Chapter 51

Pei Ye pulled out the white jade sword token and said, “She said it requires true qi to activate.”

“I have it.”

“Why wasn’t your meridian tree consumed by that light cocoon?”

“Maybe it can’t consume a meridian tree that’s reached eight-tenths formation. Even if it could, I have many ways to stop it. By the way, I still retain some of that dragon blood inside me.”

“Dragon blood?”

“Those pale blue fluids filling the vessels—the name given to them fifty years ago by Immortal Platform.”

Zhu Gaoyang infused true qi; the sword token slowly glowed with a soft, luminous light.

He stared at it for a moment: “Oh, it’s for voice transmission.”

He withdrew his true qi and canceled the recording.

He infused true qi again and said, “Ming Qi Tian… sister, I’m—I’m Zhu Gaoyang—”

He stopped, erased it, and reactivated the token: “Ming Daoist, I’m Zhu Gaoyang, first of the Dragon Lord’s Dongting Sword Line—”

He stopped again, fell silent, and stared at the sword token in his hand.

Pei Ye glanced at him strangely; Zhu Gaoyang shoved the token into his arms: “You say it.”

Then he sent a pulse of true qi into the token.

Pei Ye, bewildered, took the token and said, “Ming Miss, I’m Pei Ye. I’m currently trapped with Zhu Gaoyang in Xin Cang Mountain. Can you come rescue us?”

He let go—the token shot skyward.

“Hey!” Zhu Gaoyang reached out but caught nothing, “You just—”

“What?”

Zhu Gaoyang fell silent for a moment: “It sounds too pitiful.”

Pei Ye sneered: “You can’t even stand up, and you care about your pride?”

“Sigh.” Zhu Gaoyang sighed and said nothing more.

After running in silence for a while, Zhu Gaoyang suddenly whispered, “Hey, what does Ming Qitian look like?”

Pei Ye paused: “I never saw her. We only spoke through a wall.”

“Hmm…”

“Who exactly is she?”

“You’ve never even heard the name. I’d just be wasting my breath.”

“Why are you looking down on me?”

“Have you heard of Yunlang Mountain, Zhanxin Liuli , or the Sword Tao ?”

“...”

“See?”

Pei Ye protested: “But I know the Crane-Frog Scroll. Is that too simple?”

“Oh, that crude little thing… Ming Qitian is twenty-one, ranked third on the Crane List.”

“...”

Crude things bring crude impacts.

Pei Ye deeply understood the Black Chi’s words: “Fireflies can illuminate, and the full moon can illuminate too.” And now he regretted not taking that “little notebook recording childhood sword insights.”

“Will she come to save us?” Pei Ye couldn’t help asking.

Now that he understood the weight of Ming Qitian’s name, Pei Ye couldn’t help feeling anxious—her coming or not would mean the difference between heaven and earth.

“Then it depends on how close you are to her,” Zhu Gaoyang laughed.

Pei Ye fell silent—he had zero connection with her.

The two fell silent again, especially Zhu Gaoyang, who had forced himself to speak so much and was now drifting toward sleep.

Pei Ye was growing more accustomed to his body’s eighth-generation strength, moving with increasing fluency.

He began to sense the “breathing” of the seed in his dantian—a strange energy, utterly unfamiliar to him, entering his abdomen with each breath, absorbed by the seed: the mystery qi of heaven and earth.

Without the bead made from corpses, it could only slowly draw the energy needed for hatching from all directions.

Pei Ye could neither stop it nor aid it—he could only run as fast as he could toward Fenghuai.

Less than an hour passed when Zhu Gaoyang suddenly lifted his head from Pei Ye’s shoulder: “Stop.”

Pei Ye halted: “What’s wrong?”

“Go north ten li—there’s a small stream. Wash there, then head west.”

Pei Ye followed. At ten li, he indeed heard the “rustling” sound; through the trees, a clear spring flowed into view.

To attribute this to hearing alone was absurd—Pei Ye could only attribute it to the special ability of a Grandmaster or this Tang hero.

“It’s the Yi Long Jing,” Zhu Gaoyang stripped off his clothes and tossed them into the water, submerging himself as the current washed over him, old and new blood dissolving into fine threads and drifting away.

“Geomancy, discerning yin-yang and feng shui—that’s our Dragon Lord’s Dongting tradition,” he surfaced, smiling. “Master the Yi Long Jing, and a hundred li of mountains and rivers lie before your eyes. How about it? Want to join our sect? The previous deal still stands.”

Pei Ye imitated him, stepping into the stream, ignoring his words, and asked: “Will this help?”

“The two Grandmasters’ tracking methods are unpredictable, but Qiongqi remembers our scents—at least that’s something.”

They washed quickly; Pei Ye grabbed his clothes: “What about the scent on our clothes?”

“Leave them.”

“What?”

Even in this peril, the idea of running bare-assed through the woods with another bare-assed man was hard to accept.

He turned—and froze. Zhu Gaoyang had pulled two garments from his own abdomen!

One was a delicate white robe; the other, a coarse cloth tunic.

They dressed. Zhu Gaoyang sat on a riverside rock and pulled out a small pouch, gesturing for Pei Ye to come closer.

Pei Ye walked over, bewildered, eyes wide at the strange tools inside the pouch.

…

The sun climbed toward noon; Pei Ye still ran through the forest.

After nearly twelve hours of fighting and running, his stomach was empty. Normally, he’d be weak and dizzy—but the pale blue fluid in his body continuously supplied his needs; he remained alert and energetic.

At that moment, Zhu Gaoyang lifted his head, his eyes beneath the curtain glowing with sharp brilliance. He tapped Pei Ye’s shoulder: “They’re here.”

Moments later.

Between dappled shadows, two purple robes flashed like lightning, moving so fast they left trails of falling leaves behind them.

The boy’s eighth-generation speed, swift as a duck-hawk, seemed like turtle crawling in comparison. The man on his back slumped, half-unconscious; only after the boy’s frantic cries did his weak eyes flicker open.

The purple-robed men gave him no time to react. One raised a hand—intense heat exploded instantly, like fire fallen from the sun. The two runners were blasted apart.

The Shu Shi Scripture—whether spiritual or mystery scripture—was never recovered by Immortal Platform even during their fifty-year-old purge; records of it remain largely blank.

But the technique the purple-robed man used was one of the few documented by Immortal Platform: called “Bing Fire.”

This was no probing strike—it was a deadly, sincere killing technique. Dozens of trees around them exploded into charred fragments.

The results were as expected: Zhu Gaoyang, already gravely wounded, offered no resistance. His white robe turned black and shredded, scattering to the ground—alive or dead, no one could tell.

The most important target now was the boy carrying the seed. The two purple-robed men moved toward him—but the humiliation from last night suddenly warned them.

They turned back. They would not let a more dangerous opponent feign death again—even if he was truly dead.