Su Zhuyi now had Golden Core cultivation. She wanted to leave for a few days to walk around and see the place where she was born.
Originally, disciples of the Gujian Sect could go down the mountain for training after reaching the Golden Core stage. Seeing her determination, Sect Master Duan Linshu discussed with several elders for a while and agreed, only instructing her to act carefully and pay attention to safety.
The sect master also took out an ancient, simple, small sword about a finger’s length and handed it to her. “This is a high-grade communication talisman that disciples of our Gujian Sect carry with them. If you encounter danger, inject a wisp of spiritual energy into it, or directly crush it, and nearby Gujian Sect disciples will sense it and come to help. We will also send people over as quickly as possible.”
Su Zhuyi knew about that thing. Many righteous sects had them. In her previous life, she had studied this for a long time and finally succeeded in intercepting such communication talismans using Exquisite Golden Silk Nets and formation arrays. In other words, if those prestigious sect disciples who were alone were targeted by her, they might not have time to send messages, or simply couldn’t send out distress signals at all.
She hadn’t expected that she would also be able to get such a unique communication talisman.
“Your storage magic treasure was lost in the Sword Tomb, right?” The sect master said while scanning around. Yi Lian, who was seen by him, shook his head vigorously, “I only have a spirit beast pouch.”
Elder Qiu took out a small pouch and handed it to her. “This is what I used when I was young. Even after I changed to a higher-grade magic treasure, I’ve always carefully preserved it. I’ll give it to you.”
The pouch had exquisite embroidery work, with a pair of intertwined branches embroidered on it, and below the intertwined branches were a pair of mandarin ducks playing in water. When Elder Qiu looked at the pouch, his expression was somewhat melancholy. There must have been a story behind it, but since she had taken it out, Su Zhuyi wasn’t polite and accepted it.
Next, several elders each contributed some things. Even Yi Lian generously offered to give the Golden Sparrow on his shoulder to Su Zhuyi. Su Zhuyi accepted everything else but refused the Golden Sparrow. Anyone could see that bird wasn’t anything good, and right now she just wanted to be alone and quiet, not wanting to deal with any spirit creatures at all.
After collecting some spirit stones and pills, Su Zhuyi left Sword Mountain alone.
The elders didn’t give her a flying magic treasure, and she didn’t mention it either. Now wanting to call out the Broken Sword for sword flying to Yongan Town, she found that the sword master completely ignored her, so she could only circulate her mental technique and fly by stepping on treetops all the way. After flying for three whole days, she gradually saw signs of human habitation. After another half day, she entered a small cultivation town, spent spirit stones to buy a mid-grade flying magic treasure and a set of fresh goose-yellow clothes, and only continued her journey after changing out of her golden silk soft armor.
By the time she was about to reach Yongan Town, the results of this Sword Tomb expedition had also come out, and the news seemed to take wings, quickly spreading throughout the world. In just a few days, everyone knew about it.
In this Sword Tomb sword-seeking expedition, two immortal swords appeared in total, obtained by Su Zhuyi of the Gujian Sect and Qin Chuan of the Yunxiao Sect, respectively.
Among them, Su Zhuyi’s immortal sword was named Songfeng, and Qin Chuan’s immortal sword was named Bixie. With these two peerless good swords coming into the world, those demonic cultivators and evil cultivators under heaven definitely wouldn’t dare to come out and harm people anymore!
Su Zhuyi flew somewhat tiredly along the way. She gradually passed through those areas rich in spiritual energy and approached mortal towns.
In mortal towns, there was much less spiritual energy between heaven and earth. She didn’t have many spirit stones and pills on her, and Su Zhuyi wasn’t in a hurry, so she simply didn’t fly so desperately but walked and stopped along the way, taking the opportunity to gather some information.
On this day, she was resting briefly in Fuquan Town, which was still a thousand li away from Yongan Town. While sitting in a roadside pavilion drinking tea, she saw a group of children playing. Each of them held a long wooden stick in their hands, treating it as a flying sword and waving it around, chanting words.
“Monster, take my sword!” A child still with a runny nose thrust out the wooden stick in his hand, “Bixie sword emerges, evil spirits retreat!”
Oh, the news spread quite fast. Even in such a remote, small town, mortal children knew about the Bixie sword.
The child playing the monster had smeared mud on his face to make a big painted face, and was now baring his teeth at them. His movements were agile as he dodged left and right, actually not getting stabbed yet. At this time, another girl child shouted delicately, “Qin Chuan, you’re no good. Watch my Songfeng sword technique!”
Su Zhuyi raised her eyelids and looked at the girl child, immediately tugging at the corner of her mouth somewhat speechlessly. If they were going to play her, Su Zhuyi, couldn’t they find someone who looked a bit better?
The girl child had dark skin and two red spots on her cheeks. She was now thrusting the wooden stick in her hand horizontally, smacking the hand of the child playing the monster with a “pa” sound. The little monster shouted, “You wait, I’ll call Corpse King grandpa to deal with you.”
“We have immortal swords in our hands, so we’re not afraid even if the Corpse King comes!” As the words fell, a child wearing black clothes, stepping on a hemp sack, with yellow paper stuck to his forehead, hopped over. He opened his mouth wide and roared angrily, “I’m going to eat you all…”
But before the two children with immortal swords could make a move, they heard an angry shout from an adult not far away, “Stop playing, stop playing. What if you anger that guy?”
Only children didn’t understand and weren’t afraid. The world hadn’t been peaceful recently, and they heard that several places had corpses rising from the dead. The one who stopped the children was a middle-aged man. After seeing Su Zhuyi sitting in the tea pavilion, he hesitated for a moment, then approached her.
“Are you an immortal cultivator?” This woman wore a yellow shirt with her face covered by a veil, sitting quietly in the tea pavilion. Though her face couldn’t be seen, those eyes were extremely lively and looked quite heart-stirring.
Of course, he didn’t dare to look too much, only stealing a glance.
The weather was already somewhat hot, and everyone was covered in sweat, but around this woman, there seemed to be a breeze. The closer one got, the cooler it felt. He was certain in his heart that she should also be an immortal cultivator, but she didn’t have any magic treasures or weapons in her hands, so he didn’t know what her actual strength was.
When he reached Su Zhuyi’s front, he directly knelt down and respectfully kowtowed three times before saying, “Immortal fairy, did you come because of the recent zombie attacks in the nearby areas?”
There had already been several zombie killings in two small towns around Fuquan Town.
Fuquan Town hadn’t had any yet, but everyone was worried in their hearts. Yesterday, they had sent people to invite a Taoist priest from Qingfeng Temple. The priest hadn’t come yet, but an immortal fairy had arrived, which made him extremely happy.
Zombie killings?
Su Zhuyi glanced at him indifferently. “Speak.”
Now they were almost near Yongan Town and Changning Village. If it were about zombie killings, she wondered if it might be related to Zhang Enning.
If Zhang Enning had subdued the old tree, then his current strength shouldn’t be too weak. There was no reason for him to still be here, killing ordinary mortals. Could it be that Zhang Enning had also taken disciples and planned to establish a sect?
That one glance made the middle-aged man’s bones turn cold. The delicate-looking fairy’s gaze was so cold, as if being looked at by her once immersed his whole body in a winter ice river, with coldness growing in his bone cracks. Could this be a demonic cultivator?
He touched his forehead and felt a handful of cold sweat, as if all his body hair was standing on end. He said tremblingly and stutteringly, “It was about four years ago. Yongan Town had a very terrible family extermination case. The most horrifying thing was that after one night, all those corpses disappeared, so it caused quite a stir. After that family extermination case, strange things happened every year. One or two people would die mysteriously on the road each year. Although everyone was afraid, since several years had passed, they gradually forgot about it. But recently, there have been several zombie killing incidents, and one person who didn’t die at the time came back and said he saw members of the Su family who died four years ago, so everyone became panicked.”
“Although we’re still a thousand li away from Yongan Town, that’s not far for those zombies. Everyone is quite worried, afraid the zombies will come here, so we wanted to invite a Taoist priest down the mountain to exorcise evil spirits. We didn’t expect to encounter a fairy traveling here. Please save us, fairy.” Although afraid and puzzled in his heart, he still called her a fairy several times.
After all, if she were a demonic cultivator, she probably wouldn’t have listened to him say so much. This place was so remote, with no spiritual energy or treasures – demonic cultivators wouldn’t even bother to come!
Calling her “fairy” again and again made Su Zhuyi quite sick to her stomach.
However, the information this person just mentioned delighted Su Zhuyi. She had originally planned to inquire about the Su family of Yongan Town, and now she didn’t need to investigate – the information had been delivered to her door automatically.
The Su family of Yongan Town had indeed been exterminated. She hadn’t taken action, yet the Su family had still been destroyed at that time. Who could have done it?
Was it Zhang Enning, or Su Qingxun, or perhaps it had nothing to do with either of them?
But regardless, the Su family members were still dead. She had been disgusted by that family in her previous life, and now she didn’t have to take action herself – this group of scourges had been resolved. Only Su Zhuyi, hearing this news, couldn’t feel happy in her heart.
The Heavenly Dao above truly had some methods that made people shudder.
All the countless beings under heaven were chess pieces in its hands. How could she escape this predetermined fate and jump outside the Heavenly Dao?
…
Changning Village.
So many years had passed since the destruction of Changning Village. Deep wild grass had grown on that wasteland, with some wild beasts hiding in the tall grass, waiting for opportunities to strike.
Zhang Enning held an old, broken bell in his hand, walking while shaking the bell. Two people followed behind him – these two were the best living corpses he had refined so far. From the surface, they could no longer be seen as corpses.
They looked very normal and walked quite nimbly. Except for their faces being a bit pale and their lips slightly red, there wasn’t much difference from ordinary living people.
These two people, one male and one female, and that female zombie was Liu Zhen, the female disciple from Feihong Sect who had broken the Longquan Sword’s seal back then.
Zhang Enning walked to where the old tree used to stand. Now there was a big pit there, and because it had rained for several days, the pit had accumulated water and looked like a small pond.
He stood by the pond, shaking the bell while laughing. His smile looked somewhat sinister, and he said, “Su Zhuyi got the Songfeng sword.”
“Qin Chuan got the Bixie sword.”
The three people who had caught jumping corpses together back then had changed quite dramatically now.
“Su Zhuyi…” Mentioning this name again, a flame appeared in Zhang Enning’s eyes, and within that flame was undisguised hatred.
You knew that something would happen to Changning Village soon. Why, why didn’t you give a warning, but only tell the old tree? That old tree’s intelligence was too low. It wasn’t until much later, until after things had already happened and couldn’t be reversed, that he found out Su Zhuyi had predicted Changning Village’s destruction in advance.
If he had known in advance, his mother wouldn’t have been harmed…