Chapter 291

The lake in the distance had become a frozen river.

Sun Fuling grabbed him and ran onto the nearest high bridge, where many people were also standing.

Looking down from here at the dimly lit lake surface, only the crystal-clear lotus petals of the small lamps reflected the candlelight, shining with a warm glow.

People who saw these lamps by the lake would also silently stop their steps and pray softly.

He Lingchuan turned around and saw three or four lotus lamps still drifting on the river surface, the lonely candlelight all entrusting the thoughts of the living.

Sun Fuling also pressed her palms together and prayed softly, just as devout as everyone else.

These lotus lamps could only burn until they flowed out of Panlongcheng; as for what happened after that, it would be left to the thousands of mountains and rivers of the Chipa Plateau.

People feel the same way.

"After releasing the lamps, let this matter go." Sun Fuling's words were very practical, "The dead are gone, the living must still strive."

From now on, there would be no shortage of opportunities for them to come here to release lamps.

Seeing through things early means suffering less harm.

After the lotus lamps drifted far away, He Lingchuan whispered to Sun Fuling once again, "Let's go back."

"Mm."

￥￥￥￥￥

After opening his eyes, He Lingchuan stared at the top of the tent in a daze for a while.

This time he had stayed in the dream for even longer, a full seven days. He had even slept twice in the middle, thinking he would wake up in reality, but he didn't.

These seven days had been comfortable and fulfilling; besides pondering the Golden Armor Copper Man Secret Scroll and diligently practicing archery, he spent his time chatting with Sun Fuling.

After becoming more familiar, this girl didn't bother with the door anymore; she often leaned on the wall to talk to him, and when she came to look after the sparrowhawk, she would just jump over the low wall with a push of her hands, her movements quite nimble.

However, eating became a big problem. Sun Fuling was true to her word; she said she couldn't cook, and she really couldn't. Both of them were the type who waited for food to be served, so they had to go out together to forage for food.

It sounded like they were inseparable, their feelings growing by leaps and bounds, but He Lingchuan couldn't feel this happiness because Sun Fuling didn't care that he was on winter break and often grabbed him to do something that angered both men and gods:

Tutoring!

His progress in learning the Ancient Immortal language was too slow, and Teacher Sun expressed dissatisfaction, even arranging pop quizzes for him.

By the end of the quizzes, those characters had all turned into tadpoles, swimming around in his mind.

Disliking study was engraved in his subconscious; it wouldn't change just because he had changed bodies or worlds.

So when Liu Tong came to notify him of an outside mission, He Lingchuan felt as if he had been granted amnesty.

After opening his eyes, He Lingchuan was once unable to distinguish between dream and reality, but the sounds of people and horses outside reminded him that he was currently in a military camp.

Why was the time in the dream getting longer and longer? Was it because the Floating Life Blade had been repaired?

He Lingchuan sat up and rubbed his face, at which point a guard came to report:

"Liang Zhanglao is here."

He Lingchuan was very surprised. Liang Zhanglao of the Chuanyun Pavilion had always been polite and cold toward him, and since this person cultivated a "vow of silence" and hated speaking, he could only glare at people when he saw them. What did he want now? He had just finished getting dressed when Liang Zhanglao entered the tent.

After the two sides exchanged greetings, Liang Zhanglao's disciple spoke on his master's behalf: "Young Master He, my master wants to discuss something with you."

The guard ran off to boil water, and He Lingchuan, looking sleepy-eyed, nodded and said, "Please speak."

Unexpectedly, Liang Zhanglao's disciple took out a folded letter and handed it over with both hands: "It's hard to explain in a few words, so my master has written it down. Please take a look."

Oh? A long-winded essay?

He Lingchuan took the letter, unfolded it, and after reading a few lines, he was fully focused.

Liang Zhanglao never visits without a reason; today he was here specifically for the strange red medicine in He Lingchuan's hands. Yesterday, the medicine ape Lingguang had only tested one drop of the liquid, and it had spawned a mutant phoenix tree, eventually leading to a tense standoff on both sides of the Great River.

Liang Zhanglao didn't say anything, but he had seen the whole thing and became interested in this kind of medicine, wanting to ask for a few drops to take back for testing.

Coincidentally, he had also just fought with Dong Rui's demon puppet, and the Ghost Ape had left a deep impression on him, plus last night's sudden incident—so Liang Zhanglao mentioned in the letter that Dong Rui's demon puppet was very similar to a monster recorded in medieval secret texts.

This kind of monster is called a "Ji Beast."

Speaking of which, the Chuanyun Pavilion also has a long history, tracing back to the ancient Qingyun Sect, which was a bona fide immortal sect that had produced many earth-shattering great beings. After the cataclysm of heaven and earth, the immortal sects gradually weakened, and the Qingyun Sect was no exception, eventually splitting into several Taoist sects, with the Chuanyun Pavilion being one of them.

Therefore, although the Chuanyun Pavilion now only deep-plows Xiazhou, it is a major sect with history, tradition, and background. Although the thin spiritual energy has corroded most of the sect's treasures, several volumes of ancient and medieval classics have been preserved intact to this day.

If all else fails, just copy a few more.

The medieval secret scroll Liang Zhanglao mentioned is the "Lanshan Strange Records," authored by an elder of the Qingyun Sect before it split, dating back 2,700 years. He recorded several difficult battles he had participated in, and the two most important locations occurred near Lanshan, located within the territory of the current Xianyou Nation.

The period from the cataclysm of heaven and earth until the immortals completely disappeared is called the Medieval Period.

After the Heavenly Demons left the human realm, the world was peaceful for more than two hundred years.

Unfortunately, good times didn't last long, and demons were again stirring up trouble everywhere, not only devouring common people at will but also ambushing the descendants of immortal families. Many descendants of great beings were slaughtered.

The immortal sects were naturally very angry and fought fiercely with the demon race.

The demon race kept calling out that they were wronged, saying those bastards causing trouble everywhere were not sent out by them.

How could the immortal sects listen?

There weren't many demons with good tempers, and after being beaten enough, they had to fight back. Thus, the brothers who had joined forces to resist the enemy in ancient times turned against each other as soon as they flipped their faces.

However, the immortals later realized that the strange beasts they had killed, which had equally strange abilities and appearances, although they had various powers, didn't seem like the native demons of the human world.

At the very least, their intelligence couldn't keep up, and they were almost unable to communicate normally.

Can a demon without spiritual intelligence still be a demon?

Digging deeper, the various differences of these monsters became more and more obvious, so people gave them a new name: Ji Beast.

Unfortunately, by this time the relationship between the immortal sects and the demon race could no longer return to the past, and with both sides competing for increasingly scarce spiritual energy, the rift simply developed into hatred, adding one blood debt after another.

The author of this set of secret scrolls fought the Ji Beasts in person and dissected more than a hundred of them, finally proposing a new inference based on the research of predecessors: these monsters were all modified demons, and the most important medicine in the process was still obtained from the Heavenly Demons.

It was the secret medicine left behind by the Heavenly Demons that caused unpredictable mutations in the bodies of the demon beasts.

And the Qingyun Sect also captured several Ji Beast creators, all of whom were devout believers instigated by the Heavenly Demons.

In other words, although the Heavenly Demons had left, they still cast a shadow over this world.

Later, with the joint suppression by the immortal and demon races, and with the passage of time, the number of Ji Beasts became fewer and fewer, finally basically disappearing from the long river of history.

Seeing this, He Lingchuan looked up and asked Liang Zhanglao, "You want five drops of the medicinal liquid?"

"Exactly, and Chief He has already approved it."

He Lingchuan smiled, "This is my loot; my old man has no right to dispose of it. However, if Liang Zhanglao is willing to find me a beast soul and then clear up my confusion, I would be very happy to share."

Liang Zhanglao agreed almost without hesitation.

He Lingchuan then asked, "Do you think the medicine in Dong Rui's hands is the Heavenly Demon secret medicine?"

Liang Zhanglao nodded.

"But the demon puppets he refined can't compare to the Ji Beasts of the medieval period, right? At most, they count as a weakened version." He Lingchuan hadn't seen a medieval Ji Beast in person, but immortals still existed back then. How could things that even immortals couldn't necessarily defeat not be more powerful than Dong Rui's demon puppets?

Liang Zhanglao gestured, and the disciple translated, "Even if it is Heavenly Demon secret medicine, after being left for more than two thousand years, its efficacy may have diminished."

Are you saying the medicine has been stored for too long and is past its expiration date? Hmm, very scientific, very reasonable.

Liang Zhanglao then indicated, "Spiritual energy declined in the medieval period, so the Ji Beasts should have also been affected."

"Then when the Heavenly Demons were still ravaging the human world, why didn't they create Ji Beasts as helpers, instead using them to stir up trouble after they left?"

This Young Master He really has a lot of questions. Liang Zhanglao gestured patiently, "That is unknown. Perhaps the secret medicine had just been developed when the Heavenly Demons were driven out of this realm."

He Lingchuan thought for a moment and asked the question he had long held in his heart: "Liang Zhanglao, did the ancient Heavenly Demons turn into the gods of later generations?"

After the Heavenly Demons disappeared, the gods appeared. Although they couldn't come in person, they have been looming throughout the entire human era.

It's hard not to associate them.

However, interestingly, He Lingchuan had never been able to find a definitive answer, even in the library of Panlongcheng.

This matter seemed to always be vague, covered by a layer of fig leaf.

Liang Zhanglao stared at him steadily for a long while before narrating through his disciple: "The ancestral teachings and classics of the Qingyun Sect repeatedly warn us not to forget the insidiousness of the Heavenly Demons and the cruelty of the cataclysm. As descendants of the Qingyun Sect, we firmly believe that the Heavenly Demons have never truly left, but have transformed into the gods high above! Unfortunately, to this day, the world has forgotten the cumulative wounds the Heavenly Demons once caused to the world, and even don't believe that the natural disaster ever happened, let alone believe that the gods are the Heavenly Demons."

He sighed heavily, "Even many Taoist sects and demon races worship the gods just like the rest of the world. It is truly forgetting one's ancestors, ignorant, fearless, and disrespectful!"

"Why?" Is your propaganda too poor? The Heavenly Demons are separated by a world, and their work of fooling people is better than yours.

"That history is too long ago, and humans are too short-lived. Young Master He should understand that so-called inherited memories can be tampered with." Liang Zhanglao seemed a bit agitated, his hand movements fast, and even the translating disciple stuttered a bit, "Of course, in the final analysis, it's because we practitioners are far less powerful than our predecessors, lacking the ability to move mountains and split the earth, and are not enough to win the trust of the people."

In the era when immortals and demons rose together, humble ordinary humans only needed to be responsible for looking up and worshiping.

(End of chapter)