Chapter 41: Chapter 38: Life Is Like a Swan Goose’s Tracks in the Snow

After seeing his mother off, Lu Mingyuan didn’t resume his Martial Arts practice. Instead, he began drawing Daoist Talismans again.

With his previous experience, creating more Papermen wasn’t a problem at all.

At the same time, after breaking through to the Rebirth Realm, he also discovered a transformation in his Blood Glutton Split Body Technique.

At first, it could only create clay figurines, but now, meridians and a dantian were beginning to form inside the Blood Glutton Little People. Of course, this was just a nascent form and amounted to nothing significant.

But to his pleasant surprise, he discovered that the results of the Little People’s cultivation could be fed back to him!

It was likely due to the Rebirth Realm.

Lu Mingyuan had undergone a complete transformation, and the Blood Glutton Little People had metamorphosed along with him. They absorbed nature’s spiritual energy, refined it into Martial Dao Primordial Qi, and continuously fed it back into his dantian.

In the span of a single Hour, the Martial Dao Primordial Qi refined by the Blood Glutton Little People increased the progress of the Fifth Floor of the Blood Glutton Celestial Fall Scripture by ten points!

At this rate, since a day consists of twelve Hours, he could gain one hundred and twenty points per day.

In two months at most, he would be able to break through to the Fifth Realm of Martial Arts: Furnace Building, and officially begin forging his own human Martial Furnace.

This discovery undoubtedly lifted his spirits immensely.

Just as Lu Mingyuan was wondering what miraculous reaction would occur when a new Blood Gluttonous Avatar fused with a Paperman and whether it could unleash the power of Martial Arts, a familiar, white-haired silhouette appeared on a treetop outside the courtyard.

“You’re as serious as ever.”

Hearing that clear, cold voice, Lu Mingyuan instinctively looked up.

Sure enough, he saw the white-haired woman in the green Daoist Robe in the tree.

“You’re back? Why do you look so unwell? So pale.”

A rare smile appeared on Lu Mingyuan’s face as he asked.

“It’s nothing. I just barely escaped a True Monarch with my life. It was a close call, but I’m fine in the end.”

Yun Qinghe leaped down from the tree, walked over to the brazier in the center of the main hall, and warmed her hands as she gave a perfunctory reply.

“A True Monarch?”

Hearing this, Lu Mingyuan looked astonished.

He naturally knew what kind of figure someone called a True Monarch was.

In the Taoist Sect, a Qi Cultivator who reached the Eleventh Realm could be respectfully addressed by the world as a Master, gaining the initial qualifications to establish their own Sect and protect a region.

But a True Monarch, also known as a Great Master, was a supreme existence at the Twelfth Realm. They could possess a unique prefix in the world and were what the secular world called “Earth Immortals.”

Their status was equivalent to a Martial Artist in the Celestial Human Realm, even a cut above a Great Scholar, second only to the Three Religions’ Saints and Ancestral Master Human Immortals.

“Then how did you escape?”

Lu Mingyuan was extremely curious.

“A secret.”

As if she had returned home, Yun Qinghe poured herself a cup of hot tea, her tone casual.

The secret of the sword between her brows was enough to destroy a Dynasty; telling this young man about it would only bring him harm, no good.

“I’m still very curious about why you killed Lu Mingkong,” Lu Mingyuan asked.

Yun Qinghe picked up her tea, blew on it, and narrowed her delicate brows. “Ever since I was little, I’ve had no parents. I grew up in an orphanage, lived off the charity of others, and drifted from place to place. I don’t know many people, I’m not close to many people, and I have very few relatives. He touched someone he shouldn’t have, so he deserved to die by my sword.”

“A certain rather punchable Sword Immortal once said that a sword wielder’s path has three strikes: the first is to find a clear conscience, the second is to attest to the Dao, and the third is to seek invincibility. My sword is for a clear conscience.”

Hearing this, Lu Mingyuan fell silent for a moment, realizing that even someone as strong as Yun Qinghe had such a painful past she couldn’t bear to look back on.

Yun Qinghe turned her head, glanced at the Daoist Talismans Lu Mingyuan was drawing, and her willow-like brows relaxed as the corners of her vermilion lips curled up.

“You learn fast. I underestimated you.”

Receiving the praise, Lu Mingyuan smiled faintly. “It’s decent. Using the Blessed Vermilion Bird Brush you gave me, I can activate the Papermen. It’s a pretty good magic Skill.”

’Seeing his brilliant smile, does he not know this is the neutered version I gave him?’

Yun Qinghe said, annoyed, “It’s just a simple magic Skill. Why are you so happy about it?”

Perhaps feeling they had grown more familiar, Lu Mingyuan no longer spoke as plainly or secretively as before. He answered earnestly, “Besides my mother and grandfather, there aren’t many people in this world who are kind to me. Every one I meet is precious. The gift is small, but the sentiment is heavy—that’s the principle.”

Hearing this, Yun Qinghe’s interest was piqued. She smiled and asked, “Then among those three people, where do I rank?”

Lu Mingyuan was very sincere and said with a straight face, “Temporarily, you’re third.”

Yun Qinghe placed a hand on the hilt of her sword, tapped his thigh with the scabbard, and said with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes, “You should be thanking me for not killing you to silence you when we first met.”

Lu Mingyuan tried to recall the scene at the Great Snowfield. “I remember back then, I thought you were a Witch, so I didn’t dare try to save you.”

“Why?”

“The white-haired witch.”

“…”

Yun Qinghe covered her forehead, trying hard to suppress the urge to smack the guy. She glanced at the increasingly cozy furnishings of the palace and shook her head.

“Lu Mingyuan, I’ve noticed that even though you’re locked up in here, you’re living quite well. Isolated from the world, completely cut off from the outside… it’s a way to live, I suppose.”

Lu Mingyuan picked up an orange from a box and said wistfully, “Yeah. Just being alive is enough. I don’t ask for anything more.”

“Well, being happy is the most important thing in life. People say you shouldn’t try to find joy amidst suffering, but sometimes, it’s a necessary way to cope. A great poet once said, ’What is life in all its travels? It ought to be a wild swan’s print on melting snow.’ That’s exactly the principle. A person’s life is full of travels—what is it like? It’s like a great bird landing in the snow. It might leave a few Claw Marks behind, but in a flash, it’s flown far away. Who can say where those fleeting marks were left? Being optimistic is never a bad thing.”

Hearing this, Yun Qinghe instead fell into deep thought.

“’What is life in all its travels? It ought to be a wild swan’s print on melting snow…’”

After thinking for a long time, Yun Qinghe shook her head. She couldn’t empathize with that sentiment.

Even though she had seen many people and many things on her journey—lofty Immortal Disciples, common folk of mortal flesh, Emperors, Generals and Ministers, Demons and Ghosts—she had witnessed sorrows and joys, partings and reunions, love and hate, passions and feuds.

There was the scholar who sacrificed himself for his principles, giving up the right to establish a school and scattering a hundred years of his Dao Practice to shelter tens of thousands of citizens in a border city in exchange for peace.

There was the former Sovereign of a small southern nation, living in fear in a small, cage-like courtyard, full of regret. He would slap every railing and recite a single line: “Only the rosy cheeks have faded.”

There was the young Daoist in white from Dragon Tiger Mountain, who fought alone in the Western Wilderness Poison Barrier Mountains, slaying demons to protect the Dao, vowing to eradicate all Demon Fiends under heaven.

There was the Three River Gods, who defied the Celestial Dao’s prohibition and brought rain to a land of people suffering a hundred-day drought that stretched for thousands of miles. Their actions were deemed unforgivable by heavenly principles, and they were struck down by Divine Thunder, their bodies and souls obliterated. The common people erected Golden Stone Statues in their honor.

There was a group of Sword Cultivators stationed on the Great Wall at Beixiang, where Demon Barriers spawned. For generations, they guarded the pass, and the Demon Fiends beyond dared not invade.

There was the Enlightened Monk who passed by the mass graves of an Ancient Battlefield where four hundred thousand had been buried alive. Barefoot and holding an alms bowl, he chanted Buddhist Scriptures to guide the vengeful souls to the afterlife, achieving Perfection and attaining Buddhahood on the spot.

And now, she had witnessed yet another scene.

A dissolute Prince with a lonely and desolate figure, burdened by a great crime and accompanied by a disfigured Maid. Yet, his heart was set on the Martial Dao, he was full of hope for the future, and he was figuring out how to pass these thirty wasted years in the Cold Palace.

…

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