge, Chen Lingxi's eyes lit up at the Venerable Cauldron's question. He seemed to have prepared for this.
Sitting cross-legged on the damp, shadowed stone slabs beneath the bridge, he said respectfully, "Venerable Cauldron above, this junior is bold enough to ask!
"Do you... have any techniques that a cultivator on the Qi Circulation 2nd Floor can practice?"
A brief, dead silence filled the space beneath the bridge.
The vertical pupil narrowed slightly. On that patchwork face, the infant's lips curled up, the old man's brow furrowed tightly, and a hint of amusement flashed across the youth's features.
The expressions of these several faces overlapped and shifted before finally freezing into a single bizarre look.
"Techniques?"
The Venerable Cauldron spoke, its voice deep as the rumbling of the earth's veins. Every syllable hammered against Chen Lingxi's chest, shaking his qi and blood.
"I command three thousand wondrous techniques and eight hundred side paths. Naturally, I possess techniques suitable for the Qi Circulation 2nd Floor. It is just that..."It paused. Dark light swirled within the vertical pupil, as if scrutinizing him, tempting him.
"The way of the cauldron diminishes the surplus to make up for the deficient. I can grant you thousands of wondrous techniques, but how much lifespan are you willing to pay?"
Chen Lingxi looked up, meeting that gaze.
Outside the bridge, the river waters rippled. Sunlight like shattered gold refracted off the surface and flickered across his pale face.
He took a deep breath. His voice was far too steady for a newly capped youth of twenty.
"This junior is willing to trade fifty years of lifespan for a technique."
At these words, the vertical pupil on the Time Candle bulged wide!
"You have fifty-one years left to live, and you wish to trade fifty of them for a technique?"
For once, a trace of genuine surprise laced the Venerable Cauldron's voice.
The dark light in the vertical pupil flickered unsteadily.
"Do you know what a price fifty years of lifespan is?"
It paused before its voice suddenly rose, carrying a sinister edge of amusement. "A cultivator on the Qi Circulation 2nd Floor with only one year left to live. Are you not afraid—"
"This junior has thought it through."
Chen Lingxi interrupted the Venerable Cauldron calmly.
His eyes were clear and bright, and not a trace of fear showed on his pale face.
This was, naturally, the result of careful deliberation.
Out in the real world, he absolutely wouldn't dare reduce his lifespan to a single year—that would be tantamount to severing his own future, making even a meager, lingering survival an extravagant hope.
But right now, he was inside the Divine Chamber. With two bright mirrors hanging in the sky above, everything would return to nothingness in ten days.
His lifespan in this Divine Chamber was just like a piece on a chessboard or a chip on a gambling table—it would be a waste not to spend it.
Besides, he wanted to see exactly what fifty years of life could buy.
The Venerable Cauldron fell silent for a moment, the vertical pupil reflecting Chen Lingxi's unhurried face.
Soon after, an extremely faint flash of approval crossed that patchwork face.
"You have courage, I'll give you that."
The Venerable Cauldron said no more.
The vertical pupil suddenly expanded. Scarlet light erupted like a breached tide of blood, instantly flooding the space beneath the bridge.
The river water reflected the crimson glow, and countless twisted shadows danced madly across the stone walls, looking as though tens of thousands of ghosts were running and wailing in the red light.
Chen Lingxi felt a sharp pain between his brows, as if an invisible sword had pierced his skull. Immediately after—two complex and massive torrents of information surged into his sea of consciousness like a flash flood!
Concealed Edge Method!
Cyan Edge Method!
"To conceal the edge is to hide one's breath and condense one's qi, storing divine radiance within. Outwardly like dull iron and dead wood, inwardly harboring ten thousand jun of sharp intent.
"By channeling this method, the spiritual qi and blood in your body will fall still. Ordinary cultivators will be entirely unable to gauge your true strength."
"The cyan edge shapes qi into a sword, its sharpness peerless.
"Wielding the cyan edge with spiritual qi makes one's own body matchlessly sharp. Mastered to its depths, nothing can stand against it."
The cultivation tenets of the two techniques spun relentlessly through Chen Lingxi's mind like a revolving lantern.
The qi circulation pathways, breath-concealing secrets, and qi acupoint barriers of the Concealed Edge Method;
The spiritual qi guidance, sword qi condensation, and spiritual qi channeling of the Cyan Edge Method.
An overwhelming deluge of information poured into his mind, branding itself into his memory.
Chen Lingxi's body shuddered. His head felt like it was splitting open.
The two techniques were too vast and intricate. With such an ocean of knowledge crashing into his mind, his skull felt like it would burst.
He clenched his jaw, enduring the throbbing pain with all his might, letting cold sweat soak through his clothes.
At the same time.
The red light within the vertical pupil of the Time Candle flared brighter, and an indescribable suction surged from deep inside the candle.
Chen Lingxi felt it clearly—as if an invisible hand had reached into his limbs and bones, slowly extracting something deeper and more fundamental.
Then...
His skin lost its luster at a visible rate, turning from the smooth, warm complexion of a young man into a withered, elderly husk.
The fine lines at the corners of his eyes deepened like knife cuts, his dark hair faded to frost-white at the temples, and his spine bowed. The skin on his hands grew loose and wrinkled, covered in bulging blue veins and liver spots.
In just a few moments, a twenty-year-old youth had been reduced to the appearance of a seventy-year-old man!
Chen Lingxi looked down at a shallow puddle of river water pooling at his feet.
The mirror-like surface reflected the face of a man in his twilight years.
His old eyes were cloudy, his cheeks sunken, and a few sparse strands of dry, white beard clung to his chin.
He twitched the corner of his mouth, and the reflection in the water matched the movement, tugging at the deep ravines of wrinkles across his face.
This was his seventieth year.
He fell silent for a moment, feeling heavy all over. His joints ached faintly, and even breathing required more effort than before.
"The deal is struck," the Venerable Cauldron's voice grew ethereal as the red light in the vertical pupil receded like the tide. "Fifty years of lifespan collected, two techniques bestowed. Fair and honest. We owe each other nothing."
The red glow on the Time Candle completely dissipated. The patchwork face slowly sank into the depths of the vertical pupil, which then closed and went entirely dark.
The Time Candle fell, landing in Chen Lingxi's palm.
It looked completely unremarkable, just like an ordinary piece of blackened, rotten wood.
Chen Lingxi let out a long breath.
"It's done."
Joy filled his heart as his gaze fell upon the Time Candle again.
Right at that moment, upon seeing this blackened stump of rotting wood, an overwhelmingly intense wave of greed surged in his chest!
"What is this?"
His fingers closed around it involuntarily, a voice screaming madly in the depths of his mind...
Take it! Keep it close, never let it leave your side! As long as you have it, you can trade for infinite wondrous techniques, for supreme fortune!
The desire was too fierce, nearly swallowing his reason whole.
He stood up abruptly and stuffed the Time Candle inside his robes, pressing it closely against his chest. Only then did the greed and desire in his heart fade by a fraction.
I can't throw it away.
I absolutely cannot sink it into the river like Lin Suri did.
I'll keep it on me, nourish it with spiritual qi every night, and wait for a chance to trade again...
Chen Lingxi suddenly froze at this thought.
What was he thinking?
Horrified, he looked down at the Time Candle clutched tightly against his chest.
Why am I like this?
Doubt sprang up in him, yet he felt that the greed in his heart was almost irrepressible.
Just then!
A beam of light descended from the sky.
It came from a blazing golden mirror hanging in the highest heavens, shaped like a great sun.
Now, the surface of this precious mirror turned, and a brilliant golden light pierced the void, falling straight onto Chen Lingxi's body.
The golden light was radiant but not hot. Instead, it carried a clear, lucid chill, washing through him like an enlightenment that instantly cleansed his entire body.
Chen Lingxi felt a loud boom ring through his mind. The greedy desire coiled around his heart met the light like snow meeting a blazing sun, swept away in an instant!
He snapped back to his senses, his body drenched in cold sweat.
"That was close..."
Panting heavily, Chen Lingxi pulled the Time Candle out from his robes. He looked down at the blackened, broken candle, his eyes full of lingering fear.
He finally understood why Lin Suri had thrown the Time Candle into the Yuanjiang.
It wasn't that he didn't want to carry it with him every day—it was that he didn't dare.
This so-called cauldron is indeed bizarre.
Is this what Lin Suri called the Cauldron Disaster?
He shook his head, stood up, and casually tossed the Time Candle away—
Splash.
The blackened candle traced an arc and fell into the deep river waters beneath the bridge. It kicked up a tiny spray of water and, in an instant, sank into the deep mud, never to be seen again.
Chen Lingxi didn't even glance back. He turned, climbed the stone steps, and stepped back onto the bridge.
There were very few pedestrians on the stone arch bridge.
Sunlight fell on Chen Lingxi's hunched back, stretching his withered shadow out long across the ground.
He looked up at the sky. It was still early in the day.
In this Divine Chamber, I can have a moment of freedom.
This was what he thought.
The path he had taken here ran along the riverbank.
Back then, his steps had been brisk, his eyes and ears sharp. The spring breeze had brushed his face like a youth out for a stroll.
Now, his back was hunched, his steps unsteady, and his hair and beard entirely white. He looked just like a dying old man with one foot in the grave.
He didn't know how long this broken body would hold up.
But inside this Divine Chamber, before the ten days were up and while the two bright mirrors still hung in the sky, he wanted to take a walk.
Take a walk through Yuanjiang Prefecture.
See just what kind of world lay outside the cages of the Penal Bureau and the courtyard walls of the marquis residence.
He walked slowly westward along the riverbank.
A few old willows by the river drooped with thousands of tender yellow ribbons, brushing like a young girl's hair when the wind blew. The peach blossoms had all fallen, and the branches were already bearing tart little green fruits, hiding among the leaves like hanging emerald beads.
A few ducks were foraging in the shallows, their tails pointed toward the sky as their webbed feet paddled happily.
Across the river was an unbroken stretch of grey-tiled roofs and white walls. Curling smoke rose from kitchen chimneys, and the faint calls of women summoning their children echoed over the water.
A black-awning boat poled past. A young child with unpinned hair crouched at the bow, barefoot and splashing in the river, waving at him with a grin.
Chen Lingxi raised his hand in return—a hand as scrawny and withered as a chicken's claw.
The child froze, probably mistaking him for some old beggar, and pulled his head back, ignoring him.
Chen Lingxi didn't mind. He just kept walking forward.
Turning the corner past a street-side teahouse, he stepped onto the bluestone path leading toward the prefecture office.
Right at that moment—
"Hurry up!"
A shrill voice rounded the street corner.
Chen Lingxi paused and stepped slightly to the side to make way.
Wang Kong strode into view wearing a black velvet cap and a dark blue silk robe. Right behind him followed two burly, broad-shouldered thugs in short martial attire, their expressions unkind.
Wang Kong's face was dark. As he marched forward, he threw a harsh scolding over his shoulder, "That official bondservant surnamed Chen didn't go to Liujie Alley, so where else could he have gone?"
He didn't slow his pace, spitting as he spoke, cold sparks flashing relentlessly in his narrow eyes.
"Hurry up and find him! Chief Steward Zhao gave the order. If you don't bring him in today, it's your heads on the block!"
Before his voice could fade, he brushed right past Chen Lingxi.
The two burly men rushed past as well. One of them nearly slammed his shoulder into Chen Lingxi's hunched body, but assuming he was just an ordinary street beggar, the man didn't even bat an eyelid.
Chen Lingxi stood in the street, leaning on a dead branch he had picked up along the way. With his cloudy eyes, he watched Wang Kong and the two men disappear around the corner.
Not a single ripple of emotion showed on his aged face.
"Chief Steward Zhao gave the order?"
He stood silently for a moment, slowly turned around, and leaned on his dry branch to continue on his way.