South Mountain Monastery, the rear mountain.
Only after Song Yan and Ju Luyi had been gone for a full hour did a figure slowly emerge from the woods.
"..."
His body swayed, his limbs stiff, as he stumbled forward.
After only a few steps, he began to pant.
His face was pale, utterly bloodless, and there was a fatal wound in his chest, its blood already congealed.
Almost on all fours, he crawled to the place where Song Yan had buried the people of South Mountain Monastery.
His was a face no longer young, its once-distinct features now twisted together in pain.
His expression was one of crushing grief, yet he could not shed a single tear.
He wanted to howl in anguish, yet not a sound escaped him.
His hands slammed heavily against the ground, clawing fiercely at the soil with such force that even his knuckles cracked.
After a long while, he raised his head in despair and stared blankly at the sky.
"..."
Had Song Yan been here, he would surely have been astonished.
For this man was none other than Lu Yuan, the abbot of South Mountain Monastery, who had already "died, his Dao extinguished."
Yet there was not the slightest trace of a living person about him now.
His limbs were stiff, his gaze unfocused, and his organs had already failed. Naturally, he had no pulse either.
Instead, he resembled a Corpse Puppet.
How had I died?
He had forgotten.
How had I survived?
He had forgotten that too.
There were only faint murmurs in his ears, too indistinct to make out.
But he still remembered the disciples of his monastery, those faces brimming with vitality, waiting for him to return.
Yet when he returned to the monastery, all that remained were corpses strewn across