Yao Ming Hall was brightly lit.
In the vast, empty hall, the woman in black robes scrutinized Zanxing from top to bottom, observing her carefully from head to toe. After a long moment, she finally spoke, still in disbelief: “Are you really Zanxing?”
Zanxing sighed. “I really am, Mother.”
Nearly an hour had passed, and most of the demon clans in Heishi City had already gone to sleep, yet Bu Jiang still seemed reluctant to accept this fact.
“But back then, in the Golden Gate Ruins, before the Ascension Platform, I personally saw you leave,” Bu Jiang grasped her hand, once again trying to confirm that the person in front of her was not an illusion. “All these years, I’ve been using the Soul-Seeking Array to search for traces of your soul, but there was no sign of you anywhere.” If not for this, why would she have poured all her resentment onto Shaoyang Zhenren?
Yet now, Zanxing stood before her, perfectly fine. Not only that, her appearance and demeanor were exactly the same as before, as if all the years she had been missing were nothing more than an illusion.
Bu Jiang’s suspicious gaze swept toward Gu Baiying. “You didn’t use some kind of dark magic to create a puppet, did you?”
Humans placed great value on love, and some even crafted lifelike wooden puppets resembling their deceased partners, eating and sleeping alongside them daily. Though Gu Baiying seemed as calm as ever, had he perhaps lost his mind after Zanxing’s departure, driven mad by love, and made such a puppet?
Gu Baiying’s brow twitched as he gritted his teeth and said, “I did no such thing.”
Zanxing remained silent for a moment before offering an explanation: “I truly am real. Back then, before the Ascension Platform, I used my divine soul to mend the sky. However, I left a thread of life intact.”
Bu Jiang asked, “A thread of life?”
Gu Baiying also looked at her, equally puzzled.
“Back on Gufeng Mountain, when my identity was revealed, before the Ten Thousand Killing Formation, Gu Baiying separated a part of his soul to shield me from countless fatal strikes. His soul merged with mine. That was the first reason.”
“And when I mended the sky, Gui Yansheng sacrificed himself to the heavens.” At this point, Zanxing paused.
In her final moments, she had seen Gui Yansheng’s shadow rushing toward her. Until the very end, Zanxing could not understand what Gui Yansheng was thinking. Why did this demon lord, who had always spoken of destroying the human world, sacrifice himself to save millions of lives in Douzhou in the end? Perhaps it was for release. Living without hope was more painful than death. Or maybe it was for Xiao Chun. If Xiao Chun had still been alive, resolving the flood might have been her greatest wish.
Good and evil existed within a single thought. A wrong cause did not necessarily lead to a wrong result.
Gui Yansheng once possessed the Xiao Yuan Pearl, and later offered himself to it. Although Zanxing ultimately took the pearl, in a way, Gui Yansheng also became a stone that mended the heavens. He practiced the Path of the Ten Thousand Heart-Eating Ghosts, absorbing countless souls, but by a twist of fate, he ended up filling Zanxing’s void.
A fragment of Zanxing’s soul was thus able to escape from that vortex.
“Because of Gui Yansheng, a remnant of my soul survived. Originally, this fragment should have dissipated, but because part of Gu Baiying’s soul was entwined with it, it wasn’t completely destroyed.”
The two of their fates were bound together—so long as Gu Baiying lived, Zanxing would retain a thread of life.
“And then there’s the Qinchong seed,” Zanxing added.
“The Qinchong seed?” Gu Baiying looked at her.
“When I was in the Abyss of Extreme Ice, the Qinchong seed sprouted and grew into a tree, blooming and bearing fruit before withering away. I thought it had disappeared. But it hadn’t. The Qinchong fruit remained within my spiritual root, and whenever my spiritual root was injured, the fruit would transform back into a seed. The Qinchong seed naturally possesses restorative properties, and over the years, it has been repairing my broken soul.”
Zanxing paused before continuing, “But relying on just that wasn’t enough.”
Bu Jiang stared at her, asking, “What did you do?”
Zanxing lifted her head. “I once practiced the Peerless Heart Sutra written by Sage Yushan. The cultivation method described in it is different from the usual approaches. It is neither demonic nor immortal, possessing divine essence without a complete soul—perfectly suited to my situation at the time. Back when I stood before the Jianmu Tree, I had already anticipated what might happen, so I scattered my life essence and soul in advance, not gathering them in one place.”
In typical cultivation—whether for demons or humans—the emphasis was always on ‘gathering’. Gathering strength, gathering one’s soul, gathering the golden core. However, Sage Yushan took the opposite path, seeking dispersion instead of consolidation.
Scattered throughout the heavens and earth, everywhere in heaven and earth became a part of her.
These coincidences, one after another, allowed Zanxing to find a thread of life amidst a seemingly dead-end situation.
Bu Jiang was still puzzled. “If that’s the case, why couldn’t we sense your presence all these years? And why did you only reappear now?” She glanced at Gu Baiying, pointedly adding, “Every time I heard news about your lover, I couldn’t help but feel that we in Heishi City owed him a great deal.”
The demon race feared nothing more than owing favors. The longer Gu Baiying waited, the more uncomfortable Bu Jiang felt.
Zanxing had left without a trace, leaving behind a mess for someone else to clean up.
Gu Baiying: “…”
Zanxing sighed. “I wanted to reappear as well, but when I first awakened, I found myself trapped in the Asura Ghost Path.”
Gu Baiying’s expression shifted. “The Asura Ghost Path?”
Zanxing nodded. “I’m not sure if it was because of Gui Yansheng, but when my soul revived, I found myself in the Asura Ghost Path.” She spoke with lingering frustration. “Even though my cultivation was intact at the time, being left as just a fragment of soul in such a place made escaping incredibly difficult.”
The Asura Ghost Path devoured all living things, be they human or demon. Her fragile fragment of a soul was almost torn apart by the Asuras. She survived many perilous moments, holding on by sheer willpower.
She had come so far that to give up now would have been a waste of all her efforts.
Each time she defeated an Asura, her soul would grow a bit stronger, and as she fought her way out, her broken and tattered soul gradually mended, inching closer to wholeness.
It was then that she began to understand Gui Yansheng’s feelings when he was trapped here.
This place was cold, treacherous, devoid of life. Blood and danger lurked everywhere, no different from the hell of the underworld. Those who fought their way out from the depths did so because someone awaited them outside, or there were tasks left unfinished. It was hope that kept them from collapsing.
Back then, Gui Yansheng had sought immense power to return to Heishi City.
As for her, she simply didn’t want to disappoint those who were waiting, so she had to persevere to the very end.
At the entrance to the Asura Ghost Path, countless pale arms reached out from the tunnel behind, trying to drag her fragile soul back into the bottomless abyss. The gate was within reach, but behind her, countless Asuras and evil spirits were closing in, ready to overtake her.
Though her soul had been repaired, she still lacked the support of a physical body.
Just as Zanxing thought she would be dragged back in once again, the heavy door in front of her suddenly opened from the outside.
Someone had opened the door.