Fragments

This time, all of the evil qi that had surged disastrously sank into the earth.

The vitality in Yun Hai's body dissipated. His appearance didn't change much, but he gave off a sense of having instantly wilted, probably because the vines on his body were withering at an extreme speed.

It was only then that everyone discovered those vines had grown from his heart.

They must have been symbiotic with Yun Hai; as soon as he died, the vines also lost their vitality. The few strands coiled around Xiao Fuxuan's sword immediately loosened, retreating along the blade and becoming completely shriveled.

Only the flowering branch did not change; its stem and leaves were still coiled around Yun Hai's neck, the flower firmly shielding his half-ghostly face.

No one had expected Yun Hai to choose suicide, and they were all stunned.

Xiao Fuxuan silently pulled out his sword and straightened up, his brows slowly knitting together.

Wu Xingxue gazed at Yun Hai's lifeless face and, after a long moment, asked in a low voice, "Are there any remnant souls?"

Xiao Fuxuan shook his head. "His soul is completely destroyed."

It was his sword that had pierced Yun Hai's heart; he would know best if any remnant soul was left beneath the blade. He had not detected the slightest trace. His soul must have been utterly destroyed.

With the vines all over him gone, most of Yun Hai's body was revealed. A corner of a waist token peeked out from his black robes. From that corner alone, someone recognized it—

Yi Wusheng exclaimed softly, "That is a waist token of my sect."

The waist tokens and sword tassels of the Hua Family are made of hibiscus jade and carved with peach blossoms. They have a unique charm among the Immortal Sects and are indeed very easy to recognize.

But such a waist token is something only disciples of the Hua Family would carry. Once one reaches the level of an elder or sect master, especially someone like Yi Wusheng or Hua Zhaoting, they no longer rely on a waist token to indicate their identity.

To think that this person, who had been an immortal and then a demon, would actually wear it to his death.

"Who carved the character on this?" Wu Xingxue flipped the waist token over and saw a slender "Hai" character on the back. "Your family's successive heads?"

Yi Wusheng shook his head. "No, it's in the disciple's own handwriting."

Wu Xingxue: "Then that must be Yun Hai's writing."

Yi Wusheng: "It is."

Wu Xingxue let out an "oh," thinking, 'Then there's no mistake.'

He had discovered earlier that the runes in the deep cavern had two layers. The handwriting of the top layer was of this slender style; it must have been written by Yun Hai.

Everyone then found the core of the great suppression formation in the bloody mud beneath his left hand.

There were two formation stones in the formation's core. One was already shattered to bits, while the other had been placed later. The latter stone bore a seal—the "Hai" character, identical to the one on the waist token.

Everyone had previously wondered why the core of the suppression formation would be placed so openly in the tomb at the formation's center. Now that they saw the formation stone, everything was clear.

The one who had reinforced the suppression formation was Yun Hai himself.

"This..." Yi Wusheng clutched the formation stone, his expression complex. It was hard to tell if it was lamentation or something else. Finally, he shook his head and sighed softly. "A pity."

In truth, among everyone present, Yi Wusheng was the last person who should have been feeling this way.

Because the seal on the back of his neck was Yun Hai's doing, and his struggles and suffering of the past twenty-odd years all stemmed from it.

Anyone could sigh with lament for Yun Hai, except Yi Wusheng.

Even if he were to draw his sword and vent his resentment on Yun Hai's corpse, no one would have uttered a word of criticism. But he didn't. He even sighed "a pity" for that Evil Demon.

Wu Xingxue looked at the overlapping scars on Yi Wusheng's nape and suddenly felt a sense of pity himself.

'I wonder how much my past self interacted with this Yi Wusheng of the Hua Family,' he thought. 'Likely not much. After all, one was a disciple of an Immortal Sect, and the other was a Demon Lord.'

What a pity.

Otherwise, to have had such an acquaintance would have been nice.

Yi Wusheng squatted down and reburied the formation stone beneath Yun Hai's palm. In the process, a good deal of the nearby bloody mud was turned over. Just as he was about to cover it again, he was stopped by two fingers.

"High Immortal?" Yi Wusheng looked up. The one stopping him was Xiao Fuxuan.

Xiao Fuxuan replied, "There is something."

He then poked about with a long finger—the bloody mud was very thick, with no sign of anything else.

Everyone exchanged puzzled glances.

Wu Xingxue bent down beside him and asked, "What is it?"

Xiao Fuxuan did not answer immediately.

Seeing that searching was fruitless, he simply bent a finger and tapped the ground. Yun Hai's body did not move, but the expanse of bloody mud trembled violently, and something deep within it was jolted to the surface.

It was a spot of white, glowing with a soft luster from beneath the dark mud. Wu Xingxue was the most sensitive to such quality; one glance was enough for him to know it was white jade.

With a crook of his finger, Xiao Fuxuan hooked the object out from beneath the bloody mud.

"Dream Bell!" Yi Wusheng blurted out.

It was a white jade bell, similar to the one from the Hua Family, but far more exquisite upon closer inspection. Its jade surface was entwined with a filigree pattern, very much like that Spirit King's scabbard and mask. It was obvious at a glance that they belonged to the same person.

With this Dream Bell right in front of them, the Hua Family's bell truly wasn't worthy of being called "genuine."

Just as Yi Wusheng had guessed before, Hua Zhaoting kept the Dream Bell on his person. The only one who could have swapped the genuine for a fake was the Evil Demon controlling him.

Finding the Dream Bell in Yun Hai's tomb was, in fact, to be expected, but Yi Wusheng truly couldn't figure it out. "This... what use did he have for the real Dream Bell?"

The use of the Dream Bell was none other than to create dreams—either to turn the past into a dreamscape or to pull someone into a new one.

'Back when his cultivation was crippled, Yun Hai hadn't wanted to use the Dream Bell, so why did he take it from the Hua Family, even using a fake one as a decoy? That must have taken a lot of effort.'

'Had he changed his mind? Did he suddenly feel that life in this tomb was too hard to bear, even harder than being a fallen immortal returning to the mortal realm, and so he wanted to borrow the Dream Bell to seek a grand dream?' Wu Xingxue thought.

But Yun Hai was already dead—"his soul is completely destroyed," in Xiao Fuxuan's words—and could no longer speak to answer this question. Wu Xingxue had no way of knowing whether his guess was correct.

As he was lost in thought, he suddenly heard a low voice say, "Wu Xingxue."

Wu Xingxue looked up.

Xiao Fuxuan straightened up, the white jade bell dangling from his finger, and said, "Your hand."

"Hm?" Wu Xingxue murmured questioningly, then held his palm out to him a moment later.

His palm felt a cool touch, and the Dream Bell was lying in his hand.

He actually remembered nothing, be it the Spirit King or the Dream Bell. But the instant the bell landed in his hand, he blinked softly, and surprisingly, a sense of long-lost familiarity truly stirred within him.

He flicked the white jade bell and noticed, upon closer inspection, that there seemed to be some cracks on its inner surface.

He held the bell, about to inspect it more closely, when some images faintly flashed through his mind.

He had heard Yi Wusheng mention before that if the Dream Bell was used to pull someone into a fabricated dream, then the Dream Bell would also be needed to break it. Otherwise, one's soul would be incomplete or their memories unclear.

Now, this Dream Bell seemed to be damaged, and he did not yet know how to break its effects, but he was already faintly sensing something.

Wu Xingxue twirled the Dream Bell between his fingers, trying to recall the fragment that had just flashed past—

It must have been on a certain cold night.

For some reason, he was standing by the door with his hands behind his back, clutching some unknown hard object. It felt cool, its sharp edges digging painfully into his palm.

Xiao Fuxuan stood in the doorway, fingers holding up the curtain, neither entering nor retreating. His dark eyes were lowered slightly, looking at him.

Behind them was a vast courtyard, where a colossal, towering tree stood, draped in snow.

He continued to clutch the object in his hand, quietly facing off against the man in the doorway.

After a long moment, he tilted his head slightly and said, "Xiao Fuxuan, have you heard that Evil Demons are creatures of great desire?"

Silence filled the room.

Xiao Fuxuan was still holding up the curtain. After a long moment, he spoke. "I have."

Wu Xingxue was quiet for a moment, then said, "Since you have heard, and yet you chose this day of all days to come, what... do you wish to become this Demon Lord's intimate guest?"

After speaking, he turned and tilted his chin toward the bed.

"..."

The fragmented memory was surprisingly clear. Wu Xingxue's fingers twitched at the phrase "intimate guest."

He looked up and saw Xiao Fuxuan's face, identical to the one in the fleeting memory.

Wu Xingxue stood calmly for a moment before silently shoving the Dream Bell back into Xiao Fuxuan's hand.