The moonlight fell cold upon me as Xie Zhuo’s arms held me tightly. I could feel his struggle and trembling.

I didn’t know how he would view this embrace once he regained clarity, nor did I know how to explain to him why I, who had proposed our separation, didn’t resist this embrace—I didn’t even know how to explain it to myself.

But I decided that in this moment, if I felt no desire to resist, I would simply immerse myself in it.

Just when I thought this embrace would last until Xie Zhuo calmed down…

Suddenly!

Xie Zhuo’s arms tightened violently around me. I froze, feeling as if he had “uprooted” me completely!

My feet left the ground. Still in a daze, I found myself being thrown behind him.

I landed sitting on the ground, my mind blank, staring up blankly at Xie Zhuo in front of me. He stood with his back to me, positioned defensively before me, with ribbon-like black mist emanating from his entire body.

“You…” Before I could voice my question, a beam of light suddenly struck the barrier in front of Xie Zhuo! With a thunderous “boom,” the barrier that I hadn’t been able to break shattered instantly.

The residual force of the spell swept across, forcing me to turn my head to avoid its power. A heavy piece of broken metal followed the shockwave, brushing right past my ear—had I not turned my head, my ear might have been sliced off.

With lingering fear, I looked ahead.

A familiar figure emerged from the moonlight outside the cave. I narrowed my eyes, hardly believing what I saw: “Wu Cheng!?”

This iron-headed fool? When did he acquire such power? And that piece of metal earlier…

I turned my head to look and discovered it was Wu Cheng’s immortal weapon. He had used this thing to smash the barrier? I found it strange—my instinct told me this fool wasn’t the type to act this way.

“Jiu Xia!” Yet Wu Cheng appeared normal. He stood furiously at the cave entrance, confronting Xie Zhuo. “We’ve been searching for you for days, never imagining you’d be here in the Snow Bamboo Forest, colluding with evil spirits!”

I looked at Xie Zhuo, who was surrounded by black mist, appearing no different from an evil spirit. Unable to explain, I simply dusted off my backside and stood up, intending to walk out from behind Xie Zhuo. “How did you get here?” I asked as I walked.

As I reached Xie Zhuo’s side, his mist-enveloped hand blocked my path.

“Don’t go over there…”

I turned to look at Xie Zhuo. Now I could see his profile—those pitch-black eyes were indescribably eerie and terrifying.

In appearance, Xie Zhuo was undeniably an evil spirit. But he… hadn’t lost his reason. At least…

I believed he hadn’t.

“You’re still standing with that evil spirit!? Come over here quickly!” Wu Cheng called anxiously from the other side. “I’ll take you to see Xi Wang Mu. Xi Wang Mu will surely help cleanse the evil spirit aura from your body and guide you back to the righteous path!”

These past days, I had indeed been trying every means to leave Xie Zhuo, but…

I examined Wu Cheng. The person before me was still him, no different from usual, yet a strange feeling lingered in my heart.

Instinctively, I trusted Xie Zhuo, despite his current appearance.

I took a step back, closer to Xie Zhuo.

This step seemed to make Xie Zhuo slightly turn his head. He glanced at me, and I met his black eyes. Without saying more, I addressed Wu Cheng: “I haven’t fallen to the path of evil spirits. And he… isn’t yet an evil spirit. I’ll resolve his situation. You should go back first.”

Wu Cheng didn’t move. His gaze on me slowly grew somber: “Don’t you want one last chance, Jiu Xia?”

I frowned, not answering.

“General Jiu Xia, how unexpected…” A cold voice came from behind Wu Cheng.

My heart tensed as that chilling feeling surged up from my stomach.

Under the moonlight, Jing Nanshou slowly emerged from behind Wu Cheng. He tilted his head slightly and spoke softly: “You truly are colluding with evil spirits.”

His stark white teeth, fleetingly visible as he spoke, reminded me of how he had opened his mouth beside me that day.

But today was different from that day. Though Jing Nanshou appeared to be speaking to me, his eyes were fixed on Xie Zhuo, gleaming eerily.

This man-eating immortal and Xie Zhuo…

I grew alert, while before me, Xie Zhuo’s black mist became increasingly agitated after Jing Nanshou’s appearance.

At that moment, more and more small points of light approached from a distance in the night sky.

I knew those were the glowing lights of other Kunlun immortals flying on their swords. On the night when Xie Zhuo had split through time and space with Pangu Fu, Kunlun had been just as bustling.

I glanced at Xie Zhuo: “Control yourself.”

I said quietly, “If you continue like this, when the other immortals arrive, it will be even harder to explain.” But Xie Zhuo seemed unable to hear me. His lips trembled, and he murmured something from his throat as if he couldn’t contain it.

I couldn’t hear clearly, so I moved closer to him. Then I heard it—he was saying: “He hurt you.”

I froze, then glanced at my hand. Being an immortal, the wounds that Jing Nanshou had inflicted on me earlier had already mostly healed. I thought… this wasn’t something worth remembering…

While I was still in a daze, Xie Zhuo beside me vanished in an instant, leaving only a streak of black wind that brushed past my ear.

When I saw him again, he was several zhang away on a rocky outcrop. With a thunderous boom, Xie Zhuo had seized Jing Nanshou’s neck with one hand and slammed him violently against the rock!

Jing Nanshou’s back had dented the rock upon impact, scattering debris everywhere.

I was stunned…

This Jing Nanshou was at least an immortal of high rank! And wasn’t Xie Zhuo severely injured? How did he…

Where did he get such power? Had he been deceiving me all along?

But that couldn’t be, could it? What benefit would he gain from deceiving me? If he had just taken me back 500 years in the future, wouldn’t his wish have been fulfilled directly?

At this moment, Xie Zhuo certainly couldn’t see my astonishment or hear my questions. His hand gripping Jing Nanshou’s neck gradually tightened. Gritting his teeth slightly, when he spoke, black evil spirit mist seeped from the corners of his mouth like smoke.

“If you dare touch her, I will kill you once more.”

Murderous intent filled the air…

Today’s Xie Zhuo was different from usual. Perhaps influenced by the evil spirit aura, his emotions were more exposed, and his words no longer deliberately concealed information.

Jing Nanshou didn’t understand Xie Zhuo’s words, so he laughed pathetically: “Sir, what do you mean by killing me once more’?”

But I understood.

In the timeline where I had lived with Xie Zhuo, the man-eating immortal Jing Nanshou had been killed by Xie Zhuo.

He had never told me, never told anyone, until today, when he was influenced by the evil spirit aura.

I gazed at him from a distance, pressing my lips together. This belated answer no longer mattered…

As I was thinking, another shadow loomed over me.

“Jiu Xia.” Wu Cheng stood before me. “If you won’t see Xi Wang Mu, then I’ll send you to see the King of Hell.”

Hearing this, I looked up at Wu Cheng and discovered that he was smiling, as if killing me would bring him great joy.

I was dumbfounded, hadn’t even moved to dodge, when a piece of debris flew directly from a distance, striking Wu Cheng hard on the head. Wu Cheng’s entire body tilted to one side and collapsed to the ground, unconscious, with blood flowing from his forehead.

I stared blankly at Wu Cheng, then at Xie Zhuo in the distance. He was still gripping Jing Nanshou’s neck, but those pitch-black eyes were looking at me through the darkness.

At this moment, I seemed to see his true form—the real snow wolf, with the instincts and actions of a wild beast.

But…

I looked at the unconscious Wu Cheng.

Up close, I hadn’t detected anything unusual about Wu Cheng at all. He wasn’t fake, showed no signs of an evil spirit aura, and didn’t appear to be controlled. He was indeed Wu Cheng, my comrade from the Kunlun Guard for many years, my good friend. Yet he had just said… he would send me to see the King of Hell?

Even if I truly were an evil spirit, would the normal Wu Cheng be so happy about killing me?

What had happened to him?

In the sky, more and more immortals arrived on their swords.

I knew that with Xie Zhuo’s current appearance, there was no way to explain anything. We couldn’t let him stay here.

I glanced at Wu Cheng, saw that his breathing was still steady despite being unconscious, then rushed toward Xie Zhuo: “Let’s go quickly!” I shouted to him. “Hurry!”

But Xie Zhuo turned his head back to look at Jing Nanshou before him. His grip tightened further, as if he intended to crush Jing Nanshou’s neck right there.

Yet Jing Nanshou’s body glowed with protective immortal magic, fiercely resisting Xie Zhuo.

At this point, both their powers far exceeded mine, and I struggled to approach through the force of their confrontation.

In the fierce wind, Xie Zhuo was shrouded in black mist, while Jing Nanshou’s immortal magic was dazzling. Their standoff truly appeared to be an evil spirit causing harm and an immortal facing difficulty.

Only I knew that the “evil spirit” bore countless scars from defeating evil spirits, while the “immortal” had chewed human flesh and bones at the corners of his mouth.

“Heh…” Jing Nanshou let out a strange laugh. “You’re not far from the form that the master desires.”

I couldn’t understand Jing Nanshou’s words, but the black mist around Xie Zhuo intensified, and the protective light around Jing Nanshou, like shattered crystal, began to break.

At that moment, several beams of immortal magic shot down fiercely from the sky.

“What evil spirit dares to cause trouble in our Kunlun?”

“Release Immortal Tengluo!”

Accompanied by the immortals’ stern shouts, more and more spells targeted Xie Zhuo. The black mist behind him blocked several attacks, but there were still gaps. I watched as a beam of light pierced through Xie Zhuo’s shoulder, making his body tremble. My eyes widened.

No matter what had transpired between Xie Zhuo and me before, I now felt as if I had been struck myself.

Gritting my teeth, I looked toward the sky, summoning all the soul power I had accumulated these days to form a seal in the air, creating a barrier to block the hundreds of immortals.

“That’s the seal technique of the Kunlun Guard!”

“Kunlun has a traitor!”

Immortals in the sky seemed to notice me, and spells came attacking. I had no strength left to create another barrier, so I could only duck and dodge under the attacks.

In my hundreds of years as an immortal, this was the first time I had been chased and attacked by the Kunlun immortals.

Even if they kept attacking, I would still take Xie Zhuo away.

If Xie Zhuo, in his current state, were captured by the immortals, he would be executed on the spot. That was Kunlun’s rule.

I couldn’t stop hundreds of people in such a chaotic situation, nor could I make these hundreds believe me in just a few brief sentences.

Moreover, even if it were me from years ago, I probably wouldn’t dare believe that a demon completely controlled by an evil spirit aura could still possess its consciousness.

“Xie Zhuo!” I continued rushing toward him, shouting his name amid the commotion.

My barrier in the sky covered him. Under the barrier’s light, Xie Zhuo turned to look at me.

“Come with me quickly!”

Those black eyes, illuminated by the various spell lights, reflected my image.

I had run to his front and thrown myself into his arms. Xie Zhuo’s eyes widened as I pushed him away from Jing Nanshou.

Without Xie Zhuo’s control, Jing Nanshou offered no resistance. He was already exhausted, kneeling on the ground, clutching his throat and gasping for air. Yet those cold eyes remained fixed on Xie Zhuo with an almost manic intensity.

Only now did I realize that back then, Jing Nanshou had displayed an even more frenzied look in his eyes after touching my blood.

And what was special about my blood? Naturally, it was the blood oath that was special.

This Jing Nanshou, from the very beginning, had targeted Xie Zhuo!

There was no time to linger.

As the evil spirit aura around Xie Zhuo began to diminish, his body visibly weakened.

My barrier in the sky couldn’t hold much longer. I could only carry Xie Zhuo and run deeper into the Snow Bamboo Forest, hoping to lose the pursuing immortals in the dense bamboo.

“Don’t run.” Xie Zhuo grabbed me, bit his finger to draw blood, and drew a pattern on the snow.

“What is th—” Before I could finish, the pattern emitted a burst of light.

The light enveloped Xie Zhuo and me, and in the next instant, our surroundings transformed completely. The countless immortal spells vanished, as did the surrounding Snow Bamboo Forest. All that remained was the night and an endless snowy plain in the distance.

“A teleportation array?” I asked Xie Zhuo. “Where are we?”

No one answered…

Xie Zhuo slid off my shoulder and collapsed onto the snow, unconscious.

The evil spirit aura had completely disappeared from his body. On his exposed skin, only those hideous wounds remained, bleeding and turning him into something like a dye that stained the white snow red where he fell.

I bent down to check Xie Zhuo’s breathing. Though weak and slow, he was still alive.

Alive—that was good enough.

I raised my head, looking at the vast snowfield before me, then fell silent. In Kunlun, no matter where one stood, one could at least see Mount Buzhou, could see the Kunlun barrier anchored by Pangu Fu. But here…

Nothing was visible.

“As expected of you, Xie Zhuo,” I said. “You’ve taken me directly outside of Kunlun.”

Outside Kunlun, evil spirits roamed freely—for 500 years, the books taught to children in Kunlun had always written this.

In that moment, I didn’t know whether it would be safer to be beaten in Kunlun or to be here in this vast snowfield with a bleeding mass of flesh…