Zishu Bai had completely unexpected that Jiang Xing and Yan Zhun would jump down from the top of the sinkhole, especially not expecting both of them to be black and blue, looking in a utterly wretched state.
He sucked in a cold breath, cupping Jiang Xing’s face—where the corner of his mouth was bruised and cut—and asked in a low voice, “Did the Sky Insects do this? Didn’t the barrier stay intact?”
Jiang Xing was still recovering from the lingering terror of escaping death and had no time to answer him.
On the side, Yan Zhun, who was similarly shaken with lingering fear, said weakly, “No, I punched him.”
Pausing for a moment, he began complaining again: “Your barrier almost shattered! I had no choice but to grab him and jump down to find you…”
Jiang Xing had been acting as if possessed back then, remaining entirely motionless, which had scared the daylights out of him too.
Zishu Bai fell silent for a moment. Tapping his fingertip lightly against the water barrier, the cracks on its surface rapidly restored to their original state. “It wouldn’t have shattered. Didn’t I tell you? As long as I’m still alive, it won’t break.”
Hearing this, Yan Zhun coughed awkwardly and murmured softly, “I had just finished fighting with him, so I forgot about that.”
Putting it that way, it was actually his fault after all. Jiang Xing hadn’t intended to jump at that moment; he was the one who forcefully dragged Jiang Xing down.
“Why did you start fighting?”
Zishu Bai lowered his gaze and asked softly, “Don’t you two have a very good relationship?”
Yan Zhun opened his mouth, but catching sight of Jiang Xing’s pale, fragile expression out of the corner of his eye, he ultimately said nothing, offering only a perfunctory response: “It was nothing, just exchanged a few words.”
Seeing that he didn’t wish to elaborate, Zishu Bai didn’t press further, quietly looking at Jiang Xing.
Just moments ago, Jiang Xing’s eyes had been filled with hatred and unwillingness, as if he knew he was about to die, shedding tears in despair and anger. He didn’t even know how to call for help, appearing convinced that no one would ever come to save him.
How could anyone not even know how to call for help?
It was impossible to put that feeling into words; he only felt as though his chest had been struck heavily. If he hadn’t managed to save Jiang Xing, he would definitely have regretted it for the rest of his life.
“Do you still have strength?” Zishu Bai bent down, extending his hand toward him.
Jiang Xing slapped his hand away and steadied his breathing. “How are things?”
Zishu Bai pressed his lips together tightly. After a moment, he said softly, “Destroying this place is very simple, but…”
But what?
Jiang Xing’s face darkened, and following Zishu Bai’s gaze, his expression suddenly froze.
Inside this deep and vast sinkhole, it was actually filled with countless insect cocoons of all sizes. Some of the cocoons were even still squirming, and the faint outlines of human figures wrapped in sticky fluid could be seen inside.
Yan Zhun’s voice came from a distance, shouting anxiously, “There are still people alive here!”
Zishu Bai immediately responded and rushed over, slicing open that thick cocoon with a single sword stroke to pull the person out.
He had already saved many, but relying on him alone was far from enough to rescue so many people. The Demon Elimination Trial was far too cruel. He originally hadn’t wanted to participate in this sort of competition that held life in contempt, but he had a reason why he had to come.
Zishu Bai sighed in his heart and continued burying his head in saving people.
Jiang Xing stood in place numbly, looked down at the person on the ground, and said coldly, “His nose is already filled with sticky fluid, and his lungs probably are too. He won’t survive.”
Both of them looked at him in shock, only to see Jiang Xing opening those insect cocoons one by one, his voice indifferent: “None of these people can survive. The Sky Insects sometimes store people as emergency rations. To prevent them from breaking free of the cocoons, they immediately pour sticky fluid into their bodies. They won’t die right away, but they definitely won’t live.”
The reason Jiang Xing knew this was because it was his cause of death during his seventh reincarnation. He was merely a bit luckier—he had committed suicide before his lungs were completely filled with sticky fluid, which was why he hadn’t been brought down into this sinkhole.
Zishu Bai stared at him in a daze, murmuring in a low voice, “But he still has breath.”
“It’ll be gone very soon. You can’t save these people at all; the moment they leave this sinkhole, every single one of them will stop breathing.” Jiang Xing revealed the truth to him ruthlessly. He didn’t care about Zishu Bai’s feelings in the slightest, only wanting to leave this ghost of a place as fast as possible.
Right as his words fell, before Zishu Bai could speak, the head of the person he had just rescued suddenly dropped at an unnatural angle. Zishu Bai’s pupils shrank sharply. Kneeling on the ground to cradle that person’s head, he said in a trembling voice, “Don’t… don’t, hold on just a bit longer…”
The world was vast, yet no one answered his voice.
Jiang Xing drew his sword cleanly and sliced through the insect cocoons blocking the way. Since these demonic creatures were very much like insects, there might be a Queen Insect in existence. Finding the Queen Insect would put an end to everything.
“Sigh, I think Jiang Xing actually makes sense this time,” Yan Zhun squatted beside Zishu Bai, patted his shoulder, and comforted him, “If we delay any longer, even more people might end up killed by the Sky Insects.”
Zishu Bai closed his eyes, gripping the sword in his palm with such force that his knuckles turned white and veins bulged.
Jiang Xing, who was searching for the Queen Insect, was suddenly pulled aside by a hand. He knit his brows, looking at the other party in confusion.
Before he could speak, Zishu Bai dragged him behind his back, raised his sword, and plunged it straight down from above into the sinkhole.
In an instant, bright red, foul-smelling blood gushed out, splattering almost the entire surface of Jiang Xing’s water barrier. Instinctively taking half a step back, he watched Zishu Bai walk deeper inside covered in blood, thrusting his sword again and again.
“There’s something underground!” Yan Zhun pulled Jiang Xing away in disbelief, saying in a low voice, “Could it be that we were standing right on top of this thing just now?”
“It’s the Queen Insect.” Jiang Xing’s expression turned solemn.
So Zishu Bai had actually found it long ago! The reason he had delayed taking action was out of concern for those living human cocoons—this damned Holy Father.
The Sky Insects charged frantically toward Zishu Bai, only to be completely blocked by the biting wind of his sword techniques. After an unknown number of strikes, Zishu Bai finally stopped.
Immediately after, the entire sinkhole rapidly caved in, forming a massive cave spewing howling winds. The Sky Insects that covered the entire sky were all sucked inside. Swaying and unable to stand firm, Jiang Xing instinctively grabbed onto Yan Zhun’s lapels tightly.
“Jiang Xing, I’m about to be choked to death by you… let go!” Yan Zhun gritted his teeth and grabbed his wrist, not only having to figure out how to escape that wind cave, but also struggling to prevent himself from being choked to death by Jiang Xing.
In the next moment, right before falling into the cavernous hole, Jiang Xing and Yan Zhun were pulled out by Zishu Bai. Both of them were drained of all strength, lying on the ground and gasping heavily for air.
Without the Sky Insects, the desert sky returned to a boundless, crystal-clear indigo blue. A gentle breeze blew past, carrying away the beads of sweat on their faces.
Zishu Bai, however, sat alone on the edge of the sinkhole, gazing in silence at that underground hole that had returned to tranquility.
“We’re saved… it’s finally over.”
Yan Zhun caught his breath, and catching sight of something out of the corner of his eye, he kicked Jiang Xing with his boot: “Hey, look at him. What a kind-hearted person.”
Hearing this, Jiang Xing pushed himself up and looked back; Zishu Bai was unexpectedly still sitting there in silent gloom.
For some reason, he began to feel annoyed again.
Perhaps it was because he recalled the plot from the original book—every time someone died, Zishu Bai would adopt this half-dead, sorrowful look. This was the trait he despised the most. What did other people’s lives or deaths have to do with him? What kind of mourning was he putting on over there? Who was he performing for?
Jiang Xing scrambled up from the ground. Yan Zhun looked at him in slight surprise, whispering, “Keep a leash on that mouth of yours and watch how you talk. He’s grieving right now.”
What the hell does his grief have to do with me?
Jiang Xing stepped forward, roughly yanked Zishu Bai’s lapel, and forced him to turn his face toward him, only to be caught off guard by the damp tear tracks on his face. Though flowing down mixed with un-dried blood, it was clear to tell that those were tears.
His throat choked up abruptly, and in that moment, he forgot every single curse word he had originally intended to hurl.
In his mind, an image of a child huddled inside a wardrobe suddenly surfaced—silently weeping in the dim, narrow cabinet, as if so long as he didn’t leave that little wardrobe, everything outside would remain just as it was yesterday, with nothing changed.
Truly laughable. Dying people who had nothing to do with him had caused him to cry like this.
“You’re very unwilling, aren’t you?”
Zishu Bai lifted his head in a daze.
Jiang Xing released the hand tightly clutching his lapel, his tone surprisingly calm: “You feel that you gave up on their lives just now. You think that perhaps some of those people could still have been saved, right?”
“You’re far too high and mighty, Zishu Bai. Do you think you’re Guanyin Bodhisattva or the Jade Emperor? Do you think you have boundless spiritual powers and can do anything?” Not a single word he uttered carried any emotion, like a pool of still water that unknowingly drew one to walk into it voluntarily.
Zishu Bai’s lips parted slightly, as if wanting to say something, but Jiang Xing interrupted him in a cool voice: “People are dying in this world every single second. Some people might be chatting and laughing with you yesterday, and they might be dead the next day. You’re not a deity; you cannot control life and death. You have to admit that you’re far from enough—so far from enough that you can’t change the current situation, so far from enough that you can’t make everything in the world run according to your wishes.
The more compassionate you act, the more it highlights your incompetence. Don’t you hate yourself like this? Let me tell you, I hate you very much—extremely so.”
It was precisely because he had over-projected into Zishu Bai as the protagonist while reading the book that he felt an ever-increasing resentment toward Zishu Bai. If Jiang Xing had Zishu Bai’s talent and cultivation, if his life was like Zishu Bai’s with countless choices, with family who loved him, and with the luck of finding life in hopeless situations—he would never just sit here and cry.
Zishu Bai’s face turned pale, yet he was left speechless.
Jiang Xing leaned down and lightly patted his face, his voice cold and mocking: “Are you going to continue sitting here wallowing in useless sorrow, or return to the sect to cultivate like your life depends on it until one day this kind of thing will never happen before your eyes again? Figure it out yourself, idiot.”
Having finished his last sentence, he turned and left without looking back. Zishu Bai, however, remained sitting on his knees in the same spot, staring blankly in the direction where Jiang Xing had departed.
After a long while, he held his sword and pushed himself up. A ray of sunlight passed directly through the floating clouds and spilled before him—scaldingly bright, sending a violent tremor through the deep recesses of his heart.
He hated his own incompetence too. Aside from Jiang Xing, no one had ever berated him like this, speaking such harsh and merciless words.
Jiang Xing was right. He thought too much, but his abilities fell short. If he became stronger, this kind of thing would never happen again.
Yan Zhun watched in dumbfounded shock as Jiang Xing walked far away. Only after the figure vanished from his line of sight did he snap back to his senses: “He… he just left like that?”
Without even saying a word of thanks, he had instead given Zishu Bai, his life-saver, a complete earful of curses.
“I want to go back.”
Zishu Bai sheathed his sword and cast a Cleansing Spell to wipe himself clean. “Jiang Xing spoke like that just to snap me out of it. He’s far stronger than I am.”
He didn’t want to be hated by Jiang Xing, and even less did he want Jiang Xing to think he was a weak, incompetent idiot.
“Strong…?”
Yan Zhun looked at him in bewilderment, unable to sense where Jiang Xing was strong at all. But seeing that Zishu Bai had indeed pulled himself together, he could only mutter softly, “Fine, whatever you say. We need to bring the spiritual core of the demon we just killed back to the sect. I heard Brother Fang say scores will be assigned based on the tier of the spiritual cores. The Queen Insect you killed might even be enough to get you admitted directly into the inner sect.”
Hearing this, Zishu Bai paused, saying in a low voice, “The Queen Insect’s corpse has already fallen into the cave.”
“What? You didn’t extract the spiritual core?” Yan Zhun scrambled over to the edge of the sinkhole on hands and knees. “Do you know how rare an opportunity to enter the inner sect is?”
Just as his words fell, his expression suddenly froze. Yan Zhun remembered that right during the chaos earlier when the Queen Insect’s corpse was falling downward, Jiang Xing had seemed to do something on the Queen Insect’s body.
Realization dawned upon Yan Zhun, his face changing drastically: “No wonder Jiang Xing ran right after speaking! Your spiritual core must have been stolen by him! Hurry, let’s go demand it back from him!”
Zishu Bai, however, shook his head, pulling his hand away from Yan Zhun’s grasp, and said in a gentle voice, “Then it belongs to him.”
It was merely a spiritual core; even if he hadn’t stolen it, Zishu Bai would have given it to him anyway. He didn’t care for such worldly possessions.
Yan Zhun stared at him in utter shock. After a long moment, he sucked in a deep breath of frustration, feeling exasperated by his lack of ambition: “You’d better stay away from him in the future.”
Otherwise, with Zishu Bai’s personality, there was no doubt he would eventually be played to death by Jiang Xing sooner or later.
At the same time, on the other side.
Jiang Xing unfolded a white handkerchief and handed the blood-soaked Queen Insect spiritual core to Senior Martial Brother Fang.
Naturally, he knew what Zishu Bai would think. That man wouldn’t care who claimed the credit at all; even if it weren’t Jiang Xing but Qin Shangyan, it wouldn’t matter to him.
What a wonderful, selfless person who was indifferent to fame and fortune.
He would step on Zishu Bai like this, step by step, snatching away everything that belonged to Zishu Bai.
Who told Zishu Bai to care about nothing in the world except playing the savior? Rather than letting other antagonists profit from it, it was better off benefiting him instead.