The Hall of Mental Cultivation, inside the Zhou imperial palace.
Xiao Mo slowly opened his eyes.
Xiao Mo kept his gaze lowered.
In his heart there was a sense of something lost, a hollow feeling he could not place.
True, this was nothing more than a life experience; Xiao Mo had only been playing the part of 'Xiao Mo.'
But Xiao Mo had spent more than ten years inside the Hundred Lives Book.
And he held all of 'Xiao Mo's' memories.
Inside the Hundred Lives Book, everyone had feelings as well; every one of them was flesh and blood.
So even if it was only 'playing a part,' Xiao Mo had been completely immersed in it—he had truly treated Jiang Qingyi as his own disciple.
Even though she was fake, a fiction spun out of the Hundred Lives Book.
In Xiao Mo's heart, she was real.
It was like reading a novel, or watching a TV drama.
Read a thousand chapters straight through, watch dozens of episodes—how could you not feel something for the heroine?
Never mind that this heroine was one he had personally raised and trained.
"Ugh... enough of that. Reality is what matters most."
Xiao Mo sighed and opened the Hundred Lives Book once again.
This stretch of life experience was over; time to see what reward he could get this time.
[The Hundred Lives Book is settling the mission reward. Completion estimated in one shichen (real time). During this period the Host may enter the Hundred Lives Book as an 'Observer' and watch Jiang Qingyi's subsequent experiences. Intervention is not permitted.
Note 1: Once one shichen has passed and the settlement of the first life is complete, the Host may no longer enter the first life.
Note 2: After the Host enters the Hundred Lives Book as an 'Observer,' it will feel like stepping into the Long River of Time; time there flows more than a thousand times faster. When the Host returns to reality, some discomfort may result.
Does the Host wish to enter the Hundred Lives Book?]
"Yes!"
Xiao Mo did not hesitate for even a moment; he chose to enter the Hundred Lives Book.
He wanted to see what happened to Qingyi afterward.
Even if Qingyi was fake.
He still hoped Qingyi would have a good ending.
In a blur, Xiao Mo's consciousness entered the Hundred Lives Book once more.
Xiao Mo found himself standing before the main gate of Prince Xiao's Manor.
The difference was that his body was transparent, an existence like a soul, and he could not touch anything at all.
"Boom!"
A huge crash rang out from the front courtyard of Prince Xiao's Manor.
Xiao Mo drifted inside.
In the courtyard, Ye Sandao had already hacked twice at Xiao Mo's sword domain.
But the instant Ye Sandao unleashed his final slash, to everyone's astonishment, Xiao Mo's sword domain collapsed on its own.
That slash threw up an enormous cloud of dust.
A young girl walked out of the dust, the long sword Xuanshuang in her hand.
Tear tracks marked the corners of her eyes, and her eyes were like those of a dead woman—utterly without light.
"Dead..."
"All dead..."
"All gone..."
"I have nothing left..."
She walked forward step by step, the long sword dragging along the ground, scraping sparks from the marble.
She was mumbling something under her breath, like a person completely broken.
With every step Jiang Qingyi took, the sword qi around her grew thicker and fiercer.
Her cultivation realm kept climbing.
Xiao Jing's brows knitted. "I never thought... even with his soul scattered, he would still return the sword bone to you. It seems Xiao Mo truly did value you."
"Shut up!"
Jiang Qingyi shouted furiously and took a step forward.
Ye Sandao tried to block her, but Jiang Qingyi had already passed him by.
"So fast!" Cold sweat broke out on Ye Sandao's forehead.
Jiang Qingyi's speed was on a completely different level from before.
Is this her strength now that she has the sword bone back?
"My lord, look out!" Ye Sandao shouted.
But it was already too late.
Jiang Qingyi was suddenly in front of Xiao Jing, her icy stare seeming to have sealed away her own soul. "You have no right to speak his name."
One sword stroke.
Blood sprayed from Xiao Jing's left shoulder, and an arm dropped to the ground.
"Father!"
Xiao Han's heart lurched; he started forward to save his father.
"Stay back!"
Xiao Jing bellowed.
But it was already too late.
Jiang Qingyi turned her head and glanced at Xiao Han, her eyes black as ink, cold as frost.
With just that one glance, Xiao Han felt as though he had fallen into an abyss.
His body trembled uncontrollably, and he took two steps back without even meaning to.
By the time Xiao Jing snapped back to his senses, the frost-covered long sword was already before him.
"Clang!"
This time Ye Sandao made it in time and blocked the strike.
The long sword struck the flat of Ye Sandao's blade.
Ye Sandao felt his body turn heavy, as if a mountain had smashed into him; he was driven backward, smashed through the courtyard wall, and finally slammed hard into the formation over Prince Xiao's Manor.
If the formation had not covered Prince Xiao's Manor like a wall of air, that one strike would have sent Ye Sandao flying hundreds of meters.
Ye Sandao sucked in a sharp breath and opened his eyes; he felt as though every single bone in his body had been shattered.
The sword bone had been taken from Jiang Qingyi's own body in the first place, so of course the two fit together perfectly.
So the fact that the sword bone had carried Jiang Qingyi into the Nascent Soul realm did not surprise Ye Sandao in the least.
But he had not expected that someone newly entered into Nascent Soul could be this terrifying.
So this is the innate sword bone?
No wonder it was called a sacred physique that appears once in ten thousand years.
"Girl, what a pity. Your future is limitless, but you can only die here. I'll send you to see your master right now."
Ye Sandao raised his long saber, and a Cosmic Avatar appeared behind him.
The Cosmic Avatar can only be used by cultivators of the Jade Unpolished realm; sword cultivators can use it as well, but it consumes an enormous amount of spiritual power.
Most sword cultivators, when fighting to the death, choose to use the sword domain they have comprehended.
Ye Sandao's saber force gathered without pause.
At the same time, Xiao Jing swept his hand, and the manor's formation slowly condensed the phantom of a fire phoenix.
This was the last fire phoenix Xiao Jing could gather, spending everything the formation of Prince Xiao's Manor had.
The two of them were set on killing her with a single strike, even if the sword bone was destroyed in the process.
She absolutely could not leave this place alive.
Otherwise, once she's grown, every one of us is dead!
"Die!"
Xiao Jing pressed his hand down; the fire phoenix cried out toward the heavens, its call ringing across the whole of Liang Kingdom's imperial capital, and it dove at Jiang Qingyi.
At the same moment, Ye Sandao brought his saber down at Jiang Qingyi.
But Jiang Qingyi still stood where she was.
As if nothing mattered to her at all.
She only lifted her head and looked at the sky.
Tears slid slowly from the corners of her eyes.
"Master, can you see your disciple's sword domain...?"
The instant the girl's tears struck the ground, ring after ring of ripples spread across the hard marble floor.
In that instant, the whole of Prince Xiao's Manor was covered by the girl's sword domain.
All through the manor, maids and servants stared at everything around them.
All through the manor, maids and servants stared at everything around them: beneath a bleak, dusk-colored sky, the ground had become a vast lake—and what set it apart from any ordinary lake was that the water was black as ink.
What set it apart from any ordinary lake
was that the lakewater was black as ink.