Lu Xiaochan gritted his teeth and activated the Wuhen Sword, unleashing the Yuanze Sword Formation. The waters from the Tailing Zhenyuan surged forth, greatly enhancing the formation’s power, instantly refining all those hands formed from evil energy!
However, the Tailing Zhenyuan at Lu Xiaochan’s waist was pulled away!
“Don’t look down!” Shu Wuxi’s warning came through gritted teeth.
But Lu Xiaochan had already looked down–that golden eye seemed to occupy the entire world, approaching Lu Xiaochan at extreme speed.
“Brother Wuxi—”
Lu Xiaochan saw his own reflection in Shu Wuxi’s eyes being swallowed by that evil eye, while Shu Wuxi was forced to release the “Question Heaven” Sword Formation. In an instant, thousands of sword intents descended from the sky like an inexorable heavenly will, charging into this giant eye.
The sword formation passed through Shu Wuxi’s body. No matter how Lu Xiaochan struggled, crying out “Let me go—-“, Shu Wuxi held onto Lu Xiaochan tightly even as his form was completely destroyed…
“Xiaochan, you must trust me—I won’t let you go—don’t trust the Evil God Chaos! Trust me!”
Tears streamed down Lu Xiaochan’s face at Shu Wuxi’s words. He felt Shu Wuxi’s fragments flying toward him as he too was pressed into that evil eye by the Question Heaven Sword Formation!
After an endless fall, he was suddenly pulled back by a force – it was the Sword Spirit from the Wuyi Sword Pavilion!
The Sword Spirit had no physical form and could only be connected to the Wuhen Sword.
The Wuhen Sword, borrowing the Sword Spirit’s spiritual form, reversed course and rose up, carrying Lu Xiaochan out of the evil eye.
“Shu Wuxi—Shu Wuxi—”
Lu Xiaochan frantically tried to catch Shu Wuxi’s fragments all along the way, but everything slipped through his fingers like sand.
Until an entire expanse of bright blue, gentle sky appeared before his eyes.
Looking up, he could still see the immortal tree Fengtian, though at this time Fengtian was like an ordinary tree. The Linglong Cold Jade was nowhere to be seen, but exotic flowers and grasses were everywhere. Spirit butterflies danced past, and overhead a spirit beast glided through the flowing clouds, trailing its five-colored tail.
“Where… is this…” Lu Xiaochan looked around dumbly.
“The Wuyi Jingtian,” the Sword Spirit said softly.
“Wuyi Jingtian? But the Wuyi Jingtian was just destroyed——” Lu Xiaochan stared in confusion.
The Sword Spirit took the form of a youth, lightly leaped onto a rock, then jumped onto a branch of the immortal tree “Fengtian”, and with another leap reached the treetop.
He turned around and waved to Lu Xiaochan. “Come on!”
Lu Xiaochan didn’t understand but flew on his sword to the Sword Spirit’s side.
Looking down, there was no vast Sword Sea around them, but rather clear skies for thousands of miles and boundless expanses in all directions, making one’s heart feel expansive.
“This is the Wuyi Jingtian at the end of the Great Primordial Era!” the Sword Spirit said, resting his chin on his hand.
Lu Xiaochan was dumbfounded. “How… how did I come here? I still need to find Shu Wuxi!”
“Lu Xiaochan, I used up all my primordial power to bring you back to the Great Primordial Era! Don’t you want to know the origin of Evil God Chaos? Only by knowing what it is can you fight against it! Only then will you have a chance to find your Shu Wuxi!”
“Evil God Chaos… you mean it has an original form?”
“All evil thoughts have their roots. Of course Evil God Chaos also has one——look!”
Following the Sword Spirit’s gaze, Lu Xiaochan saw a young man in white robes. His spiritual energy was pure and clear, a rare sight of otherworldly grace.
He sat leaning against a rock opposite the divine tree Fengtian, his foot lazily tracing circles in a way that seemed familiar to Lu Xiaochan, though he couldn’t recall who it reminded him of.
He discovered that he was like a non-existent observer to this world – he could only watch but couldn’t change anything.
But the white-robed youth’s abundant and light elixir sea nourished the growth of all things in the Wuyi Jingtian above. This was definitely spiritual energy approaching divinity above the level of great power.
The white-robed youth stretched lazily, and when he stood up, immortal herbs had grown where he had been sitting.
Lu Xiaochan’s first reaction was: “This person… could he be True Lord Lingyuan?”
The Sword Spirit nodded, his eyes filled with longing. “I have turned back countless times just to see him one more time… but alas, the Heavenly Way cycles, the withering and flourishing of all things cannot be reversed. I can watch him countless times, but can never change that outcome.”
“What outcome?”
As soon as Lu Xiaochan’s words fell, the heaven and earth suddenly changed, and evil energy suddenly swept across the entire Wuyi Jingtian.
The world darkened until not a ray of light could penetrate. The spirit bird that had been flying freely overhead was corrupted by darkness and gradually fell.
The white-robed youth looked up coldly at the sky, clasped his hands and shook them once, causing spiritual energy to surge – this was the “Tailing Pure Origin Spell” cast by True Lord Lingyuan, entirely different from what Lu Xiaochan had learned in later generations. It was more complex, and the caster’s cultivation and mental state were far beyond what later generations could achieve.
The Wuyi Jingtian that had been corrupted by evil energy was instantly purified by this great spell. True Lord Lingyuan called out loudly, “Yang Cang—”
A proud and solitary figure walked out from the thick evil energy, slowly opening his eyes, shocking Lu Xiaochan who was watching—they were golden, exactly like the evil eye that had swallowed Lu Xiaochan!
True Lord Lingyuan showed a surprised expression, “You… have been possessed?”
Lord Yang Cang walked step by step toward True Lord Lingyuan and embraced him tightly.
“With you in the world, it is so good… why must everyone ask me to abandon emotion and love, to become a god alone?”
Lu Xiaochan, watching all this, couldn’t help but be shocked. “Could it be… that Evil God Chaos actually…”
The Sword Spirit answered in a calm voice, “Who said Yang Cang didn’t become a god? He did become one. The higher his cultivation was, the deeper his attachment to True Lord Lingyuan, the heavier his desire became. Taking in all the world’s desires, heart demon becoming god—-that is Evil God Chaos.”
Since True Lord Lingyuan was the source of Yang Cang’s obsession, he used the “Tailing Void Purification Spell.”
That was the most vast elixir sea Lu Xiaochan had ever seen. True Lord Lingyuan sent his tens of thousands of years of cultivation into the formation, forcing Yang Cang’s heart demon Chaos out of his body.
But Evil God Chaos, at the moment of leaving Yang Cang’s body, rushed through True Lord Lingyuan’s inner palace and took his elixir core.
True Lord Lingyuan fell into Yang Cang’s arms. In that instant, plants and trees in the Wuyi Jingtian withered, heaven and earth turned upside down. Yang Cang, who had never shown any emotion, had tears flying down, piercing through layers of dust, falling into True Lord Lingyuan’s eyes.
Yang Cang cut a thousand-year ice from the Northern Sea, built a nine layered Linglong Cold Jade, and placed True Lord Lingyuan’s original body within it, to preserve his last breath.
He summoned the spirit beast Chang Yan to chase Evil God Chaos together to the Xiyuan.
In that battle, Chang Yan died, and Yang Cang split open the Hopeless Land to retrieve True Lord Lingyuan’s elixir core.
He was already exhausted, his spiritual energy dispersing, but he persisted in protecting True Lord Lingyuan’s elixir core.
And Lu Xiaochan, sitting on “Fengtian”, seemed to share the feelings – True Lord Lingyuan’s loneliness in the nine layered Linglong Cold Jade and his expectation of seeing Yang Cang one more time all entered Lu Xiaochan’s heart. He hugged himself tightly, almost shattered by such pain.
It turned out True Lord Lingyuan never cared about his own elixir core, he only wanted Lord Yang Cang by his side.
Not caring about eternal life, only caring about this moment.
He used all his strength to maintain his original body, but in the end still didn’t wait for Yang Cang to return.
“Xiaochan, do you still want to see Shu Wuxi again?” the Sword Spirit asked him.
“I want to…” Lu Xiaochan’s heart ached beyond measure.
He just wanted to rush into Shu Wuxi’s arms, hold him tight, crush his bones, merge into his own bloodline, never to be separated for all eternity.
“Xiaochan, I still remember the first time you came to the Wuyi Jingtian, I accompanied you playing in the Sword Intent Pavilion, and you also made me feel not so lonely for the first time in tens of thousands of years… What you like, I also find interesting. What makes you happy also brings me joy. You are me, and I am you… so I will help you fulfill all your wishes.”
The Sword Spirit reached out his hand to Lu Xiaochan. At this moment, Lu Xiaochan only wanted to break free from the unbearable regret and expectation that True Lord Lingyuan had given him. He gritted his teeth and gripped the Sword Spirit’s hand tightly, like a drowning person grabbing the last straw.
In that instant, the Sword Spirit gradually transformed into Lu Xiaochan’s appearance and entered his body.
As the Sword Spirit completely merged with him, he seemed to hear Shu Wuxi’s deep and firm voice brush past his ear.
“Xiaochan—don’t believe everything Evil God Chaos shows you!”
The “Question Heaven” Sword Formation fell straight down, spiritual energy gathered over thousands of years rushed in from that evil eye, fierce winds arose, as if it were a life-and-death clash between the world’s ultimate evil and the heaven’s righteous spiritual energy. The two forces ground against and consumed each other, explosive sounds rising and falling, like the creation of heaven and earth from chaos!
Mo Qianqiu and others maintaining the formation exhausted all their strength, even their immortal swords were almost shattered!
Layer upon layer of evil energy was refined away, and the world that had been swallowed by the evil eye gradually revealed its original colors.
The Wuyi Jingtian was leveled to the ground. When the smoke cleared, a huge crater appeared before all the immortal leaders.
Shu Wuxi was holding Lu Xiaochan at the bottom of the crater.
“Xiaochan! Xiaochan wake up!”
Shu Wuxi’s brows were tightly knitted, teeth clenched, one hand holding the back of Lu Xiaochan’s head, gently shaking him.
“Xiaochan!”
Mo Qianqiu and Ling Nianwu were about to fly over on their swords, but were stopped by Miaochen and Lianyue.
“Wait!”
They saw Lu Xiaochan in Shu Wuxi’s arms slowly open his eyes, golden pupils seeming to contain another unfathomable void.
He curved his lips in a smile. “Lord Yang Cang—long time no see!”
The wicked and unrestrained smile made everyone shudder.
“What is… that…” Mo Qianqiu trembled involuntarily looking at those golden eyes.
“Do you know of the ‘Playing with Dust’ world?” Ling Nianwu said.
(TL: possibly symbolizing mortal affairs, illusion, or a realm of worldly struggles.)
“You mean… just now when the evil eye opened wide, Chaos created the Playing with Dust world to deceive Xiaochan?”
This was a result none of them had anticipated.
“Only immortal realm supreme beings with tens of thousands of years of cultivation merged with heaven and earth can create the ‘Playing with Dust’ world,” Lian Yue’s expression changed from his usual calm to cold, “But with Evil God’s tens of thousands of years of accumulated evil energy, creating the ‘Playing with Dust’ world is not difficult for it…”
“It used the ‘Playing with Dust’ world to draw out Xiaochan’s obsession, entering Xiaochan’s original body! Shu Wuxi could unhesitatingly refine the Evil God, but facing Xiaochan, how can Shu Wuxi strike…”
Lu Xiaochan looked into Shu Wuxi’s eyes, gently stroking his brows and eyes. “I’ve missed you, have been thinking of you for tens of thousands of years…”
Shu Wuxi’s gaze looked unflinchingly into those evil eyes, saying softly, “I said I wouldn’t leave you or let you go.”
“Then let’s never be apart.”
Lu Xiaochan held Shu Wuxi tight, those eyes making people tremble with fear, while the Wuhen Sword flew spinning up, evil energy dyeing it black as night.
Everyone formed a formation, blocking the Wuhen Sword behind Shu Wuxi’s back.
But Lu Xiaochan possessed by the Evil God had too much evil energy, and the Wuhen Sword gradually pierced through the sword formation formed by everyone.
Shu Wuxi’s hand pressed against Lu Xiaochan’s brow, saying softly, “I’ll come find you.”
The Wuyi Sword Sea that had been hovering in the sky suddenly plunged down, unhesitatingly rushing into Shu Wuxi’s body.
This was tens of thousands of years of sword intent. Shu Wuxi’s original body and elixir sea were bearing this enormous power, about to collapse at any moment.
While Lu Xiaochan smiled and said, “You think borrowing the Wuyi Sword Sea’s tens of thousands of years of sword intent can enter my ‘Playing with Dust’ world? Before you even enter, your original body will be completely destroyed!”
