Killing and Dreams

How was he to regard the "Spider Mother"?

Jiang Wangxuan felt he had no right to judge her. As the remnants of souls and bloody figures emerged from the raging flames, he felt only respect for the Spider Mother and the Punishment Yang Peak lineage she represented.

His two lives together amounted to just over forty years. How could he understand the Spider Mother's century of steadfast resolve? Unless you had suffered another's pain, do not urge them to be kind.

He could only lament that the Spider Mother's path happened to cross his. The moment she began absorbing Radiant Wish, Jiang Wangxuan finally sensed the place he was desperately seeking!

The source of the Black Tide in Rising Yang Mansion!

With that thought, Jiang Wangxuan held nothing back. He had already witnessed the Spider Mother's endless succession of methods; this time, he would kill her in a single strike!

The silver-white moon disk in his sea of Qi shone with dazzling light. Jiang Wangxuan stood in the void, his right hand holding his sword behind his back and two fingers of his left hand pressed to his brow.

Fang Lin raised his head to look at the "banished immortal" above the wind and snow. That final Hearth Invites the Lord Art had also wrung his Divine Sense dry, and he could only faintly hear the words of the Daoist chant.

"The Silver River stretches far, trailing the cold essence of the nine heavens."

"The moonlight shines bright, gathering the pure radiance of ten thousand ages."

Silver River Moonlight drew upon Grand Yin, gathering the brilliant light of stars and moon at Jiang Wangxuan's fingertip. His eyes filled with compassion, he sent that radiance toward the Spider Mother, who had given up resisting.

The scarlet spider eyes beneath her abdomen closed one after another, and the golden-red light ceased to gather. Her compound eyes watched that glimmer of radiance before she finally lowered her gaze in silence.

"Honored teachers and elders, Tao Yao, Peach Spider still fell just a little short..."

"Perhaps this is for the best. To die by the hand of one of his kin brings things full circle!"

"I'm free..."

Silver-white moonlight, accompanied by a sigh, pierced through the morning sun over Jinping Mountain. The night's snow vanished beneath the light of dawn in the east.

The first rays of the morning sun reached the valley, but the figure who had lived here in peace for a hundred years was nowhere to be seen.

A golden-red bead of blood no larger than a thumb floated alone in the air. Jiang Wangxuan reached out, and it settled gently into his palm.

In the final moments before her death, the Spider Mother had abandoned her last resistance and condensed all that remained of her bloodline and her shattered Immortal Foundation into this golden-red blood bead!

The Spider Mother's final words to this world were, "So your original surname is Jiang!"

The valley floor beneath him began to shake from side to side, and boulders began tumbling down from the cliffs above. The Radiant Wish the Spider Mother had drawn down gradually turned transparent, with only a faint wisp following the orange flame back to Fang Lin.

Jiang Wangxuan descended to the ground and looked at the Fang Clan scion lying unconscious there. The killing intent in his eyes finally faded, and he put Autumn Frost back into the Cavern Spring Talismanic Words Bracelet.

Using what little true essence he had left, he summoned a clear green cloud. He looked back once more at the place where the little temple had stood, but it was already buried beneath fallen rocks.

"Let's go!"

Jiang Wangxuan spoke softly, and the clear green cloud carried the burly man after him as he left the site of the great battle.

"Master, why didn't you kill him?" Big Fat Fish popped out of Rising Yang Mansion at just the right moment.

But Jiang Wangxuan kept his head down and continued on his way without answering. Big Fat Fish grew unhappy and planted her feet on his Spiritual Sense. "Didn't you see all the predictions I gave you about how things might develop?"

"This Fang Lin is too dangerous. He knows too much, and he must have some great secret. He's very likely to discover your real reason for going into the mountain!"

Jiang Wangxuan, who had returned to the underground wilderness, looked back at Fang Lin, who was like a severely disabled man, and shook his head. "Big Fat Fish, your calculations are full of the coldness of mathematics, but this world doesn't run on numbers!"

"When you can raise the sword in your hand even an inch, the road ahead will be much easier to travel."

"Hmph!"

Inside Rising Yang Mansion, Big Fat Fish picked up her broom again and smacked "Jiang Wangxuan" hard on the head. "You'll regret this! In every simulation and deduction, this Fang is a huge trouble!"

Jiang Wangxuan shook his head helplessly and had to remove the freeloading Big Fat Fish from the "top of the head" of his Spiritual Sense. "At the very least, right now, there's no reason Fang Lin has to die! Be good and go play your games. When you have time, write an analysis report on that golden-red blood bead!"

"You unscrupulous capitalist, you should be strung up on a lamppost!"

Morning on Jinping Mountain should have been like any other, but early that day, grumbling scenic-area workers were clearing the snow at the foot of the mountain with great big brooms.

Yesterday's heavy snow had come suddenly. Jinping Mountain had not seen such a snowfall in more than a decade, and its blanket of white had given the land inside and outside the mountain a fresh new look.

Jiang Wangxuan stood atop a temple outside the mountain, gazing at the two peaks like the ends of a painted scroll. What a fine view it was!

Behind him, as Clear Water washed through the enormous tree pit, countless rocks tumbled down and filled it in. But these measures treated the symptoms rather than the root cause. In the past, Jinping Mountain had escaped outsiders' notice only because the spiders had kept watch day and night!

Now, the tree hollows riddling the mountain's interior would eventually be discovered by someone observant who ventured up the mountain. He would have to break through to Foundation Establishment as soon as possible, then find a chance to return and deal with it.

As Jiang Wangxuan saw it, the matter of Jinping Mountain was far from over. Could the Spider Mother really have hidden safely in Jinping Mountain all these years on her own?

Big Fat Fish's answer was a clear no. The spiders of Jinping Mountain could not have remained independent for a hundred years; the Spider Mother must have maintained some unknown connection with the outside world.

And someone would certainly notice the earth-shaking changes that had taken place on Jinping Mountain overnight. The Spider Mother's last words had left him with a powerful sense of danger.

"So your original surname is Jiang!" It seems she wasn't referring to me?

Jiang Wangxuan looked down again at the unconscious Fang Lin. This guy really was trouble. He had better send him away first!

"Fang Lin, Fang Lin!"

The Jixia Fang Clan scion, who had successfully reached Foundation Establishment, had somehow fallen asleep in the study. His cousin shook him awake, and Fang Lin finally came to his senses in a daze!

"Brother Xiu! What brought you back from Qingdu?"

Fang Lin was overjoyed to see his elder cousin, whom he had not seen in a long time. This man was the one who bore the cauldron for their generation of the Jixia Fang Household. He cultivated in Vast Wood and had already forged the Immortal Foundation "Eastern Radiance Gathering" at twenty-eight.

"Brother Lin, you've only just turned thirty, yet you've attained the Immortal Foundation 'Ten Thousand Households' Hearth.' The elders in the clan are quite astonished. I hear there's something different about your Immortal Foundation? Someone from Hundred Hearth Heaven even came to see it?"

Fang Xiu wore a green robe and tapped his younger cousin on the head with the paper fan in his hand. "Everyone outside is beaming with joy and bustling about, yet you're hiding in here sleeping in!"

Having his elder brother point at his head and tap it left the burly man in his thirties somewhat embarrassed. He could only plead for mercy ingratiatingly. "There have been so many people from the various households coming to offer congratulations lately. Even I can't keep up with all these social obligations."

"What did the honored person from Hundred Hearth Heaven come down and say to make them kick up such a fuss?" That was what Fang Xiu had been most curious about since returning home.

"Ah, it's nothing much. My Immortal Foundation just happened to merge with a 'remnant wish.'" Fang Lin scratched his head sheepishly. He owed it entirely to the help of his dear brother from a different father and mother. Without Brother Jiang, he would still be fertilizing the peach grove!

"From Huaqi?"

Fang Lin nodded. Fang Xiu put down his paper fan and gave his cousin a meaningful look. "You should know that the path of Huaqi hasn't shown itself to the outside world for hundreds or thousands of years. Only in those hidden realms of the Buddhist cultivators might one find a wisp of 'Qi.'"

"To have gained such a fortuitous opportunity at the Foundation Establishment Realm, your future is boundless. What are your plans now? Will you join Hundred Hearth Heaven or go to the Altar of Soil and Grain Palace?"

Fang Lin shook his head at both suggestions. "Neither. I want to go to Yuanhuai Heaven. My brother is studying in Lüyu, and I need to go protect him!"

Fang Xiu could not help laughing at that nonsense. "I haven't been home in years. When did our Fang Household produce another promising talent in Lüyu?"

"Brother Xiu, he's the dear brother who saved me from fire and water. Besides, it'd be a good thing to go to Lüyu and lie low while things are so lively in Jixia!"

As soon as Fang Lin had reached Foundation Establishment, he had planned out the next ten-odd years for himself. He would go drink tea with Brother Jiang and watch him play with Sword Qi. What a wonderful thing that would be!

Whenever he recalled how Brother Jiang had controlled the whole battle that night like a banished immortal descended to earth, using the fourth-grade technique Facing the Shadow, Becoming Three People at the Qi Refining Stage as smoothly as Fang Lin lit a fire in a hearth!

How many Foundation Establishment cultivators had exhausted their lifespans without grasping the secrets of a fourth-grade technique? My Brother Jiang knows one before he's even reached Foundation Establishment. Could he really be the reincarnation of some Golden Core True Lord?

Fang Lin missed the feeling of Moon-Worshipping Spirit-Calming Benediction a little. He wondered how Brother Jiang was doing now. He was so young that the elders in Lüyu would probably hold his cultivation back a little longer.

He had already been delayed too long by the mundane affairs of Jixia. Now that Brother Xiu had returned, those people could go pester him instead. Fang Lin would buy a ticket to Luyu Port tonight!

Brother Jiang, here I come!

"Brother Lin, I'm afraid the timing is unfortunate. I just came back from Lüyu! Luyu Port has already closed its high-speed rail routes to the outside!"

Fang Lin was dumbfounded. "Huh? What happened? Why close Luyu Port? Could those old-timers from Yuanhuai Heaven be making trouble again? If you ask me, it's only because True Lord Chengyue is too good-natured..."

"None of that!" Fang Xiu's brows were tightly furrowed, and his knuckles had gone a little white around his paper fan. "Not long ago, a Grand Yin Qi Refinement cultivator in Lüyu was murdered on the spot while breaking through to Foundation Establishment!"

With a bang, Fang Lin, who had been grinning just a moment ago, blew the study apart with the Hearth Fire erupting from his body. "Brother Xiu, what did you say? A Grand Yin Qi Refinement cultivator? Breaking through to Foundation Establishment? Murdered on the spot?"

Seeing Fang Lin lose his composure so easily, Fang Xiu was somewhat displeased. After all these years, his younger brother still had not changed that temper of his. Someday, he would take a great fall because of it.

With a casual wave, he sent out a stream of pale green Qi that suppressed the Hearth Fire in the study. "When the news reached Yuanhuai Heaven, True Lord Chengyue was furious. True Person Chonghuan, the head of Lüyu, was sent straight to Abyssal Secluded Ravine to reflect on his mistakes.

"The trouble is, Vast Cold Heaven and Jielin Hall are preparing to temporarily suspend Luyu University's qualification to recruit Grand Yin cultivators..."

No, it can't be. That person can't be Brother Jiang. How could someone like him be murdered on the spot?

How is that possible? Have the people of Lüyu gone mad?

Fang Xiu sensed something was wrong when his cousin became distraught upon hearing the news. After a long while, Fang Lin finally asked, his face deathly pale, "Brother Xiu, was that Grand Yin Qi Refinement cultivator who was murdered surnamed Jiang?"