Though he drifted in the alien realm for a mere eight years, Wen Zhihan felt it was longer and more agonizing than a century.
The moment he realized that every single day he delayed meant his disciple would have to endure yet another day of isolated and bitter hardship, all of his patience completely evaporated.
The system consoled him by explaining that while the novel’s opening was somewhat harsh, it was all intended to ignite the protagonist’s potential, a descent preceding an ascent, serving as foreshadowing for a subsequent counter-attack and revenge.
Eventually, after weathering the storms of the world, the protagonist Shen Zong would be driven to the brink by torment until he blackened, leaping forward to become an invincible supreme ruler where anyone who had once looked down on him, bullied him, or betrayed him would pay a price a thousand or ten thousand times over.
The system called this a satisfying story.
Yet Wen Zhihan still could not feel happy.
He only saw that impostor of a villainous master injuring Shen Zong while simultaneously whitewashing himself, turning things around to claim that the protagonist Shen Zong ought to be grateful for his cultivation and trust.
He saw how Wen Zhihan had been reduced to a cowardly and incompetent wretch who knew only how to flee and shirk responsibility, yet hypocritically and loftily proclaimed that Shen Zong was someone favored by the heavenly dao.
Shen Zong smiled coldly, sending the weapon of Wen Zhihan flying with a single slash of his sword. “Since the heavenly dao is so shallow and base, I shall first destroy the master’s sect, and then slay the heavenly dao!”
Wen Zhihan finished reading the chapters of the novel, turned around, and plunged right back into slaughter. His anger and resentment both transformed into bone-chilling killing intent, causing even the most ferocious evil ghosts to shudder in terror.
Within a mere few years, the number of malignant spirits and the amount of blood stained upon his hands had far exceeded the past century. His swordsmanship and killing skills were honed through this until they became increasingly refined.
The speed at which he completed tasks and earned points had somehow shattered the record set by the system.
He was the least merciful and the most fearless of injury, life, and death when battling evil specters and monsters. At the same time, he was the most compassionate yet coldest among the otherworldly combatants, never sinking into madness or losing himself like others did.
The system frequently rejoiced over the resilience of his soul, while simultaneously regretting that someone with such capability was unwilling to linger in this realm longer to accumulate more points for grander, more arduous wishes.
Instead, he remained stubbornly fixated on his place of origin, devoid of greed or ambition, constantly plotting to return to such a narrow, ordinary plane.
What true meaning was there in that?
The system could not comprehend how the world of a source novel could be so narrow, why it held such a fatal attraction for its host, or how it could have nurtured such a resilient, unshakeable soul.
Wen Zhihan could not be bothered to explain.
He simply refused to yield to fate.
Protagonist or heavenly dao, he knew only this: he wished to return, his little disciple needed him, and only within dreams did the child dare to grasp his master’s sleeve to voice grievances.
Even so, Shen Congyuan remained resilient and possessed a clear, lucid disposition.
Just as he had been when he first encountered Shen Congyuan.
The tiny child was frozen blue with cold, his complexion ashen and lifeless. Stroking the child’s head, Wen Zhihan patiently inquired about his wishes.
“Would you like to come with me? From this day onward, leave behind the clamor of the mortal world and wholeheartedly pursue the Dao.”
“If I go with you, will I be able to survive?”
“Not necessarily,”
Wen Zhihan answered him with complete candor. “You will certainly survive today. Even if you do not come with me, I will send you to a medical clinic for assistance. You will have warm food and shelter, a family to adopt you, and you will grow up and start a family.
“However, to follow me means to become my disciple, severing all earthly ties from that moment onward, having no association with worldly pleasures. Upon the path of cultivation, you will encounter countless demons and obstacles. You may not live to a hundred, and you are very likely to sustain grave injuries or even sacrifice your life.”
The child raised his head, gazing steadily into Wen Zhihan’s brow and eyes. “I want to go with you. I am not afraid of hardship.”
“Good child.”
“I want to become an immortal just like you, to save more people still trapped in the mortal dust.”
The dao companions traveling alongside Wen Zhihan had once mocked him, saying that such wonderful bone structure and innate talent would be entirely wasted if not apprenticed to study the Dao, asking why he needed to tempt the child with worldly benefits, what if the kid decided not to apprentice, wouldn’t that be a massive loss?
Hearing this, Wen Zhihan merely smiled and continued teasing the child with a candied hawthorn from the roadside, telling him that as long as he did not become a disciple, there would be endless candied hawthorn to eat.
This had angered little Shen Congyuan, who sulked without eating for half a day to prove his resolve, nearly fainting from hunger once more.
His Ayuan was the best disciple in the entire world.
Such a wonderful child, an immortal cultivator with such peerless talent, harboring that sort of pure, unblemished heart and dreaming of one day becoming a savior immortal.
He should have been able to step onto a smooth, unobstructed path, striding forward with high spirits.
Instead of ending up like this in the book,
Having just concluded a battle, Wen Zhihan stood amidst a sea of blood and mountains of corpses for the umpteenth time, summoning the bound system in place and exchanging points for several original chapters of the novel The Return:
Chapter 80: The Blackened Shen Zong
Within the array of heavy, labyrinthine illusions, Shen Zong had fought to the point of utter exhaustion.
Driven to a dead end, a stroke of fortune descended from the heavens. He needed only to execute a blood sacrifice of dozens of people to break through the predicament and escape.
“I cannot… If Master were to see me looking like this, he would be displeased.”
Struggling, Shen Zong rose to his feet while gripping his sword, relying on the weapon to support nearly half his body weight. “Even if I die… I cannot, I cannot bring shame to my master’s sect!”
“Yet…”
Beneath his feet, the crimson pool of blood reflected his disheveled silhouette. That shadow moved as if it possessed a life of its own, parting its lips to utter ambiguous, delirious ravings that muddled the mind, breaking into a mocking smile.
He was speaking to his own reflection. Though they were merely a string of blurred and distorted syllables, they formed highly bewitching persuasions directly inside his ears.
“The Three Realms and Five Elements… soul scattering…”
Shen Zong muttered, occasionally repeating only a few of those words as if weighing and guessing the consequences of perishing in this place.
The crimson shadow continued speaking. If one listened closely, its vocal timbre matched Shen Zong’s own precisely, save for being far more flippant and deranged.
“… Revenge.”
Shen Zong raised his head once more. The bright, stubborn brilliance within the depths of his eyes finally grew dim, heavy injuries rendering him utterly incapable of maintaining a clear consciousness. Instead, he was guided into a back-and-forth conversation with his own reflection,
“Who is going to take revenge…”
The delirious voice gradually synchronized with his own, issuing directly from the depths of Shen Zong’s throat like an ominous curse,
“Kill Wen Zhihan… kill… them…”
Shen Zong slowly straightened his posture, fierce and terrifying killing intent bursting forth from the edge of his blade.
Yet those blind, reckless cannon fodder characters continued to hurl abuses and attacks at him, resenting his incompetence for failing to even break such an array, shifting the blame onto him and cursing him for bringing such bad luck that everyone was plunged into this plight. They calculated his value, wishing to push him out to block the danger for a moment before a new crisis arrived.
Seeing him suddenly draw his sword, those people failed to react for a split second, before their faces successively morphed into expressions of terror or hatred.
“What has he been muttering to himself since just now?”
“I see he has lost his mind—”
“He is already—”
“Shen Zong, you…”
Had this happened in the past, he would always manage to handle things calmly. Verbal offense was not a capital crime, cowardice in the face of death was not a capital crime, silent bystanders were not capital crimes, none of these could serve as justifications for them to be buried in this place.
Yet within the span of a single blink, the world grew quiet.
Shen Zong’s pupils were scarlet, devoid of any warmth as he gazed ahead. When clarity returned to his mind, the blood sacrifice beneath his feet was already complete.
The array broke, and he walked out as the sole survivor. Though covered in wounds, he seemed to have lost the capacity to perceive pain.
At this moment, Shen Zong felt a long-lost serenity within his heart, as if a part of himself deep within his soul had finally completed the ritual of a funeral sacrifice, allowing him to embrace eternal, peaceful slumber.
To be continued
Knowing full well that this was a plot event which had yet to transpire, Wen Zhihan nevertheless felt as though he were watching each scene unfold right before his eyes.
Watching Shen Zong left in utter isolation, watching his disciple step step by step into despair, becoming the target of public condemnation, watching him gradually plunge past the point of no return,
He saw it. His disciple had been so unwilling, had fought against fate with such desperate exhaustion. Had he been given a choice, Shen Zong would certainly never have been willing to become like this.
If only he had remained by his disciple’s side.
If only he had still been there, Ayuan would never have fallen into such a state…
Even strangers from an alien realm could find a peaceful death by his side, yet his disciple had encountered nothing but malicious words while struggling in the jaws of near-death desperation.
Pondering this, Wen Zhihan was instantly overwhelmed by acute heartache and agitation. Sharp pains and spasms rippled through every meridian in his body, his legs grew weak, and drained of strength, he dropped to one knee on the ground.
Was this truly the destiny his disciple was fated to bear?
“It should not be like this…”
He muttered under his breath, crimson sharpness creeping over his soul body like a blooming red lotus,
“The heavenly dao… is wrong.”
Thus, his dao heart shattered, only to be reforged within a new obsession, condensing into an even more unbreakable power of the divine soul.
The sword in his hand grew colder, sharper.
Before long, he finally carved out a bloody path.
Ayuan…
I am sorry.
In an instant, battered by the yearning within his memories, Wen Zhihan’s soul surged violently, and he immediately coughed up a mouthful of fresh blood.
“Master?”
The call beside his ear instantly yanked his consciousness back. Opening his eyes, he met Shen Zong’s gaze of startled hesitation and bewilderment.
He had originally wished to keep Shen Zong from witnessing this scene, which was why he had deliberately placed a sleep-inducing talisman on his disciple and laid down an illusionary array around the area.
Yet Shen Zong had still tracked him down, breaking free from the sleep talisman he had cast and arriving far earlier than he had anticipated.
Having recovered the greater part of his memories, when Wen Zhihan once more encountered Shen Zong’s complex gaze, he finally perceived that three-tenths of his disciple’s tension stemmed from wariness.
Shen Zong had grown older and taller, yet because of the hardships he endured, he looked like a youth barely twenty years old, standing there cautiously and refraining from rash actions due to uncertainty over the situation.
Even so, Shen Zong had not chosen to seize the opportunity to distance himself and flee from his side.
Shen Zong was still willing to acknowledge him as his master.
Realizing this, Wen Zhihan felt no overwhelming joy; instead, a dense, intricate ache welled up from the bottom of his heart, filled with profound distress.
Fortunately.
Those plot events that had driven Shen Zong mad and pushed him into practicing demonic arts through successive desperate situations had not yet occurred. They were merely an undecided future, one he could still personally prevent.
There was still time.
Now that he was aware of the original work, those numerous terrifying tragedies would never come to pass. He would rewrite everything and spare Shen Zong from ever experiencing a shattered dao heart or being forced into the ending of a demonic cultivator.
He would cherish and compensate him properly, reigniting the light within Ayuan’s eyes and allowing his disciple to walk freely forward.
Gazing quietly at Shen Zong, Wen Zhihan could not hold back his hand as he reached out and spoke,
“It is already over.”
He wanted to pull his disciple into his embrace and comfort him just as he had in the past.
Yet the youth abruptly raised a hand to block him, his brow furrowed tightly as he looked at him with unease and suspicion.
Wen Zhihan froze for a moment.
“Shen Zong, you… are afraid of me?”