After hearing the sobbing from inside the room, the answer had become painfully clear.
Li Changqing and Ye Guyi exchanged a glance, then rose from the stone steps at the same time.
Li Changqing pushed open the door, and the two entered one after the other.
Inside, Jiang Nannan was sprawled over her mother's body, weeping her heart out. Her shoulders shook violently, as though she were pouring out all the grievance, helplessness, and despair she had bottled up over the past days.
The woman on the bed had already closed her eyes forever. Her expression was peaceful, and a faint smile still lingered at the corners of her lips, as though she had merely fallen asleep.
Li Changqing stood at the doorway, his face calm and devoid of any visible emotional change.
Over the years of traveling the continent, he had witnessed too many lives and deaths, too many faces shattered by grief.
His heart was no longer as soft as it had once been, but that did not mean he was coldhearted.
He simply understood more clearly that in this world, sympathy and tears alone were far from enough.
Ye Guyi quickly stepped forward, crouched down, gently wrapped an arm around Jiang Nannan's shoulders, and comforted her softly. "Nannan, don't cry... Your mother passed peacefully. She wouldn't want to see you this upset."
Jiang Nannan said nothing. She only cried harder.
Ye Guyi gently patted her back. After a moment of silence, she seemed to think of something. Raising her head, she said seriously, "Nannan, I have a way. Maybe... maybe I can bring your mother back to life."
The crying stopped abruptly.
Jiang Nannan suddenly lifted her head, her tear-blurred eyes fixed on Ye Guyi as though she suspected she had misheard.
Her swollen, reddened eyes were filled with shock and disbelief. Her trembling voice could barely form a sentence. "G-Guyi... Sister Guyi, what... what did you say?"
Rather than answering directly, Ye Guyi turned to Li Changqing at the doorway and asked, "Changqing, can you place Nannan's mother's life soul in my Spiritual Sea as well? Let her be revived alongside my mother in the future?"
Jiang Nannan was completely bewildered.
What life soul?
What Spiritual Sea?
What revival?
What was all this supposed to mean?
Why could she not understand a single word?
Li Changqing leaned against the doorframe with his arms crossed. After pondering for a moment, he nodded. "Yes. Didn't the Sea God Tang San do the same thing ten thousand years ago? The two soul beasts who sacrificed themselves for him eventually ascended to the Divine Realm with him and gained eternal life. The principle is essentially the same."
Hearing this, Ye Guyi let out a breath of relief.
As long as there was hope, that was enough. No matter how slim that hope was, it was still better than having none at all.
All that remained was to give everything they had for that hope and possibility.
Jiang Nannan, however, became completely frantic.
She grabbed Ye Guyi's sleeve, her voice filled with anxiety and confusion. "Sister Guyi, what exactly are you talking about? What life soul? What revival? Why can't I understand any of this?"
This time, Ye Guyi did not hide anything. Taking Jiang Nannan's hand, she explained everything from beginning to end.
From her own mother's death, to Li Changqing preserving her mother's life soul, to the plan of reshaping their bodies and reviving their loved ones after becoming gods—she told her every detail without holding anything back.
After hearing it all, Jiang Nannan was utterly stunned.
Becoming a god?
Revival?
This...
Was that truly something they could accomplish?
Seeing her dazed expression, Ye Guyi tightened her grip on Jiang Nannan's hand and said solemnly, "Nannan, if you are willing, we can try walking this path together. If you are not, then all we can do is let your mother reincarnate. The choice is yours. As for me, I have chosen to gamble on it."
When Jiang Nannan learned that Ye Guyi's mother had also died, and that Ye Guyi had chosen the path of becoming a god and reviving her, she fell silent.
She lowered her head and looked at her mother's peaceful face. Her mother's final words echoed in her mind: "It's a pity Mom won't get to see you marry and have children." Her heart felt as though it were being cut apart.
After a long while, she slowly raised her head. A resolve and seriousness unlike anything before gradually emerged in her tear-reddened eyes.
She looked at Ye Guyi, then at Li Changqing, and nodded solemnly. "Then... I'll have to trouble you."
Li Changqing said nothing more. He stepped forward and extended his right hand.
The next moment, a stream of gentle, pure spiritual power flowed from his palm and lightly entered the woman's forehead.
A moment later, a faint, nearly transparent golden orb slowly floated out from between the woman's brows and hovered in midair.
With a gesture from Li Changqing's finger, the orb drifted toward Ye Guyi, gently sank into her forehead, and vanished.
"It's done."
Li Changqing withdrew his hand and said flatly, "Go in and take a look."
Ye Guyi closed her eyes, and her consciousness sank into her Spiritual Sea.
After hesitating briefly, Jiang Nannan also closed her eyes and extended her spiritual power into Ye Guyi's Spiritual Sea.
It was a vast golden expanse, boundless and endless, permeated everywhere by a warm and sacred aura.
At the center of that space, she saw two figures.
One of them was familiar to her.
Her mother stood there quietly, looking exactly as she had in life, still as gentle and beautiful as ever.
Only her eyes seemed somewhat unfocused, as though she were immersed in a long dream.
Beside her mother stood another woman.
She appeared to be in her early thirties, tall and strikingly beautiful. She resembled Ye Guyi by seventy or eighty percent, and her bearing was noble and dignified. She must have been Ye Guyi's mother.
The two mothers stood side by side, quietly floating in that golden space, as though waiting for something.
Seeing her mother's figure, Jiang Nannan's nose stung, and she nearly burst into tears again.
But she held them back.
She took a deep breath and silently said to her mother in her heart, Mom, I'll do everything I can to become a god and bring you back as soon as possible.
Then, her consciousness withdrew from the Spiritual Sea.
When she opened her eyes, the confusion and despair in her gaze were gone, replaced by a light called hope.
Under Ye Guyi and Li Changqing's watchful eyes, Jiang Nannan reached up and wiped the tears from her face.
She did not cry again. Instead, she silently stepped forward and carefully lifted her mother from the bed, moving so gently that it seemed she feared waking someone who was asleep.
Holding her mother, she walked out of the room step by step, crossed the courtyard, and arrived in the backyard.
There was an open patch of ground she had chosen long ago. It was where she had often played as a child, while her mother loved to move a chair beneath the eaves and watch her run about.
Ye Guyi wanted to step forward and help, but Jiang Nannan gently shook her head to stop her. "Sister Guyi, let me do it myself."
Ye Guyi opened her mouth, but in the end, she withdrew her hand and stood silently to one side.
Jiang Nannan gently laid her mother on the ground, then knelt beside her and began digging with her hands.
She used no tools and did not draw on any Soul Power. She simply dug handful by handful.
Dirt wedged beneath her fingernails, and her fingertips split open, beading with blood, yet she paid it no mind.
Exactly like Ye Guyi had been before.
Standing some distance away, Ye Guyi watched that stubborn figure, and her eyes could not help turning moist.
She turned her head away, unable to bear watching any longer.
Just then, an elderly voice, tinged with impatience, carried in from the front courtyard. "Girl, have you made up your mind? This old man has already settled things with the Netherworld Sect. We're just waiting for you to nod!"
The voice was strong and vigorous, carrying a matter-of-fact arrogance, as though its owner was certain Jiang Nannan would agree.
Li Changqing raised an eyebrow but said nothing. He turned and headed toward the front courtyard.
The moment Ye Guyi heard that voice, her expression turned icy, and she followed close behind.
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