The early spring morning wind blew in gusts, and at some point, the wind began carrying fine rain threads like ox hair, continuous and unending. Not far away, by the riverbed, the reed marshes swayed left and right, rustling softly.

When Chao Nian heard this, he was stunned for a moment, glanced at Xue Yu, then hurriedly moved to Su You’s side. Seeing those four and a half stars so conspicuous that they couldn’t be ignored, he sucked in a sharp breath: “How… how can it still change?”

That small scroll lay dead quiet in Su You’s palm, like a piece of waste paper without the slightest spiritual essence.

Xue Yu took a deep breath.

This was her second time accepting a four-and-a-half-star mission. Counting this life and the previous one, more than a thousand years had passed since the last time, yet she still remembered the circumstances vividly. Just thinking about it made her head buzz.

That time involved the imperial family’s succession struggle. Three princes were each unwilling to yield, while the aged old emperor spent his days lounging in the rear palace, either entertaining beauties or refining pills with Taoist priests, allowing several powerful older princes to turn the court into complete chaos.

For thousands of years, the Sacred Lands and the imperial family had coexisted peacefully, each governing themselves. Logically, such matters shouldn’t and couldn’t be interfered with. But that time was special – the old emperor died of illness, all three factions established themselves as kings with their armies, wars broke out frequently, and the people suffered bitterly. In the end, they even employed demon ghosts and evil creatures in their struggles. At the palace gates, blood could form rivers daily.

Several Sacred Lands saw that this wouldn’t work.

They could fight among themselves all they wanted, even fight themselves to pieces, but those evil spirits and ghosts absolutely could not flow into the mortal world to harm ordinary people.

However, if such matters were handled by those white-bearded old men from the Sacred Lands, within a day, rumors would spread like wildfire through all major cities: “Sacred Lands take advantage of imperial civil strife to break regulations and seek to rule the palace.”

So they deliberated and the next day summoned the younger generation – the seven people who went to the Judgment Platform this time. Without saying much else, they had them draw from the Heavenly Secret Book first.

Yin Ling was fearless, laughingly drawing first and getting a two-and-a-half-star mission, returning satisfied.

The Buddhist Son and Daughter, along with Lu Chengze, went up one after another. After Buddhist Daughter Shan Su drew a four-star mission, Xue Yu and Kunlun’s young sect master Lu Qin both simultaneously felt an ominous premonition deep in their hearts.

The two of them touched the Heavenly Secret Book one after another, and the “premeditated” four-and-a-half stars appeared before everyone’s eyes.

That mission took Xue Yu a full three months.

First, she couldn’t interfere in the imperial family’s internal strife or favor any side, but if you ignored them, they would always try to win you over. She couldn’t respond with cold rejection either – she had to deal with each one through false courtesy. Second, while managing the internal strife, she had to capture the evil creatures one by one, interrogate their origins, and determine whether they had accomplices, keeping her so busy her feet barely touched the ground.

That time there was also a major mishap, but it wasn’t with others – it was with a teammate.

Xue Yu maintained a cold face and rarely smiled when outside. After others hit a few snags, they knew to retreat in difficulty. But Lu Qin was naturally good-tempered, always greeting people with spring-like warmth. On just their first day in the imperial city, he received peerless beauties sent by all three princes. When Xue Yu had already captured the first fierce ghost, he was still smiling bitterly as he sent back the last beauty.

This would have been acceptable.

But the key issue was that, compared to Xue Yu’s lack of desires, Lu Qin’s side was easier to approach.

He was a sword cultivator.

Sword cultivators loved swords like life itself, and were poor.

Lu Qin was also clear about this point, so he guarded against it strictly, absolutely refusing to give anyone leverage. But while he guarded against those three princes with obvious ambitions, he was completely unprepared for another prince who was bedridden with illness and had to cough three times and lean against walls when taking a single step. A few cups of fine wine and a few good swords, and he was ready to become sworn brothers with the man.

No one expected that those cunning, troublesome demons all came from that frail, helpless medicine-jar prince.

Using Lu Qin as cover, he repeatedly evaded Xue Yu’s investigations.

When the three others had fought until they were injured and weakened, he gave a command and bathed the imperial city in blood. By the time Xue Yu and Lu Qin rushed over, he had already been formally crowned as emperor, while those demon ghosts who had become uncontrollable due to the stimulation of blood naturally had Xue Yu and Lu Qin to clean up.

For the first time in her life, Xue Yu had been used by someone and still had to help clean up the mess. Her expression was so cold it could drip water, while Lu Qin was so angry at being called “Brother Lu” by that scheming young emperor that he nearly fell backward. Feeling he had wronged Xue Yu, he gritted his teeth after returning home and sent all the remaining presentable treasures from his private vault to Yedu. For a long time afterward, he didn’t dare make eye contact with Xue Yu when he saw her.

Xue Yu pulled herself from the memories. Without a word, she retrieved the Heavenly Secret Book and tossed it back into her storage ring.

“Young lady, what should we…” Chao Nian spoke hesitantly.

“Split up.” Xue Yu quickly made her decision. She glanced at the gray, overcast sky and said: “Liang Yan, you take Chao Nian and Qing Luo to Thunder Sea and ask the local villagers about the situation.”

“I’ll go check out Golden Light Temple. Before dark, we’ll meet at the inn near Thunder Sea.”

Having finished speaking, Xue Yu was about to conceal her form when she remembered there was now another person in the team. Her movement paused slightly as she turned to look behind her.

In the light rain, the young man had narrow shoulders and long legs, his waist outlined into a thin stroke beneath his sash. His features were shrouded in cold mountain mist, like the first handful of clean snow under early winter. But once those glazed pupils accumulated indescribable shadows, all the surrounding pure essence would fade completely away. At such times, he was like a demon trapped deep in mountain forests, specializing in bewitching people with beauty.

Xue Yu moved her lips: “You, come with me.”

She was accustomed to going alone, but she knew Su You was no good person. Once he turned hostile, the three of them – Chao Nian and the others – couldn’t stop him alone.

Even though he had just reconnected his meridians and was still in recovery.

Cornered beasts always leave themselves escape routes.

As Xue Yu’s words fell, she found a sword from her storage ring and tossed it into Su You’s arms, saying, “Keep up.”

She wouldn’t let him continue practicing his former cultivation methods, and in the Yedu mental techniques she gave him, traveling through air was a skill only learned after mastering the first level. Before that, Su You could only rely on external aids like borrowing a sword.

Having finished speaking, Xue Yu leaped onto the cloud layer. Su You weighed the spiritual sword in his hands that wasn’t docile and was buzzing noisily, then lowered his eyes indifferently.

The next moment, he stepped onto the clouds before everyone’s eyes, maintaining a moderate distance from Xue Yu, neither too close nor too far.

Chao Nian, who witnessed this entire scene, opened his eyes wide as saucers: “?!”

The two figures disappeared one after another. Liang Yan reacted slower than Chao Nian, but after coming to her senses, she also drew a breath in surprise and uncertainty: “This little brother is not simple.”

Chao Nian asked Qing Luo, who was completely confused beside him, “How many days has it been since the young lady gave him the manual?”

“A little over two days—” Qing Luo calculated the time and dutifully replied: “Not even three days.”

Hearing this, Liang Yan shook her head with a bitter smile: “I practice the Earth Character Formula. Even studying it day and night without rest, it took me half a month just to get started. His speed in comprehending the manual is truly humbling.”

More than humbling – it was mortifying.

“Chao Hua practices the Heaven Character Formula. The content is much more obscure than the Earth Character Formula. Even when she went into seclusion to comprehend it, she took ten days to reach the first level, and even received praise from our master.” Chao Nian spoke of his sister Chao Hua’s situation, then sighed with old-fashioned sentiment: “No wonder he caught the young lady’s eye.”

“Did he use even less time than the young lady?” Qing Luo asked: “How many days did the young lady take?”

“You wouldn’t know this.” Chao Nian reached out to adjust the hair buns hanging at Qing Luo’s sides. Just beginning his words, he swelled with shared pride: “Our young lady is a once-in-a-millennium prodigy in the clan. Whether handling affairs or personal cultivation, she belongs to the unmatched category.”

“The upper volume of the Heaven Character Formula – our young lady comprehended it in just a day and a half.”

“Then the young lady is still more formidable.” Qing Luo became happy again.

Chao Nian opened his mouth and muttered quietly: “This can’t be compared. The young lady is a Spirit Array Master and doesn’t primarily cultivate this, while Su You just experienced such punishment… But overall speaking, the young lady is more formidable.”

In mid-air, Xue Yu also quickly noticed the movement behind her. When she saw Su You traveling alone instead of borrowing sword momentum to fly, a brief flash of surprise crossed her eyes.

She slowed down deliberately to wait for Su You to catch up.

Due to the misty drizzle, before the sky had fully brightened, it had already turned completely dark. In the heavy black clouds, her clear, cold white robes billowed in layers when the wind blew, like ripples of water spreading in circles after a stone is thrown into the center of a lake.

Su You withdrew his gaze, knowing she had something to say, and imperceptibly quickened his pace.

“When did you comprehend it?” When he drew near, Xue Yu asked him.

“Half a day ago.”

Even Xue Yu, who also practiced the mental cultivation techniques, couldn’t help but fall silent for a moment at such an answer. Song Heng had also practiced this in the past, and his talent was already considered top-tier. Facts proved that a thousand years later, even Sacred Land inheritors like Lu Chengze and others were indeed overshadowed by his brilliance.

Back then, it had taken him five days to reach the first level.

This demon ghost’s talent and comprehension could be called terrifying.

The sky pressed down gloomily over their heads, with torrential rain ready to pour down like a waterfall at any moment. Xue Yu asked nothing else, only nodded, and said: “Next, we need to go faster. You—” She rarely paused, scanning the thin-bodied young man up and down before asking: “Can you hold on?”

“Yes.”

The young man looked up at her, his voice like spring rain, each word like pearls and jade: “Can we enter the city like this?”

Definitely not.

Otherwise, when leaving the city earlier, this Yedu princess who was focused on saving time wouldn’t have taken a carriage.

“Generally speaking, no.” Xue Yu replied calmly while simultaneously pulling out a token from her storage ring. The token was square with both ends sharpened to extreme points. The surface was inscribed line by line with mysterious patterns in vermilion ink, and touching it brought an unbearably cold sensation.

Su You had a good memory.

So with one glance, he recognized this should be a token representing Chi Shui, one of the Six Sacred Lands.

She was going to use Chi Shui’s token to force her way through Mist Arrival City.

“This is Lu Chengze’s identity token.” Xue Yu knew he was clever, and when speaking with clever people, she never needed to beat around the bush or conceal anything: “When there are urgent matters, traveling through the air is fine – we just have to pay some fines afterward.”

Since coming into contact with her, this princess had always shown only her cold and unsympathetic side to others, whether to him or to the demon clan members who had long served under her, as if this was her natural temperament.

But “Lu Chengze” was an exception.

Twice, Xue Yu had shown different emotions because of him – once having her attendant report on him, taking his token to cause him minor trouble.

And she wasn’t the type who enjoyed petty conflicts or constantly making others uncomfortable.

Su You lowered his gaze thoughtfully, unable to distinguish for a moment whether this was a unique way of communication between Sacred Land inheritors or if there was real enmity between them.

Or perhaps… it was a young girl’s first stirrings of love…

With that token, they passed unobstructed through the airspace above Mist Arrival City, traveling straight to Golden Light Temple.

The moment they arrived at the temple, the sky seemed unable to support itself any longer, as if someone had torn a huge gash from within. Torrential rain poured down, striking the glazed tiles and eaves with sounds like hailstones falling.

Xue Yu hurried along the corridor toward the temple interior, but halfway there, she noticed something wrong.

She turned around to see the young man at the far end of the long corridor, his palm braced against the railing, his face frighteningly pale.

Xue Yu paused, then quickly walked back.

Having just reconnected his meridians and then following Xue Yu around such a large circuit, even an immortal couldn’t withstand it, let alone him still dragging a body of new and old wounds that hadn’t fully healed. That he hadn’t collapsed headfirst halfway through already showed exceptional willpower.

Throughout that entire journey, he had stubbornly not made a sound, refusing to show weakness before others.

“If you can’t hold on, just say so.” Xue Yu pressed her lips together and said, “Who suffers when you try to be tough?”

Su You slowly raised his eyes. His pupil color was extremely deep, heavily suppressing emotions. Through the layer of torrential rain outside, when they fell into Xue Yu’s sight, they became an indescribable purity, docility, and innocence.

You’d say he refused to show weakness, yet when his eyelashes moved and his eyes lowered, he appeared completely vulnerable, twelve parts aggrieved and pitiable.

For the first time, Xue Yu was completely stunned by a man’s appearance.

This demon ghost.

Was his original form a fox spirit?

She had once captured several fox spirits who had committed crimes, but thinking back now, none compared to the young man before her eyes.

“Extend your hand.”

He obediently stretched his hand before her – that hand was thin and white, with long, distinct fingers that showed a sickly frailness like a sheltered lady when hanging slightly downward.

Xue Yu found a jade bottle, tilted its mouth, and a round pill fell into her palm. She quickly crushed the pill and covered it all over Su You’s wrist, then gave it a light pat before withdrawing her hand and walking away without looking back, leaving only a faint sentence: “Come over by yourself when you feel better.”

The rich medicinal power and spiritual energy rushed into his body. Su You’s raven-feather lashes moved up and down. Very slowly, he rubbed the spot on his wrist that had been touched with his fingertip. Besides the rich medicinal fragrance, his nose also caught the woman’s faint cold fragrance.

Not unpleasant, but his body still showed instinctive rejection and resistance to such kindness and contact.

He was unwilling to accept anyone’s goodwill.

But he wanted to live.

Su You thought of those brilliant four and a half stars on the Heavenly Secret Book scroll, thought of her angry expression because of it, and thought – before she let him go.

He would help her cut through all troublesome matters and things.

When the time came, he would owe no one anything.