All of a sudden, changes came quickly and unexpectedly. One moment, the ghost infant was grinning as she swung on the black-clothed person’s arm like a swing, drawing out her tone to taunt Xue Yu and the others. The next moment, she tumbled down clutching a bloody severed arm.

Before she could react, Shan Shu’s long-accumulated Buddhist ghost-suppressing technique fell upon her like gentle spring rain, binding her tight.

That ghost infant had grown in the Xie residence for over a hundred years, watching so many people come and go, right and wrong. In terms of intelligence, she was comparable to someone of Chao Nian’s age. Knowing her luck had run out and she’d been suppressed right after birth, after several considerations, she rolled her eyes, neither crying nor moving, hanging her head dejectedly to play pitiful.

Unfortunately, no one paid her any attention now. The only one finally free to deal with her was Jiu Feng, whom she had just brazenly provoked.

As soon as the ghost infant lowered her head, her chin was roughly seized by slender, soft fingers with enough force to separate skin from bone. She was forced to raise her head along with the pressure, meeting Jiu Feng’s slightly upturned, half-smiling eyes: “You really do look fresh and tender with that delicate skin and flesh. Your act is quite convincing too.”

“Come, repeat what you shouted at me just now.”

Great demons were naturally unrestrained, inherently wild at heart. When slightly restraining her expression, she was a languid, boneless beauty. Now, truly provoked into disciplining someone, that aura of hers ignited like fire, rising “whoosh whoosh” upward.

The ghost infant stared wide-eyed at those pupils occupied by golden flames. With her death energy sealed, her mind immediately went blank, as if someone had dropped a mountain’s weight on her head, causing her to groan in pain.

These past days, Jiu Feng had restrained her voice and demeanor while following Xue Yu, playfully roughhousing with Su Yun, Chao Nian, and the others without proper form. But this sudden release of her aura directly made the distant Qing Luo and Liang Yan involuntarily tremble – that was the instinctive fear of superior bloodlines carved into demon bones.

Even Tao Zhi, who was closest and had extended his hand halfway to stop her actions, couldn’t help but tremble.

He looked at his hand, and after a long while, silently withdrew it.

“What kind of thing dares to shout and scream in front of me?” Jiu Feng had just experienced Yun Lai’s death, and then been provoked consecutively by Hui Jue and the ghost infant. Her pent-up anger finally found an outlet and became unstoppable.

According to Jiu Feng, she got along peacefully with Xue Yu because they were of equal status – neither suppressed the other, and they had genuinely clashed and acknowledged each other’s strength. Playing around with those kids like Su Yun was just for fun and entertainment. With ordinary people, there was simply no need to bother.

But a mere hundred-year-old brat, relying on the massive spiritual power temporarily absorbed through a broken lamp and using the woman’s body as cover, had squealed and shrieked in her ear for half the night, even repeatedly speaking rudely – how could she endure this?

If she could endure it, she wouldn’t be called Jiu Feng.

Seeing the ghost infant beaten and disheveled by Jiu Feng in just a few moves, puffing and panting from her throat, Tao Zhi stepped forward, speaking with some helplessness: “Yao Xiang.”

“Don’t try to persuade me.” Sensing him behind her, Jiu Feng replied aggressively, but the great demon’s aura on her body seemed afraid of hurting someone and suddenly withdrew: “Nothing you say will work.”

“Miss Xue Yu and Miss Shan Shu have both gone inside.” Tao Zhi had refined features, and his voice possessed an almost naturally soothing gentleness that could extinguish anger: “We came to deal with that sorcerer after all. This ghost infant – you’ve vented your anger, and they’ll handle her afterward.”

Mentioning the sorcerer, Jiu Feng immediately thought of that monk who had calmly admitted the life-borrowing technique came from his hand, then swaggered into the courtyard right under her nose.

Weighing her options, she forcefully pinched the ghost infant’s jawbone and threatened sinisterly: “Learn your lesson this time. When you’re in the Sacred Land prison, remember to behave yourself. Right after birth, you should know to keep your tail between your legs, hmm?”

With that, she flung her hand away and strutted arrogantly into that brightly lit courtyard.

In Luo Cai’s room, Xue Yu and Shan Shu positioned themselves left and right – one leaning against a pillar by the bed, the other standing beside the square table in the room. Both remained silent, their gazes fixed on the monk in kasaya with a Buddhist staff beside him at the bed’s edge.

Jiu Feng’s aggressive momentum for settling scores was suppressed by this heavy atmosphere. Her expression inexplicably tilted as she looked toward Xue Yu and asked: “What’s happening?”

“Don’t know.” Xue Yu’s old wounds hadn’t healed, and she had forcibly triggered killing moves to keep the ghost infant. Her face was now pale as paper, but her words remained cold and emotionless as usual: “See for yourself.”

The three of them looked over together.

That handsome monk had earlier recklessly released his spiritual cultivation to lure out the ghost infant. Even after the ghost infant emerged, he hadn’t stopped. Those golden light points wrapped around the young woman on the bed like gentle spring wind and rain, spiritually and tenderly cocooning her, leaving only the few fingers he held in his palm.

Due to those flowing, colorful Buddhist lights, the entire room temporarily took on a dreamlike beauty of flowering trees and silver flames.

With such changes, Hui Jue, half-kneeling at the bed’s edge, seemed drained of blood and flesh. The human blood color slowly faded from that deceptively handsome face that showed no trace of age.

Even so, he still shook his shoulders, unreservedly shaking out the accumulated essence within his body. By the end, the flowing spiritual power was no longer purely golden, but a tragic red mixed with fresh blood, exactly like the brilliant evening glow filling the April sky.

Xue Yu and Jiu Feng ultimately didn’t understand Buddhist cultivation methods, so they both looked toward Shan Shu.

Shan Shu seemed shocked, pulling at her lips in a bitter smile as she looked at them and explained: “Our Buddhist cultivation differs from others. In the early stages, we drive away evil spirits, ferry departed souls, and calm resentment. Each good deed becomes a merit.”

“Since he could be chosen by Northern Wasteland early on, he must have done many good deeds. By reason, when he later fell to evil paths and practiced dark arts, these counted as evil karma. Good and evil offsetting each other, he still had a thread of life left. Even in death, he could successfully enter reincarnation.”

“But he came with a determination to die, keeping the good for Miss Luo Cai and taking the bad for himself.”

From now on, there would be no next life.

“Similar to what Miss Yun Lai did that day. Buddhist techniques and Sun-Moon Flowers are both rooted in goodness, only his method is more domineering. Miss Yun Lai could leave behind a demon pearl, so she still has infinite possibilities in the future. This way, he leaves nothing behind.”

At this moment, Hui Jue’s form had become as thin as paper. Due to that cocoon, he could no longer see Luo Cai’s face, so he gripped her hand even harder, squeezing those delicately raised, scallion-like fingers until they turned abnormally white.

Only then did he seem to finally grasp something, his eyes moving slightly as he breathed out gently: “In the past…”

In the past.

Over a thousand years ago, he wasn’t yet called Hui Jue, just a novice monk fresh from the mountains, leaving temple and monastery to train everywhere and accumulate merit.

Carrying his meager belongings, filled with youthful righteousness and longing for the outside world, he prepared to slay demons and eliminate evil, ensuring people’s peace. Halfway there, he discovered a little fox secretly following him down the mountain.

“Su Se, I’ve told you the foot of the mountain is dangerous. You can’t follow me anymore.”

Hui Jue stepped onto several moss-covered stone steps, quickly scooping up the pure white little fox who knew she’d been discovered and had simply curled up motionlessly. Sitting her upright, despite his young, handsome face, his words carried serious authority: “Sometimes I can’t even protect myself properly. How could I take care of you?”

The little fox suddenly transformed into human form before his eyes – a small girl with lively features and exquisitely beautiful appearance. She was a head shorter than him, so she had to stand on the higher stone step to display her momentum: “I don’t need your protection. I can protect you. I’m a demon!”

Su Se had grown up in the back mountains of Qingshan Temple, living among monks who came and went, with no chance to see the mortal world. She’d only read a few storybooks, remembering nothing except that demons were powerful and mysterious creatures that people spoke of with changed expressions, everyone fearing them.

Therefore, that phrase “I’m a demon” was said naturally and proudly.

Hui Jue struggled to straighten his face: “You’re not allowed to go. If you keep following me, I won’t play with you anymore in the future.”

So the little fox could only stamp her feet angrily on the steps each time, watching Hui Jue, who couldn’t even be called a youth yet, leave Qingshan Temple for increasingly longer periods. Often he’d leave during warm spring days and return when the weather had turned cold.

Hui Jue was quite accomplished. He was self-disciplined with a clear sense of right and wrong, possessing extremely high natural talent and comprehension in Buddhist teachings. At a young age, he already had considerable local reputation. The abbot had great expectations for him, teaching him with more care and strictness.

He gradually grew up between these two lives of temple cultivation and descending the mountain to eliminate evil. His appearance became more outstanding, his strength more powerful, and every word and action inspired confidence and peace.

People’s address for him changed from “little monk” to “little saint monk.”

But the fox in the back mountains remained that same fox, only growing into devastating beauty while her mind stayed in drowsy sunlight and lively, interesting storybooks.

One winter, Su Se really couldn’t resist. Using a treasure that could track scents, she secretly followed Hui Jue down the mountain from afar, hiding here and there, afraid of being discovered and mercilessly sent back again.

In the end, he still discovered her.

In the pouring rain, inside a broken temple with several beams lying askew, a fierce battle had just concluded. When Su Se carefully poked her head in to look, Hui Jue was chanting Buddhist names as he subdued the demon that had been causing trouble everywhere, blood still dripping from his hands.

Sensing someone’s presence and thinking it was the demon’s accomplice, when that gaze fell upon her, the ice-like coldness in his eyes immediately stunned the little fox.

In her memory, he was still as warm and soft as in childhood, with the sweetest smile.

She had never seen such a look in his eyes before.

She walked out dejectedly, expecting a scolding, but he only methodically cleaned his hands, then carefully examined her features. Seeing that, though her appearance was disheveled, it was just wilderness wandering, and she hadn’t suffered any real harm.

“Are you afraid?” he asked.

Su Se shook her head, still remembering to please him listlessly: “I know. You only kill demons that do bad things.”

Since she had already followed him, sending her back along this treacherous mountain path didn’t seem safe. After much consideration, Hui Jue brought her along.

Monotonous days became lively and interesting with her arrival.

The mortal world was bustling, far more exciting than little Qingshan Temple. Emboldened by his presence, she had no restraints. When she had time, she’d drag him to the streets, wanting this and that. Sometimes, knowing she was being excessive and seeing his barely contained patience, she wouldn’t make a sound, only watching him with her eyes.

She had long grown into devastatingly beautiful, with irrepressible natural charm in her features. When she looked at him so pitifully and pleadingly, softening her voice to act coquettish, people around looked at Hui Jue with indescribable teasing and scrutinizing expressions.

Perhaps because she’d been out for so long, she came to know she was a beauty, and at just that age, she often admired her appearance contentedly while cupping her face by rivers and mountains. Finally, she’d always lean close to Hui Jue’s face and ask if she was pretty.

At such times, Hui Jue would remain expressionless, saying: “In a monk’s eyes, feminine beauty is all pink skulls. Beautiful or not, I cannot distinguish.”

When he wouldn’t answer, she wouldn’t make a fuss, just holding her face while looking at him, clearly prepared to compete in patience.

Often when he opened his eyes, he’d see her long lashes, full lips, and the slight upward curve at her eye corners. Unfortunately, she didn’t know how to use her various advantages, often misusing them chaotically and pretentiously.

Even so, despite Hui Jue’s renunciation of worldly desires and not judging people by beauty or ugliness, he had to admit she was extremely beautiful.

That beauty wasn’t just surface-deep, but flowed like water into her very bones.

People found it hard not to be attracted to her.

Days passed like this, with Su Se like a rooted tail following behind him. Perhaps because she’d grown up and no longer took his childish threats to heart, or perhaps because she too loved those lively days outside where she could wander mountains and waters with him, arguing and playing.

Over time, Su Se’s maiden heart awakened to first love, and her object of affection was and could only be him.

But this was impossible.

When the matter was exposed, she looked panicked like someone caught doing wrong, choking out a promise: “I know your rules. We’ll just, just be like before, okay?”

For the first time, she truly used a pleading tone, crying until her face powder ran.

For the first time, Hui Jue was so cold to her, speaking decisively and firmly: “When we return this time, don’t follow me out anymore.”

“Su Se, I’m not that good. Don’t like me.”

Afterward, he truly kept his word, rarely appearing before her. Facts proved that with his cultivation at the time, if he wanted to avoid her, her amateur skills couldn’t possibly catch up.

Soon, Qingshan Temple received tremendous good news.

Hui Jue had caught the attention of a Sacred Land elder and would be exceptionally accepted into Northern Wasteland, soon departing for Buddha Continent to continue deep cultivation.

Entering Northern Wasteland – what a glorious achievement.

Late at night, a snow-white fox climbed through the window into his room, transforming into a woman with loose hair. She curled up her knees, seeming to know he didn’t want to acknowledge her, even speaking carefully and hesitantly: “I don’t like you anymore.”

“Hui Jue, I don’t like you anymore.”

“Stop ignoring me, okay?”

Hearing her increasingly tearful voice, Hui Jue ultimately couldn’t remain unmoved. He sat up expressionlessly, facing her, and asked: “Really don’t like me anymore?”

“Don’t like you, really don’t like you.” Seeing he was finally willing to speak, she answered repeatedly, her eyes bright as if washed with water: “I heard them say you’re entering the Sacred Land. Then, when I become powerful in the future, can I come and find you?”

Thinking of her decades-unchanging soft tactics, Hui Jue couldn’t help pulling at his lips: “We’ll talk when you become powerful.”

But she seemed to have received some guarantee, smiling with pursed lips, her tone light and soft: “You promised me, you promised. No taking it back, no ignoring me.”

That night, finally, having received his answer, she joyfully transformed back and ran into the wilderness.

At that time, he neither thought nor could have imagined that it would be their last meeting.

Ten days before he entered the Sacred Land, the lamp she had left beside him suddenly went out. He was practicing calligraphy at the time. Seeing the lamp’s change, the brush in his hand dropped onto the white paper with a “thud.”

Since reaching adulthood, he rarely showed such unsteadiness, but that day when he ran toward the back mountain, his steps were staggering and stumbling, his hands and feet weak.

So much blood flowed from her fox den. She barely sustained her last breath, as if waiting for him to come.

The barely concealable aura and traces at the scene almost plainly told him that his master, who was so strict with him, absolutely wouldn’t allow anyone to shake his dao heart, and had finally lost patience enough to kill Su Se.

The little fox had lived a life of innocent romance, her aura clean as white paper. For a long time, she had even followed him in eating vegetarian meals and chanting Buddha, never harboring ill will toward anyone. Just for saying she liked him, just for liking him, she had to die.

She collapsed in his arms, drained of all blood color. Seeming to know her life was ending, she didn’t say who had acted, didn’t complain to him, didn’t cry about pain. Unprecedented in her obedience and good behavior, she only stubbornly repeated over and over: “I still like you.”

“That day, I lied to you.” She clutched his sleeve, tearfully aggrieved: “I like you very much.”

She said if there was a next life, she didn’t want to be a demon. She wanted to be human – that way, she could be a little closer to him.

Not having to return to the damp fox den every nightfall, not being helpless when he ignored her, when even meeting once was difficult.

Not needing to be together, just closer, a little closer would be enough.

The little fox died in her beloved’s arms – that was the first time he held her. So in her last glimpse of the sky before closing her eyes, she felt the clouds were bright, the wind was clear, the sunlight was warm, and this whole world was radiant.

Hui Jue left Qingshan Temple carrying that demon pearl, neither continuing to eliminate demons and uphold justice nor going to the Sacred Land.

He blended into the masses, wandering in the mortal world. Sometimes while walking, he felt she was following behind him, crisply begging him to buy those strange, sweet foods only children loved.

The longer time passed, the more he missed her.

He stubbornly collected various heretical techniques like a madman.

Hundreds, then over a thousand years, flowed through his fingers. He became increasingly moody and temperamental. He might impulsively hunt demons that created random slaughter, then in the next moment remember which household had once helped him and the little fox, immediately delivering something as sinister as the life-borrowing technique into their hands.

The talented youth who had once made even the Sacred Land consider acceptance became the “demon monk” people spoke of with considerable wariness.

After drifting aimlessly for unknown years, who knew Hui Jue would find a method to use the demon pearl for reincarnation – or rather, someone actively sought him out.

But none of that mattered.

He poured most of his cultivation into the demon pearl, allowing it to be reborn into an ordinary human family. Her parents gave her a new name: Luo Cai.

Cai as in colors.

This life, she truly lived smoothly – pampered in her chamber, with a childhood companion who accompanied her, naturally marrying him after coming of age. The little fox who had died lonely in her previous life finally received reciprocated love. She still loved to laugh, her smile bright and moving.

Her husband was extremely good to her, calling it devoted care wouldn’t be excessive.

This method had two taboos: first, the caster could never appear before her, and second, she would face a tribulation at twenty-five. Once past it, the rest would be a completely new life.

So for those twenty-plus years, Hui Jue secretly guarded her side, watching her marry in red wedding clothes, living harmoniously with her husband in deep affection.

Night after night, he couldn’t sleep, seeing her lively, delicate features, her tearful confession of love for him, then in a blink, images of her walking hand-in-hand with another man. Several times, he was driven to madness and alcoholism, then returned to silently guard her next door.

He wondered if, when the little fox tearfully said she didn’t like him, her heart felt as sour, wronged, and devastatingly sad as his did now.

Later, he finally learned what her “destined great tribulation” in this life was.

For the ghost infant’s birth, life must be exchanged for life.

After over a thousand years, he could finally find release.

As the golden light flowed to its last drop, Hui Jue tremblingly kissed Luo Cai’s fingertips. The man who had always been composed finally had a choked, broken sound in his throat: “I like you too.”

Very much, very much.

That was a response a thousand years too late.

But Su Se could never hear it again.

Their final ending was nothing more than her living and him dying, the two never to meet again in life or death.

“Sleep, and when you wake up, everything will be good from now on.” Hui Jue smiled and released her hand, allowing the golden light to wrap her completely, also allowing himself to scatter like sand grains in mid-air.

Moments later, Luo Cai opened her eyes.

She met Xue Yu and the others’ complex gazes, looked around at her environment, then pushed off her covers and sat up, asking with some embarrassment: “What happened to me?”

“Madam, have you seen any monks these past days?” Xue Yu lowered her eyes, her expression showing no change as she tentatively asked a question she’d asked before.

Luo Cai thought carefully for a long time, then shook her head: “I haven’t seen any.”