Chapter 894: Side Story 4: 131

A wisp of human soul, even if it had been tempered in the Qingming Sword for a long time, should not have such strong control over the Qingming Sword.

Xiao Jiu immediately began to speculate about the old man's identity.

Could he be the War God Bai Qi?

After all, the Qingming Sword is Bai Qi's weapon; under heaven, only he has the closest relationship with the Qingming Sword.

But obviously not; judging by appearance, aura, or attire, he does not resemble him.

And he is not a sword spirit, so who is he?

The old man exerted all his strength to pull out the Qingming Sword.

It was as if, with the Qingming Sword in hand, he could defeat them.

But as time passed, the old man's consumption increased, and his entire soul body visibly faded.

His soul body contained both earth vein dragon qi and resentful spirit ghost qi.

After the earth vein dragon qi was heavily consumed, the resentful spirit ghost qi rose to dominate, and the old man's whole body gradually became shrouded in a sinister yin qi.

But from beginning to end, the Qingming Sword was under Liu Junyan's control.

There was no need for Xiao Jiu to act.

Bang!

A surge of true qi burst from Liu Junyan's palm; seeing the situation was wrong, the old man flickered and tried to dive underground.

But that true qi seemed to have a tracker, pursuing him downward.

A mournful ghostly wail echoed through the entire underground heavenly pit, followed by a shower of soil mixed with white bones sliding down, and the range of the underground heavenly pit expanded slightly in all directions.

When Xiao Jiu came down from above, he had already discovered that this so-called heavenly pit was not naturally formed; rather, because this underground area already had its own separate realm, and with the influence of various crustal movements, it gradually formed the present layout.

Before the heavenly pit formed, the seal in this underground area must have remained intact.

Therefore… the old man likely had the opportunity for a human soul to enter after discovering the underground heavenly pit, thus beginning his path of ghost cultivation.

Then Xiao Jiu had a fix on the old man's identity.

He should be the temple keeper.

Bai Qi Temple had a temple keeper, but that was long ago.

After the temple keeper died, his human soul seeped into the underground heavenly pit, invaded the Qingming Sword, and has remained there until today—who knows how many years have passed.

Precisely because he is the temple keeper and has a contract with Bai Qi Temple, he could restrain the Qingming Sword; unfortunately, he faced Liu Junyan, which was bad luck for him.

Xiao Jiu looked at Liu Junyan.

When she saw Liu Junyan's eyes narrow, she understood that Liu Junyan had also likely confirmed the old man's true identity.

Indeed, the next moment Liu Junyan said: 'As a temple keeper, on the day you died, your task was already completed; even without merit, you have endured hardship, and reincarnation will surely bring a bright future—why linger here, coveting what does not belong to you, only to ruin your own prospects?'

Liu Junyan could still converse amicably with the temple keeper because he knew how harsh this environment was.

Now, with the development of tourism, entering this area is not difficult.

But go back a few decades, and this place was where not even a bird would defecate.

The temple keeper had guarded this place alone for decades, enduring hardship beyond words.

Liu Junyan felt some respect for the temple keeper in his heart.

But unexpectedly, the temple keeper snorted coldly and said: 'No merit, only hardship? I devoted my whole life to guarding that ruined temple, starving and freezing, diligent without complaint, yet when I froze to death in a snowy night, my soul wandered these mountains and forests, I thought I would smoothly enter the underworld, but this Qingming Sword seized me into its blade, calling heaven and earth brought no answer.'

Do you know how I endured those days?

My human soul suffered day and night from the sword qi of the Qingming Sword, being gnawed by the captive resentful spirits suppressed in the sword's body; if I did not resist, my fate would only be annihilation.

The ridiculous part is, do you know why my human soul was detained in the sword? It's because we temple keepers must guard the temple in life and cannot enter samsara after death! What right? What right do I have to come into this world and spend my whole life serving a ruined temple and a broken sword?!

Heaven and earth treat us as straw dogs; fate is unjust.

The temple keeper felt he had devoted his life and deserved a good ending.

During those countless difficult days and nights, what sustained his belief was nothing more than the idea: 'Suffer this life, enjoy blessings in the next.'

But in the end, his devotion did not bring the outcome he deemed fitting, so he collapsed.

He resisted the sword qi's erosion, subdued the captive resentful spirits trapped in the sword's body, and even awaited the revival of earth vein spiritual energy, successfully stealing earth vein dragon qi to cultivate… yet in the end, he still fell short.

The temple keeper's plight is inevitably sigh-inducing.

Liu Junyan shook his head helplessly and said regretfully: 'You shouldn't have killed people.'

Indeed, the temple keeper's greatest mistake was killing people.

Over twenty people in total were killed and drained by him.

Such a great sin was the final straw that broke him.

"They deserved it!" the temple keeper snarled, "I stayed peacefully underground cultivating; only after a hundred years did I finally await this revival of earth vein dragon qi, yet they chose this moment to barge in, destroying this area's magnetic field, even dreaming of entering the heavenly pit to take its contents for research… they were the ones who ruined my cultivation!"

"I have lost too much; now this sole opportunity is also being destroyed—why? Why must I bear all this?! I refuse!"

From the temple keeper's perspective, he indeed had nothing left to lose.

Thus he panicked and began to actively kill people.

"Is that really the case?" Liu Junyan questioned, "If you killed people merely out of anger and not wanting to be disturbed, why then absorb their essence blood after killing them?"

The temple keeper's gaze toward Liu Junyan instantly grew fiercer, and his murderous aura suddenly intensified.

A single sentence from Liu Junyan pierced his lies and hit his sore spot.

Exactly.

If not intentional, why would one absorb corpses' essence blood after killing?

Such evil cultivator methods are not innate.

Thus it is certain that the temple keeper killed people from the start for cultivation.

Only before, he had not caused such a commotion, nor been caught by his pigtail, so he felt emboldened to try to deceive heaven and earth.

The scheme failed; the temple guard, at his wit's end, drew a dagger and lunged straight at Liu Junyan to kill him.

A chilling ghostly aura hissed as it came.

Liu Junyan, however, grabbed the hilt of the Qingming Sword with one hand, and with a heave pulled the Qingming Sword up from the ground, then immediately swung the blade sideways, slashing outward……