"Xiao Jinjin, are you there? Come out and chat with me for a bit. I have something to ask you."
Although the Invincible Overlord Sphere had been summoned by him, it appeared as nothing more than a dull, gray lump of coal, which meant it currently had no desire to converse with Shen Fu.
Hundreds of years of getting used to each other had made Shen Fu intimately familiar with Overlord Ball's temperament. Seeing that it didn't want to acknowledge him, Shen Fu simply placed it on the table, dipped his pale, jade-like fingertip into some lukewarm tea, and sprinkled it onto the Overlord Ball.
"What do you think you're doing?! Don't you know I'm sleeping? How dare you splash water on me!" The moment Overlord Ball spoke, Spiritual Qi converged around it, transforming it from its dull, gray state into something dazzling and radiant.
"I need to ask you something. Don't get worked up—I'll wipe you clean in a moment." Shen Fu said, casually tearing a corner of his robe to dab away the moisture on its surface. "With Senior Brother here just now, there were things I couldn't discuss with you. I had to wait until we were alone."
Hearing this, Overlord Ball roughly guessed what Shen Fu wanted to ask, yet still pretended to be oblivious. "Go on then, what business requires consulting this lord?"
"At this point in time, I shouldn't have met you yet. How is it that you appeared in my Senior Brother's hands?" Shen Fu cradled Xiao Jinjin, deliberately lowering his voice as he spoke.
If Shen Fu had truly been reborn, logically speaking, he shouldn't have encountered it at this time.
Because Xiao Jinjin was only discovered after the entire Xuanji Mountain sect had been slaughtered, when Shen Fu had been cultivating at the back mountain and stumbled upon it by accident.
At that time, Xuanji Mountain was so destitute that all that remained was a bowl of rice, half a jar of salt, and a few stalks of vegetables. Shen Fu had no spiritual root and couldn't perform bigu fasting. To keep himself from starving, he had braved the heavy snow to search for food in the back mountain—only to find nothing edible and instead get caught in a blizzard.
Shen Fu slipped and rolled into a cave, never expecting that hidden within it would be a peerless treasured sword, along with countless gold, silver, and treasures, as well as spiritual flowers and rare herbs.
Xiao Jinjin was discovered in that cave. Relying on those treasures, Shen Fu spent decades barely managing to gather a trace of Spiritual Qi. He had initially planned to pull Xiao Jinjin out first and save it for later use, but his Spiritual Qi was far too weak. The moment he gripped the sword's body, Xiao Jinjin slashed his hand, drawing blood.
Then he fainted from excessive blood loss right in front of Xiao Jinjin. Unexpectedly, his blood happened to contain a substance capable of awakening Xiao Jinjin. By the time he regained consciousness, Xiao Jinjin had already automatically acknowledged him as master and become his sword spirit.
Of course, Xiao Jinjin itself was unaware of any of this, because at that time its mana was so weak that it had no idea what had happened. It was only decades later, after Shen Fu had painstakingly accumulated some Spiritual Qi and channeled it into Xiao Jinjin, that it finally learned the truth.
Realizing it had ended up with such a useless master, Xiao Jinjin naturally wasn't pleased. That was why, over all these years, their relationship had remained so awkward.
But ultimately, at this point in time, there was no way he should have encountered Xiao Jinjin. So why had it appeared? Shen Fu had to get to the bottom of it. Moreover, he had already suspected whether Ji Yanzhi had also been reborn, and after seeing Xiao Jinjin, that ominous premonition had only grown stronger.
"I am your sword spirit. I expended half my cultivation base to bring you back here, so of course I have to follow you. Until this strange bond between us is severed, I won't let you die." Xiao Jinjin nimbly hopped onto Shen Fu's shoulder, bounced a few times, then lazily lay down.
"What do you mean, you brought me back?" Shen Fu was utterly bewildered, momentarily unable to believe what he had just heard.
"Who told you to chant that sword technique recklessly? You said it yourself—I couldn't very well not do it." Xiao Jinjin rolled over on his body and answered lazily.
"I chanted…" Shen Fu's words caught in his throat as a phrase echoed in his mind: Heaven and Earth, Dark and Yellow, Universe and Wilderness, Great Curse of Heaven-Returning and Earth-Destroying!
Damn it. After memorizing that sword technique for so long, had he still botched it when it actually mattered?
Shen Fu fell silent, letting Xiao Jinjin crawl along his long hair up onto his head. "Heaven-Returning—you should be grateful I actually possess this ability, or else I'd have died right there with you."
Upon learning the truth, however, Shen Fu's expression grew increasingly grave. He grabbed Xiao Jinjin, who had just settled down, and held it in his palm, speaking seriously: "You're the one who made me reborn? Then in this world, besides you and me, is there anyone else who has been reborn with their memories intact?"
Shen Fu's heart was about to leap out of his chest. If his rebirth was Xiao Jinjin's doing, and both he and Xiao Jinjin retained their memories, then could it be…
Had Ji Yanzhi also been reborn with his memories?
In the original story, by the later stages, Ji Yanzhi's cultivation base had already surpassed any measure of the existing evaluation system. If he were truly bored enough to want to rewind time, it wouldn't be impossible.
But as a defeated opponent, Ji Yanzhi shouldn't have any interest in him at all.
Except for one extremely special situation mentioned in the original novel—when certain cultivators are on the verge of becoming gods, they undergo the Heavenly Dao Inquisition, where the seven emotions, six desires, and the eight sufferings of mortal life all fall within the scope of examination. If any one of them is found unqualified, they are immediately cast down to the mortal world to continue their trials. In order to thoroughly resolve these karmic obstacles, some great cultivators choose to press the reset button on the entire world, retreading the path of cultivation and sweeping away all obstacles.
At that time, when Shen Fu went to assassinate Yin Zhenyue, Ji Yanzhi should have already ascended the Ascension Platform by all accounts. So why did he suddenly appear in the lower realm?
Could it be that he truly failed the Heavenly Dao Inquisition and was cast down to the mortal world, and in order to clear his karmic obstacles, he reset the world?
This thought was clearly a bit far-fetched, and the more Shen Fu thought about it, the colder his spine felt. But he had tested Ji Yanzhi before—while Ji Yanzhi was bathing, Shen Fu had secretly observed him, and there was no mark of the Divine Power Legacy on his body.
The so-called Divine Power Legacy was more precisely called Legacy Transmission—fragments of power scattered across the mortal world when a deity falls, perishes, or is on the verge of physical collapse and Dao dissolution due to tribulations, which can be directly inherited by mortals.
In the original novel, because Ji Yanzhi was born with the Divine Power Legacy, his talent was extraordinary, but he couldn't control this power on his own. As a result, on the night of his birth, all the divine statues enshrined in temples within a hundred li radius collapsed in a single night.
Such an event was an absolutely ominous omen in this world. With the statues collapsed and their protection lost, the villages began to suffer frequent demonic invasions. Tracing the source, the blame naturally fell on Ji Yanzhi. His own parents, avoiding him like a viper, personally locked him in a cellar and planned to let the demons devour him.
Coincidentally, just as Ji Yanzhi was about to starve to death, Cheng Ping happened to pass by his home while hunting demons, and inadvertently discovered the Divine Power Legacy on Ji Yanzhi. He then bought him from his parents for five copper coins and brought him back to Dongxu Sect.
Because Dongxu Sect was protected by the Mountain Protection Array, ordinary demons couldn't enter, and so Ji Yanzhi managed to grow safely to the age of sixteen.
Unfortunately, Cheng Ping didn't buy him to nurture him, but rather because he coveted the divine power within his body. He made several attempts on Ji Yanzhi's life, but Ji Yanzhi narrowly escaped each time.
Later, forced into a corner, he fled from the sect, and Cheng Ping ordered his pursuit and execution. When his life hung by a thread, he awakened a portion of his divine power. In the original novel, one of the major signs of his awakening was the appearance of a mark left by the Divine Power Legacy on his body—located on his left chest. And the original text stated that once awakened, even through reincarnation and rebirth, or even physical death and Dao dissolution, the mark would never disappear.
Following this logic, if he were the Ji Yanzhi from the previous life, he would definitely carry this mark on his body.
However… he had observed carefully. Apart from wounds and the Cauldron Mark, Ji Yanzhi's body had nothing else.
Shen Fu told all his worries to Xiao Jinjin—in the previous life, Xiao Jinjin was also the only one who knew Shen Fu's true identity, so Xiao Jinjin wasn't too surprised by things like the original novel or the plot.
"You mean, you suspect Ji Yanzhi also reincarnated with his memories like you?" Xiao Jinjin pondered for a moment, then denied it: "I don't think that's likely. Everything you said is based on the premise that he still has lingering obsessions he hasn't resolved. But he was so powerful later on—even if he wanted to destroy the entire cultivation world in an instant, it would be as easy as snapping his fingers. What obsession could there be that he couldn't accomplish with everything he had, forcing him to choose to start over?"
"If there really was one, then even if he came back, he should be going after that obsession, not you. You didn't actually kill him."
Shen Fu knew Xiao Jinjin made sense, but he just felt something was off.
Seeing Shen Fu's grave expression, Xiao Jinjin could only advise: "Well, if you really can't rest easy, why not test him?"
"How?" Shen Fu said.
"Have you forgotten that you once learned illusion arts in your previous life? If you think Ji Yanzhi also has memories from the previous life, why not pull him into an illusory realm to probe the memories in his mind? If he truly remembers and has come to take revenge on you, then you can kill him within the illusion."
"Then use illusion arts to make Ji Yanzhi believe you've already been killed by him, and then slip away like a cicada shedding its shell. You can even make him get the hell away from you and return to the original plot. How about that?"
"That won't work either," Shen Fu said in a low voice. "He's my furnace cauldron now. Whether I live or die, he can sense it. Unless the cauldron contract is dissolved, even if I fake my death a hundred times, he'll still discover it."
"Moreover, casting illusion arts requires finding a place with no living souls within a ten-li radius, because if anyone accidentally wanders into the illusory realm's range, they'll be dragged in. If not handled properly, it could easily harm the innocent. If a mortal dies within the illusory realm, the one who created it will suffer backlash—at best, their cultivation is halved; at worst, they lose their life."
Given Shen Fu's meager skills, conjuring an illusory realm to amuse himself was about the extent of it. Using it to kill someone was simply asking too much of him.
"…" Xiao Jinjin fell silent as well. "So what you're saying is, you're doomed either way?"
"I don't see a way out for now."
"Then before you die, can you at least find a way to untie us? I haven't lived enough yet."
"Glittering Invincible Overlord Sphere, how could you be like this? We agreed to live and die together."
Shen Fu slumped limply in his chair, feeling only darkness ahead.
The moment the words left his mouth, a voice sounded by his ear: "Who is Master planning to live and die with?"
The familiar tone startled Shen Fu so much he nearly tumbled off the chair.
Fortunately, a strong arm caught him steadily. "Master, be careful."
Ji Yanzhi held a lunchbox in one hand while wrapping the other around Shen Fu's waist, pulling him into his embrace. His amber eyes held a smile as he gazed at Shen Fu without blinking.
"Wh-when did you get in here!" Shen Fu's eyes flew wide, his words stumbling from fright.