As the morning sun rose, the small town on the outskirts of Wan Xian Hui began to bustle with activity. Perhaps it shouldn’t be called a small town anymore. The catastrophe caused by the Sea Calamity 400 years ago wasn’t as devastating as imagined, with Guang Sheng Hui being the most severely affected area near the Hai Pai.
After the Sea Calamity ended, with the approval of many sect leaders from Hai Pai, Wan Xian Hui, being the closest to Guang Sheng Hui, accepted some of its disciples and surrounding towns. The once-small town of Wan Xian Hui, limited by its unique terrain, gradually flourished. Today, the outskirts of Wan Xian Hui have become one of the great cities of the Eastern Sea, rivaling Yang Pu City, and frequently trading with the Central Plains inland.
Li Fei adjusted the floral scarf on her head. She had used an illusion technique to disguise herself as an ordinary village girl. Beside her, Lei Xiuyuan once again played the role of a rugged peasant. Ri Yan had shrunk to the size of a thumb and was dangling from Li Fei’s waist belt as an ornament. Its tiny green bean eyes darted around, exclaiming, “How it has changed! It’s completely unrecognizable!”
Li Fei whispered, “Ri Yan, lower your voice. How would we explain if someone hears you? We’ll be discovered.”
“So what if we’re discovered? What are you afraid of?” Ri Yan rolled its eyes fiercely.
Li Fei patiently explained, “I’m here to absorb spiritual energy, not to fight. Besides, Xiuyuan wants to see the Central Plains, and didn’t you want to capture some rare demon beasts? How can we do that if we’re discovered by the Central Plains cultivators?”
‘Why not just kill them all?’ Ri Yan thought but didn’t say it aloud. It knew that asking Li Fei to slaughter all the Central Plains cultivators was unrealistic. What’s more annoying was that Lei Xiuyuan never took its side, making, the elder, seem like a troublemaker in front of these two youngsters.
“I wonder if we’ll see Ge Lin and Lu Li,” Li Fei mused as she casually walked, curiously observing the new Wan Xian Hui town. It had changed so much that she couldn’t recognize where Bai Li Ge Lin’s small courtyard used to be.
It had only been 400 years since the last Sea Calamity, and the Central Plains hadn’t made any preparations for the next one. The overall atmosphere was unusually relaxed and carefree. She shouldn’t have sneaked into the Central Plains at this time, but back on Ju Ying Island, Ri Yan kept nagging her to open a Small Thousand World to store corpses. After all, a Small Thousand World was much more practical than Lei Xiuyuan digging underground chambers. So she chose a bronze mirror and, following Ri Yan’s instructions spent a considerable amount of spiritual energy to create a Small Thousand World.
Then came the task of healing Lei Xiuyuan. He had been injured by the Heavenly Thunder and Fire Sea, and despite sleeping for hundreds of years, he hadn’t fully recovered. Healing a Yaksha and reattaching his broken horn consumed a lot of her spiritual energy. Li Fei once again felt her body craving for spiritual energy.
The sparse spiritual energy overseas couldn’t satisfy her. With no other choice, the three of them discussed and decided to secretly come to the Central Plains. Calculating the time, only 400 years had passed, so the Central Plains probably hadn’t made any preparations. It was a good opportunity to come back and see old friends in secret. Lei Xiuyuan and Ri Yan were the types to leave at a moment’s notice, so Li Fei boldly swallowed the Heavenly Thunder and Fire Sea and flew towards the Central Plains she hadn’t seen in 400 years.
She felt a bit uncertain. Time flowed differently between the overseas and the Central Plains. For her and Lei Xiuyuan, 400 years had passed in sleep, and past events felt like yesterday. But for her friends, each moment of those 400 years had been lived through realistically. The passion of their youth probably seemed laughable now.
Sensing a gaze fixed on her, Li Fei turned her head and met Lei Xiuyuan’s eyes. She smiled slightly, “What is it? First time seeing me disguised as a village girl?”
Lei Xiuyuan slowly shook his head, observing her seemingly nonchalant appearance, and said in a low voice, “Are you alright? That Heavenly Thunder and Fire Sea.”
The Central Plains and the overseas were separated by the Heavenly Thunder and Fire Sea, a terrifying natural barrier that would kill ordinary people with just a touch. But he had seen her fly into it, and in no time, all that Heavenly Thunder and Fire Sea had entered her body. Yet she could still joke around as if nothing had happened.
Li Fei patted her chest, “To say I’m fine wouldn’t be entirely true, but compared to last time, it’s within my tolerance. I’ve hidden them here in my chest for now. When we go back, I’ll release them, and it’ll be fine.”
Ri Yan suddenly cried out strangely, “So there’s no Heavenly Thunder and Fire Sea now?! Does that mean people from overseas can come and go as they please, and people from the Central Plains can leave whenever they want?!”
“Probably,” Li Fei was still patting her chest. “Didn’t the Central Plains and overseas have exchanges before? I think it must have been after swallowing the Heavenly Thunder and Fire Sea with the Jian Mu fruit and driving away the fierce beasts and demons lingering on the sea that they could communicate. This time we’re a hundred years early, and the sea hasn’t been taken in by Gui Xu… This is good, isn’t it? For the Central Plains, not having the Sea Calamity every 500 years is a good thing, right?”
Her hand was suddenly grasped by Lei Xiuyuan. He glanced at her chest with seeming disdain and said flatly, “Stop patting, the more you pat, the flatter it gets.”
“You… what did you say…” Li Fei stared at him wide-eyed, wondering if she had heard wrong.
Lei Xiuyuan smiled, “I didn’t say anything. Let’s go.”
Fine! This was the second time! She hadn’t forgotten, back at the academy when he was still a little brat, he had already very impolitely noticed her figure!
Li Fei glared at him fiercely, but her hand remained naturally held in his as they walked one behind the other on the street. To onlookers, they appeared to be nothing more than an ordinary newly-wed couple from the countryside.
“Ah, that slope,” Li Fei finally spotted a familiar sight. Dozens of miles down the slope was the sparkling water of the Eastern Sea. Once, the six of them had drunk at a tavern behind the slope, all getting thoroughly drunk. “And that inn, Xiuyuan, do you remember?”
She pointed to a particularly tall building in the distance. After hundreds of years, it couldn’t possibly still be the original inn. It must have been renovated countless times, with more floors than before and more gaudy, bright colors. Numerous tamed demon beasts still lingered above it. Back then, when she got drunk, it was Lei Xiuyuan who carried her back to the inn. The memories were vivid.
Lei Xiuyuan squinted and looked for a long while, then slowly shook his head. To say he had no impression of this place at all wouldn’t be true. He vaguely felt familiar with it – the taste of the wind, the smell of the sea. He should have been here before, but he couldn’t remember anything more specific.
“It’s alright. After I’ve absorbed enough spiritual energy, let’s sneak into Wu Yue Ting. We can also see Hu She Feng where Master used to live. Oh, and we can go to the academy, and the small courtyard at the foot of Xing Zheng Guan Mountain where you used to live, though I don’t know what it looks like after so much time…”
Li Fei was recounting the many places of memory in the Central Plains like a tour guide, but before she could finish, her mouth was covered by Lei Xiuyuan. He frowned, “Are you so eager for me to remember?”
She removed his hand and grinned, “Didn’t you say it doesn’t matter whether you remember or not? You’re still the same person, so what’s the difference?”
“You’ve become quite glib,” he pinched her face. As the saying goes, one takes on the color of one’s company. He had probably brought this upon himself. This girl had lost her former naivety after spending time with him.
Ri Yan coughed impatiently twice, “If you two want to be intimate, do it in your room tonight! What are you doing in broad daylight?! Both of you, control yourselves! Look over there! Don’t you feel a strong spiritual energy fluctuation?”
Does even a bit of joking count as intimacy?! Li Fei was exasperated. This fox was getting better and better at seeking attention. She looked in the direction Ri Yan was pointing and saw that in the part of the city near the sea, there was a space. It was surrounded by a thick network of spiritual energy, covering an area of about one li. Within the spiritual energy network stood a huge object several zhang high, covered with black cloth, its true form indiscernible.
Li Fei’s heart suddenly stirred. She looked around at the scenery and said, “Is that… the Spirit Stele I left behind?”
That day, she had engraved her master’s decades of overseas experiences on the Spirit Stele and left it for the various sects of the Central Plains. She never imagined its ultimate fate would be to be sealed away like this. If she remembered correctly, weren’t countless cultivators in the Central Plains once very curious and longing for the overseas?
Ri Yan sneered, “They all treated the overseas as a treasure trove! If what you left behind is so tempting, and everyone saw it, they’d all develop a desire to go overseas. How would those sect leaders and so-called immortals at the top handle that? What benefits would they get? Moreover, after the Sea Calamity had raged for so many years, you suddenly left this thing telling people that overseas isn’t what they thought. Who could accept that? How to deal with people’s restlessness? Sticking to the old ways is much easier than innovation! How convenient to just seal it away!”
Li Fei couldn’t help but fall silent. The complexity and fickleness of human hearts was something she indeed hadn’t fully considered. She had left this stele too early. Even though her master’s life’s work was made public, it still suffered 400 years of suppression. The Spirit Stele was like an untasted fruit that looked incredibly tempting. For 400 years, no one dared to try it. They looked at it, and sealed it, leaving this karmic cause for future generations.
“…Let’s go down and take a look,” she lightly jumped down from the slope and quickly walked towards the Spirit Stele.
This huge stele, shrouded in black cloth and a spiritual energy network, seemed to have become a famous sight on the outskirts of Wan Xian Hui. Early in the morning, many people were already gathered around, looking at it nonstop. Some locals were even making up stories about the Spirit Stele’s origins to impress the onlookers.
Li Fei even heard someone say it was a divine stone that fell from the sky 400 years ago. She didn’t know whether to laugh or cry as she turned her head, wanting to see who was spouting such nonsense. With people moving chaotically in front of her, she suddenly caught sight of a familiar graceful figure. The girl had her back to her, wearing the disciple robes of the Eastern Sea’s Wan Xian Hui, revealing a snow-white, slender waist. Her long hair cascaded down her back like a waterfall.
Li Fei’s whole body trembled, and she involuntarily called out, “Ge Lin!”
The people around her turned to look at this village girl, wondering who she was calling. But that girl didn’t turn around. She had her arms folded and seemed very interested in those messy stories, listening intently.
Li Fei squeezed through the crowd and lightly tapped her shoulder, calling again, “Ge Lin.”