Elder Yi and Elder Mei were severely wounded.
Su Zhuyi’s spiritual energy was exhausted. The urgent priority was to find a safe place to hide and heal their wounds.
“The secret realm has many spirit beasts, and the bloody smell here is too strong. We must leave this place as soon as possible.” Yi Lian was so weak that even speaking was difficult. The Golden Sparrow on his shoulder was also sickly, with one wing broken and its head drooping weakly, speaking listlessly.
Find a safe place?
The safest place in this secret realm was naturally the Rebirth Valley. Su Zhuyi gestured for Elder Yi and Elder Mei to board the spirit boat. After she spoke, Elder Mei said, “This spirit boat is an immortal artifact. With your spiritual energy exhausted, you probably can’t drive it forward.”
Flying magical treasures didn’t require continuous infusion of spiritual energy to fly—most had levitation arrays and energy-gathering arrays that consumed spirit stones. But they still needed cultivators to steer them, which required divine consciousness and spiritual energy. Although not much was needed, Su Zhuyi’s current condition was complete spiritual energy exhaustion, and she couldn’t recover quickly. They couldn’t help either. Using the spirit boat would be very difficult, and this spirit boat made too much noise, which would instead expose their position.
“I have a way,” Su Zhuyi said.
She sat on the spirit boat. Seeing her insistence, Elder Yi also got on, and Elder Mei, after slight hesitation, ultimately followed onto the spirit boat. After the three of them got on, the Dong Fushang Sect’s Li Shan suddenly rushed over. Su Zhuyi thought she wanted to seek help and coldly glanced at her.
A middle Gold Core stage female cultivator carrying a newborn small qilin would probably find it very difficult to survive in this secret realm.
Not killing her was already the utmost benevolence. Now she still had the face to come asking for help?
Su Zhuyi’s gaze was cold. When she looked over like this, her soul pressure directly pressed down on that female cultivator, who immediately couldn’t take another step forward. Her face turned deathly pale, and her hands holding the small qilin were trembling. Just then, the small qilin in her arms seemed to sense the pressure and uncomfortably nuzzled a few times, then raised its head to bare its teeth at Su Zhuyi. However, it had no teeth, so after baring its “teeth” twice, it blew a bubble from its mouth that popped with a soft sound.
With this light sound, Li Shan felt the pressure around her body weaken considerably. She extended both hands forward, holding out the small qilin in her arms, nervously saying, “Senior, this qilin was just born. I… I’m afraid I can’t keep it alive. Could… could I entrust it to you?”
A newborn qilin cub would attract many powerful spirit beasts. Li Shan knew she couldn’t protect it. She also didn’t know how to get food for it, but she knew that Elder Yi of the Gujian Sect was very knowledgeable about spirit beasts. During the battle, he had summoned spirit beasts to help, and there was still a small Golden Sparrow standing on his shoulder.
He should know how to raise a qilin cub, right?
Su Zhuyi hadn’t expected this Dong Fushang Sect female cultivator to seek her out not for herself, but for the small qilin in her arms.
An auspicious qilin beast delivered to her door—how could she not take it? Su Zhuyi reached out to grab it, but…
That small qilin directly scratched her hand with its claw.
Pan Siji had said qilins were close to kind people. Su Zhuyi’s hand didn’t even have a scratch mark, but in her heart, she still let out a cold laugh.
Su Zhuyi’s physical body was now formidable, and the small qilin was very weak. One scratch didn’t break her skin, but instead broke its tender nail. It curled up with its paw retracted, and the green bead it had been holding in its mouth fell out. Saliva dripped down, and there were two water bubbles in its eyes.
It had scratched Su Zhuyi once, didn’t hurt Su Zhuyi, but ended up crying itself. Li Shan steeled her heart and tried to push it outward, wanting to send it onto the spirit boat, but it kept shrinking into her arms, even burying its head under her arm.
Pan Siji said, “This small qilin that was just born is indeed not easy to keep alive.”
Su Zhuyi thought for a moment, glanced at that Dong Fushang Sect female cultivator, and said, “Come up.”
Keeping this female cultivator was also fine. When she went to hunt down the remaining Dong Fushang Sect cultivators, if other sects interfered, keeping this female cultivator would be like keeping a witness. The Dong Fushang Sect had attacked and killed first—she was merely retaliating.
Li Shan was stunned, then thanked her and tremblingly boarded the spirit boat. After getting on, she didn’t dare move, just silently huddled in a corner, her emotions churning, unable to calm down. She was a Dong Fushang Sect cultivator. The Gujian Sect had killed so many Dong Fushang Sect people, yet now she was seeking protection from Gujian Sect cultivators.
Holding the small qilin, Li Shan huddled motionlessly in the corner. She had no relatives left, her master at the Dong Fushang Sect had also perished, and she wasn’t close to other fellow disciples. Now, she would be an ungrateful villain, as long as she could preserve the small qilin.
After Su Zhuyi had people board the spirit boat, she didn’t pay attention to them anymore. She called for Pan Siji to help and take them back to the Rebirth Valley.
She saw Pan Siji reach out and pick up the spirit boat made from green leaf illusions. He had caught a primordial spirit in one hand, was still gripping his axe in the other hand, and holding the leaf was inconvenient. After thinking, Pan Siji let down a loop of the large braid coiled around his neck, then inserted the leaf stem into the braid.
So, although the spirit boat was tilted to one side, looking like it was about to capsize, it flipped very steadily, just hanging on the braid and moving forward.
Elder Yi and the others, who had originally been sitting at the bow, also rolled to the stern, leaning against the leaf stem position and sitting together with that Dong Fushang Sect female cultivator. Su Zhuyi stood on the leaf tip. She said, “We’ll return to the Rebirth Valley first.”
“Are those pets you plan to raise?” Pan Siji asked curiously. In his eyes, human cultivators and spirit beasts weren’t much different. Probably, human cultivators just looked slightly more like them, similar to how humans viewed spirit monkeys?
Su Zhuyi: “…”
What else could she say? If she wanted to bring people in, she could only acknowledge it now.
“Mm.” Su Zhuyi responded, swept her divine consciousness over those three “pets,” and silently twitched the corner of her mouth.
After returning to the Rebirth Valley, Su Zhuyi ran to the edge of the Rebirth Pond to take a look.
She couldn’t contact Qin Jianglan now.
Originally, she had planned to put Mei Ruhua’s primordial spirit into the Liuguang Mirror. That way, she could live in the Liuguang Mirror and perhaps still have a chance for reincarnation.
It was just that Qin Jianglan was still in the Rebirth Pond now. His strength was formidable, and who knew when he would emerge from the water?
Seeing that she couldn’t contact Qin Jianglan, Su Zhuyi was about to begin sitting in meditation to cultivate. Her purpose this time was to send the two injured elders back to the valley to heal, conveniently deliver Mei Ruhua’s primordial spirit to the Liuguang Mirror, and, after resting briefly herself, continue going out to kill people and seize treasures.
Su Zhuyi’s strength had greatly increased now, so she didn’t need Pan Siji to back her up anymore. Just by herself, she could eliminate that rabble from the Dong Fushang Sect one by one.
However, just as she sat down, she saw Pan Siji approaching with a bitter face. He squatted in front of Su Zhuyi, still feeling the height wasn’t right, so he simply lay on the ground with his chin on the earth, extending his hand in front of Su Zhuyi with his five fingers still curved, saying miserably, “I’m holding that primordial spirit in my hand! What do we do now?”
Find a soul weapon to contain it?
But they didn’t have any. Soul weapons themselves were difficult to craft, and were completely useless to them, so not only did they not have any, no one knew how to make them. Unfortunately, after Su Zhuyi returned, she seemed to have forgotten about this small primordial spirit. His heart was anxious, so he could only ask, “How much longer do I have to hold it?”
It was just a small bit of primordial spirit, but holding it in his palm felt like holding a hot potato. Mainly because his strength was too great—he was worried about accidentally crushing it.
“Hold it until that other companion emerges from the Rebirth Pond.”
Su Zhuyi opened her eyes and saw the Pangu lying in front of her, just like a coiled dragon not far away. His head was like a small hill. As she sat there, mountains suddenly appeared before her eyes, immediately making her feel some pressure.
“Wouldn’t that mean waiting hundreds or thousands of years?” Pan Siji said in shock, his voice involuntarily becoming louder, the vibration nearly making Su Zhuyi spit up blood.
“It takes that long?” She was too lazy to wait. Besides, in three to five years, the overlapping star tracks would separate again, and they would be sent out of the ancient secret realm. What would happen then? Even though she had rolled around in the Rebirth Pond, she essentially wasn’t a creature of this place and would still be expelled, right?
“Right, I’ve never encountered someone emerging as quickly as you before.” He wasn’t certain either. After all, it had been a long time since any companions had been reborn, and he’d never seen one so weak. He didn’t even remember who she was, and she didn’t remember either…
Each reincarnation caused the primordial spirit to collapse. He had lost too many memories.
Pan Siji lay there, his heart aching. He unconsciously felt that the companion still soaking in the Rebirth Pond was probably the last member of the Pangu clan who could successfully reincarnate.
“I used to be quite smart,” Pan Siji suddenly murmured.
Su Zhuyi: “…”
She didn’t know why Pan Siji would suddenly say such a thing out of nowhere, but sensing that he seemed unhappy, Su Zhuyi smoothly replied, “You’re still quite smart and capable now.”
“That’s right.” Pan Siji nodded, then returned to the previous question. “This primordial spirit, why do we have to wait until he comes out?” As he spoke, he turned his head to look at the Rebirth Pond.
“You know about the Liuguang Mirror, right? The Quicksand River.” Su Zhuyi didn’t hide anything. After all, she had discussed with Qin Jianglan before and had some ideas about the giants’ Rebirth Pond.
“When Pangu split heaven and earth, his body and blood became all things in heaven and earth. Among them, the Quicksand River and Jianmu Tree were the strongest spiritual objects at that time. The Quicksand River later transformed into the Liuguang Mirror, and the Liuguang Mirror can preserve primordial spirits from decay.”
Originally it couldn’t, but Qin Jianglan had gained the Liuguang Mirror’s recognition. After he planned to establish the path of reincarnation, he could control the Liuguang Mirror, making it so the Liuguang Mirror wouldn’t absorb certain people’s primordial spirits anymore. In the very beginning, Qin Jianglan’s primordial spirit would also be weakened by the Liuguang Mirror.
“Quicksand River, that sounds somewhat familiar.” Pan Siji appeared somewhat happy. “Can it work? Can our primordial spirits also go in?” Their giant clan was too powerful and had never found anywhere that could accommodate their primordial spirits, except for the Rebirth Pond.
“I don’t know. We’ll find out when he comes out. The Liuguang Mirror is with him.” Su Zhuyi smiled. “Tell me, if it can accommodate your primordial spirits, wouldn’t that mean you wouldn’t have to dissipate during future rebirths?”
The remaining giants would have another form of eternal life, wouldn’t they?
Whether he believed it or not, Su Zhuyi still painted a grand picture for Pan Siji and his kind. Their clan’s numbers were getting fewer and fewer, and their primordial spirits were getting weaker each time. Perhaps before long, they would face extinction. But if they could enter the Liuguang Mirror, there was a possibility of preservation.
“Alright then, I just need to protect her until that companion comes out, right?” Pan Siji looked at the weak primordial spirit in his palm and sighed quietly. With this thing in his hand, doing anything would be inconvenient. However, since he had promised to help, he couldn’t go back on his word and had to do it well.
He just hoped that person could come out earlier, but if he came out too early, he might not be able to break through the lotus. It was worrying. Just as he was lost in random thoughts, a voice said, “He’s out, he’s out, he’s surfaced!”
Su Zhuyi turned her head to look and saw another lotus flower surface on the water, swaying slightly twice.
The lake water was azure blue, and the white lotus on the surface was like jade, glowing faintly in the sunlight. The moment the lotus appeared, several giants suddenly appeared—Su Zhuyi didn’t even know where they had been hiding just now.
“He’s out.”
“Such a small one.”
“A tiny bit bigger than the previous one.”
The giants looked at the white lotus in the lake and discussed animatedly.
Su Zhuyi also stood up. She jumped onto Pan Siji’s shoulder and went with him to the lakeside.
She watched the lotus in the center of the lake from afar, her heart slightly filled with anticipation. That person was someone she had loved. If not for the Qing Gu, she would still love him.
Old Dog Qin had come out.
He surely wouldn’t be unable to break through the white lotus, would he?