White Impermanence

As Yellow Wind Little Sage's words fell, Xie An, who had been about to put brush to paper, suddenly froze.

His hand hung in midair, the fingers gripping the brush trembling slightly. His once-clear eyes gradually lost focus, the light in his pupils fading bit by bit, as though his soul had been drawn away.

His entire being seemed to sink into some distant reverie.

"Xie... Bi... An?"

Xie An's lips parted gently, his voice low and hollow, as if it had drifted from some faraway place. He murmured those three words in a daze, each syllable carrying an indescribable resonance.

His hand began to move.

It was not a conscious motion, but something driven by instinct. His fingertips dipped in blood, then slowly descended into the blank space between the characters "Xie An," adding the character "Bi."

The writing of that single character was incomparably slow, every stroke imbued with a ritualistic gravity. The instant "Bi" was completed, a sudden change erupted.

Yellow Wind Little Sage's small body jolted. He could clearly sense it: within Xie An's body, a pair of profound eyes seemed to slowly open.

Those eyes had no discernible shape, no discernible color, and could not even be described with words. Crossing the boundary between life and death, they gazed here from the endless depths of the netherworld.

An eerie change began to overtake Xie An. The shadow behind him suddenly twisted, writhing continuously as if it had come alive. The shadows gradually spread, extending outward from beneath Xie An's feet and rapidly sprawling in every direction.

The Mythic Trait of Traversing Yin and Yang had been activated, but this time, Xie An had not unleashed it of his own accord. It was being forcibly guided by some higher-level power.

The shadow-space reflected by those shadows began to transform, its range continually expanding. From this abandoned building, it spread across the entire street; from the street, it diffused through the whole old district; in the end, it enveloped all of Yin Mountain City.

Through Yellow Wind Little Sage's senses, Zhou Yao witnessed a breathtaking sight.

Within that shadow-space, the entirety of Yin Mountain City had undergone earth-shaking changes.

Above the ground, towering skyscrapers had turned into broken ruins. Brand-new buildings became ancient temples weathered by a thousand years. Modern streets were paved with bluestone slabs, with crumbling walls and shattered remnants everywhere. In that shadow-space, this modern city presented an ancient and desolate scene.

The people walking along the streets became translucent ghosts in the shadow-space. They still repeated the actions of their lives, yet seemed like phantoms trapped within some cycle of time and space, endlessly retracing the same paths.

And wherever sunlight reached, countless vivid Other Shore Flowers bloomed in wild profusion, guiding the dead souls of unknown times and spaces.

The sight was like the ancient Underworld descending upon the mortal world once more!

Standing in this eerie world, Yellow Wind Little Sage felt the dense netherworld aura surrounding him. He could tell that this was no illusion, but the world reflected within those profound eyes.

Then, the gaze cast by those eyes fell upon Yellow Wind Little Sage.

In an instant, Yellow Wind Little Sage felt himself locked onto by some terrifying existence.

Yet strangely, Yellow Wind Little Sage felt little fear. The Great Sage Thief Fate and the Inner Threefold Meditation Talent allowed him to face that gaze with calm composure.

Of course, it was only a gaze.

Those deep, shadowy eyes paused for a moment, their gaze slightly congealing, before slowly withdrawing in the end.

It made no further move, as though it had been startled awake from sleep and had opened its eyes merely to confirm something.

Like seawater drawing back at low tide, that terrifying pressure abruptly vanished.

The surrounding phenomena began to recede. The shadow-space slowly contracted, withdrawing from all of Yin Mountain City back to the old district, from the old district back to this small room, until it finally vanished entirely into Xie An's shadow.

All of this had happened in one ten-thousandth of an instant.

Had Zhou Yao not been using his mental connection with Yellow Wind Little Sage to observe everything at all times, he might never have realized that such earth-shaking changes had occurred in this small world where Yin Mountain City stood.

And as those eyes closed, the emptiness in Xie An's gaze gradually gave way to life once more.

He stood there blankly, taking several seconds before finally coming back to himself.

Lowering his head to look at the paper in his hand, he saw that he had neatly written the three characters "Xie Bi'an," just as Yellow Wind Little Sage had requested.

Only, the middle character, "Bi," appeared somewhat blurred. Its strokes seemed unstable, as if they could disappear from the paper at any moment—or as if they were resisting something.

In a classroom more than ten li away, Zhou Yao, who had been watching Xie An's movements closely, finally let out a breath.

Cold sweat had already soaked through his back. Those few short seconds had felt to him like an entire century.

So it really was him?

Zhou Yao murmured to himself inwardly.

Xie Bi'an—the White Impermanence of ancient mythology, and the original true name of this Yin Marshal.

According to legend, he and Black Impermanence, Fan Wujiu, traversed Yin and Yang, specializing in snaring souls and claiming lives. He was one of the Underworld's Ten Great Yin Marshals.

In this era when Lost Mythology had only just returned, most ancient legends had already been lost. Even the tales of the Ten Great Yin Marshals had not survived, much less the true names of these deities.

As a transmigrator, Zhou Yao retained the memories of his previous life. The myths and legends that had vanished from this world remained as clear as ever in his mind.

When Zhou Yao learned that the Mount Luofeng Deity Tablet could only be removed with a written order from a deity of the Ancient Underworld, Xie An was the first person he thought of.

He wanted to use Xie An's Mythic Trait, the Wealth-at-First-Sight Hat, as a disguise—to imitate an Ancient Underworld deity and write an order, testing whether he could bypass the rules of the Northern Yin Mountain Temple.

Naturally, this was only an attempt. Even Zhou Yao himself could not be certain that this method would succeed without fail.

After all, from the very beginning, Xie An had merely possessed some of White Impermanence's traits; he was not truly White Impermanence.

But after Xie An revealed his second Mythic Trait, the Mourning Staff, and explained the bizarre coincidence behind it, Zhou Yao's thoughts changed.

White Impermanence carried a Mourning Staff and could traverse Yin and Yang.

These characteristics matched Xie An's Mythic Traits perfectly. They could never be explained away as a simple coincidence.

Zhou Yao realized that Xie An was very likely the vessel through which White Impermanence had returned from the mythic age into the present world.

If asking Xie An for a written order before had merely been a matter of trying his luck, seeing whether he could muddle through the checkpoint—

Then now that matters had developed to this point, the likelihood that Xie An's written order could work had undoubtedly increased severalfold.

Of course, there were still certain risks even at this stage.

After all, Xie An was ultimately human, not the true Impermanence Yin Marshal. He merely carried a portion of White Impermanence's power and traits; he was not White Impermanence himself, and might not receive the recognition of the Northern Yin Mountain Temple's rules.

Thus, in order to obtain the Mount Luofeng Deity Tablet, Zhou Yao gritted his teeth and made the decision to have Xie An add the character "Bi" to the middle of his name, turning it into White Impermanence's true name.

There was undoubtedly enormous risk in doing so.

Xie Bi'an was not considered some top-tier great figure in the entire mythological system. Among the myriad gods and Buddhas, there were countless beings stronger than Black and White Impermanence.

Even within the Underworld, the Ten Yama Kings and Five Directional Ghost Emperors all stood above him in status.

But in this era when Lost Mythology had only just returned, what White Impermanence represented was entirely different.

He was a genuine deity.

Writing down White Impermanence's true name and rashly entangling himself in White Impermanence's arrangements could very likely draw unknown trouble.

But in order to get his hands on the Mount Luofeng Deity Tablet, Zhou Yao could no longer afford to care about so much.

He needed that tablet not only for his main body to advance into a Mythic Walker, but also to seize the initiative in the coming Mythic Invasion at the Yinshan Investigation Branch.

Compared with the value of the Mount Luofeng Deity Tablet, taking one risk was not unacceptable.

Fortunately, the final result was more or less what Zhou Yao had anticipated. White Impermanence's condition did not seem very good.

Although the true name had drawn White Impermanence's brief attention, it had not been enough to make him personally intervene.

Furthermore, Yellow Wind Little Sage himself was also a safeguard.

White Impermanence could not possibly fail to recognize the renowned Yellow Wind Great Sage. Though Yellow Wind Little Sage was merely an incarnation, far weaker than the Yellow Wind Great Sage of old, the True Samadhi Resonance he carried could not be faked.

That body of divine abilities and spells, that vessel refined from the Yellow Wind Great Sage's hairs, and that faint yet genuine trace of True Samadhi Resonance all clearly told White Impermanence that this little fellow had an immense connection to the Yellow Wind Great Sage.

Coupled with Yellow Wind Little Sage speaking White Impermanence's true name, White Impermanence could not gauge the depth of the situation, and ultimately chose to turn a blind eye.