9.18 – But the task has only been completed halfway!
translator: xiin
editors: BlueBug & Misogi
This mysterious secret realm did not have a name. It once belonged to an unknown swordsman. After the swordsman found his dao, he turned his estate into a secret realm and then scattered five stones engraved with parts of the map all over the world, hoping that in the future, some predestined person would be able to break the seal to the secret realm and obtain his inheritance.
A swordsman"s inheritance was naturally related to his swordsmanship. But the person who would be able to enter his secret realm had to be a person of great strength, and anyone who would be strong enough to enter would already have developed their own swordsmanship, which naturally differed from his. He wanted to find a successor, but ultimately was unable to achieve his goal.
According to the outline that the author supplied, Yu Shaofeng and Chi Jian ultimately managed to enter this secret realm, despite not being strong enough, through a series of mistakes and accidents. They had only obtained minor achievements along the path of the sword and had their own sword intent, but had not yet touched the realm of creating their own sword dao. They were precisely the successors that matched with that Venerable Swordsman"s inheritance, so this secret realm became the stepping-board for their rapid development. The people who had driven them into the secret realm were immediately slaughtered when they came out, and then these two began to kill in all directions. Although they were still hunted at the end because their strength was not strong enough, things like the path of the sword was something that one only had to step on, and understanding would naturally follow. In the later stages—after the two of them accepted the inheritance—they escaped from many pursuers and killed many opponents.
Xue Ling knew what was going to happen in the secret realm, but he still had to make a trip. Intuition told him that there was something odd about the secret realm, and when they arrived in front of the secret realm, this feeling became increasingly evident.
The five stones contained a map that guided people to find the secret realm, and they also served as the key to enter. But even with the key, one still needed enough strength to open the seal that surrounded the secret realm, and it was for this reason that they needed Chi Lan to join them on this journey.
According to the directions they were given, Xue Ling and the group was already standing in front of the secret realm. The secret realm seemed peaceful on the surface, but for some reason, it gave Xue Ling a strange feeling. According to the timeline that was outlined in the plot summary, this place contained nothing other than the inheritance, but the aura that the secret realm was emanating gave off a sense of extreme danger.
Chi Lan seemed to have noticed this too. He narrowed his eyes and reached out to hold Xue Ling"s hand, but Xue Ling brushed him off.
Xue Ling’s movements were ruthless, but there was no expression on his face. He only spoke in an odd tone, "Something is wrong.”
Chi Lan was already very satisfied that he could keep this person by his side. He did not have any other requirements regarding Xue Ling"s moods right now; they still had a long time ahead, and he would naturally be able to properly coax his disciple. He soothingly placed Xue Ling behind him for protection, and glanced at Yu Shaofeng and Chi Jian. "You two step back. I will open up the secret realm now."
Their present location was not concealed. If they didn"t quickly open up the secret realm and enter it, they might catch other people"s attention, and the probability that they would be able to clear out the secret realm alone would become much smaller.
Yu Shaofeng split the five stones so that everyone had one. Only those who were holding the stones would be able to enter the secret realm.
Electric light flashed on Chi Lan"s fingertips. A tiny spark of fire was nestled within the light - it was not obvious, but as the lightning became stronger and covered a larger and larger area, the small flame also spread out and turned into a burning dragon composed entirely of fire.
The lightning wrapped around the dragon’s body and ran along its scales. Each and every scale flashed with lightning. At some point, the entire sky had become covered by the gathering clouds, and this piece of the sky was threatening to fall down as the fire dragon threaded its way amongst the clouds. Every time it rose up, it brought along with it the roaring sound of thunder.
This kind of scenario would definitely alarm other cultivators, but the movements this time were too huge, and n.o.body dared to come close and investigate what was going on. Anyone who understood even a little bit about the ways of the world would be able to guess who this particular powerhouse was.
In the cultivation world, there was only the Venerable Crimson Flame that had a fire and lightning spiritual root and had the ability to make such a big battle array.
Since he was here, then even if there was benefits as big as the sky to be had, it would not be their turn to obtain it. And it was also because of this that n.o.body tried to come close even when the fire dragon broke through the boundary seal.
The crowd could only look on as the dragon pa.s.sed through a void and the four figures that had been hovering in the sky all disappeared. The dark clouds in the sky gradually dispersed, and everything was eventually restored to how it had been. The pract.i.tioners grouped up into twos and threes and discussed it, and finally came to the conclusion that the four of them had probably entered a secret realm.
But it was pointless to have reached such a conclusion—they couldn"t go in. Finally, some people decided to stay and see if they would emerge again soon so that they could go up and ask what kind of secret realm it had been. Perhaps their luck would be good, and the Venerable Crimson Flame would be willing to tell this group of melon eating spectators about it~ Everyone else rolled their eyes at these fools and turned around to leave. They weren"t that foolish - what if the Venerable Crimson Flame decided to kill everyone to keep them quiet when he emerged? It was safer to just leave.
As for the group who just entered the secret realm, they were currently shocked by the sight before them. The plot outline had not described what the environment in secret realm was like, but the secret realm before Xue Ling"s eyes was bitterly cold. The entire secret realm was absolutely dark. Other than the ground that his feet were standing on, he couldn"t feel or see anything else.
He had clearly been teleported over with three other people, but he could not sense anyone around him. That was to say, he had been separated from the others…
Xue Ling touched his chest. He had a mark on his chest that matched with the one at the top of his inner thigh. If he was too far away from Chi Lan, the mark would react. But there was no reaction from the mark right now, which meant that he was probably not too far away from Chi Lan. He thought for a moment, and then sent out his spiritual awareness. But due to the influence from the endless darkness, his consciousness could only explore a limited area, and he had no way to find Chi Lan"s figure. He also didn"t know where Yu Shaofeng and Chi Jian had ended up.
Xue Ling frowned and stretched out his hand. The bitter cold wind blew at him. There was no response from his body, but his mind felt as though it had been p.r.i.c.ked by needles. He adjusted his posture so that this wind with the ability to affect his consciousness would no longer blow on him, then called the system out.
Recently, the system had been so bored that it had simply gone off to sleep, resting peacefully in the system s.p.a.ce. It was suddenly dragged out by its host, and woke up completely confused. It turned its head to look around, then asked curiously, "Where is host now?"
“In a secret realm.” Xue Ling placed the system on his shoulder and continued, "This secret realm was mentioned in the original text, but it is now somewhat different from what was described in the plot. What"s going on?"
The system looked around and wondered out loud, “The atmosphere here really is a little strange…”
“Does it have anything to do with my tail?” After recovering three tails, Xue Ling already knew that once his tail appeared in one of these small worlds, it would cause some chain effects. For example, the zerg in the ABO world, or the changes in all the deep-sea merfolk, these had all happened because the strength contained in his tails was too powerful. They would cause changes in the worlds where they had fallen. Now that this secret realm had turned out like this, given that it was also a place where the protagonist had to go, there was a great possibility that it had been influenced by his tail.
The system automatically carried the ability to detect his tails. Although it had no way to find its general direction, it was still very easy for it to determine whether or not his tail was present. The little fox"s tail swept around, and then the system confidently told its host, "There"s no mistake, it"s the host"s tail… and there seems to be more than one of them. One of them should be of the dark element, which is why it caused this darkness…"
“Then the other one should be wind…" Each of Xue Ling"s tails contained a different element. He had lost eight of them, and the only element he had kept was light. Since then, he had already found three, and he currently had a total of four tails. As long as he took back these two, he would have six. By then, as long as he managed to fuse his strength together and re-opened the meridians on his body, he would be able to break through the blocks on his memory and more or less recover his original memories.
The shackles on his memory had gone unnoticed by Xue Ling for a long time. It was only after he had merged with the power of four of his tails after the last world that he had discovered that there was a forbidden zone within his sea of memories. This forbidden zone had been sealed by him and another force, and without retrieving all of his tails, he would not be able to open it at all.
But in this world, Xue Ling had realized that the things hidden in his forbidden memories might be related to the man. This made him rather anxious to pry the shackles open. Even if he could only make a small gap and reveal a small portion of the whole, perhaps it would still be able to answer some of his questions.
“How do I retrieve them?"
“Taking back the tails will depend on the host." The system shook its head. “I also don"t know how to do this. Currently, the tails appear to have been sealed within this secret realm, and their strength became limited to this area and do not affect the outside world. But correspondingly, they were able to thoroughly control this s.p.a.ce."
“What about the other three?"
“I don’t know. Normally, since forces from beyond this world have shown up, they will be affected and faint. Their bodies should not be too far away from the host. Host should first deal with the two tails, and they should be able to wake up after that."
“All right.”
Xue Ling looked around and wrinkled his nose. He had never paid much attention to his tails. To him, those tails were just places to store his power, and were very important for his cultivation, but ever since they existed, they had been on his body, so they had always been under his control. Xue Ling had never had to think about how to make them listen to him…
He recalled two of the previous worlds. In the first one, he had taken the tail back after defeating the Zerg. In the second world, he had taken it back from the deep-sea merfolk"s inheritance, and there had been no similarities in how it had been done.
“Host, they’re all in energy states right now. All you have to do is control that power."
Xue Ling nodded and thought about how to reunite this power back into his own body. Although it was said that he had lost his tails, in fact, it was his power that had been lost. The "tails" he retrieved were not physical tails, but rather forms of energy. When he fused the energy back into his body, his original body would then naturally grow back one of his tails.
These energies were scattered, but once he remembered that it had all originally been his, it became much easier for him to control. Xue Ling concentrated, and gestured in mid-air. He pinched his fingers together in a subtle gesture, then he slowly closed his eyes and allowed his original power to seep into this world.
He physically existed in another world, and when he borrowed the strength of his body, he normally only used the power that was embedded in the body he was currently using. But now that he was allowing his own power to seep in, it took a lot of effort to channel it inside.
When this power touched the barrier surrounding this world, Xue Ling could feel an obvious resistance. Fortunately, it seemed to understand what he wanted to do, and the resistance slowly disappeared.
Xue Ling’s eyelashes flickered slightly. He did not open his eyes, but his head turned slightly to face a certain direction.
A man stood there. Currently, his lips were curved as he guided Xue Ling, teaching him how to compress his strength.
Because Chi Lan’s body had been suppressed at this time, the original Su Xuanyan"s soul was able to wake up. He only needed to take one glance around before he immediately understood all that had happened. He took in Xue Ling whose aura was going somewhat out of control as he tried to reabsorb his power and his brow wrinkled; after he approached, he picked up the system that was crouched anxiously next to its host, wanting to help but unable to get involved.
“My… My Lord! ” The system really had no idea who this person was, so it could only address him in this way.
“His strength is currently unstable. He must return to the system s.p.a.ce immediately, otherwise this small world will be unable to withstand this power and directly explode."
The system looked surprised and its voice was shocked as it said, “But the task has only been completed halfway!"
“I will draw out a strand of his soul that will stay in this world. It will not have much impact on your task. Bring him back to the system s.p.a.ce first, and I’ll deal with things on this side…"
The system was not a system that would obey just anyone. It had just been about to refute, when it received orders in its mind from the Ten Directions World. Although it was somewhat unhappy, the system still did what the Ten Directions World told it to do.
The Ten Directions World said, “Do as he says.”
“If he"s like this now, the more energy he retrieves, the more concerns there will be about his control over it. If he can"t grasp control over all the energy and maintain a certain level of balance within his body, flaws will arise in his body. Next time, don"t look for two tails at once." Su Xuanyan lowered his head and kissed Xue Ling, who had already reverted back to his original form because of the rioting energy in his body. The little fox"s body was even smaller than the transformed system"s furry body, his four tails hanging listlessly behind him while two other tails that were formed out of pure energy swayed wildly. Only by turning these energies back into genuine tails would Xue Ling be able to transform back into his human body again.
The system was still muddleheaded as it responded, extracting its host"s soul and bringing it back to the system s.p.a.ce.
As for the man who had been left behind to clean up the mess, he looked at the empty sh.e.l.l that Xue Ling had left behind and sighed helplessly. There was a pale soul at his fingertips - this was a part of Xue Ling"s soul, or rather, a sliver of his consciousness. Leaving it in this world would ensure that the remaining plot would not be completely destroyed. After completing all this, he placed Xue Ling"s body beside Chi Lan"s, withdrew a portion of his own consciousness from his body, and inserted it into Chi Lan"s body.
He was different from Xue Ling. Xue Ling"s ident.i.ty could be changed in the middle, but it was not the same for him. He must be the same person from beginning to end to ensure that he would not make any mistakes.
This world was unable to bear his presence for a long time, so the man left as quickly as he could. What he was doing now was only enough to ensure that the plot would stay on the track that they had plotted out for it, but nothing else could be guaranteed. These strands of their souls would not contain their memories, and when they woke up, they would become the real Xue Ling and Chi Lan of this world. Their relationship might perhaps turn a bit strange, but there was not much Su Xuanyan could do about it.
His little fox"s wellbeing was the most important thing. As long as he was okay, even if splitting their souls could lead to minor mistakes in the next world, he would be willing to bear the blame.
well, this arc came to an abrupt end (kind of like the original plot in this arc too, haha). wanna make guesses on what the next arc will be about?
i stayed up really late last night to read a BL novel called ‘The Turing Code’. unfortunately, n.o.body has picked it up to translate it yet, but i did end up if you guys are interested. it’s not to my usual tastes since it’s Modern Day with a little more angst than i’d like, but it was very good. deep and thoughtful (in ways that WTMT isn’t, lol) with moments of hilarity to lighten up the mood.