In the small Southern Border kingdom of Southern Li, there stood a mountain at the western edge of its borders, named Immortal Trace Mountain. Red clouds wreathed it year-round, Immortal Qi faintly stirring within. Jagged rocks covered its peak as though they had flown in from beyond the heavens, making it all the more peculiar amid the crimson haze.
Old legends claimed immortals lived in the mountain, though no one had ever found so much as half an immortal hair. Thus, the red clouds became little more than an odd tale for people to discuss after tea and meals. Other than the occasional stubborn seeker of immortality who came to investigate, it was no different from any ordinary little mountain.
Midnight.
A youth slowly climbed to the summit and stood outside the pile of jagged rocks, lost in thought.
He was not a seeker of immortality, merely a villager from the foot of the mountain.
Yet strangely, ever since he had come of age at sixteen this year, he often felt an odd impulse, as if something in the mountain were waiting for him. Whenever he could no longer suppress it, he would come to the mountaintop and stare blankly into space, but he had never found anything.
The rocks atop the mountain were rough, their surfaces covered in ancient patterns that lay in chaotic disorder, without any discernible structure. The youth reached out and stroked them, inexplicably feeling a sense of familiarity whose source he could not name. He had looked at these things every day since childhood. Why had he never felt this way before...
"I wonder whether this has something to do with Father and Mother... Whenever I ask Uncle Xu and the others, they say I'm talking in my sleep." The youth raised his head toward the stars and moon. The moon had already climbed to the center of the sky, and through the red clouds and mist, its light bore an unusually crimson tint.
Just then, a voice suddenly came from within the rock pile. "What rotten luck. I came all this way to this damned mountain, only to find that Little Peach Red has no idea which bastard beat me to the punch."
Someone replied, "Shut up. The National Teacher said..."
As the words fell, two men emerged from the pile of rocks. Upon seeing the youth, both froze, and the speaker swallowed the rest of his sentence. Then their expressions twisted into vicious grins, and two long swords stabbed toward him at once.
The country youth was simple-hearted and had seen little of the world. He had encountered some seekers of immortality before, and they had always been courteous to the local residents. It had never occurred to him that these people would try to kill him without a word. Even when the two swords pierced straight through him, he did not know why.
The two men left laughing. The youth lay amid the rocks, blood gushing from his chest. His eyes were wide as he stared in the direction they had gone, and even at death's door, he wanted to ask one question: Why?
The two men had underestimated the youth's vitality, believing him certain to die. In truth, he had practiced martial arts since childhood. Had he not been utterly unguarded, it would not have been so easy for them to kill him. For the moment, he did not die. Slowly, he discovered that after being splashed with his blood, the rocks he had grown accustomed to seeing since childhood began to change.
Beneath the moonlight, the stones gradually glimmered with a ghostly blue sheen, mingling with the bright-red blood in a scene of eerie strangeness. Then, as though the light were contagious, the surrounding rocks began to shine blue one after another. Before long, nearly every rock on the mountaintop had turned blue, and the dying youth lying on the ground suddenly vanished.
The world before him twisted, followed by a boundless blood-red expanse, like a world dyed in fresh blood. There was no end in sight, no boundary to be seen. Everywhere he looked, there were only white bones carpeting the ground, cold and reeking of decay.
Besides the bones, broken fragments of stone tablets and weapons lay scattered everywhere. Sword hilts and blades were strewn in disorder, while countless faces seemed to twist, roar, and wail within the red mist around him.
"Is this... hell?" The youth's consciousness was close to scattering. "I hate this..."
The youth himself did not notice that in this peculiar place, a special kind of Spiritual Energy seemed to be gradually repairing his body. The body that should have died from blood loss was slowly healing. Unfortunately, his soul was already too weak and his consciousness too scattered. He could not survive.
Amid the shrieks and wails deep within his soul, a vague voice suddenly sounded. "This bloodline... no wonder he could come here..."
"Bloodline?"
"Are you about to die?" The voice seemed delighted. "Such a weak soul, perfect, perfect!"
Before the youth could react, a frigid sensation surged from nowhere, passing through his soul and reaching the depths of his Sea of Consciousness. He could only feel a terrifying ghostly face grinning as it lunged from the depths of his soul. Boundless darkness surrounded him and swallowed him whole.
"Body Seizing..." That was the youth's final thought.
His luck had truly run out; first he had been killed, then his body was to be seized... Forget it. He was going to die anyway. The youth's soul let out one final roar. "If you take my body, then go ask the National Teacher why!"
At that very moment, a soul of unknown origin suddenly barged into this twisted space-time.
As though drawn by the shell that had only just lost its soul, that soul drifted into the youth's body in confusion.
The ghostly face in the midst of seizing the body seemed somewhat surprised. Then, sensing that the newly arrived soul was not powerful either, it simply went all the way and swallowed that soul as well, attempting to digest it.
With a BOOM, an enormous volume of utterly unexpected and completely incompatible information flooded in. The ghostly face was left at a loss, and with a muffled groan, it expelled the new soul in its entirety.
This setback seemed devastating. The ghostly face immediately weakened considerably, unable even to hold its shape. Like a receding tide, it was forced back and left the body.
Only the new soul remained within the youth's body.
The youth opened his eyes, utterly bewildered.
"So there really is a hell after death. So this is what hell looks like?"
Silence.
After a while, a voice drifted up faintly. "What are these computers, phones, videos, novels, and avs crammed throughout your soul?"
The youth said, "Huh? You've been in hell for so many years and still don't know about those?"
"..." After another long pause, the voice said helplessly, "Who are you?"
"My name is Qin Yi."
The voice sounded faintly mocking. "What a coincidence. From the soul I just swallowed, I learned that the one whose body you possess also seems to be called Qin Yi."
At those words, the youth immediately became alert. "No, this isn't hell... Who are you?"
"You may call me Liusu." The voice spoke slowly. "This is not hell, though it may be called hell. Do you... want to leave?"
"How do I get out?"
"Pick me up, and you will naturally be able to leave."
"Pick you up?"
"There is a Wolf Tooth Club slanted into the ground beside your hand. That is me."
Qin Yi: "..."
The instant Qin Yi pulled out the Wolf Tooth Club, space twisted. The entire region suddenly disappeared, and when he opened his eyes again, he was back atop the mountain, beneath a bright moon and sparse stars, with red clouds winding around him.
At the same time, in the small village at the foot of the mountain.
An old farmer sat up from his kang bed.
The Woodcutter opened his door and looked toward the moon.
The yellow dog at the village entrance turned its head toward the mountaintop.
"The gate opened?"
"It did not."
"That is because I guard a gate, while you merely guard a grave."
"Actually, I never wanted to guard a grave."
"Then why don't you leave?"
"If it leaves, this place will no longer be a grave."
"I have never thought your words made this much sense before."
Southern Li Royal Palace.
"May Father King be well."
"Qing Lin, Qing Jun, you came at just the right time. Last night, I took the National Teacher's Golden Elixir, and I feel several years younger. Look, hasn't some of my white hair disappeared?"
The young Prince fell silent for a long while before saying softly, "Father King, there is no such thing in this world..." Seeing his father's expression darken, he did not continue, instead changing the subject at once. "The Great General reported last night that the Western Wilderness Kingdom has massed troops at Stone City. There appears to be unusual activity."
The king impatiently waved a hand. "Go deal with it."
"Yes." The Prince silently withdrew.
After leaving the royal palace, the Prince turned back to gaze at it for a while. Then he shifted his eyes toward the resplendent Daoist Temple in the west of the city. Worshippers streamed through it like a woven tapestry, bowing devoutly. Amid the lingering immortal music, the incense-wreathed Daoist Temple resembled an immortal palace.
The Prince's gaze gradually turned cold.
"Brother dislikes Dong Huazi too?" A crisp voice rang beside his ear.
"Too?" The Prince looked at his younger sister. "Aren't you very devoted to immortals?"
"I admire immortals, but shouldn't immortals dine on wind and drink dew, coming and going through the blue firmament? How could they possibly come to this mundane mortal world and become some ridiculous National Teacher?"
The Prince laughed despite himself. "Right."
"Ah, there are legends of immortals in many places. Let's find a real immortal. If we truly find one, I'll follow him and cultivate..."
The Prince stared blankly at the Daoist Temple for a moment, then answered with a smile, "All right. When I have some free time, I'll accompany you to look."
Before you continue