Even knowing it was a past life, his heart still broke

Chen Heng was a native of the Rong Kingdom in Eastern Maitreya Province, now a disciple of the Mysterious Truth Sect on Little Sweet Mountain.

The life of this body's former owner had been absurd and bizarre. Born into the Chen Clan of the Rong Kingdom, he had already become renowned throughout the land for his beauty and bearing in his youth. Everyone who saw him thought him a figure carved from jade. Women who had long heard of his fame would join hands to surround his carriage whenever he went out, with onlookers packed as tightly as a wall.

Perhaps it was for this reason.

Although Chen Heng's former self had been born from his parents' illicit union without a matchmaker, the Chen Clan had never treated him harshly.

Instruction from renowned teachers, spirited horses, splendid clothes-he had never lacked anything expected of a son of a great household.

His father had died of illness early on, while his mother, a young lady of the Chen Clan, had developed consumptive bleeding after giving birth and was unable to raise him herself.

The clan had simply entrusted him to a childless uncle. After a few more years, he would be formally adopted into his uncle's household and inherit that branch's estate.

Had things ended there, his life could have been considered complete.

Famous in his youth, surrounded by harmonious kin, he had lost his father early but was fortunate enough to have his widowed mother alive, allowing him to fulfill his filial duties at her knee.

Unfortunately, on a chance excursion outside the city three years ago, he had encountered Yan Zhen, who happened to have come down from the Mysterious Truth Sect for a spring outing.

Everything that had come before had flowed away like a river running east.

The beautiful Daoist priestess had been delighted by her find. First, she invited Chen Heng to become her kept lover. When he refused, shame turned to rage, and she abandoned all pretense, coercing him openly with her power.

Though the Chen Clan was a great clan within the Rong Kingdom, it was no immortal aristocratic clan and possessed not even a single accomplished cultivator. The entire Rong Kingdom was merely a mortal dynasty. How could they defy a decree from the Mysterious Truth Sect? They could only bow their heads and obey.

But his former self had an exceptionally cold, unyielding disposition. Seeing that nothing could change the outcome, he first bade farewell to his widowed mother and the uncle who had raised him, then threw himself into a well that night. Had a few alert servants not hurried to rescue him, his life would have ended three years ago.

Upon hearing of this, Yan Zhen flew into a terrible rage.

Not only did she station two hundred Dao Soldiers within the Chen Clan estate to keep strict watch, surrounding it so tightly that not even water could seep through.

Several Daoists from the Mysterious Truth Sect also followed Chen Heng, attending him day and night and leaving him no freedom.

Nevertheless, after Chen Heng threw himself into the well, Yan Zhen's attitude had softened somewhat. Though she still kept him confined, waiting for him to yield, she no longer dared press him as aggressively as before.

Amid the widespread fear and anxiety, someone in the Chen Clan finally found the strain unbearable. Through an intermediary, he requested an audience with Yan Zhen and offered her a plan.

Chen Heng's former self was utterly devoted to his mother. After childbirth, her body had remained chronically depleted, and she had contracted consumptive bleeding. He had spent years seeking renowned physicians, with little effect and scarcely any benefit.

If Yan Zhen wanted him to bow, exploiting this matter would produce immediate results.

Upon hearing this, Yan Zhen broke into a broad smile. That very night, she obtained pills from the Mysterious Truth Sect and forced Chen Heng's widowed mother to take them.

Within just three days, Chen Heng's widowed mother was healthy again, her face glowing with color.

Faced with this scene, in this place and at this moment, however great his resentment and unwillingness, Chen Heng could only bid farewell to his tearful mother and follow Yan Zhen up the mountain.

Afterward, Yan Zhen repaid Chen Ze, the Chen clansman who had offered her the plan, peach for plum. She fulfilled his wish to join the sect and study the path of qi refinement and immortality under its masters.

But Chen Heng's former self did not know that just three months after he left home, his widowed mother suddenly passed away. Her remains were little more than skin and bones, as though all her blood and vital essence had been drained dry.

Great elixirs that replenished the spirit and essence were precious, but the Mysterious Truth Sect did possess them.

Yet she was merely an old mortal woman.

Perhaps, in Yan Zhen's eyes, using such a great elixir to prolong her life would clearly have been foolish.

The pills his mother took that day had no power to nourish life or extend it. They merely forced her failing vitality to rise and held it steady for a time. Whatever depletion followed afterward had never entered the calculation.

The news eventually reached the Mysterious Truth Sect. Chen Heng's former self was crushed by grief, every hope reduced to ashes.

From then on, others watched over him day and night with their spiritual senses. Nothing sharp was allowed near him; even his hairpins had to have their points ground down before anyone would bring them to him.

Thus, his former self was kept like a caged bird for another three years.

During that time, Yan Zhen tried every means of pleasing him to win a single smile. She knew he had been skilled in music in his youth and had sought instruction from many renowned teachers.

So she launched extensive construction within the sect, cutting through rock and opening up the mountain to build palaces, halls, towers, and golden gateways, naming the complex the Hall of Joyful Virtue.

Once the Hall of Joyful Virtue was complete, she requisitioned musicians in great numbers from the surrounding kingdoms, placing them there to perform and sing with Chen Heng's former self.

Yet despite all Yan Zhen's painstaking schemes, he only grew more withdrawn and unyielding. His gaze was as cold and deep as a pool, and anyone who met his eyes felt an involuntary chill of fear.

Those days.

They only ended not long ago, when Xu Sai, a rogue cultivator from the Western Sea, killed Yan Zhen with a single sword stroke.

That day, his former self heard only a thunderous ringing of a sword. Boundless radiance flooded everything before his eyes, blinding him for a moment. His skin hurt as though it would split, and his eyes felt as if needles were piercing them.

When he finally managed to open his eyes again, that slender figure-the woman whose flesh he longed to devour and whose skin he wished to sleep upon-had already been severed from her head. Disbelief still lingered on her jade-like face, and the fading light in her eyes held an emotion no one could name.

Afterward, Yan Feichen wailed and wept, venting his fury on the Daoists who had been attending her at the time. He threw them all into the water prison to be confined and tormented.

Although Chen Heng's former self had escaped being killed outright by Xu Sai's sword stroke, the cold dipper true qi within its light had nevertheless invaded his organs, leaving his body riddled with wasting illnesses and injuries. Then, caught in Yan Feichen's displaced anger, he was imprisoned in the damp, freezing water prison.

After only two months, he died laughing one night, his breath coming to an end.

And Chen Heng, who had spent six agonizing years in a hospital bed in the modern world, had, through a chance convergence of fate, brought along the Golden Cicada he had found as a child and been reborn into this body bearing the same name...

He went through his former self's memories once more.

Chen Heng closed his eyes in silence. Only after a long while did he open them again. Sitting upright at the desk, he took a roll of white paper and dipped his brush in ink.

An unknown length of time passed, until the paper was covered with the character for "stillness," leaving no room for another stroke.

Only then did his eyes regain their dark, unruffled calm.

"Only two matters are urgent now. First, expelling the cold dipper true qi Xu Sai drove into my body takes precedence over everything else. With this true qi lodged inside me, forget cultivating for immortality-even my life could be in immediate danger."

To enter the gateway of the immortal path through cultivation in this world, one first had to attain embryonic breathing, refine true qi, complete Establishing the Dao Foundation, and open the purple mansion.

Embryonic breathing persisted like an unbroken thread, drawn upon without exertion.

A person's greatest treasure was this single breath of true yang.

It was an innate spark of spiritual light, one's essential nature. The Buddha said, "All living beings are equal." The Dao called it the realm of utmost goodness, the source of nature and life, the principle of creation.

Embryonic breathing was the first step in cultivating the immortal path. Without attaining this realm, everything that followed was futile.

Once embryonic breathing was perfected and the root of one's nature revealed itself, the subsequent Qi Refining realm required a qi-refining method. Only then could one refine essence into qi and cultivate true qi.

The true qi of this world was divided into nine tiers and thirty-six grades, with a strict hierarchy between them.

Only a substantial foundation of true qi of the seventh tier or above could support a superior-grade Dao foundation.

And to form such true qi, a superior Qi Cultivation Art was indispensable.

"The cold dipper true qi inside me must rank among the high-tier forms of true qi. Even this single wisp is vicious beyond measure. If I want to expel or subdue it, my own cultivation and embryonic breathing won't be enough. Perhaps only Qi Refining could suppress it to some degree."

At that thought, Chen Heng could not help feeling a headache coming on.

His former self's aptitude for cultivation had been truly poor. Forget Qi Refining—he had not even attained embryonic breathing.

Every day he failed to comprehend that sensation of qi persisting like an unbroken thread, drawn upon without exertion, was another day he remained mortal.

Certainly, this was partly because Chen Heng's former self's heart had turned to dead ashes after his mother's passing, his mind withered and exhausted.

But whatever the reason, having been given another life, Chen Heng had to comprehend Embryonic Breathing Qi Sensation—to preserve his life and to pursue immortality!

"Still, is high-tier true qi the only way to build a flawless Dao foundation? Even this whole Mysterious Truth Sect probably lacks a superior Qi Cultivation Art."

Chen Heng frowned.

Though the Mysterious Truth Sect enjoyed overwhelming prominence in the surrounding region, with virtually no one able to oppose it, within the vast Eastern Maitreya Province it was merely an insignificant little sect, one grain in a thousand bushels.

His former self had once happened to hear Yan Zhen mention that the world they inhabited was called Xudu Heaven, encompassing the vast expanse of nine provinces and four seas.

Seen in that light, the Mysterious Truth Sect probably did not even amount to one grain in a thousand bushels.

"Yan Zhen also mentioned that the Mysterious Truth Sect might be one of the hundreds of Dao lineages under the Jade Dawn School, a great Daoist school. I wonder whether that was true."

Setting aside that stray thought, Chen Heng took up his brush and crossed out the characters for "stillness" one by one.

"Besides expelling the cold dipper true qi and preserving my life, the second matter is finding a pretext to leave the mountain and escape Yan Feichen's displaced anger."

After Yan Zhen died, Yan Feichen had vented his fury on Chen Heng's former self, sentencing him to a hundred days of confinement. He had died in the water prison.

Sect rules stood in the way.

Though Yan Feichen held the lofty position of elder, he could only confine Chen Heng on the grounds of failing in his duties. He could not directly execute him to accompany his daughter in death.

But an open spear was easy to dodge; an arrow from the shadows was hard to guard against.

Chen Heng had yet to shed his mortal body. Remaining within the sect and facing Yan Feichen would undoubtedly pit his own weakness against the other man's strength-a profoundly unwise choice.

His former self had endured two months in the water prison before helplessly passing away. Chen Heng did not even know how he had gritted his teeth and survived the remaining forty days.

The day before yesterday, when his confinement ended and he staggered out of the water prison into daylight, he had almost felt the bewilderment of being reborn yet again.

Given this body's condition.

If he went through the water prison one more time, sooner or later he would follow in his former self's footsteps.

"Still, although Yan Zhen humiliated his former self, thanks to the profound art she cultivated, he fortunately retained his primal yang." Chen Heng silently sighed at his good fortune.

This body's aptitude was already poor. Had it lost its primal yang as well, climbing the Dao path would have been beset by a thousand hardships and ten thousand obstacles.

Just then, his expression shifted slightly, and he turned toward the tightly shut entrance.

First came hurried footsteps, followed immediately by knocking and shouting.

"Who is it this time? Someone from the Steward Office?"

Chen Heng rose, first tearing up the white paper covered with the character for "stillness" and tossing every scrap into the small red-clay stove used to brew tea.

"Junior Brother Chen! Junior Brother Chen, it's me! Xu Zhi! Senior Brother Xu! I heard you accepted a talisman decree for the Earth Abyss as soon as you left the water prison the day before yesterday! Are you mad? Have you gone mad? Don't listen to the nonsense those stinking ox-nosed priests in the Discipline Office spout! Open the door! Hurry up and open it!"

After pounding hard for some time without the door opening, the man grew even more anxious:

"I know you haven't wanted to live for a single day since you came up the mountain, but even if you're seeking death, this isn't the way! Why insist on going to the Earth Abyss?"

"Think it through properly. Think of the people who are still alive. Think of, uh, think of..."

His voice abruptly faltered. A little embarrassed, he forcibly lowered it several pitches:

"Think of Auntie Wang in the kitchens? Well... don't you like the lotus seed soup she makes? Right? If you die, you'll never get to eat it again..."

Inside the cave dwelling.

Chen Heng glanced toward the door, the tail of his eyebrow lifting almost imperceptibly.

Two updates daily while the book is new, with a burst of updates upon its paid release. Yes, you read that right-a man who has regrown severed limbs and lived a second life is just this confident!!