Yuan Lian had spent over a hundred years in turmoil. Although things didn’t go exactly as she wished, she couldn’t say she gained nothing. After sending off Yan Hang, she closed her eyes again, trying to hold onto the emotions that had mostly dissipated.
She was naturally indifferent to the extreme, born with everything she could want. Very few things in this world could shake her mind, and those tiny emotions could linger with her for a long time.
Unfortunately, those were the thoughts of a split soul. Compared to the vast soul of an Immortal Venerable, those feelings of pain and suffering were too insignificant, like a drop of water in a lake or sea, disappearing in an instant.
Yuan Lian searched carefully for a while but found nothing, causing her to frown slightly. Then, sensing something, she immediately opened her eyes.
Sure enough, not far from the cloud platform, someone was sitting quietly at a table, eyes lowered. His long black hair was tied behind him, and he wore a simple white robe. The hem of his robe hung above the pristine white jade floor, slightly curled up, maintaining a subtle distance from the ground, quietly suspended in the air.
This person had been there for an unknown amount of time, neither moving nor making a sound, his presence elusive and blending into the spiritual energy. If Yuan Lian hadn’t advanced in her cultivation, she might not have noticed him for another year or two.
He had thick, long eyebrows that almost seemed to fly into his temples, giving him an extraordinary and handsome appearance. As if knowing Yuan Lian had noticed him, the man lifted his eyes, painted with deep, rich colors, meeting Yuan Lian’s clear and shallow gaze.
One of the supreme beings of this world, Cang Hai Shenwang, curved his eyes and smiled, calling out, “Junior Sister.”
Yuan Lian’s heart stirred slightly. She paused for a moment and responded, “Senior Brother…”
Her tone even carried a hint of a smile.
Cang Hai Shenwang looked at her expression and was momentarily dazed. He carefully observed her and softly asked, “…Did you succeed?”
Yuan Lian’s faint smile disappeared. She silently stared at Cang Hai without speaking.
She wasn’t very happy.
Both of them knew Yuan Lian was unhappy because Cang Hai was asking the obvious.
His cultivation was only slightly below Dao Ji Shenwang. Even though Yuan Lian was an Immortal Venerable and could now touch the edge of Shenwang, she hadn’t broken through. With Cang Hai’s ability, he didn’t even need to look; he could tell from across Buzhou Mountain that Yuan Lian had almost succeeded but ultimately failed.
Sensing her displeasure, Cang Hai’s figure faded, and the next moment he appeared beside Yuan Lian. He leaned over and pinched her nose, with three parts apology and seven parts teasing, “I noticed you were different from usual…”
Without him saying, Yuan Lian was aware of her own changes.
Previously, without comparison, she hadn’t noticed. But now that all her souls had returned, she clearly felt that compared to now, it was as if there had been a thin mist over her primordial spirit before. Her perception of everything was dull. This dullness didn’t mean she wasn’t sharp or reacted slowly, but that when she received external stimuli, she could perceive it but could only give a minimal response.
For example, when ordinary people encounter something terrifying, they feel fear and horror. But if Yuan Lian encountered it, she knew what it was and how to deal with it, but couldn’t feel “fear”… Sometimes she might feel a little, but never as much as a normal person.
At the moment her primordial spirit became whole, the mist faded significantly, and her emotions fluctuated. She even felt disdain at the thought of someone possibly dirtying her immortal mansion.
Before, if she saw Cang Hai, she knew she should be “happy,” but in reality, she wouldn’t be very happy. But just now, when she opened her eyes and saw her senior brother quietly watching over her, and when he smiled brightly at her upon noticing she was awake, she actually felt a faint sense of joy and couldn’t help but want to smile back.
Then, the next moment, he stepped on her sore spot.
Yuan Lian’s cultivation had been stuck at this point for a long, long time. She had never encountered any setbacks in her life, so the feeling of trying everything and still not getting what she wanted was new to her, making her inevitably gloomy. Hearing his words, she closed her eyes and ignored him.
Cang Hai wrapped his arm around Yuan Lian’s shoulder, letting her naturally lean into his embrace. He didn’t mention cultivation again, instead asking, “How do you feel?”
Yuan Lian was very accustomed to this posture. Her emotions never lasted long, so she didn’t refuse. She just felt there wasn’t much to say, so she shook her head in his arms, her tone a bit weary, “Nothing special.”
They were already immortals, so their bodies wouldn’t feel tired even after hundreds of years without sleep. But Yuan Lian had torn her soul apart, scattering it across various realms, which had shaken her soul platform. Therefore, her spirit was ultimately not vibrant. Recently, as her souls gradually merged and returned, it was another kind of feeling, and she felt fatigue she hadn’t experienced in a long time.
Cang Hai placed his palm on the back of Yuan Lian’s head, his spiritual energy flowing gently like a stream, soothing her still-recovering soul platform.
Yuan Lian sighed comfortably, her white jade-like cheek tinged with a faint pink.
Cang Hai’s gaze was calm, but his primordial spirit slowly reflected onto her soul platform along with the spiritual energy.
Yuan Lian’s eyelashes fluttered, and she held his hand with her eyes closed, whispering, “Not now… Senior Brother, it hurts a little…”
Cang Hai didn’t force it, withdrawing smoothly and focusing on comforting her.
He originally had the three spiritual roots of water, wood, and earth, making his spiritual energy thick and gentle. His cultivation was also above Yuan Lian’s, and his patient soothing made her primordial spirit feel as if it were soaking in a mother’s amniotic fluid, comfortable and drowsy.
In the past, when Yuan Lian described it like this to Cang Hai, he would always laugh at her, saying, “You’ve never been in a woman’s womb, how do you know what it feels like?”
This time, she had indeed been through it a few times, but perhaps because the split souls were too small, just like those feelings of love and hate that didn’t leave much impression, Yuan Lian compared it in her mind and found that Cang Hai’s embrace was still more comfortable.
She rested her head on Cang Hai’s lap, closing her eyes to rest. Suddenly, she felt another divine sense gently brush over her forehead, as if someone lightly tapped her there.
Yuan Lian opened her eyes to look, but there was nothing.
Cang Hai, on the other hand, laughed, touching her forehead where she had been nudged, “Take a break, and don’t forget to pay respects to Master later.”
Yuan Lian responded with an “Mm,” and fell silent.
She was held in the most comfortable position, her soul platform being repaired by the trickling spiritual energy, and her divine sense relaxed.
With Yuan Lian’s current cultivation, if she didn’t restrain her divine sense, it could cover tens of millions of acres centered on Buzhou Mountain. But at their level, being able to sense everything was actually annoying.
So unlike ordinary people who need to concentrate and cast spells to spread their divine sense, Yuan Lian usually kept her divine sense tightly contained within her qi sea. Now, as she relaxed, her mental perception spread out like unrestrained water, and a flood of sounds and images poured into her mind.
Everything was laid bare.
There were only two places where her perception was blurry and unclear: one was beside her, and the other was the Supreme Heavenly Palace above.
Everything else was clear and detailed. From Yan Hang teaching his disciples in his palace to the insects crawling among the mountain rocks, nothing escaped the Immortal Venerable’s perception. They didn’t even know their every move was being watched.
It was indeed a bit noisy, but perhaps influenced by the recently reclaimed strands of her split soul, Yuan Lian found herself more curious than before, when she had no interest in anything.
The Wanyi Sect was neither too close nor too far from Buzhou Mountain. For those below Earth Immortal, it might take a month to travel there, but it was just within Yuan Lian’s perception range. The most noticeable person there was Yan Hang. Although he was famous and a renowned Jade Immortal, he was somewhat impulsive and impatient. At this moment, he was in the Wanyi Hall, angrily scolding his eldest disciple for being useless, leaving the disciple looking dejected and extremely aggrieved.
Yuan Lian didn’t know that her nominal disciple, with whom she had little interaction, had such a fiery temper in private. When he was a child serving her father, he was honest and much duller than his disciple. Now, he was righteously complaining about others not being smart.
She was more advanced in cultivation than Yan Hang, so he didn’t notice at all that someone was watching him. His posture was unrestrained, with his left foot resting on his right leg, and his words were quite casual, which surprised Yuan Lian somewhat.
Afterward, she gathered her divine sense and casually swept through the Wanyi Sect, finding that everyone was busy with their own affairs. The elders were either in seclusion or teaching, the inner sect disciples were mostly busy cultivating, and the outer sect was actively taking on sect tasks to earn resources. Few were as leisurely as she was now.
Then Yuan Lian inadvertently noticed a familiar face living in a cave dwelling.
Feng Yunqing had been brought up from the lower realm only half a day ago. Everything he saw and heard was vastly different from before, leaving him physically and mentally exhausted. No matter how he tried, he couldn’t focus while meditating, so he could only lean on the bed to rest with his eyes closed.
He now had too many thoughts in his mind, with past events weighing heavily on his heart, unable to be resolved. He could only cultivate day and night, neglecting sleep and food, and hadn’t rested well for a long time. The fatigue of the day forced him to rest, and before long, he fell into a half-conscious sleep.
Yuan Lian immediately noticed the accessory on his neck, a piece of purple jade carved into a monkshood flower.
Mortals believed monkshood to be highly toxic, and even cultivators rarely used its flowers for carved accessories. Only some demons from the Great Thousand World used it as a symbol.
Yuan Lian recalled that this jade pendant had indeed been hanging around that demon child’s neck. She had seen it on the day Yun Lian died.
Now it was in Feng Yunqing’s possession, shrouded in black mist, with a remnant soul residing within. Although Yuan Lian was too lazy to look closely, she could guess whose remnant soul it was.
It had only been about ten years since Yun Lian’s death and disappearance. How had this child ended up in such a fragmented state, relying on his lover to constantly infuse spiritual energy just to barely maintain himself?
Even in his sleep, Feng Yunqing’s brows were tightly furrowed, making his otherwise handsome features appear somewhat haggard. Yuan Lian couldn’t help but take a closer look at him.
Yuan Lian knew this person was once “her” beloved, and “she” had loved Feng Yunqing with unwavering devotion, ecstatic at his reciprocation, and devastated by his infidelity, ultimately disregarding life and death.
Yuan Lian actually remembered their shared ideals and the subtle yet natural bond between them, but she couldn’t feel that heart-wrenching love and hatred no matter what.
It was like reading a book. You might feel a bit of sympathy or sigh for the characters, but to be fully immersed and empathetic…
That was indeed not the case.
Yuan Lian struggled to recall those tumultuous emotions but ultimately found nothing.
Even though she remembered every detail of their interactions, even the thoughts and little ideas after falling in love, she couldn’t empathize with those intense emotions now.
She couldn’t understand or feel it.
Yuan Lian was slightly displeased by her lack of findings, and her divine sense unconsciously brushed over Feng Yunqing’s arm. Still, with his eyes tightly closed, Feng Yunqing seemed to sense something, taking a heavy breath and instinctively clenching his fingers, murmuring a name:
“Yun Lian!”
Then he suddenly opened his eyes, sat up, looked around for a while, and closed his eyes to extend his divine sense, seemingly trying to sense something.
But with only a Nascent Soul stage divine sense, he naturally couldn’t feel anything, so he sat there in a daze, motionless for a long time.
Yuan Lian was slightly surprised—after all, they were no longer equals in cultivation as senior brother and sister. They were now worlds apart. Not to mention Feng Yunqing, even his ancestor Yan Hang, the Jade Immortal, couldn’t sense Yuan Lian’s divine sense.
Was it a coincidence?
Yuan Lian scanned him up and down several times with her divine sense, finally confirming that this person wasn’t exceptionally gifted; he truly couldn’t sense it.
Seeing Feng Yunqing sitting there blankly, Yuan Lian lost interest in watching him daze off and withdrew her divine sense with a hint of curiosity.
She turned over on Cang Hai’s lap, facing upward and meeting her senior brother’s slightly raised eyebrows.