Chapter 39

Different Lives

Yue felt her heart freeze for a moment, her eyes warily veering toward the north. In the far distance, she felt something surge like a tidal wave. The pressure felt exalted, as though a God had descended upon the world for a brief moment. She never experienced anything like it before--perhaps only the Master's friends ever felt more terrifying, and even the few times she saw Soul Ascendance cultivators fell quite short.

She realized that the location seemed to be the Holy Blade Sect.

"Ah, the Heavenspan Tournament. Maybe it's that?" whatever it was, it had nothing to do with her. She was just about done with shopping and ready to go back 'home'.

**

"RUN!!" the word was still echoing inside Lya's mind as she, alongside five other people, continued rushing away from the Holy Blade Sect.

Thinking back to what happened, she still had difficulties processing it all. Right after the aged, terrifying voice in the sky faded, the fight resumed. As the Sect Master got wounded, the fight at the very top became rather even, and they found themselves being pushed back against the hooded figures.

However, as the figures were focused on capturing one person in particular, the fight was at a stalemate for a moment. It was evident, still, that they were on the losing side. Ultimately, her Master ended up rescuing the girl who was the target--a young, fifteen-year-old girl with brown hair and eyes and an entirely unassuming appearance. There seemed to be nothing special about her, but as she was being chased, there had to be a reason.

In the middle of the carnage, while dozens were dying by the second, the small cluster Lya was a part of scattered and her Master managed to just barely create an opening for them to leave. Quite a few stayed in the rear to block the pursuers, leaving in total six figures running away: Lya, who was leading charge mindlessly, not realizing she was moving toward the Nameless Forest, Song who was being carried by their Senior Brother Xu Liang, a tall, muscular, and handsome man with black hair and eyes. When she first came to the Sect, Lya had developed quite a crush on him, but it was quickly snuffed out when the two interacted briefly.

For all his positives--and there were many, such as his undying loyalty to the Sect and quite a decent talent--Senior Brother Liang was... a bit dull. Well, a bit was still underselling it. He was best at obeying orders, but if he was forced to think for himself...

Besides them three, there was also the girl that was the target of the hooded figures--Ling'er, they called her. She was a member of a small, insignificant Sect and had come to the tournament simply as a part of an excursion as she was just barely at Peak Qi Condensation Realm at 15. She was just as lost as everyone, seeming in some was as dull as Senior Brother Liang.

There was also Senior Sister Qiu Mei who was barely limping along them, her left arm completely missing from the shoulder. It was a ghastly sight that left the proud and aloof woman Lya admired seem broken and despondent.

And, lastly, there was Elder Shui Xiaoling taking up the rear. She had probably spent the most Qi out of all of them, but was not falling behind all. Pale in face and with reddened clothes, she seemed more like a ghost than a woman, but she didn't complain even once.

Luckily, quite a few Elders who stayed behind seemed to have managed to block their pursuers as they weren't being chased. It was too early to celebrate, however, and Lya was panicking. She'd just now realized where she was going, and was wondering whether it was the right choice.

The reason why the Elder wasn't saying anything was probably because the Sect Master told her to follow Lya, knowing full well that she would have headed to the Nameless Forest. But even if they went there... would the Senior help them? And it wasn't even a small amount of help--Lya was certain that, without Senior's help, Song might die, Sister Mei will never advance in cultivation again, and even Elder Xiaoling might perish.

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Even if the pursuers never caught up, if the Senior turned them away, it would be a disaster. They may as well have stayed in the Sect and took their chances.

As such, Lya was afraid--afraid that her choice might have doomed everyone. In the end, she could only put her faith into the man she'd know for a few days before leaving. In her heart, she believed the Senior would help them--he was a sage figure to her, someone above life. Ultimately, though, a worm of doubt had begun festering inside her young mind...

**

Shen Tao was lying in a pool of blood, coughing up, gasping for breath. There was a hole in his chest, his innards hanging visibly. All his Qi was spent, and his vision was blurring.

He lost.

He lost so convincingly that the shame in his heart could build a mountain. And against a young child, no less. To be proven so explicitly that he was nothing, a footnote in the history of the world, was beyond debilitating. Parts of him, in fact, were glad that he would die, so that he would never have to face the reality of his existence.

"Don't be embarrassed," the child loomed over him and smiled--the smile was cold, dark, and desolate, as were the pair of eyes staring at him hollowly, void of recognition. "There is no shame in losing to me. Rather, I should be embarrassed for picking at the kids. Alas, Master said all of us had to come. I will--hm?" the child frowned and lifted his left arm suddenly; a moment later, the arm flew off his shoulder as he jumped back.

Despite losing the arm, the boy appeared entirely unenthused. The bleeding was brief, and he seemed to have stopped it as though he did it a thousand times before. A moment later, a figure sprung from the void in front of Shen Tao, a familiar figure of his Father and his Master Shen Yu.

"Hm? A child?" his Father mumbled, seeming equally shocked as Shen Tao was when he first laid his eyes upon the boy. "How is this possible?"

"It will take me a while to fix my arm, you bastard," the boy said, his voice losing the little bit of playfulness that it had before, replaced with stark indifference.

"You bastard?"

"What are you, if not a bastard? Nearly two hundred years old and still barely at Mid Soul Ascendance. If you hadn't sacked your potential just to keep up with the Holy Blade, you would have still been a decrepit nobody at the Early stages. Seeing as you arrived here so quickly, you must have been nearby. Our information was wrong, it seems. Good to know."

"... who the hell are you?"

"What is it to you? We may not be able to kill that Minge bastard and his cohort," the boy grinned strangely all of a sudden. "But you? I wonder... what will become of the world tomorrow when it learns that one of its Sages was felled? I do wonder~"

**

Birds were chirping in a rather lovely tone, and Leo was loving every second of it.

On his second day of trying to gather enough timber, quite a few animals followed him over. In fact, some of them even helped--on the way back, Blackie and Milky were by some unholy miracle carrying a log each, Red was carrying two, and a strange, oversized tiger that terrified Leo so much he didn't even dare name the beast carried six of them and was still sauntering through the woods.

He felt a bit embarrassed to be only carrying four, but there was nothing he could do about it. Grateful that he was helped, Leo prepared quite a feast as soon as they returned, taking special care of the meal he prepared for the tiger. For one reason or another (mostly because it was a tiger), the animal gave him heebe-jibes.

It didn't do anything to earn his caution--it never growled or howled or yowled or whatever the tigers did, it even played with Blackie and Milky when Leo was too busy for it, and it mostly just swung by twice a day to eat before disappearing into the forest. The fact that the animal helped shocked Leo more than most other things he'd experienced in the world thus far, and he gathered it was the form of a bargain--the tiger would help him in exchange for more food! So, Leo prepared four times as much food as usual for the tiger.

As he got too busy with the rest of the animals, he missed the tiger eating and leaving. Glancing at the plate, Leo grew slack-jawed for a moment as there was so much food on top of it. In fact, it was only short just one portion--the tiger ate as much as it ate every night and sauntered off into the forest, apparently unimpressed by Leo's take-charge attitude.

He didn't have that much energy to ponder on it, however. Between cutting trees all day long and then carrying the logs back and then immediately preparing dinner, he was spent. Retreating into the mud hut, he lied down flatly onto the bed and patiently waited for the nightly ritual to finish--Blackie immediately jumped on his chest, curled up, and went to sleep; Milky curled up next to his head, a black-colored armadillo nestled itself against Leo's right side, while the golden gopher nested itself against the back of Leo's head.

It wasn't long before the rest of him was covered with the smaller critters and lizards--there was a rabbit by his left foot, a pair of multicolored iguanas on his right knee, a few skinks wrapping themselves around his fingers...

Some ten minutes later, he was completely covered, wondering whether he was like a super heater for these animals or something which was why they loved sleeping on top of him or against him or even just near him. Whatever it was, because he was a cultivator, he could endure it well enough. Closing his eyes, he lovingly listened to the symphony of purrs, low growls, and the breathing of so many animals, getting lost in its grace and drifting off to sleep.