From that day on, Jian Zhen never saw Ye Jisheng again.
The Demon Realm’s entire great hall became quiet and desolate. Only occasionally, after he awoke, would Yan Ji come over to look after it. Even so, it could still sense that Yan Ji’s emotions lately seemed somewhat tense.
Yan Ji’s expression today was still somewhat grave.
Standing by the window, after watering the little grass in the pot, Yan Ji let out a soft sigh. “His Excellency has entered closed cultivation. The upheaval of Wanmie Mountain happens once every ten thousand years. There should clearly still be a hundred years before the next upheaval, yet recently Wanmie Mountain has been acting up frequently. That mountain seals half of His Excellency’s power. The curses are linked, and it has a great impact on His Excellency. I hope nothing happens.”
Hearing her words, Jian Zhen also felt a little worried.
But on second thought, the demon god had a divine body, this was a matter among gods. How could a little grass like it possibly have any influence?
Yan Ji gently brushed its branches and chuckled softly. “You’re worried about His Excellency too, aren’t you?”
The little grass in the pot gently swayed its branches.
Yan Ji comforted it. “I’m the same as you. The Demon Clan has only just managed to live in peace over these ten thousand years. It wasn’t easy to finally have things get better. Now the Immortal Clan and the Yao Clan are eyeing us like tigers watching their prey. If something were to happen to His Excellency, our situation would become dangerous.”
Jian Zhen reassuringly stretched out its leaves and patted her hand.
Don’t worry, the one from the Immortal Clan is also in closed cultivation right now. Nothing will happen!
A few more smiles appeared on Yan Ji’s beautiful face as she said leisurely, “You really are a cute little grass. No wonder you can win His Excellency’s favor. If after you take form you really become the queen consort, I don’t think that would be impossible~”
Jian Zhen: “……”
Is it really okay for you people to tease it all day long like this?!
After Yan Ji left, the Demon Realm’s great hall returned to silence.
Jian Zhen had also been feeling more drowsy these past few days, so it slowly fell into sleep as well. These days had been peaceful, and it had slept for a long time. Originally, it thought this sleep would be very deep,
As dusk gradually sank westward, until the final ray of sunlight fell to the last line of the horizon.
“Boom!”
A dull rumble shattered the silence of the night.
The sound seemed to spread from the edge of the heavens, rippling outward like waves toward the Three Realms. All things were startled. Beside the windowsill of the Demon Realm’s great hall, the immortal grass pot let out fine cracking sounds. Golden light surged along the veins of the grass leaves, flooding the entire grass body. The light grew brighter and brighter, slowly enveloping the entire pot as well.
Hot, so hot……
Jian Zhen, who abruptly awoke, first felt an all-encompassing heat like blazing flames.
This sensation was not unfamiliar to him, it was almost identical to the feeling from the day he was about to take form. But almost the very next second, the sensation that followed was extreme cold. The torment of ice and fire, like two opposing heavens, made the grass suffer unbearably.
“Pa-da.”
There was the sound of a flowerpot falling and completely shattering.
Yet the entire immortal grass still emitted golden light. Thunderous heavy sounds came from the distant horizon, like the roar of a beast. A dull thunderbolt streaked across the sky of the Demon Realm, as if it were about to tear the entire sky apart.
Jian Zhen, the whole grass, had already lost consciousness from the pain.
Until after the thunder rang out, together with the booming sound, it was as if some invisible force was pulling at him. His entire person fell into a pitch-black place, with only the cave entrance ahead emitting a red glow. At this moment, Jian Zhen was in extreme agony, without even the strength to stand up. He lowered his head, yet he was no longer a little ball of a body, he could see his slender palms and fair skin.
He had taken form, he had a human body!
Realizing this, he should have been extremely happy, yet the pain of ice and fire ravaging his body nearly made his head explode.
A familiar aura came from not far away.
Jian Zhen forced himself to stand up. The voice and strength rising from deep in his heart pushed him forward, toward the cave entrance.
Red light and soul fire filled the entire cave.
Jian Zhen saw the person at the center of the formation in the cave. Ye Jisheng’s dark robes seemed to be dyed red. On his pale, slender hand, red talismanic patterns glowed. His violently swelling meridians and the restless soul fire filling the entire cave all revealed his poor condition, until another ear-splitting shockwave came from the horizon.
As if instinctively, Jian Zhen ran over without thinking. The dangerous protective soul fire did not launch an attack on the intruder. He stumbled and knelt before the person in the cave. “Ye… Ye Jisheng.”
He anxiously tried to reach out to awaken the unconscious man.
Almost instantly.
A pair of red eyes opened. Those crimson eyes seemed to burn with flames, devoid of any rationality, within them was only endless killing intent and bloodthirsty cruelty. Ye Jisheng directly grabbed Jian Zhen’s hand in midair. His palm was scorching like iron; his grip was terrifyingly strong, almost able to easily twist that slender arm apart.
The dark robes were stained with traces of blood; his ink-black hair flew wildly.
Killing intent overflowed. Jian Zhen had no doubt that he would kill him.
Though he could crush the person before him in an instant, he did not move. At the point where they touched, the glow of the runic curse on his arm seemed to dim considerably.
Ye Jisheng’s gaze was as if looking at a dead man. His voice was hoarse yet dangerous. “Seeking death.”
In that instant, Jian Zhen felt that the pain of ice and fire throughout his body had actually weakened quite a bit. He did not understand why, yet hope arose. He feared death and feared pain; at this moment, he could only softly try to plead, “I, I can save you.”
Wasn’t it an immortal grass?
Since it could detoxify all poisons, then it should work on curses too, right?
His body was both cold and hot; Jian Zhen’s mind had already turned into chaos. He was an immortal grass, yet he did not know how to detoxify.
In pain and fear, sensing Ye Jisheng’s wildly surging demonic qi, Jian Zhen lowered his head and tentatively lifted Ye Jisheng’s hand, seeing the winding talismanic curses on the arm emitting an eerie glow, completely unlike its usual healthy skin tone.
It was these bad things tormenting them.
Jian Zhen’s mind was a complete blur. Like a newborn calf unafraid of the tiger, just as he had been for a hundred years as a little grass, he lowered his head and gently took a bite.
Ye Jisheng’s wrist was stained with his aura; the curse patterns dimmed like receding tides.
A crystalline smile appeared in Jian Zhen’s eyes. Kneeling before the dark-robed man, the young, fair-skinned youth revealed a satisfied smile. He lifted his head to look at Ye Jisheng and said, “It, it works, look, it works……”
But he only met a pair of crimson eyes.
The fire within them seemed ready to engulf everything. This was absolutely not the usually rational demon god. His somewhat rough fingertips rolled over the lips Jian Zhen had just bitten him with. From afar came the ancient rumbling of the earth, as if shaking the soul.
Soul fire scattered in all directions; heat and cold churned within the body.
The next second.
The world spun. An irresistible heat engulfed Jian Zhen completely.
Jian Zhen only felt as though his entire being was torn apart in muddled chaos and then reassembled. Yet amid the indescribable pain, there was a familiar force that stayed with him the whole time. That familiarity felt engraved into his very soul, making him unconsciously want to accept it, to sink into it.
In the night sky over the demon city, wind and rain raged. Wanmie Mountain suddenly erupted in unrest. The red moon anomaly appeared. Spiritual qi and demonic qi between heaven and earth roiled, shaking the Three Realms. The grand formation of Demon Realm Mountain, belonging to a god’s soul energy, surged skyward. Heavy rain fell for a full day and night.
***
The torrential rain stopped.
Sunlight poured down through the mountains. Tender green leaves unfurled their buds. Little birds rested on the branches. Dew from the leaves dripped down, landing on the person in the forest.
Pain.
So much pain.
The youth on the ground slowly opened his eyes. Just as he tried to move, clear soreness surged from his limbs. For a moment, he suspected he might be about to fall apart.
Another drop of dew fell.
Jian Zhen shakily raised his hand and wiped his face. His fair arm was mottled with bruises of blue and purple, it looked frightening.
“You’re awake?”
A voice from not far away startled him so badly that he jerked.
Jian Zhen struggled to turn his gaze and saw, beneath a tree not far away, a youth sitting there in rather tattered clothing. He wore ash-gray clothes, his skin somewhat dark, holding a tree branch as he said, “Fortunately, looks like you’re still alive.”
Sunlight spilled through the forest, and for a moment one could not tell what day it was.
Jian Zhen’s head ached as if it were splitting open, his consciousness still muddled. He softly said, “Where is this?”
“This is the Marsh Forest outside Yun City. This place is closest to Wanmie Mountain, so it’s a crossroads for all races of the Three Realms and belongs to no clan.” The youth said, “My friend and I were trapped here a few days ago. Today, when we came out to look for a way, we saw you lying here. You were covered in injuries and wearing some tattered clothes.”
Jian Zhen was a bit dazed.
Lowering his head, he saw that he was wearing a ragged robe that barely covered his body.
He had taken form.
Jian Zhen looked at his hands and legs. Last night’s memories were a muddled blur; thinking about them was like stirring paste. He only remembered being in extreme pain, then hazily arriving at some place, and then……
And then……
Jian Zhen stiffened in place at a loss, his memory seeming to jam.
The person under the tree said, “Did you encounter something in this forest, or were you abandoned by some heartless man?”
Jian Zhen looked at him, his fair face full of confusion. “Heart… heartless man?”
“Isn’t that so?” The dirt-smudged youth under the tree held a blade of grass in his mouth and looked at him. “The marks on your body, although many are covered by your clothes, I recognize those marks. Those are marks left only by intimate relations, right? In this desolate wilderness, you appear here half-dead with no one by your side. If you weren’t abandoned by a heartless man, then what?”
After hearing this, Jian Zhen was completely stunned.
He really couldn’t clearly remember the memories of last night’s transformation. He only remembered being startled awake from his sleep, but he had no idea where he was. In a daze, he vaguely remembered barging into some big shot’s secluded cultivation grounds, and then… then……
Jian Zhen clutched his head in pain.
Fragmented memories of skin-on-skin intimacy flashed into his mind. When he transformed, his spiritual body surged, his mind unclear, he really did seem to have dual cultivated with some big shot!!
But……
With whom?!
Jian Zhen lowered his head to look at the robe on his body, but this was an inner robe. He had only ever seen Fu Changhuan’s and Ye Jisheng’s outer robes; he had never seen their inner garments!
Seeing how shaken he looked, the youth under the tree said in disbelief, “You really were abandoned by a heartless man?”
Jian Zhen hesitated. “I……”
The youth looked at the person sitting in the forest. Although his body was mottled with frightening blue and purple bruises, his skin was delicate and fair as if made of water. His face was clean and refined, his eyes clear, his temperament so pure it was as though untouched by worldly dust. His current helpless appearance stirred compassion.
One really didn’t know what kind of stone-hearted person could abandon him.
The youth couldn’t help but comfort him. “Don’t worry. Once we get out of this marsh forest, outside is the largest Tianshui City in the Three Realms. There are huge merchant guilds there. As long as that heartless man isn’t some supreme being of the Three Realms, like the Demon Venerable or the Immortal Venerable, those powerful figures, the guilds will definitely be able to help you find him, no matter to the ends of the earth, and take revenge for you!”
Jian Zhen: “……”
