The winter months in Kunlun were bitterly cold, with ice and snow everywhere. Not seeing Xie Zhuo here, I guessed that he had emerged from the time-space rift before me, or perhaps we had landed at different points in time.
The urgent matter at hand was to figure out exactly what time it was now.
My meeting with Xie Zhuo happened on the twelfth day of the second winter month. If Xie Zhuo had come back this time… if I wasn’t mistaken, he probably intended to directly prevent my past self from meeting him, after all…
The last time he said he wanted to kill me, I didn’t take it seriously. Sure enough, I almost drove myself to a dead end. Shouldn’t I have learned my lesson by now?
Before he came this time, he said that it would have been better if he had never met me. So, he must be here to prevent our meeting.
He wanted to sever our connection at its source.
I was just puzzled why Xie Zhuo didn’t directly make time return to this point previously. If he had already decided to kill me, could it be that he still wanted to preserve the memory of our meeting?
Were these memories important to him?
I couldn’t understand him, and I didn’t want to understand him anymore.
I just wanted to quickly resolve this mess Xie Zhuo had created, properly protect my own life, and then return to five hundred years later to live my carefree life as an immortal.
I took a step, intending to find a place where people might still be active in Kunlun during this season. I needed to ask about the time first. As long as I had returned before the twelfth day of the second month, I would still have a chance to stop Xie Zhuo’s next move.
I cast a wind-riding spell to rise from the snow that was half a leg deep. Just as I was about to leave, a small black object brought up from the snow by my wind-riding spell caught my attention.
I picked it up and examined it—wasn’t this the yin-yang fish charm that should have been on Xie Zhuo’s ear!
So Xie Zhuo had indeed arrived here before me!
To shake me off, he had thrown away the communication tool!
He was truly determined to work against me!
Angered, I also reached for my ear, wanting to remove and discard this thing that others didn’t value, but…
The moment I touched my ear, I suddenly remembered something important.
The previous time we returned to five hundred years ago, Xiaxia had initially accidentally entered Xie Zhuo’s Snow Bamboo Courtyard, and I had seen Xiaxia through the reflection in a mirror.
Later, many times, I encountered Xiaxia while she hadn’t yet seen me. We both remained safe under the rule of “king not meeting king.”
It seemed that as long as we didn’t make eye contact in reality, we would both be safe.
Then, if I used this device that Xie Zhuo had modified… could I directly establish contact with Xiaxia!?
Thinking of doing it, I did it…
I immediately grasped the yin-yang fish, cast a wind-riding spell beneath my feet, and flew toward my immortal residence.
Having walked out of the split timeline for the second time, I was no longer as disoriented as before. Once again, I found my way into my immortal residence with familiar ease. At the entrance, I checked the current date—
The eleventh day of the second month…
My meeting with Xie Zhuo will be tomorrow.
I didn’t know what Xie Zhuo was planning to do, but I could only make thorough preparations today to ensure that tomorrow Xiaxia would go to meet Xie Xuanqing.
To rescue him, to protect him, to heal him!
Only by establishing this foundation would Xie Xuanqing later feed Xiaxia that mouthful of blood.
As I approached the courtyard of my residence, my heart began to pound wildly.
It seemed that so far, the me who had traveled through time was still slightly weaker than the me from five hundred years ago.
I perched on the wall and peered inside. By the window, a figure moved about—it was I inside.
I tore off a piece of my clothing, placed the black yin-yang fish inside it, and then wrote six characters using magic: “Do not put on ear.”
Knowing myself as I did, I knew she wouldn’t disobey.
I gathered my energy and directly threw the torn cloth containing the yin-yang fish through the window.
Then I ran away, afraid that Xiaxia might come out curious.
I ran to the Snow Bamboo Forest, found a secluded spot to sit down, and quietly waited for any activity from the earpiece.
Before long, there was a stirring in the wind, and suddenly an image appeared in my mind.
In the image, “I” was sitting at a dressing table. In the bronze mirror, Xiaxia’s face was clearly reflected, showing slight curiosity. She turned her head this way and that, examining the small black fish on her ear.
“What is this? Who sent it? So mysterious.”
I smiled…
I understand myself so well—that’s me for sure.
I raised my hand and tapped my ear.
The wind in the Snow Bamboo Forest blew through my hair, and before my eyes was the quiet scene of bamboo sea and white snow.
“It’s me…”
Xiaxia suddenly gasped and jumped up from her dressing table.
She looked at the bronze mirror, but her gaze gradually became somewhat distant. I knew that she could see the bamboo forest from my side in her mind.
I, too, was looking at my former self in my mind.
It was as if I had met myself in a wonderful sea of time.
I told her, “I am Fu Jiuxia from five hundred years in the future.”
Then the image in my mind went black.
Xiaxia had turned off the connection on her end. But because I hadn’t turned mine off, she should still be able to see the scene in front of me in her mind.
After thinking for a while, to convince her of who I was, I dug a hole on the spot, melted the snow inside into water, and then leaned my head over the water’s surface, letting the clear snow water reflect my face.
“I am you, look.”
After a period of darkness in my mind, the image reappeared. Xiaxia was still sitting at her dressing table.
In my mind was her in the mirror; in her mind was me in the water.
It was magical, like flowers in a mirror and the moon in water.
Only her expression was somewhat silent.
“Xiaxia,” I called her. “To distinguish between you and me, I can only address you this way.” I seriously told her, “Your time is running out…”
“Wait,” she interrupted me. “Aren’t you me from five hundred years in the future? What do you mean my time is running out? Don’t I have at least five hundred years left?”
“Don’t interrupt, listen to me.”
“Fine.” With a solemn face, I sat cross-legged in the Snow Bamboo Forest, using my fingers to gesture and write in the snow, and finally explained to her all about my time travel with Xie Zhuo to break our marriage bond.
Then I told her: “So, tomorrow, you must go save that Xie Xuanqing. No matter if there’s wind or rain, no matter what major event happens in anyone’s home, even if Xi Wang Mu comes to stop you, you must go out, come to the Snow Bamboo Forest, and save him.”
Xiaxia, on the other side, pondered with her chin in her hand for a long time: “I have a question.”
She raised her hand and said, “You, that is, me… I and the demon I’m supposed to meet tomorrow, we were married for five hundred years, and we only held hands and kissed? And then… nothing else?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“How could I have endured that?! No, how could you have endured that? Don’t you know that among the spirits outside, in some mortal places, two years without living together is considered a de facto divorce! Your five hundred years is enough for two hundred and fifty divorces. You endured until now?”
I fell silent…
“What happened in your life?” she asked me. “Tell me, so I can be prepared. This time I absolutely won’t walk down the same path of no return.”
I remained silent for a long time, then sighed dejectedly: “The only change in your life was falling in love with a demon.”
My love for Xie Zhuo was something my past self, who had never met Xie Zhuo, couldn’t understand.
I couldn’t explain why I loved him, but I could describe many small details.
I loved how Xie Zhuo always fulfilled his promises—when he said he would make a bamboo flute, he definitely would.
I loved the cup of water Xie Zhuo handed me when I returned home exhausted from training soldiers. I loved the small snowman Xie Zhuo clumsily yet earnestly built in the snowy courtyard in winter—a snowman of me and him holding my hand.
And many other inexplicable little details…
Like how he could always grasp my hand in time when danger arose, and how his gaze would stay only on my face when he listened to me speak. And the curve I occasionally caught at the corners of his mouth when he watched me laugh, rising involuntarily.
What I loved was that Xie Xuanqing was calm, gentle, yet full of strength.
But these details were eventually worn away by five hundred years of concealment and misunderstanding.
Until now, I was too tired to have any desire to explore his matters further.
Whether he spoke or not, whether he concealed or not, it made no difference anymore.
“I have another question,” Xiaxia dutifully interrupted my wandering thoughts. “This demon you love concealed everything just because it hurts him to speak?”
I remained silent…
Xiaxia continued asking: “Can’t he read? Can’t he write? Do his hands hurt too? The pufferfish spirit performing in the East Market has learned to create paintings by bumping its belly against things. If his hands are impaired, he could use his feet to write. Even if his body is damaged, his will shouldn’t be weakened.”
I couldn’t help but scold my past self: “Xiaxia, use your brain. Did I ever say he concealed so many things from me just because his mouth hurts when he speaks? He could read books to me until I fell asleep. If he truly wanted to explain something to me, I’m afraid he’d find a way to pry open my ears and tell me even if I covered them. He kept things from me, anything at all, simply because he didn’t want to tell me.”
“Then why didn’t he tell you?”
“If I knew that, would I be in this situation today?!”
Xiaxia thought about it and felt that it made sense.
But she still had questions: “That Xie Zhuo said that when he saw you cut the red thread, he felt pain a thousand times worse than speaking, so he wants to kill you?”
“Yes, he said he was in pain, so he thought that if he killed me, perhaps he wouldn’t be in pain anymore.”
Xiaxia cursed: “Is he sick in the head?”
“Haven’t you understood yet? He is sick.”
“If he’s sick, why do you want me to follow the same disastrous path?” Xiaxia reasoned logically. “Look, I haven’t met Xie Xuanqing yet, and Xie Zhuo wants to prevent it, so just let him prevent it! If I don’t meet Xie Xuanqing, we won’t get married, we won’t become an unhappy couple, we won’t divorce, and he won’t kill you.
When you return five hundred years later, you and Xie Zhuo might be two strangers who don’t know each other. How would he still remember to kill you?”
“You’re right, but there’s another possibility.”
“What possibility?”
“Perhaps he prevents you from meeting, feeding blood, and getting married, but when he and I return five hundred years later, he still remembers that I once cut his red thread. The only thing that changes is that I, who is you, this body, no longer has his blood oath.”
Xiaxia seemed frightened by this possibility: “No way, if he prevents the blood feeding, and my body no longer has the blood oath, how could his body still retain the memory of the past?”
“Who knows?” I shrugged. “After all, after returning to the past twice, I still clearly remember everything that happened before. If traveling through time doesn’t damage memories, only changes physical states, then Fu Jiuxia, you and I are thoroughly, without hope.”
Xiaxia swallowed: “Is this possibility high?”
I asked in return: “Do you dare to bet on it?”
She fell silent…
I concluded: “Therefore, having Xie Xuanqing feed you blood is the only way to protect your life and mine.”
Xiaxia thought for a while, then firmly shook her head: “To protect your life and mine, this is not the only way.”
I raised an eyebrow, looking at my five-hundred-year-younger self.
I didn’t believe that after I had eaten five hundred more years’ worth of food, she could be smarter than me.
She spoke: “Kill Xie Zhuo, solve it once and for all.”
Yes, Xie Zhuo couldn’t kill me, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t kill him.
Xiaxia might not be as clever as me, but when it came to dealing with Xie Zhuo, she was truly more ruthless than I was.
But I had to remind her: “Have you forgotten? The story begins with a snow wolf demon blocking all Kunlun immortals, single-handedly stealing the Pangu Fu, and opening up time and space.”
I asked Xiaxia, “You haven’t even passed your ascension tribulation yet. How could you kill him?”
Xiaxia thought for a moment: “Come, let’s talk about what I should do when I meet Xie Xuanqing tomorrow.”
While we couldn’t see eye to eye on matters of the heart, when it came to survival, we easily reached an agreement.
Xiaxia also emphasized to me: “This time, I only guarantee the result. I absolutely won’t let myself fall in love. Jiu Xia.”
She addressed me thus, “I won’t walk the same path as you.”
I blessed her: “I hope so.”
Author’s note: I’ve revised a detail, as follows—
“Haven’t you understood yet? He is sick.”
“If he’s sick, why do you want me to follow the same disastrous path?” Xiaxia reasoned logically. “Look, I haven’t met Xie Xuanqing yet, and Xie Zhuo wants to prevent it, so just let him prevent it! If I don’t meet Xie Xuanqing, we won’t get married, we won’t become an unhappy couple, we won’t divorce, and he won’t kill you.
When you return five hundred years later, you and Xie Zhuo might be two strangers who don’t know each other. How would he still remember to kill you?”
“You’re right, but there’s another possibility.”
“What possibility?”
“Perhaps he prevents you from meeting, feeding blood, and getting married, but when he and I return five hundred years later, he still remembers that I once cut his red thread. The only thing that changes is that I, who is you, this body, no longer has his blood oath.”
Xiaxia seemed frightened by this possibility: “No way, if he prevents the blood feeding, and my body no longer has the blood oath, how could his body still retain the memory of the past?”
“Who knows?” I shrugged. “After all, after returning to the past twice, I still clearly remember everything that happened before. If traveling through time doesn’t damage memories, only changes physical states, then Fu Jiuxia, you and I are thoroughly, without hope.”
Xiaxia swallowed: “Is this possibility high?”
I asked in return: “Do you dare to bet on it?”
She fell silent…
I concluded: “Therefore, having Xie Xuanqing feed you blood is the only way to protect your life and mine.”