Chapter 593: Demon

The wind seemed to still for a moment.

"We all once believed that the Ancestor's treasury did not need to be preserved." Shi Xiansheng sighed in a low voice, as if she had forgotten she was leaving a message for an unknown descendant; she was immersed in her own emotions.

Luo Qi understood what she was talking about. Du Zhengyi's old captain had once said that he had accompanied Pei Shu to several Seal Lands, and Pei Shu had gone in alone to clear and destroy those Seal Lands. Now Luo Qi understood why Pei Shu was so obsessed with this matter, personally clearing out the Seal Lands.

"Demons should not remain in the human world," Shi Xiansheng said. "But who exactly is the demon? Could it be that those lowly animals are the demons? Compared to us Mages, they are like jackals, wolves, tigers, and leopards to humans. When have humans ever sealed jackals, wolves, tigers, and leopards as demons and elevated them to such a status?"

Luo Qi looked at the female Mage in silence. A strange feeling jumped into his heart, and the matters in his mind began to churn.

"Demons are always in the human world." Shi Xiansheng turned her head and looked precisely at the spot where Luo Qi was. Wrinkles had crept onto her skin, but those still-beautiful eyes looked at Luo Qi. Luo Qi looked back at her cautiously, not knowing how much charm the education of Wushan could carve into a soul; he was terrified of being persuaded against his will. Yet, in his heart, he actually knew that he had long since looked back into the Abyss. Only those who can be persuaded will be persuaded; the ending of the story was already destined the moment the first stroke was written.

"I don't know who you are, I don't know where you come from, and I don't know how much weight that child in the courtyard will have for you in the future." Shi Xiansheng stood up and walked toward him under the tree; they were almost face to face. She looked into his eyes, a trace of pity appearing on her face. "But since I have chosen you, then you must be Pei Shu."

Luo Qi felt a chill of horror at these words.

"You are another Pei Shu, and you will also become Pei Shu."

"Because you, too, have walked onto this path and are about to make a decision: whether to believe in the common great cause, give your friend a push, and let the Du Family be completely wiped out."

"Or to try and break free from fate?"

"I don't know what choice you will make. We are perhaps not friends, and I certainly cannot make a reliable prediction. Now that you have not yet appeared, I may not have time to get to know you. If I am careful, I can live for a while longer, but death will eventually find me. After we have met, I fear death will have descended upon me immediately. I will not know what happens to the affairs left behind. I think that by the time you have reached this day, you must have gone through much exploitation and deception; you will not like being manipulated. If in the future you want to blame me, just think of how I spent this life watching everything, yet could only watch. Even if I made some arrangements and left a glimmer of hope, I did not know what the result was when I died. Thinking of it this way, don't you feel it is a bit more fair?"

Luo Qi stared motionless at this phantom of memory. She was like a devil who had walked out of the darkness to guide him, yet she was the guidance he had been longing for.

But in the outside world, is she dead now? Luo Qi felt his blood pressure rising and his heartbeat accelerating. Did they, or he, kill her? Because she came to meet him, was she keeping an appointment with the Grim Reaper that day? So, including Luo Qi, he was also being subjected to Calculation; perhaps in a larger game, there were gods observing him.

"I do not wish for everything to be meaningless. Death is the end; the Other Shore does not exist. Even in the future after I die, I have no hope of reuniting with Pei Shu and Tingxiu." She said softly. Luo Qi could not escape this heavy sorrow; a grief that did not belong to him yet simultaneously belonged to him enveloped him.

She raised her hand from her sleeve, and Luo Qi saw a seed appear in her palm. By intuition alone, he knew it was not a real seed. He did not know how she had broken through the barrier between reality, memory, and the environment. The woman pointed toward him, and the seed appeared before him. He raised his hand, and a small, shriveled brown pea landed in his palm.

"But to sow a seed is to ensure that new branches will wind their way out in the future; this is my only belief."

At this moment, the pea flickered and burst in his palm, turning into nothingness. At the same time, the paths of the layers of memory became clear, like a pea vine climbing and growing amidst the weed-like jumble of memories, pointing out a winding road. Luo Qi searched his own memory in astonishment—it was the memory he had obtained from Shi Xiansheng; a part of his Yajian followed the pea vine, rapidly locating the memory.

Deep within Shi Xiansheng's memory, a memory she had locked herself and forcibly forgotten was opened. Luo Qi understood this Magic of Yajian; he also had similar locks, used to make himself a Forgotten One, so that no profound Mind Mage could discover the secrets he already knew.

The memory unfolded into information devoid of emotional color, countless ancient symbols, most of which Luo Qi could not identify. He felt somewhat ashamed, but he soon had no time to care. Countless ancient Mage characters formed about ninety categories of Magic, with each type of Magic having about several dozen subcategories beneath it. Luo Qi grabbed a bit of the text to interpret; fortunately, Shi Xiansheng had already annotated a portion of the Magic in modern language. She must have studied and cracked them for a long time, perhaps exhausting her final energy.

These Magics might not have much value to many Mages; Luo Qi did not find any Attack Magic, nor any valuable transformation Magic. These Magics were merely ancient commands. For example, in the first category, Luo Qi saw "Open Door." Just for the task of opening a door, he saw nineteen different Spells. This might be for different doors—he hoped they weren't fairy-tale gold doors, silver doors, or wooden doors.

However, Luo Qi immediately thought that they might not necessarily be nineteen different types of doors; they could be doors in nineteen different situations, or different doors in different situations. More importantly, these might be the Spells to open the Seal. Luo Qi knew that opening a Seal required two parts: the first part was the existence of the Du Clan, and the second part was a Mind Mage to drive the Spell. Pei Shu must have known these Spells long ago, far before he became the Head Venerable, so that he could open the Seals and destroy the legacy of the Progenitor Mage. Perhaps his ex-wife started coming into contact with this type of Magic under these circumstances; he did not know if he knew she had gone this far, perhaps he did.

Luo Qi fell into deep thought. He could be certain that if Shi Xiansheng was already dead now, these things were the reason for her death. If he were to open the Seal next, he would be telling them that he had inherited Shi Xiansheng's legacy. No wonder he had come here so easily; no wonder Du Zhengyi had also been sent here.

(End of chapter)