Chapter 23: 23. Chapter Twenty-Three

23. Chapter Twenty-Three

"The sage forgets emotion."

The old Daoist read the first sentence from the small booklet lazily, with a rather playful tone, "Isn't this from our Taixuan Sect's Heart-Forgetting Scripture?"

As he spoke, he glanced at Duan Xuan, and seeing that the latter did not respond, he continued reading.

"A person's life is filled with endless seven emotions and six desires; one must sever them when necessary to attain purity."

"Isn't this the twisted nonsense that Fo Xiu always have on their lips?"

Reading one sentence and commenting on it, the old Daoist Tian Heng was quite pleased with himself; however, while he was enjoying his own entertainment, the others listening felt quite uncomfortable, and what's more, some of them turned livid.

Every sentence in this booklet was correct, and every sentence had a source, but when strung together, it became complete and utter gibberish.

Although it is said that one can become an immortal through any of the three thousand Daos, in the final analysis, it is not without taboos; a person's energy is so limited that one path is barely enough to walk to the end, let alone being mixed to such a shocking degree—it is completely leading the disciples astray.

"There's Dharma Cultivator, there's Fo Xiu..." Daoist Tian Heng counted on his fingers, "The only thing missing is a Sword Cultivator, let me see..."

He flipped through a few more pages, and after seeing the content inside, he smacked his lips, "Yo, it's all here!"

Saying this, he held up the content of the booklet and displayed it to the others; on it was clearly a diagram of a Sword Technique, with the three large characters "Heartless Sword" written in wild cursive next to it.

"Pfft."

Atian couldn't help it and burst out laughing.

Her voice was not loud, but it was enough for those around her to hear clearly, causing both Bai Xinli and Li Ke to glance at her. Atian pondered for a moment and felt that compared to Elder Li, she was more familiar with her Senior Brother, so she leaned slightly toward Bai Xinli and whispered, "Senior Brother, do you think this looks like those deceptive little storybooks from when we were kids?"

Bai Xinli thought about it and found it really did look quite similar; at the very least, Master Bai used to tease him with such things in the past. However, those little books were purely fabricated by mortals, unlike this one, which was a "four-unlike" monster truly pieced together from the heart methods of various schools.

"Duan Xuan, you are not young anymore, why are you still reading this kind of thing meant to coax children all day long?" The old Daoist raised his eyebrows, which were almost drooping to his ears.

"I wish it were me reading it," Duan Xuan sneered, "This is something we confiscated from the disciples' quarters."

"Don't try to pull my leg," Daoist Tian Heng said with a half-smile, "Why would your Sword Cultivator lineage look at sword manuals? This is something only Instrument Cultivators who use swords would look at."

"Indeed, it is thanks to this point that we escaped a disaster," Duan Xuan nodded solemnly, "Whether we read it or not is not the point; the point is that they think we read it."

When Li Ke gave the disciples a stern warning in the Classroom back then, he had said that this "Heartless Dao" affair was both shrewd and stupid. It was shrewd in that the person who fabricated this book completely grasped the psychology of young people who admire strength and are rebellious, and it was stupid in that this person made obvious mistakes in many common-sense areas.

Every sentence in this booklet was true; this person had dismembered the Heart-Forgetting Scripture, intercepted Buddhist scriptures, and stolen the core tenets of various schools' heart methods, finally blending them into a "Heartless Dao," completing a beautiful act of grafting. Yet, they did not understand the mutual exclusion between Dao Lineages, and they did not even understand that Sword Cultivators fundamentally do not look at sword manuals.

The former makes you feel that this person is calculating, while the latter makes you feel that this person knows absolutely nothing about the cultivation world.

What kind of person would have such contradictory characteristics?

Someone who has just stepped into the cultivation world but can access the cultivation methods of various sects.

Most importantly, he, or they, harbor extremely obvious malice toward the Beihai Sword Sect.

In Duan Xuan's view, this was not the individual action of one person; aside from the clearly excerpted Buddhist scriptures, the content from other sects pointed directly to the core cultivation tenets, which could not be known by anyone other than their own disciples. This was also the reason why people from various sects looked unpleasant every time Daoist Tian Heng read a sentence.

When one's own bottom-of-the-box secrets are known by others, it would be a ghost story if their expressions could look good.

To put it bluntly, anyone with a little cultivation knows very well that the barriers between Dao Lineages are distinct. Leaving aside the Sword Cultivators who were the target of the harm, "Heartless Dao" directly mixed the Taixuan Sect's Heart-Forgetting with the Buddhist concept of "six senses purified." Anyone with a clear head would know this is undoubtedly a trap, and it could only deceive children who have not yet formally begun cultivation.

Did the person who fabricated it not know this was a fatal flaw?

They knew.

Did they not want to fix it?

They wanted to, but they couldn't.

Duan Xuan could imagine the scene: young disciples from various sects gathered together. They were young, they were impulsive, their cultivation was low, and their only two common points were that they didn't like the Beihai Sword Sect and their brains weren't enough. Thus, under the leadership of some ringleader, they decided to execute a bold plan.

A bold, idiotic plan.

Honestly, trying to shake the foundation of the Beihai Sword Sect with a mere "Heartless Dao" full of loopholes was nothing short of a fantasy. Not to mention that disciples would realize it was all nonsense once they stepped onto the right path, even if there were some stubborn ones, he believed that their own Junior Sister Luo could "personally" save the lost youth with "warm care." But having the ability to cope does not mean you can let others treat you like fish on a chopping block.

Some things, once the line is crossed, it is crossed.

"This is actually quite interesting," Daoist Tian Heng threw the small booklet in his arms to the side and returned to his lazy demeanor, "I declare in advance, our Taixuan Sect has never been involved in such things. In this old Daoist's opinion, this must have been done by the Fangxian Sect."

The surrounding Taixuan Sect disciples nodded in unison, dedicated to shifting the blame onto their old rivals; anyway, it was no secret that they and the Fangxian Sect were at odds.

Regarding this, someone had a different opinion.

"Nonsense!"

The middle-aged cultivator from the Fangxian Sect, who had been silent after being humiliated by Duan Xuan, suddenly shouted, sternly rebuking the calm old Daoist Tian Heng, "Daoist Tian Heng, it is a waste that you are an Elder of a sect, how can you say such irresponsible words!"

The old Daoist, being rebuked like this, was not angry; instead, he smiled toward the direction where the Fangxian Sect disciples were gathered. His gaze pierced through the agitated middle-aged cultivator and fixed on the depths of the crowd, stroking his eyebrows, "Oh my, this is truly rare. You are actually willing to leave your precious furnace? Let this old Daoist see, did the sun rise from the west?"

Before his voice had faded, the Fangxian Sect disciples automatically cleared a path, and a round ball squeezed out from the narrow passage they had made.

One could see that the round ball was wrapped in a purple-red Daoist robe, wearing a golden crown on its head, patting its round belly, with the eyes and mouth on its face squinted into slits, looking like a smile no matter how it was positioned.

"You are making a scene here, and my furnace of Golden Core back there is almost about to explode. If I don't come out to see, won't the sky turn upside down?"

The Sect Master of the Fangxian Sect, Wei She-ren, the number one alchemist in the cultivation world, even looked like a walking alchemy furnace, but his temper was not as explosive as a furnace; he was a famously good-natured person. Otherwise, the Fangxian Sect would not have ended up in this state where branches act on their own.

Anything is fine, anything is good, anything is possible—in the cultivation world, as long as someone mentions this big shot, these three famous quotes are the first things that come to mind.

Atian curiously hid in the pile of Beihai Sword Sect disciples, looking around. With this look, she really discovered something: behind Wei She-ren, there was a piece of fabric with a significantly lighter color. She looked closely and realized it was Zhang Zeyan, who had been almost completely blocked from view.

Having been on the mountaintop for so long without seeing this gentleman, it turned out he had run straight to find his master. However, judging from the fact that he went directly to notify Wei She-ren and was unwilling to stay to hold up the scene, the gap between the main branch and the sub-branches of the Fangxian Sect was probably already comparable to an ocean trench.

Atian could understand this feeling very well. Before the magistrate's daughter and the scholar's daughter officially tore their faces, they also had such a period of paper-thin sisterhood. She secretly looked around and found that the sickly Elder Li Ke looked like he was about to be melted by the sun, while Mu Yi and several other unfamiliar Senior Brothers were whispering together. Senior Sister Liu Yan was staring intently at the Taixuan Sect's team, seemingly wanting to find her son among them.

Perhaps only Senior Brother was listening seriously to the Sect Master.

She thought naively, then turned her head to look and found that Bai Xinli was closing his eyes to rest.

Bai Tian had never felt as much pity for Duan Xuan as she did at this moment.

Duan Xuan naturally did not know that he had been labeled with a "low status" in Atian's heart. Ever since Wei She-ren appeared, his attention had shifted to this good-natured person.

"Senior Brother Duan," Wei She-ren frowned, continuing to use the old form of address for Duan Xuan, "I can guarantee you that I am absolutely unaware of this matter."

He said he was absolutely unaware, but he did not vouch for the Fangxian Sect, clearly knowing what kind of character his own sect had. Moreover, if one were to ask who in the cultivation world hated the Beihai Sword Sect the most, if the Fangxian Sect claimed second, no one would dare claim first.

The enmity between the Fangxian Sect and the Beihai Sword Sect, besides the dispute over Sword Technique, lay most crucially in the branch of Instrument Cultivators who use swords.

The Instrument Cultivators who use swords considered themselves to be of the Sword Cultivator lineage, at which the Beihai Sword Sect scoffed. The grievances between the two were as numerous as the crucian carp in the river, and it was truly impossible to explain clearly in a short while.

After such an analysis, even Wei She-ren himself did not believe that the Instrument Cultivators who use swords were not involved in this matter.

"If you are unaware, there are naturally those who are," Duan Xuan remained very calm, "In ordinary times, it would certainly be difficult to search through so many Dharma Cultivator sects one by one, but fortunately, there is still the Qingtan Assembly in this world, is there not?"

"People may lie, but the Dao Heart does not; whether it is true or false, one will know upon taking action."

"Using the Sword Heart against the Dao Heart, using truth to collide with truth."

"Disciple against disciple, Elder against Elder, Sect Master against Sect Master; from the northern foot to the southern foothills of Luofu Mountain, the Beihai Sword Sect is willing to test everyone present one by one."