Bai Yue’s heart was filled with doubts, but for now, these were just suspicions that needed to be verified.
She silently prayed that she was overthinking.
Right now, she had a family to protect and didn’t want to encounter any powerful enemies.
When Hei Ya finished cultivating, she happily led Bai Yue and the others to the guest room she had prepared.
“Besides the guest room, you can also rest in my room.”
Hei Ya said.
“What about you?”
Bai Yue asked.
“I don’t rest at all. I cultivate at night too.”
Hei Ya explained matter-of-factly.
Bai Yue was speechless. She felt Hei Ya was really strange.
Could it be that the disappearance of her parents had affected her, making her work so hard to improve her strength so she could continue searching for them?
Bai Yue wondered silently.
“Hei Ya, we all like sleeping with Master. We don’t need other rooms.”
Yan Hua explained.
“So that’s how it is. I also like sleeping with my parents.”
“That’s enough, I’m going to cultivate now. Good night.”
Hei Ya bid farewell to everyone.
The Bai Yue master-disciple group lay on the simple but clean bed to rest.
This time, the one entering Bai Yue’s sea of consciousness was Su Qiuyue.
She once again saw Bai Yue in a hospital gown, who pulled her out of the hospital.
“Master, what are we going to do?”
“We’re going to watch a movie.”
“What’s a movie?”
“It’s something similar to the Liu Ying Shi in the cultivation world.”
“Oh.”
Su Qiuyue nodded in understanding.
In truth, as long as she was with Master, anything felt interesting.
Bai Yue took her into the cinema, and Su Qiuyue also saw the movie poster at the entrance, causing her to pause.
On the poster was a familiar tombstone, with the words Tomb of Beloved Wife Ziyuan written on it.
This was the Liu Ying Shi of a predecessor from the Violet Blossom Secret Realm.
Bai Yue used her wit to exchange for popcorn and cola, then pulled Su Qiuyue to the front row to sit together, eating popcorn and watching the life of the Violet Blossom Secret Realm’s predecessor play on the big screen.
Her name was Qian Xue, her love as eternal as snow that never melts.
Her Ziyuan was the violet flower that bloomed in her world of pure white, never wilting.
They were childhood sweethearts, the first and only light in each other’s lives.
Qian Xue’s Sword Dao talent was average, and she often clumsily hurt herself during practice.
Whenever that happened, Ziyuan would hold her hand, using her gentle spiritual energy to carefully heal her wounds, patiently guiding her hand through each move.
“Ah Xue, here—lower your wrist another inch.”
“Ah Xue, don’t get distracted. Look into my eyes.”
Ziyuan’s eyes were like the clearest amethyst, always reflecting only Qian Xue’s image.
But as the years passed, Ziyuan’s brilliance grew ever brighter.
She became like a phoenix soaring in the heavens, easily breaking through one realm after another, while Qian Xue remained like a fledgling bird, struggling in place.
Inferiority quietly grew in Qian Xue’s heart.
She felt like a stain on Ziyuan’s perfect painting.
She began to avoid Ziyuan’s affection, hiding in the most remote corners during sword practice.
Until that night, Ziyuan found her curled at the edge of a cliff, hugging her knees and weeping silently.
Ziyuan didn’t speak, only gently embracing her from behind, draping her outer robe over Qian Xue’s cold shoulders.
“Ah Xue,”
Ziyuan’s voice carried a sigh, yet it was warm enough to melt ice and snow.
“I know everything you’re thinking.”
“I… I’m not worthy of you.”
Qian Xue’s voice trembled with tears.
“I’m too stupid, I’m useless, I only hold you back.”
But Ziyuan smiled.
She turned Qian Xue to face her, forcing her to meet her gaze.
In those violet eyes, there was not a trace of impatience—only overflowing love and heartache.
“Fool.”
Ziyuan cupped her face, gently stroking her cheek with her thumb.
“I love you simply because you are Qian Xue. Even if your spiritual roots were shattered, even if you became a mortal, even if you forgot all the sword forms and turned into a little crybaby, I’d still love you.”
“My love has nothing to do with your cultivation or talent.”
A warm tear slipped from the corner of Ziyuan’s eye, burning as it touched Qian Xue’s heart.
All of Qian Xue’s inferiority and unease melted away with that kiss, that confession.
Yes, they were Dao Companions, lovers witnessed by heaven and earth.
Those days were as sweet as stolen dreams.
They chased and played in the snow, slept beneath trees blooming with violet flowers, exchanged the most intimate kisses in each other’s breath.
But then, the Heavenly Tribulation descended.
Blood-red cracks tore the sky apart.
Countless ferocious Extradimensional Demon Beasts swarmed in like locusts, turning their peaceful world into hell in an instant.
In the chaos, Qian Xue saw the demon beasts go mad upon sensing Ziyuan’s presence, charging at them recklessly.
During one escape, Ziyuan shielded Qian Xue and suffered a deep wound across her back.
While Qian Xue bandaged her, Ziyuan quietly performed a soul search on a dying demon beast she had captured.
In that moment, her face went deathly pale.
Purple Flower Physique.
To the demon beasts, her flesh and blood were the ultimate delicacy.
As long as she lived, these monsters would pursue her relentlessly, like sharks smelling blood.
And Qian Xue by her side would be dragged into danger again and again.
Ziyuan looked at Qian Xue, who was carefully tending her wounds, her gaze full of devotion.
Ziyuan’s heart felt as if it was being crushed by an invisible hand, making it hard to breathe.
When Qian Xue finally looked up, what she saw were cold, unfamiliar violet eyes.
“Qian Xue.”
Ziyuan’s voice was icy.
“Look, I’m injured again. All because I was protecting a useless person like you.”
Qian Xue’s hand, holding the bandage, froze in midair.
The worry on her face turned to shock.
“Ziyuan… you…”
“I’ve wasted so many years,”
Ziyuan pushed her away, rising to her feet and looking down at her.
“Has your Sword Dao improved even a little? Besides hiding behind me, what else can you do?”
“You’re just a burden.”
Each word was a blade, stabbing deep into Qian Xue’s heart.
“No… it’s not like that… Ziyuan, what’s wrong with you?”
Qian Xue panicked, crawling over to grab Ziyuan’s sleeve.
“Get lost.”
Ziyuan’s voice wasn’t loud, but it carried endless disgust.
“I won’t!”
Tears streamed down Qian Xue’s face.
She clung to Ziyuan’s leg, looking up helplessly, sobbing.
“Are you hurt? Are you delirious? Look at me. I’m Ah Xue!”
“You said it yourself. You loved me the most! You said it!”
She didn’t understand why the lover who had been so gentle a moment ago had suddenly become like this.
She couldn’t believe it.
“Let go.”
Ziyuan’s voice was icy cold.
Seeing that Qian Xue still wouldn’t release her, she raised her hand.
“Pa!”
The crisp slap sent Qian Xue crashing to the ground, blood trickling from her lips.
The world seemed to freeze.
She held her face, staring blankly at Ziyuan as if seeing her for the first time.
Ziyuan didn’t look at her.
She simply lifted her foot and kicked her in the chest.
“Didn’t you hear me? I told you to leave.”
“I’m tired of you, useless thing.”
With that, Ziyuan turned, spiritual energy surging, transforming into a violet light that shot into the sky.
But in that instant, as she turned away, her cold violet eyes filled with blood-red veins.
A single scorching tear escaped, carried away by the wind, leaving no trace as she vanished.
“Ziyuan… do you have some reason for this?”
Qian Xue knelt in place, staring at the fading light, screaming in despair.
Her only answer was the wind.
And a distant voice, colder than ice.
“The thing I regret most in this life is meeting you.”
Ziyuan was gone.
She took all her light, all her dreams, and left.
Qian Xue knelt for three days and nights.
She didn’t eat, didn’t drink, didn’t move.
Like a statue without a soul.
Rain soaked her hair, mud stained her robes, but she only stared with empty eyes in the direction Ziyuan had disappeared.
She replayed every word, every icy look from Ziyuan, trying to find even the tiniest crack.
But there was none.
That resolve, that loathing, were real enough to shatter her heart.
But…
But she still didn’t believe it.
That was her Ziyuan.
The Ziyuan who’d worry for hours over a small cut on her hand.
The Ziyuan who said love had nothing to do with cultivation.
Three days later, she finally moved.
Like a walking corpse, she followed the faint trace of Ziyuan’s presence.
She still refused to believe it.
She chased Ziyuan’s aura.
On a sunlit hillside, she found where that familiar aura stopped.
The ground was scorched black.
The air was thick with the scent of blood.
A stone tablet lay on the ground, covered in blood.
The sunlight was blinding, burning the inscription on the stone into her eyes.
Every character on the tombstone made her heart tremble.
Beloved Wife Ziyuan’s Tomb.
She reached out with trembling fingers, touching the stone as that familiar voice echoed in her ears.
“I’m sorry, Ah Xue. My constitution brings disaster. Only by dying can you live.”
“Forgive me, okay?”
Boom.
Qian Xue’s mind roared.
She clung to the cold tombstone, her body shaking.
Looking down at the torn fragments of violet cloth on the ground, her pupils contracted.
The sunlight was still warm.
But Qian Xue’s world collapsed in an instant.
She fell into a bottomless abyss of darkness.
Her Ziyuan had protected her in the cruelest way imaginable.
And she couldn’t even collect her body.
“Heh… hehehe…”
Qian Xue knelt before the tombstone, broken sobs tearing from her throat.
She laughed bitterly, and as she laughed, tears streamed down her pale face.
She reached out, over and over, stroking the cold stone inscribed with “Beloved Wife Ziyuan’s Tomb”.
As if that could let her feel Ziyuan’s warmth.
“Ziyuan wasn’t wrong. I was…”
She forced out a hoarse voice with all her remaining strength.
Her only answer was the cold wind between the mountains.
Cold to the bone.
Her Ziyuan—the one who’d warm her hands in winter, who’d hold her through sleepless nights, who’d say she loved her most—was gone.
Dead.