Pressing an Ant to Death

Chen Lingxi narrowed his eyes and continued onward.

At some point, the sky had turned overcast, and it began to rain again.

Spring rain in March should have carried the gentle warmth of "apricot blossom rain, dampening clothes without soaking them," yet today's rain was as cold as melted snow in the dead of winter.

There were gradually fewer pedestrians on the streets.

Mixed among the scattered people leaving the city, Chen Lingxi headed all the way toward the northern city gate.

Before long, he arrived.

It was a broad, empty execution ground.

The land here lay low, surrounded on three sides by bare earthen slopes. Only an official road to the north led in or out.

Not a blade of grass grew nearby; not even a single foxtail grass could be seen.

Chen Lingxi stood before the execution ground in silence.

The rain fell ever more densely, striking his shoulders and streaming down from his temples, but he did not wipe it away.

He remembered this place more clearly than any other.

More than two years ago, on that day, the execution ground had been ringed by common folk watching the spectacle.

His father, Chen Yanzhi, had knelt in this very execution ground, and the executioner had severed his head with a single stroke.

His mother followed close after. Before she could even let out a cry, she too fell upon the same patch of yellow mud.

That day had also been such a rainy, overcast day.

The rain washed over the blood on the ground, carving out a long red channel that flowed all the way to his feet.

Later, he had been made an official slave and passed through many hands before arriving at Baosu Marquis Residence.

This place seemed colder than anywhere else.

He stood quietly for a while, until the rain had soaked him through.

"Consort Chun..."

"Mirror Listening Art..."

He recalled them in his heart.

Just then, a soft chuckle suddenly sounded behind him.

It was not loud, mingled with the pattering rain, yet it reached Chen Lingxi's ears with perfect clarity.

Chen Lingxi spun around.

On the branches of a crooked old locust tree not far away stood a person.

He was a youth of no more than eighteen or nineteen, with red lips, white teeth, and a face so handsome he seemed not of this mortal world.

He wore a moon-white robe whose fabric remained dry despite the rain. Raindrops rebounded of their own accord once they came within three feet of him, as though an invisible barrier enveloped him.

A longsword hung at his waist. Its sheath was entirely silver-white, while a jade-green gem was set in its hilt, casting a faint, cold gleam beneath the dim sky.

One hand behind his back and the other resting on his sword hilt, the youth looked down at Chen Lingxi from above.

His eyes were exceptionally bright, bright as two cold stars.

Yet there was not the slightest warmth in that starlight—only an aloof indifference, as though he were examining an ant.

It was as if, in his eyes, Chen Lingxi below was not a living person, but an amusing plaything.

Who is this person?

Chen Lingxi had exchanged only one glance with him before the blood and qi throughout his body abruptly congealed.

At last, the man spoke.

"Seeing that you could withstand the cauldron calamity of that Candle of Time, I followed you for quite a while."

The youth's voice was clear as jade chimes striking one another. His tone was lazy and casual, yet every word struck Chen Lingxi squarely in the chest.

"But now that I look at you, there seems to be nothing special about you."

Chen Lingxi's pupils contracted slightly.

Candle of Time, cauldron calamity.

This man had been watching me just now.

Seeing that Chen Lingxi did not seem as shocked as he had expected, the youth tilted his head. "Then what is your background?"

Before his words had faded, another change arose.

The curtain of rain in the direction of the bridgehead suddenly seemed to be churned by an invisible hand. Dense fog surged in from every direction like a tide, its blue-gray vapors so thick they nearly solidified.

Footsteps sounded within the fog.

They were neither hurried nor slow. Every step fell to the same rhythm, steady as drumbeats, as if the man were treading not upon yellow mud but some invisible staircase.

A figure slowly emerged from the dense fog.

The figure was tall and slender, with his hands clasped behind his back.

He wore a black brocade robe. His face was exceedingly pale, and his eyes were so dark that they resembled two ancient wells, bottomless and unfathomable.

—Lin Suri.

There was no mist around him, yet rain turned into vapor and silently dispersed as soon as it came within three feet above his head, as though an invisible barrier covered his surroundings.

Lin Suri's gaze fell upon Chen Lingxi for only a moment.

That glance was utterly calm, yet it seemed to pierce through flesh and bone, seeing straight into the deepest pathways of spiritual qi.

Chen Lingxi felt the dormant thread of spiritual qi in his dantian quiver faintly before settling once more, as though something had been effortlessly brushed aside by that gaze.

Lin Suri's brows furrowed slightly, and the faintest trace of surprise flickered through his eyes.

"Six-Qi True Method." His voice was steady and without ripples. "No cultivation art has been practiced—only the way of breathing, circulating qi, and guiding its flow."

He paused, those eyes like deep wells staring directly at Chen Lingxi's weathered face.

Though wrinkles layered his face like the bark of an old tree, though his eyes were clouded as if covered by a film, Lin Suri still recognized him at a glance.

"An official slave from the north courtyard's rear rooms?"

An official slave who should have been muddled and dull, fated to exhaust his strength in labor.

Yet spiritual qi identical to that of the Six-Qi True Method he cultivated circulated within him.

"You are..." Lin Suri slowly said, "a disciple of Dao-Below Academy?"

Before his words were finished, the youth in the locust tree suddenly laughed.

The laugh was exceptionally soft, yet it sounded especially clear across the silent execution ground.

The youth tilted his head slightly, his gaze circling once between Chen Lingxi and Lin Suri.

"Lin Suri."

He spoke, his voice as clear as ever. "You intended to lure me here with this fragment of a cauldron artifact. I came specially to take the bait, and the journey was rather interesting."

His gaze returned to Chen Lingxi, and the smile at the corner of his lips deepened.

"I thought it was merely an ordinary pitfall meant to draw me out, but I did not expect there to be such an amusing diversion."

"Since he is just a diversion..."

He paused, his eyes carrying a wholly natural, utterly undisguised contempt.

"...once you have looked at him, that is enough. Why bother caring about his origins?"

As he said this, the youth grinned.

That smile was clean and bright, like a young man enjoying a spring outing, yet there was no superfluous emotion in his eyes.

No killing intent, no rage, not even disdain.

There was only a pure, almost innocent sort of lofty superiority.

Like a child crouching beneath a tree, watching ants move house.

After watching, he would lightly crush them with a fingertip.

For no reason at all.

He flicked a finger.

Chen Lingxi's pupils shrank sharply.

He saw it clearly.

The youth's finger-flicking motion was extremely slow, even elegant, as though he were merely brushing a fallen petal from his shoulder.

But at the instant that finger snapped straight—

Thunder boomed through the void!

This thunder did not come from the heavens. It was a thunderclap bursting forth from the air itself, close at hand!

A thread-thin bolt of pale golden lightning shot from the youth's fingertip!

Lin Suri frowned at that moment. "Lu Baizhong!"

He spoke the youth's name, yet made no move to stop him.

The lightning tore through the rain curtain. Raindrops vanished into nothingness the instant they touched it, while the air along its path warped and shattered, giving off a piercing sound like fabric tearing.

Chen Lingxi could not move.

This kind of power...

The strength contained within that lightning was too overwhelming. Chen Lingxi felt like an ant.

At this moment, this ant seemed to be standing before a mountain flood. Before even the thought of fleeing could arise, he was swept away, crushed, and swallowed whole!

The next instant—

That pale golden bolt of lightning plunged unimpeded into the center of his brow.

Boom—

Chen Lingxi felt a chill between his brows, followed immediately by an irresistible force exploding within his skull.

He seemed to hear his bones shattering, his blood boiling and evaporating, every inch of flesh and every wisp of spiritual qi being torn into dust in that instant!

Even at this moment, Chen Lingxi could still see the youth's eyes.

Clean and clear, with no hatred, no anger, not even killing intent.

He had merely finished looking, then casually pressed him to death.

He wanted to kill, so Chen Lingxi died.

Crack—

Above the heavens of the Divine Chamber, the two bright mirrors abruptly burst forth with blinding light.

One was blazing gold, the other silver-white. Two pillars of light descended at once, shining upon Chen Lingxi's shattered body.

As the light flowed, the entire world began to warp, crack, and collapse.

Water surged backward, the locust tree toppled, and the stone bridge turned into rubble that scattered through the air!

—

Chen Lingxi suddenly opened his eyes.

He lay on the hard plank bed in the servants' quarters, gasping for breath. Cold sweat soaked his clothes, and his head throbbed as if it were splitting apart.

He pressed his fingers to his temples. Even his fingertips trembled faintly as the spiritual qi in his dantian circulated, thread by thread rising to the crown of his head and slowly suppressing the intense pain.

Only after nearly half an incense stick's time did he brace himself against the bedframe and sit up, his chest heaving violently.

Outside the window, the moon had not yet fully set.

Chen Lingxi pushed open the door and stepped into the courtyard.

The peony in the courtyard was in full bloom.

After a moment's thought, Chen Lingxi left the courtyard.

Beyond the courtyard wall, several servants of the marquis residence walked away together, chatting and laughing. One saw Chen Lingxi standing in the courtyard and approached with a smile. "Brother Chen, do you have any clothes that need starching and washing?"

Chen Lingxi slowly shook his head without answering.

He raised his head. In the sky was a real waning moon, half-hidden behind the western wall.

The two bright mirrors were nowhere to be seen.

He drew a deep breath, and the icy night wind poured into his lungs.

He had returned to four days earlier.

More precisely, he had left the Divine Chamber beneath the Thorough Awakening Divine Ability.

Everything had been like a dream.

"No, this is not a dream."

Chen Lingxi drew another deep breath.

For within his mind, the qi-circulation pathways of the Concealed Edge Method, its breath-concealing secrets, its qi-aperture barriers... the spiritual qi guidance of the Azure Edge Method, the condensing of Sword Qi, the method of releasing one's edge... countless cultivation methods remained vivid and exact, without the slightest error.

The memories within the Divine Chamber return with me to the real world!