Baosha Shall Rise!

The back mountain.

A solitary meditation hut stood hidden deep in the clouds and mist.

Its furnishings were sparse. There was only a wooden Buddha, blackened by incense smoke.

And an old monk whose hair and brows had turned white.

The old monk sat cross-legged on a cushion with his back to the door. He was as thin as kindling, like a piece of rotten wood about to burn away.

The three abbots who had once shaken the Longyou martial world stood beside him with their hands at their sides, not daring to raise their heads.

Only the young monk looked perfectly at ease.

He walked slowly to the wooden Buddha and did not bow.

Instead, he reached into the incense burner, pinched up a little ash, and rubbed it between his fingers.

"Seas become mulberry fields, white clouds turn into gray dogs... Senior Brother, you've grown old."

The old monk did not take offense at his discourtesy.

He merely struggled to lift his eyelids and searched the young monk's face.

From his brows and eyes to the bridge of his nose, then to the faint upward curve of his mouth.

As though trying to fit it over a face buried deep in memory.

A long while passed.

The old monk's shriveled lips trembled. "...Wangchi?"

At those words,

Wangfan and the other two, standing nearby, jolted.

Wangchi?!

How could that be?!

He had vanished without a trace sixty years ago!

Some said he had gone mad and fallen off a cliff, leaving no bones behind.

Others said he had betrayed his masters and died far from home.

But whatever the rumors said, if Wangchi were still alive, he would have to be at least seventy or eighty!

How could he...

Be this red-lipped, white-toothed young monk who looked barely past