Bloody footprints stretched along the path. Her footsteps echoed through Huayu Tower. There were no others, no guards. It was as if everything here had been emptied, leaving only a vacant building.
Bang—
Xing Shuishui turned around. The door had closed at some point. It was already dark here, and with the door shut, only darkness and silence remained.
She dropped her pretense, lighting a flame at her fingertips. She could now see the young master of Huayu Tower standing above, which was… exactly as expected.
Of course, that day Baihe Elder had stayed by his side, never leaving.
The young man wore fine brocade robes, his long hair loose down his back, hand resting on the railing, his gaze playful. Unlike his earlier pretense of being timid and fearful, he was now like a snake emerging from its den, flicking its tongue.
“Tell me, should I call you Xing Shuishui? Or should I call you — Xue Jiuling?”
Xing Shuishui looked at him and said: “Are you worthy?”
She walked up the stairs step by step, light and shadow divided, the Qitong blade gleaming cold in her hand.
“Want to bet I’ll cut out your tongue?”
Hua Wushan laughed: “Then why haven’t you done it yet?”
He didn’t retreat. Xing Shuishui, wary of the nearby mirrors, also didn’t step closer.
She asked coldly: “Why did you kill my sister? When did I ever offend you? What did my sister ever do to you? Tell me! Who are you really?”
He must be working with Shangguan Houyue, skilled in both forbidden arts and mirror techniques. So Hua Wushan definitely wasn’t his real identity.
The flame in her palm spread, bringing a sense of pressure. Sparks scattered in the air, falling like starry rain. The young woman stared at him, completely unharmed.
Hua Wushan smiled, his expression unchanged: “You — don’t deserve to know either.”
He leaned against the window, playing with a mirror in his hand: “I wasn’t wrong. You really weren’t completely dead — it took quite a bit of effort to force you out. But possessing someone else must be difficult. Would Xue Sansi forgive you if she knew?”
If this was the Xing Shuishui from several hundred years ago, hearing these words would have made her explode. But after hundreds of years, she had felt guilt, pain, stubbornness, and regret.
She had also grown a lot: “I think you should worry more about yourself.”
She had set talismans all around Hua Wushan. Today he wouldn’t be leaving. She raised her blade to his throat, shattering the mirror in his hand to dust.
Hua Wushan showed no fear, even displaying some contempt: “Aren’t you tired after all these years? Taking Du Dizhu for me, making such a commotion that everyone knows, it’s foolishly laughable. How about this – since I killed your sister, and you’ve taken one of my people’s lives, let’s call it even. I won’t tell Xue Sansi about your rebirth either.” Every word he spoke seemed meant to provoke her.
Xing Shuishui kicked him hard, following up with several fierce slashes. Hua Wushan neither dodged nor resisted. His head hit the wall, forehead covered in blood, but he only laughed softly, a chilling sound.
Only then did she notice the puppet strings on his body. She grabbed his throat.
Puppet techniques again!
Hua Wushan spoke recklessly: “What’s wrong? Won’t kill me? Or have you realized killing this puppet is useless?”
“Xue Jiuling, don’t you understand? I only killed your sister, but you personally scattered your sister’s soul. How can what I did compare to your cruelty?”
Disgusting.
Xing Shuishui slapped him hard across the face. Not satisfied, she stabbed him several more times, grabbed his head and continued beating him until her hands were red.
She said: “Nothing but dog barking from start to finish, not a word worth listening to. Don’t you want to kill me? Come on then. Why act like a coward?”
Looking at his blood-covered body.
Xing Shuishui sneered: “Yes. I didn’t die.”
“— Why should I die when scum like you are still alive?”
The young man was barely breathing, his face swollen and distorted, but his chest still rose and fell as he laughed.
“Xue Jiuling… you’re still as magnificent as ever…”
Xing Shuishui laughed: “Then you better wait for me to magnificently kill you, make you regret ever coming into this world, never able to reincarnate. Everything my sister suffered, I’ll return to you a hundredfold. Understand?”
The Qitong blade cut his throat, and his eyes lost their light.
He said: “You just wait.”
Then she would wait.
Xing Shuishui felt sick looking at his corpse and raised her hand to burn it.
Suddenly she remembered his last words before death. He had smiled strangely and said he was curious about her relationship with He Liansheng.
Lunatic.
Xing Shuishui didn’t understand the meaning, but when she pushed open the window to look, her eyes widened in shock the next moment.
The wind swept up her hair as a lone bird cried mournfully.
The Taoyuan sword stood planted among countless corpses. The young man gripped it backhand, so ostentatious. He knelt on one knee, wiping blood from the corner of his mouth, drawing everyone’s horrified gaze.
It made Xing Shuishui’s heart tremble too.
She had thought killing Hua Wushan would make the ghosts disperse.
But she hadn’t expected that before her, one person had slaughtered all ten thousand ghosts of Qingzhou in the midst of bloody rain, fearless of death, just to give her a chance at survival.
Xing Shuishui suddenly remembered He Liansheng saying earlier not to leave his side by more than three steps. She quickly sheathed her blade, lifted her skirts and ran downstairs, pushing through the crowd, walking step by step toward He Liansheng.
The young man seemed to sense something and raised his eyes.
Her hands clasped tightly, face and skirts covered in blood, she walked fearfully toward him.
“I’m sorry… there were too many ghosts just now… I got pushed away and couldn’t find you, I could only find a place to hide…”
He Liansheng stood up from among the corpses, looking at her, blood still dripping from his sword tassel.
He didn’t speak.
Xing Shuishui unconsciously stepped back a few steps. The young man advanced steadily, suddenly grabbing her hand, lowering his head so his shadow imprisoned her, breathing heavily.
She smelled the strong scent of blood on him.
Please don’t be angry…
She said again: “I’m sorry, you—”
The people around drew in sharp breaths. Unease rose up. Li Guanxing spoke up to stop him: “He Lian… don’t…” He ran over intending to pull Xing Shuishui away.
But before he got halfway there.
He Liansheng took out a blood-stained jade bracelet and bent down to put it on the young woman’s slender wrist, his voice hoarse: “Don’t lose the bracelet I gave you again.”
He stared at her pale face, speaking harshly: “If there’s a next time, I’ll scold you directly, understood?”
Xing Shuishui froze, only then realizing that during the earlier chaos, she had lost the bracelet without noticing.
She came back to herself with an “Oh,” touching the warm jade bracelet, complicated emotions welling up inside.
The young man lowered his eyes to look at her.
So obedient.
Suddenly without warning he collapsed onto her. Xing Shuishui stumbled back several steps, nearly unable to support him. Her hands stretched out in front, soon becoming wet, fingertips covered in his warm blood. She trembled.
Only then did she realize: he was severely wounded.
Of course, Xing Shuishui turned to look at the mountain of corpses. For one person to slaughter all the ghosts in the city, at such a young age – this would shock the entire cultivation world when word got out.
His master and family must be proud of him.
Xing Shuishui curled her fingers.
The barrier broke, ten thousand ghosts buried in Qingzhou. She raised her head as the bloody color in the sky dispersed, pale sunlight breaking through.
In the sky.
The battle between Guan Mulan and Shangguan Houyue was also reaching its end. Both were master-level practitioners – when they fought, the wind howled and birds and beasts fled. Naturally no one dared to interfere.
They saw Guan Mulan cut down with a palm strike. Shangguan Houyue raised her sword to block but was in a state of seeing threats everywhere, struggling to respond to the next move. She threw some plum blossom needles and turned to flee. But Mulan’s immortal binding rope had already struck, snapping around to lock her in place as she fell to the ground.
Guan Mulan raised her hand to seal her spiritual veins, then turned to the onlookers: “What are you looking at? Want to come back to Lingshan too?”
The crowd scattered like birds and beasts.
She escorted Shangguan Houyue back to the inn where He Liansheng had already fallen unconscious. Xing Shuishui sat beside him. When Guan Mulan brought people in, Shangguan Houyue saw there was no red string between Xing Shuishui and He Liansheng’s wrists, and immediately understood.
She suddenly laughed.
Guan Mulan lowered her brows and said sternly: “You still have the heart to laugh.”
Shangguan Houyue said: “I’m laughing at two things. First is how interesting you Lingshan people are, second is betrayal. Guan Mulan, do you know? Betrayal.”
Li Guanxing said: “What do you mean ‘you Lingshan people’? Aren’t you from Lingshan too?”
Guan Mulan said: “Shut up.”
Shangguan Houyue said coldly: “Heh heh.”
She looked at Guan Mulan: “Guan Mulan, you’re such a hypocrite. Back when I was brought to Lingshan, when your noble disciples discriminated against me, called me a little stutterer, said an orphan like me wasn’t worthy to cultivate with them – where were you then?”
Only then did Xing Shuishui notice that Shangguan Houyue spoke without moving her lips, her voice deep and melodious — it was ventriloquism!
Shangguan Houyue continued: “On that freezing day when they kicked me into the ice lake, I crawled out completely broken, Guan Mulan. You were standing right in front of me when I begged you to punish them. You said it was useless, everyone has difficult moments like this. Let me ask you, are discrimination and bullying really necessary trials everyone must go through? Especially when one of them was your beloved disciple!”
Guan Mulan said: “None of this justifies you later using human blood and flesh to nurture flowers and increase your cultivation.”
Hearing Guan Mulan’s answer, Xing Shuishui gradually came to understand the cold-bloodedness of these Lingshan people. They spoke constantly of love, yet were selfish and indifferent.
Shangguan Houyue said: “Why is everything my fault? If I hadn’t desperately worked to increase my cultivation, how would I have survived until today? I would have died at your beloved disciple’s hands, or when Guan Yinzi massacred the Shangguan family, or when Du Dizhu killed my fiancé!”
Guan Mulan sneered: “You think those little tricks fooled anyone? Back then the wedding wine in your bridal chamber had already been switched with poison. Whether Du Dizhu came or not, Shangguan Fu would have died by your poison. And don’t think I don’t know you were involved with Du Dizhu before that. If we weren’t worried about damaging Lingshan’s reputation, do you think you’d be here today?”
Shangguan Houyue said: “Yes, I poisoned him! If he hadn’t taken a fancy to Guan Yinzi’s sister back then, how could I have nearly died at Guan Yinzi’s hands? I not only wanted to poison him, I wanted to poison Hua Yiling too, that slut actually dared to betray me! Just like when she sent me to Lingshan – she never loved me!”
Guan Mulan: “You’re truly beyond reason!”
Xing Shuishui suddenly spoke: “Actually, your father knew.”
Shangguan Houyue said rudely: “Knew what?”
Xing Shuishui said: “Knew that what you sent wasn’t a longevity pill, but a mother-child pill refined from luoyu flowers. He knew, but still took it willingly. He thought it would make you happy. So after all these years, you still bet correctly on one thing — that was your father’s love for you.”
Shangguan Houyue’s agitated expression calmed, and she smiled mockingly: “So… he knew…”
After his wife died, he thought sending his daughter to Lingshan would make her happy. He never expected to receive her hatred in return.
Carrying endless guilt, he shut himself in a pocket dimension, willingly taking the mother-child pill she sent, until the day he quietly died, never able to say that “I’m sorry.”
Shangguan Houyue said: “At this point, let me see him one last time. I’ll go with you.”
Guan Mulan asked: “You still want to return to Huayu Tower?”
Shangguan Houyue said: “Don’t you want to know what the Qingzhou matchmaking gathering, the Qitong blade, and the ghost-summoning array were about? If I refuse to tell you, you’ll never know.”
Xing Shuishui raised her eyes.
Guan Mulan compromised: “Just one look.”
Shangguan Houyue said: “About the luoyu flowers, they were indeed stolen from Du Dizhu. But I didn’t have that ability back then. A strange person approached me, saying they could help me get the luoyu flowers. But in exchange, I had to use Huayu Tower’s influence to help him find someone.”
Li Guanyu: “Find who?”
Shangguan Houyue: “I don’t know. Go ask him yourself. He stirred up this whole mess, I don’t know what he’s up to, even pretending to be my son. Oh, that person is also in Huayu Tower, if you go now you might make it in time.”
Since it involved forbidden techniques, Li Guanyu and his sister exchanged looks with Guan Mulan, not daring to delay. They immediately led Shangguan Houyue out.
The room was very quiet, with only Xing Shuishui and the unconscious He Liansheng remaining.
Xing Shuishui suddenly laughed. Yes, they would make it in time, in time to see that person’s corpse. Just one of many puppets. A dead puppet.
She clenched her fist. The Li family’s puppet techniques again…
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