"Pfft!" Ning Qingfeng burst out laughing.
Too many people had praised her beauty; their lovely verses and flowery words could pile up into a sea of paper.
But this was the first time she had received such blunt praise.
Not only had he dared to compliment her, he had even given her a thumbs-up.
"All right, I'll stop teasing you." Ning Qingfeng reined in her smile. "Had events followed their original course, that mortalized body might have fallen in love with you. But you cut her down, so clearly, you and I share no such destiny."
Li Yang was curious about one thing:
"During reincarnation mortal transfiguration, was Xiao Feng an independent version of you, or was she entirely your will, passively experiencing life?"
This touched on a sore point in Blue Star webnovels-external incarnations.
Li Yang himself could not accept creating a clone with an independent consciousness.
If that were the case, he would feel guilty for killing Xiao Feng.
"If she were independent, I wouldn't have waited until now to come. I could simply have guarded Yongning Commandery myself. Who would have dared cause trouble?" Ning Qingfeng replied.
Li Yang thought about it and agreed.
"You can think of it as my will being reincarnated as Xiao Feng, so the experience of being killed by you was every bit as real," Ning Qingfeng added with a smile.
Li Yang's expression stiffened:
"What's done is done. Whatever punishment you impose, Senior, I can only accept it."
"You killed my mortalized body. By rights, I should take your life, or at least cripple your cultivation and leave you to squander a hundred years in the mortal world."
Ning Qingfeng paused, making Li Yang break out in a cold sweat.
"But Xiao Feng was me, and I was Xiao Feng. Before I died, I bore you no hatred. Still, you may escape the death sentence, but not punishment.
"And I'm curious. There's something I want to verify."
Li Yang instinctively asked, "What is it?"
"If you were the one who fell into an enemy's hands, could you calmly accept death?" Ning Qingfeng's expression was serious. "If you don't fear death, I won't pursue the matter of you killing my mortalized body.
"But if your conduct falls short of my expectations-if you fear death yourself, yet still killed a hostage-
"Then not only will you die, the Mystic Heaven Sword Sect will also pay the price for my mortalized body alongside you!"
She gave Li Yang no room to refuse.
Ning Qingfeng's beautiful eyes shifted, seizing his soul.
In an instant, she drew Li Yang's consciousness into an endlessly wondrous illusion.
With her Mahayana cultivation, casting it on a Foundation Establishment cultivator meant Li Yang could not detect the slightest hint of anything amiss.
Li Yang was still Li Yang.
But the scene had changed.
During a sect mission, he had fallen into the hands of a local half-step Nascent Soul evil fiend, who used him to force a senior sister from the Mystic Heaven Sword Sect to comply.
"Hand over my Soul Banner! I sacrificed a million people and refined it for a thousand years to create it. With it, I'll definitely succeed in forming my Nascent Soul!
"I can swear by the Heavenly Dao and my heart demon-as long as you return it, I'll immediately return your junior brother unharmed.
"He's one of the finest in your Mystic Heaven Sword Sect, a rising prodigy with limitless prospects.
"This is a very worthwhile trade!"
Yet as his senior sister hesitated,
Li Yang, whose throat was clamped in the fiend's grip, remained utterly calm.
His dantian boiled as he decisively burned away everything he had.
In exchange, he gained the mightiest slaughter sword intent, forcibly broke through the half-step Nascent Soul evil fiend's restraints, and detonated himself on the spot!
In the final moment of his life, he turned toward his senior sister and smiled:
"Senior Sister, don't hesitate next time."
The illusion ended.
Li Yang's body shuddered as his consciousness returned.
Seeing Ning Qingfeng remain silent, he did not dare speak either.
"You were right. I have no right to punish you, nor the face to take revenge on you."
Li Yang cupped his fist:
"You're too kind, Senior."
The stone weighing on his heart finally fell.
After all, the powerful were always fickle in their moods.
It was like noticing an ant by the roadside crawling onto you.
If you were in a good mood, you would put it back on the ground; if your mood was even slightly worse, you would simply crush it.
He had thought that would be the end of it.
But Ning Qingfeng asked again:
"Do you blame me? A single mortal transfiguration cost so many mortals their lives."
Li Yang answered earnestly:
"At first, yes. But later, I learned that this had nothing to do with you, Senior, and that you were also a victim. Then I let it go."
Ning Qingfeng, however, shook her head:
"The karma here arose because of me. I must do something."
Li Yang felt his body shift through space along with Ning Qingfeng.
Looking up, he realized they had reached a height from which they could overlook all of Yongning Commandery.
In the firmament, a phantom Phoenix appeared, its wings veiling the continent.
Looking closely, he could see countless colored threads connected within its wings.
With Li Yang's current knowledge, he could not make out what they were at all.
But they were surely some unfathomable, endlessly profound laws of karma or the like.
Ning Qingfeng sat cross-legged at their center, her phoenix eyes lowered as her hands formed seals.
The phantom Phoenix that blotted out the sky and sun suddenly moved.
Its wings fluttered gently, and the karmic threads between heaven and earth trembled with them, like plucked strings playing a dirge that did not belong to the mortal world.
"Nirvana Return to Origin."
"With the origin essence of my phoenix nirvana immortal body, I trace the bygone hours and reverse the order of life and death."
From its mouth, the phantom Phoenix spat a mass of golden flame.
That flame did not burn the myriad things. It burned only-karma.
The karmic threads touched by the flame began to rewind, as though time were flowing backward, stripping every mortal who had died because of the evil fiends from the outcome of death.
The corpses of murdered mortals regrew flesh and bone, drawing vital essence from heaven and earth;
The bodies of mortals refined into human puppets were purged of every sinister, poisonous technique;
Inside a Soul Banner in a soul cultivator's storage ring, burning karmic threads reached in, freeing the mortal souls that had been refined into vengeful ghosts or were still suffering within, returning them to their dead bodies...
An unsurpassed divine ability!
Beyond the borders of the Great Qian Dynasty,
Countless mighty cultivators opened their eyes and turned their gazes toward her.
All who heard were utterly astounded.
"This is true supreme power!"
"Resurrecting a million people with a mere gesture-truly worthy of the strongest Zhuyou Immortal of this age!"
"The phoenix nirvana immortal body... a pity they all failed. If I could win her love, what would there be to fear in death?"
Li Yang was also shocked speechless.
But sensing that Ning Qingfeng's cultivation seemed to have declined, he could not help feeling profound respect.
He had once again underestimated Ning Qingfeng's character.
The higher one's cultivation, the more dearly one cherished it.
Yet Ning Qingfeng had not hesitated to expend her cultivation to resurrect mortals. Her greatness needed no further words.
Only mortals were resurrected; the price of resurrecting cultivators was too great.
Besides, the mortals were innocent. Cultivators had to pay for their own choices.
After doing all this, Ning Qingfeng's face grew a little paler.
"Now-do you still harbor any resentment toward me?"
Li Yang did not say, "I wouldn't dare."
Deeply, from the bottom of his heart, he offered a sword-seal salute:
"Your compassion is boundless, Senior. You have my heartfelt admiration!"
But Ning Qingfeng smiled.
Li Yang suddenly saw his feet begin to burn, and agony that pierced his soul crawled up his entire body, inch by inch.
"Senior?"
"You killed me once, so I must kill you once too." Ning Qingfeng's voice was a little cold. "Only then will it be fair!"
Li Yang did not know why Ning Qingfeng had changed her mind.
But amid the searing blazing golden divine flame, his expression remained composed.
There were no curses, no demands for an explanation.
"No matter what, Senior, you are the person most worthy of respect I have ever met on my path of cultivation."
Ning Qingfeng nodded:
"If those are your last words-you may die."
The divine flame burned Li Yang's flesh and blood to ashes, and his dantian with them.
Until, at last, even his entire skeleton turned to drifting ash...
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