In the blink of an eye, ten years passed inside the Hundred Lives Book.
Once, Jiang Qingyi had been a cultivator who could not even step into the Qi Refining realm.
But now Jiang Qingyi had already reached the Golden Core realm.
Fourteen years, and no more, to go from Qi Refining to Golden Core—measured against the whole world, that talent already stood in the very first rank.
These days Jiang Qingyi was a deacon of the Dragon Spring Sword Sect.
Once she reached the Nascent Soul realm, she could become an elder of the Dragon Spring Sword Sect.
Of course, that was only because the Dragon Spring Sword Sect was a major sect.
Otherwise—
anywhere else in the world, a Nascent Soul cultivator was already qualified to found a sect of his own.
"Cough, cough, cough... cough cough..."
On the bed, Xiao Mo coughed without stopping.
His face was ashen and his expression awful; he looked like a man with not much time left.
After Jiang Qingyi entered the Golden Core realm, Xiao Mo truly no longer needed to use the Sustaining Heaven Formula on her at the cost of his own lifespan.
But over these ten years, every use of the Sustaining Heaven Formula had drained him terribly.
And the higher Jiang Qingyi's realm climbed, the more often Xiao Mo had to use the Formula on her, and the more savagely each use cut into his lifespan.
By now, Xiao Mo figured he might not have thirty years of life left.
Even if he lived another thirty years, and added the fourteen already spent,
the total still wouldn't come to forty-five.
He wouldn't even reach the "fifty years" the Hundred Lives Book demanded.
But was Xiao Mo regretful?
Regret was out of the question.
Give him the choice again, and Xiao Mo would do exactly the same.
Because without the Sustaining Heaven Formula, Qingyi could forget about ever becoming one of the world's foremost sword talents.
She might never have been able to set foot on the path of cultivation at all.
What Xiao Mo counted himself lucky for was that after every time he used the art he forcibly concealed how awful he looked.
On top of that, he went out on missions from time to time.
Every time he came back from one, Xiao Mo would deliberately release the concealing art and let his face look as bad as it could.
Otherwise, if Jiang Qingyi ever learned the truth—
there was no need to think twice: even if it killed her, she would never let him use the Sustaining Heaven Formula on her again.
She would even blame herself horribly, until it damaged her Dao heart.
And then everything he had done would truly have been wasted.
Now Xiao Mo had only one last thing left undone.
His body still held a sliver of fighting strength—after all, a Nascent Soul cultivator was still a Nascent Soul cultivator—so he could keep guarding Jiang Qingyi's Dao a while longer.
Once Qingyi entered the Nascent Soul realm, he could do that last thing.
"I just hope that when the time comes, Qingyi won't blame me."
Leaning back against the bed, Xiao Mo murmured to himself.
But no sooner had he said it than he shook his head with a smile.
When that time came, what would it matter even if Qingyi did blame him?
This was only ever a life to be experienced; from the start, Qingyi was nothing but a person who did not exist.
Once he left the Hundred Lives Book, this "world" would end completely.
Thinking that far, Xiao Mo found he really was a little reluctant to let it go.
After all, the time he had lived inside the Hundred Lives Book was real, every bit of it.
Over more than ten years he and Qingyi had shared every morning and every evening; they had long since built a bond like that of family.
"Ugh... I've gotten too deep into the role... cough cough cough... cough..." Xiao Mo coughed several more times, each one worse than the last.
He hurriedly snatched up the handkerchief by the bed and pressed it to his mouth.
The handkerchief came away bright crimson with blood.
"Master..."
When Jiang Qingyi came in carrying the medicine and saw her master coughing so violently, she hurried to his side.
"Master, are you all right...?"
Jiang Qingyi set the medicine on the bedside table, knelt by the head of the bed, and looked at her master with worry.
Over these years, her master's health had gone from bad to worse.
After she entered the Golden Core realm, her master's life fire had become like a candle in the wind, as though it might go out at any moment.
Jiang Qingyi did not know why.
Master said he had injured his foundation on a mission.
At first, that was exactly what she had believed.
Because every time her master came back his face looked terrible, and he would go to the Medicine Hall for treatment.
But gradually, Jiang Qingyi began to feel that something did not add up.
Because whatever mission her master took, even trivial ones, some great expert would always turn up and wound him.
Even if her master had terrible luck, it couldn't be that terrible, could it?
"I'm fine, don't worry." Xiao Mo stealthily moved the handkerchief away.
But Jiang Qingyi still caught sight of the blood on it.
The girl pressed her thin lips tightly together.
"Master, let me feed you your medicine." Jiang Qingyi picked up the bowl.
"No need. Your master has hands, doesn't he? I'll do it myself." Xiao Mo reached for the bowl, but Jiang Qingyi refused to give it up.
"Just lie there, Master. Do you remember after the New Blood Tournament? I was injured, and you fed me my medicine every day. Now that Master isn't well, it's only natural that Qingyi feed you."
"Fine..." Seeing how determined Jiang Qingyi looked, Xiao Mo stopped refusing.
When the medicine was finished, Jiang Qingyi helped Xiao Mo lie slowly back down. "Rest well, Master. Don't worry, you're going to be fine."
"Don't worry, your master isn't going to die just yet. Besides, I haven't even seen you find a reliable Dao companion." Xiao Mo said with a smile.
"Master, don't joke about things like that. A Dao companion is the last thing your disciple needs."
Jiang Qingyi shot her master a feigned look of reproach, tucked the blanket in around him, and carried the bowl out.
And the moment Jiang Qingyi closed the door behind her, her pretty brows knitted; she set the bowl on the stone table in the courtyard and flew straight off to the Medicine Hall!
No sooner had Jiang Qingyi left than Xiao Mo's door was knocked on.
"Qingyi, is something wrong?" Xiao Mo asked.
The door opened, and a woman stepped out.
At the sight of her, Xiao Mo's eyes froze for a beat, and a trace of killing intent flickered across his face.
Xiao Mo knew who she was.
She was from Prince Xiao's Manor of the Liang Kingdom.
To be precise, she was Xiao Mo's sword attendant.
For as long as Xiao Mo could remember, she had grown up at his side.
When Xiao Mo left Prince Xiao's Manor and cut all ties with it, he had wanted to take this sword attendant who had grown up with him along.
But she refused.
Only afterward did Xiao Mo understand.
She had never been his sword attendant. She was the sword attendant of "Prince Xiao's son."
"Xiachan, what are you doing here?"
Xiao Mo's brows drew together, and his tone was distinctly unfriendly.
This was not because she had failed to follow him more than ten years ago.
He could understand her choice.
The reason he was so wary of her, even hostile, was simply that a woman loyal only to Prince Xiao's Manor—Xiachan—had turned up here.
Perhaps Prince Xiao's Manor was about to make some move against him.
"Young Master, it has been a long time."
Xiachan stepped forward and bowed to Xiao Mo.
Xiachan was as she had always been: there was not a shred of warmth in her words or her movements.
From the day Xiao Mo first knew her, she had been this cold.
As though nothing in the world could stir her feelings.
"Skip the pointless talk. I stopped being Prince Xiao's heir long ago. Say what you have to say—what did my father send you here to do?" Xiao Mo said coldly.
Xiachan did not answer him directly. Instead she asked, "Does the Young Master know how much thought the Prince spent finding an innate sword bone for you? And how great a price he paid?
It was the Prince who made you a sword cultivator of extraordinary talent. That you could reach the Nascent Soul realm at eighteen is entirely because the Prince transplanted that sword bone into you."
Xiao Mo sneered. "Then do you know that if I had known the sword bone I received was someone else's—a four-year-old girl's—I would rather have stayed an ordinary man my whole life!
Do you know that the little girl nearly died because she lost that sword bone?
And in your eyes, was transplanting an innate sword bone into me done for my sake, or for my father's ambition?
Go ask him!"
"The Young Master is just the same as ever." Xiachan shook her head and sighed. "The Young Master is good in every way, except that he inherited the Princess Consort's kindness. And the Princess Consort was good in every way, except that she taught you to be too soft."
The words had barely left Xiachan's mouth when a streak of sword Qi sliced past her cheek.
A lock of hair was cut cleanly through and drifted slowly to the ground.
A long, thin wound opened on Xiachan's fair cheek, and blood welled out of it.
Xiao Mo looked at Xiachan icily. "That strike was out of respect for the fact that we grew up together. Say one more word against my mother, and the next streak of sword Qi will open your throat!"
"Whatever you came here for, say it and get out!" Xiao Mo had run out of patience.
Even though Xiao Mo knew he was only here to experience a life, he possessed every last memory of this world's "Xiao Mo."
"Xiao Mo's" mother was Xiao Mo's mother.
She had died in the year Xiao Mo turned seven, but in his heart, her gentleness and her lessons would be remembered forever.
He would absolutely not permit anyone to speak ill of his mother.
Xiachan paid no attention to her wound. She simply regarded Xiao Mo calmly and said slowly, "In the third year after the Young Master left, a younger brother of yours was born. Unlike the sword bone transplanted into you—
the Second Young Master was born with double pupils.
Double pupils are in no way inferior to a sword bone.
Barring accidents, in the future he can reach at least the Immortal realm—perhaps even the Ascension realm!
And Prince Xiao's Manor's supremacy will endure forever!
For generation after generation, the Liang royal house will be the Prince's puppets!"
"Heh heh heh..." Xiao Mo laughed. "My father sent you to find me just to say all that on purpose?"
Xiao Mo of course understood his father's thinking.
In this world, an emperor had to bear enormous karma.
If a cultivator of accomplished cultivation became emperor, he would be bound up in karma; from then on his realm could hardly rise a single step, and in the unseen workings of fate he might even die of karma.
And once an ordinary man became emperor, cultivation became extremely difficult for him. However prodigiously gifted he was, he could at best cultivate to the ninth layer of Qi Refining; establishing his foundation was beyond him, and his lifespan would exceed an ordinary man's by at most thirty or forty years.
His own father wanted it both ways: he wanted the power of a great nation like Liang, and he did not want to bear the karma. So he gripped the reins of government and made the present Liang royal house into puppet emperors.
But doing that was bound to stir resentment in the court.
At times like that, he needed an overwhelming fist to overawe them.
That "fist" used to be Xiao Mo.
Now that "fist" was his half brother.
Xiao Mo had never once laid eyes on this brother of his, yet he felt sorry for him all the same.
"Of course not."
Xiachan shook her head.
"It seems the Young Master still hasn't grasped my meaning.
True enough, when the Young Master left, the Prince did regret it somewhat, because the Prince needed you.
At first the Prince did think of calling you back.
But the Young Master kept refusing, and the Prince gradually lost hope.
Until the Second Young Master was born.
From then on, the Prince gave you up for good.
The Young Master and Prince Xiao's Manor have no ties whatsoever, and I would not have come looking for you at all.
But what the Young Master has done these past years forced the Prince to take notice of you again.
The Prince never imagined that the girl from back then was still alive.
And what he imagined even less was that you truly found her—and even taught her to cultivate."
"..." Xiao Mo's brows knitted. "How long have you people been watching me?"
"Since the day you left the manor and entered the Dragon Spring Sword Sect."
Xiachan answered calmly.
"Perhaps the Young Master does not know that the Dragon Spring Sword Sect's sect master is a friend of the Prince's—they share interests besides. Every move you make in the Dragon Spring Sword Sect is in the Prince's eye.
As this servant said before.
After the Second Young Master was born, if you had only kept your head down, or if Jiang Qingyi had been unable to cultivate,
then the Prince would have had no attention to spare for you.
But the Young Master went and disregarded his own Great Dao, disregarded his own lifespan, and used an art like the Sustaining Heaven Formula on Jiang Qingyi.
And who would have thought it would actually work.
Not only can Jiang Qingyi cultivate, her talent is terrifying—at only fifteen or sixteen years of age, Jiang Qingyi reached the Golden Core realm!
With things having come this far, the Prince can no longer sit by."
"What is it you want to do?" Xiao Mo clenched his fists, nails already digging into his flesh.
"What we intend to do, the Young Master surely understands. The Second Young Master's future has no limit; barring accidents, he can reach at least the Immortal realm, perhaps even the Ascension realm.
But all of that rests on 'barring accidents.'
And Jiang Qingyi is the Second Young Master's accident."
"You're afraid she'll take revenge, so you want to kill her?"
Xiao Mo laughed.
"Can you even manage it? The highest-realm cultivator in Prince Xiao's Manor these days is that doddering old retainer, isn't he? Or does he mean to have the Dragon Spring Sword Sect's sect master make the move?
But they're both at the Jade Unpolished realm, aren't they?
Don't forget.
I may be only late-stage Nascent Soul, but my sword bone is enough to let me kill across realms.
Would they dare make a move?"
"The Young Master is mistaken. They do not need to make a move."
Xiachan shook her head.
"Does the Young Master think that if Jiang Qingyi learned her sword bone is in your body,
and that for the sake of that sword bone, your father killed her parents—
if Jiang Qingyi knew all of it, how do you suppose she would feel?"