Afterward, Su Jiu and Ouyang Yanyu spoke at length within the barrier.
Su Jiu finally filled in all the information she had been missing and came to understand the causes and consequences of everything that had happened.
Although it was much as she had guessed, once everything had been confirmed, she still let out a sigh.
Tragedy was never a matter of chance, but of inevitability.
Every cause had its consequence. This was a law of survival left to cultivators that even the Heavenly Dao had to obey.
After their conversation, Ouyang Yanyu should have returned to the Azure Tide Sect with Su Jiu, but she declined to accompany them, as though she still had some unfulfilled wish.
She asked them to give her one more day, as she needed to settle matters concerning the opera troupe.
Su Jiu and Chu Luohen decided to return to the sect first.
Before they parted, however, Chu Luohen asked Ouyang Yanyu a question that had puzzled him all along.
"Why were the people from the Heavenly Dawn Sect so certain you were in the neighboring town?"
Ouyang Yanyu paused slightly before saying slowly, "I really was in the neighboring town at first. I killed a disciple of the Heavenly Dawn Sect and nearly exposed myself. Later, the opera troupe I was with moved to Pumpkin Town, so I went along with them. Naturally, they couldn't find me.
"Besides, those stupid, lazy disciples weren't sincerely looking for me in the first place. They were just muddling through their days under pressure from their sect."
With that, Su Jiu and Chu Luohen understood why so many Heavenly Dawn Sect disciples had been stationed in the neighboring town.
"Did they never consider that you might have gone somewhere else?"
The corners of Ouyang Yanyu's lips curved