Eight more years slipped by in the flick of a finger.
Xu Xuan was sixty-three.
This should have been a time when his cultivation advanced and his Lineage flourished.
Yet now he lay against the couch in his meditation chamber, his face ashen and his breathing feeble.
Dark bloodstains covered the front of his robes, and the spiritual power throughout his body was in utter disarray.
Faint cracks had appeared in his dantian. His cultivation had actually fallen from Meridian Opening Perfection, barely holding at late Meridian Opening.
His foundation was severely damaged, and his great Dao was all but severed.
A month earlier, an upheaval had suddenly struck Heyang Prefecture.
The leader, deputy leader, and other senior members of the Great Dragon Gang had all been murdered in a single night.
Xu Xuan had also come under attack.
A black-robed cultivator had infiltrated his residence to assassinate him.
At the time, Xu Xuan had been studying cultivation arts with fellow practitioners in the prefectural city. Only by joining forces had they driven the enemy back and escaped harm.
Even so, he had taken a palm strike from the black-robed cultivator.
That cultivator's art was vicious. Cold had invaded Xu Xuan's marrow, clinging like a festering sore upon the bone, impossible to dispel.
Xu Huai'en had fallen unconscious while saving him and had yet to awaken.
Xu Xuan had also immediately drawn on his information network to investigate the cause of the incident and the identity of the attacking cultivator.
What he learned sent his spirits plunging into an abyss.
"The turnover of officials in Heyang Prefecture reflects a struggle between different powers in the cultivation world."
"This new prefect probably has cultivators behind him as well."
Several more days passed before Xu Xuan finally obtained news from Yuan Qiu.
The cultivators who had attacked them belonged to a cultivation faction called the Blood Refining Hall.
The current prefect of Heyang was also a disciple of the Blood Refining Hall.
As soon as he took office, he had repeatedly suppressed established gangs such as the Great Dragon Gang and the Azure Mystery Gang, turning around to prop up the Blood Refining Hall.
Many of the Xu Household's businesses had been sealed.
For a time, everyone feared for their own safety.
Xu Yuming held back his grief, arranging the funeral of his maternal grandfather, Liu Qingshan, while maneuvering between the authorities and the Blood Refining Hall, utterly exhausted.
In just a few short days, white hairs had already appeared on his head.
His wife, Liu Yun, had cried herself unconscious again and again, never having imagined that her father would meet such an end.
She wanted to seek revenge, but did not know where her enemies were. She could only hope that Xu Xuan would find information soon so that she could avenge her father and wash away this blood debt.
By now, Xu Xuan had obtained that information.
But their present circumstances were far from promising.
Inside the meditation chamber, Xu Xuan struggled to regulate his breathing.
Yet he found his injuries extraordinarily stubborn.
The sinister palm force kept eroding his meridians and dantian. His cultivation was still slowly declining, and his vitality was ebbing away as well.
Medicinal pills were useless, and the cold poison could not be purged.
Could this life of mine truly end here?
He had cultivated for so many years in this life and endured countless hardships, yet he had still never reached Qi Refining.
He could not resign himself to ending here.
Moreover, his Lineage was now as precarious as a pile of eggs. The slightest misstep would leave his home destroyed and his entire Lineage exterminated.
If his bloodline were severed, even with the Book of Time...
He feared he would be unable to begin his next life.
Just as his consciousness began to blur and he thought death was certain...
Deep within his soul, the long-dormant phantom of the Book of Time suddenly trembled.
"An innate writ of longevity, unbroken by tribulation. Though your foundation is damaged, your allotted lifespan remains unspent. Forty years of mortal life may yet be continued."
At the same time...
A gentle yet tenacious vitality flowed into his body from some unseen source.
It barely stabilized his worsening injuries, sustaining his last breath of vital energy.
Xu Xuan's eyes snapped open, and he coughed violently.
He spat out another mouthful of stagnant blood, only to find the dull pain in his chest slightly eased.
The writ of longevity... forty additional years.
Of course. The Book of Time inscribes the chart of destiny, ascending to immortality through a hundred lives. How could it let me perish so easily along the way...?
Understanding dawned on him, followed by a bitter smile.
Forty years was a long span to a mortal.
But to a severely wounded cultivator like him, whose Dao Path was all but severed...
It was merely clinging to a dwindling breath.
Xu Xuan spent more than half a month recuperating in dejection inside the meditation chamber before he finally turned his state of mind around.
As long as he was alive, there was a chance for things to change.
Even if he failed in this life, he could still lay plans for the next.
This body is ruined, and the great Dao is beyond my reach.
But everything I have accumulated, learned, and understood over two lives must not end here!
Xu Xuan worried that in his next life, the mystery of the womb might obscure his memories, or that he might even lack spiritual roots and be unable to cultivate.
Thus, he had to begin preparing now.
He would use the coming forty years to secure an opportunity to cultivate in his next life!
Forcing his ailing body to endure, Xu Xuan issued orders.
He would enter a sealed seclusion, and no one was to disturb him.
Xu Yuming hurried over upon hearing the news.
Though his father's breathing was weak, his eyes were exceptionally bright and resolute, easing his worries somewhat.
He agreed through his tears and stationed more men in layer upon layer around the meditation chamber.
Inside the chamber, Xu Xuan took out several blank jade slips.
These were high-grade jade slips that he had acquired over the years through Hundred Fragrance Valley's channels at considerable expense.
Used to inscribe secret manuals and cultivation arts, they could hold a substantial amount of text and illustrations.
He focused his mind and steadied his breath, ignoring the stabbing pain in his soul and the sluggish circulation of his spiritual power.
He began recording his memories from both lives, his insights into cultivation, his understanding of the improved Grain Garment Art and Green Grain Art, the fundamentals of talismans and pill refining, an introduction to formations...
Even his observations and analyses of Hundred Fragrance Valley, the Azure Wood Sect, River Sun Market, the Ancient Verdure Lin Household, the Blood Refining Hall and the cultivators behind it, the distribution of Lineage forces, and possible directions for future development...
Every piece of information he considered important.
He sorted it all into categories and inscribed it into the jade slips, leaving out no detail, large or small.
It was an extraordinarily taxing process.
Repeated relapses forced him to stop as he vomited blood without end, yet time and again, sheer will drove him to continue.
Finally, he even placed two layers of restrictions on the jade slips.
First, they required the blood of the Xu bloodline as a key.
Second, they could only be opened using his unique method of releasing the restrictions.
Otherwise, the only option was to break them by force.
If someone could break his restrictions by force, these jade slips would be of little use to them anyway.
In this way, Xu Xuan produced more than ten jade slips in total.
In a mere half a year, he exhausted all forty of his additional years.
When his oil finally ran dry and his lamp burned out, leaving him collapsed limply on the floor, his heart was utterly tranquil.
These dozen-odd jade slips, shimmering with flowing colors, were the legacy he had left for his next life.
In my next life... whoever I am reborn as...
As long as I am of the Xu bloodline, awaken my past-life wisdom, and obtain these jade slips, I will inherit the accumulation of my two lives, spare myself countless blind attempts, and rise more quickly...
After resting for a moment, Xu Xuan summoned Xu Yuming.
Looking at his son's haggard, worried face, Xu Xuan felt a slight pang in his heart, but he knew this was no time to go soft.
"Yuming, my son, my injuries have stabilized, but my Dao foundation is damaged and will be difficult to restore."
"The Lineage will have to rely on you from now on."
He handed Xu Yuming an ordinary jade slip containing only arrangements for Lineage affairs and words of encouragement.
He had hidden the true inheritance jade slips away.
"Father..."
Tears filled Xu Yuming's fierce eyes.
"None of this tearful sentiment." Xu Xuan waved a hand, his expression solemn.
"The Blood Refining Hall and those behind it are certainly no decent people. I fear they are demonic cultivators."
"The new prefect is colluding with them. The Xu Household is in a difficult position."
"From now on, restraint and preservation must come first. Avoid their edge for the time being and build strength in secret."
"Hundred Fragrance Valley is the Lineage's foundation. We must not lose it."
"Be sure to maintain good relations with Deacon Yuan."
"If the situation becomes untenable, abandon everything in the mortal world and send all the Lineage's direct descendants to Hundred Fragrance Valley."
"Even becoming slaves or servants would be better than having the entire Lineage exterminated."
"I understand."
Xu Yuming nodded through his anguish.
He was in the prefectural city and knew how perilous the situation had become. The slightest misstep could bring extermination upon their household.
Though his father's words were hard to hear, they also offered the safest way forward at present.
With the Azure Wood Sect behind Yuan Qiu, neither the Blood Refining Hall nor the demonic cultivators backing it could harm him.
Moreover, Yuan Qiu was a Qi Refining Cultivator, an existence who could be called invincible within Heyang Prefecture.
After settling his final affairs, Xu Xuan fell silent once more.
He no longer tried to restore his cultivation, instead beginning to quietly lay his plans.
Using the last of his influence and resources, Xu Xuan secretly transferred some of the Lineage's elites and wealth to Hundred Fragrance Valley, preserving embers for the Lineage.
At the same time, he secretly screened children of suitable age within the Lineage, observing their dispositions and Root Bones.
He was preparing for the choices he might have in his next life.
The suppression from the Blood Refining Hall and the new prefect intensified by the day. The Azure Mystery Gang's influence kept shrinking, and the Xu Household's businesses suffered repeated blows.
Strictly following his father's instructions, Xu Yuming yielded step by step, enduring without retaliation, seeking only to preserve their foundations.
Xu Xuan watched coldly from the sidelines, committing everything to memory.
The cultivator behind the Blood Refining Hall made no further move.
He seemed to have some reservations.
Yet his very existence hung like a shadow over Heyang Prefecture.
At sixty-three, Xu Xuan sat quietly in his increasingly desolate villa, his gaze icy beyond measure.
He had already sent people to deliver the dozen-odd jade slips elsewhere. Once his next life began, he would be able to find them and embark on the path of cultivation anew.
I will avenge this in my next life.
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Please bookmark and keep reading. The first life is more or less finished. There isn't much left to write, so we'll go straight into the second life.