“Where is your ‘Seven Perfections Zither’?” Lin Fei Yuan asked urgently. “You were so formidable playing music earlier today. Quickly take it out and continue playing!”
“Once we entered this place, magical artifacts became ineffective,” Song Qian Ji said. “Lend me a sword. I know you have another one.”
A normal assassin would never have just one sword.
“Remember to return it!” Lin Fei Yuan produced two swords, handing the more valuable one to Song Qian Ji.
Endless waves of people surged out from the night mist, approaching the two men in the center of the street.
When Song Qian Ji took the sword, he had already seen the faces of those people.
The passersby who had brushed shoulders with them earlier now had hollow eyes and blank stares.
Men, women, the elderly, children—all with expressionless faces. They moved at the same pace, like puppets on strings, like walking corpses.
Initially, their steps were slow, as if the puppeteer was still inexperienced, but gradually their speed increased.
Song Qian Ji looked up at the night sky. It was pitch black, with rolling dark clouds and howling cold winds. In the black clouds, it seemed as if spectral figures were moving about.
As expected, it had come again.
A mocking smile appeared at the corner of Song Qian Ji’s lips.
Lin Fei Yuan had traversed numerous deadly formations and countless perilous situations. He considered himself someone who lived with his head hanging from his waist, fearing neither heaven nor earth.
But the extremely eerie atmosphere of this place truly chilled him to the bone.
“Are they human?” he asked Song Qian Ji, his voice trembling slightly. “Do the people of this city want to kill us?”
In the previous moment, a city full of vibrant life and rich colors, with joyful and lively pedestrians—in an instant, everything had changed.
“This isn’t the real Huawei City. They aren’t real people either. These people have no consciousness; they can only be controlled by someone. The controller must also be in the city. But to avoid my detection, he will conceal himself as much as possible.” Song Qian Ji spoke quickly but steadily.
“How do you know?” Lin Fei Yuan frowned.
The other man was too calm, too clear. If this person wasn’t Song Qian Ji, he would almost suspect he was a spy sent by the enemy.
“I’ve encountered this before,” Song Qian Ji said. “A long time ago.”
Even facing the river of time, watching the ending of “Snow at the End of the Road” a hundred times until his heart was as still as a lake without ripples.
Watching the experience of “First Steps on the Immortal Path” a thousand times, eating melon seeds while chatting with the narrator, mocking himself.
But among the myriad experiences of his previous life, there were still certain scenes he didn’t want to see again, memories he subconsciously wanted to forget.
Like this moment.
“Excellent!” Lin Fei Yuan was delighted, suddenly filled with heroic spirit. “If you’ve faced it once, you can face it twice! How did you escape last time?”
He waited for a moment but received no answer. Just as he was about to press further, he heard the other laugh and say:
“I’m not telling you.”
Lin Fei Yuan’s smile vanished, his anger surging: “Are you sick? Are you sober or not?!”
Song Qian Ji ignored him and seriously instructed: “Before I find the controller, try to keep them at bay without lethal force. Understand?”
“I understand. I’ll conserve my spiritual energy,” Lin Fei Yuan nodded, took a deep breath, and smiled. “If we make it through this together, we’ll truly be friends who’ve faced life and death together. I’ll draw them to the right, you go left to find the controller. After I count to three, we’ll move simultaneously—Hey, Song Qian Ji! Damn it!”
Before he could finish, Song Qian Ji moved too quickly, his silhouette instantly disappearing into the night mist.
Lin Fei Yuan could no longer see him.
…
In Huawei City, there were many tall buildings and spacious mansions.
Song Qian Ji darted across the rooftops of one building after another, like a bird soaring and landing through a forest.
Amid the rolling thick fog, his route was clear, without any detours, as if he was certain of his target’s location.
The puppeteer manipulated crowds to climb onto the rooftops, attempting to block him, but Song Qian Ji’s speed was a step faster.
A strong wind blew in the sky, powerful currents trying to blow him down, yet Song Qian Ji advanced against the wind.
Occasionally surrounded, he wielded his sword with a calm expression, as if cutting down trees.
Song Qian Ji muttered to himself, his voice very soft: “You could have taken action at Huawei Sect, or come to Thousand Channels. Better yet, act personally rather than using others… you shouldn’t have used this approach again. I’m a bit angry now.”
The city was fake, the people were fake—a false heaven, a false earth, a false world.
But the “feeling” of killing was real. As long as one could feel the warmth of blood splashing on one’s face, hear the screams and wails, and see the mountains of corpses and bones piled up.
What difference was there between real and fake?
He didn’t let Lin Fei Yuan use lethal force.
The other thought was to conserve spiritual energy for the big battle.
He didn’t explain the reason, nor did he want to tell the truth—in his previous life, he had killed an entire city of people before finding the controller.
He wanted to live, not die.
But Huawei City had a million inhabitants. Men, women, old, young, peddlers, laborers.
People of different heights and builds, each face unique.
Anyone who had gone through such a slaughter, even if they survived, would suffer mental collapse, never able to hold a sword again, becoming like sheep and pigs waiting to be slaughtered.
In his previous life, this fake city had lured him into a trap, not only wanting his life but also wanting to destroy his spirit.
In this life, the city also contained people he had brought from Thousand Channels, all very young, not yet twenty.
At night they dreamed of “soaring with swords for thousands of miles, roaming the world of cultivation, wandering freely through heaven and earth,” while during the day they threw snowballs at their companions.
The night wind was mournful. From the sky, a black shadow dove down like a bat, letting out a shrill, bizarre laugh.
Immense spiritual pressure pressed down upon Song Qian Ji, mixed with intense death energy, like a tsunami crashing into a lone island.
The living has “vital energy”; with each breath, life flourishes.
The dead have “death energy.” The two naturally oppose each other. And the remnant soul’s master had been dead for hundreds of years, the death energy at its most concentrated.
“Dead people floating in the sky come to kill me, living people on the ground also come to kill me.” After saying this, Song Qian Ji suddenly raised his head and shouted:
“If your body has died and your Dao has dissipated, why do you still linger in the mortal world?!”
The sword in his hand was like ordinary iron, the large sleeves of his ceremonial robe torn and billowing in the wild wind.
The words “linger in the mortal world” echoed repeatedly.
The remnant soul had lost its consciousness and could not use its mortal techniques. Relying solely on the force of spiritual pressure, it was still like a mountain crashing down.
With the physical strength of a normal Yuan Ying cultivator, if one chose to withstand it head-on, one would immediately be crushed into a bloody pulp.
If one tried to evade using movement techniques, the remnant soul would still pursue relentlessly, and the “death energy” and resentment would still engulf them.
Song Qian Ji opened his mouth, held the long sword between his teeth, and formed hand seals. From his throat, a commanding shout erupted: “Domain! Open!”
In an instant, surging vitality exploded forth, and golden light flared brilliantly, breaking through the thick fog and illuminating the rooftop.
The black shadow rushed into the golden light, passed through his body, and vanished into thin air.
…
Yuan Qing Shi appeared before the city gate, holding a huge white banner.
The city gate was grand and majestic, with the three large characters “Huawei City” hanging above his head.
The white banner in his hand was enveloped in a faint red glow, fluttering vigorously.
Fine, cold sweat seeped from Yuan Qing Shi’s forehead.
His master had entrusted this task to him, repeatedly emphasizing that it must be executed flawlessly.
He was equally aware that this matter concerned the rise or fall of the sect.
Huawei Sect could not lose the smoke and fire offerings of the mortal world, the allegiance of other forces, or its position as the hegemon of the Western Territories.
With Song Qian Ji—no, with Thousand Channels County—they had reached a life-or-death situation.
Sometimes life-and-death struggles weren’t due to personal grudges, but because of positions, social strata, and interests—things unseen and untouchable, yet extremely important.
He had already changed positions twelve times, while Song Qian Ji had changed routes eight times, each one leading most directly to his location.
And the speed was increasing.
This was supposed to be his domain; he could move freely and perceive everything within the city.
Initially, this feeling of omniscience and controlling puppets had nearly addicted him.
While the enemy, trapped in the city, should have had dulled senses, with spiritual perception unable to penetrate the thick fog. Just like Meng He Ze, Ji Chen, and the other Thousand Channels disciples.
How did Song Qian Ji know his whereabouts?
Why couldn’t the powerful souls harm him, but were instead “absorbed”?
It made no sense at all.
In Yuan Qing Shi’s impression, Song Qian Ji was the carefree young master who struck rhythm and sang, playing the jade flute in the great hall.
The world knew that Song Qian Ji loved flowers and plants, excelled at chess and calligraphy, and had gained the favor of saints through the Star-Plucking Bureau and Hero’s Notes.
After today’s banquet, they would add his mastery of music and disregard for etiquette.
Indeed, a genius. Yuan Qing Shi thought that after cutting off his backing and magical artifacts, such a person shouldn’t be difficult to deal with.
What should have been a certain victory now felt like the situation was spiraling out of control.
But being in the “city,” he couldn’t contact his master or the sect.
“Go!” He gritted his teeth and waved the white banner.
Crimson light flickered, and ten more black shadows flew together toward a certain spot from the sky.
The remnant souls had no consciousness and could only be driven and commanded by the Soul-Summoning Banner.
He was the banner-holder, the puppeteer. He must not be found.
Just then, his ears twitched, hearing a voice carried by the wind:
“I am very sensitive to vital energy. You are the only truly living person in the city. Stop running.”
It was Song Qian Ji’s voice.
Yuan Qing Shi’s face instantly turned deathly pale, and his form vanished from the spot like light smoke.
…
“Tonight, leaving Huawei Mountain, entering the mortal world to be a mortal. Raising chickens, fighting dogs, farming the land…” Song Qian Ji raised his sword and struck down another person—the soup dumpling vendor from earlier—and continued to recite, “Living a carefree, short life.”
On his first night after being reborn, he hung from the cliff face of Broken Mountain with a dagger, swaying.
The cold wind of the mountains blew through his outer disciple’s robe as he gazed into the bottomless abyss, reciting this doggerel in his heart.
Tonight, he recited poetry, cut down people, opened his domain to collect remnant souls, advancing with song, as scenes from his previous life reappeared before his eyes.
—A youth walking out of a street piled with corpses, half an arm exposing stark white bones, his entire body soaked in filthy fresh blood, mud, marrow, vomit, unrecognizable as a complete human form.
When he stood before the puppeteer and asked why they hated him so much, why they wanted to kill him in such a manner.
The other was scared witless, cleanly beheaded by one stroke of his sword.
When pushed to the edge, it wasn’t about comparing cultivation or magic.
It was about whose heart was harder, crueler.
“I’ve already gone to extremes; I’ve grown weary of killing. I don’t want to walk the path I walked before. Why don’t you understand?
I’m not the child of destiny, I’m not the protagonist, I can’t save the world. I want to farm—is that also wrong? Plant melons get melons; plant beans, get beans. I like new life, not death.
The land and plants are more reliable than people. They will never say to you, ‘I’m sorry…'”
After finishing his soliloquy, Song Qian Ji suddenly sighed:
“Someone who can kill their way out of this city isn’t human. Someone who can control an entire city to kill people isn’t human either. You’re still young. Didn’t your master teach you that once certain boundaries are crossed, a person can’t turn back? How could he let you do such dirty, exhausting work?”
Yuan Qing Shi stiffly turned his head to see Song Qian Ji’s calm face.
He trembled all over, feeling, in that instant, a terror greater than death.
Song Qian Ji’s voice was faint, with a hint of weariness.
He could hear every word, yet couldn’t understand a single one. Nor did he dare to listen or think too deeply.
“Ah!” With a fierce shout, the crimson light of the Soul-Summoning Banner illuminated half the city.
In the distant sky, black clouds roiled, and countless black shadows rushed out, like a flock of vicious crows swooping down on prey.
Song Qian Ji was engulfed by the rolling black tide, a sea of death.
Standing at the center of the surging waves, he opened his lips: “Domain, manifest!”
The Pure Bottle hummed and resonated, golden light radiated brilliantly. The vitality of spring returning to earth surged from his Purple Palace!
Yin and yang, life and death, conflicting yet exchanging, originating from the same source.
Without death, how could there be new life?