The Unfettered Immortal - Chapter 3

The spirit beast went silent.

So did everyone around us.

So did I.

Feeling the chill of the spirit sword against my throat, I nodded furiously, tears in my eyes.

His eyelids trembled. His thoughts seemed to drift somewhere far away.

“What else did she say?”

“She also said she knows she was wrong. She wronged you, and she deeply regrets it now.”

I racked my brains.

The man before me gave a cold laugh, his beauty as icy as his expression.

“Wrong? Tell me exactly what she did wrong.”

Hang on. Was this how it was supposed to go?

Blinking at him, I improvised a mixture of truth and nonsense.

“She said she shouldn’t have used her position as your senior sister to make you cook and wash for her, work you like a beast of burden, or trick you out of your spirit stones to buy wine. Or secretly drink the wine you’d hidden away. She hardly taught you anything either, and then she vanished for centuries.”

Old memories began to overlap. The words came more easily.

“She utterly failed in her duty as your senior and deserves to be struck by heavenly lightning and cut into a thousand—”

“Enough!”

His sudden shout scared me into silence.

I didn’t understand why his face had gone so dark.

Didn’t he hate me? Why was he upset when I cursed myself a little?

He laughed in fury, veins standing out on his sword hand.

“Nonsense. Evading the point. Still as reckless with your tongue as you ever were.”

“Guards. Take her away!”

“Spare me, Immortal!”

At least let me finish making it up!

The spirit beast laughed nastily.

“I knew you’d get what was coming to you.”

It hadn’t come along willingly.

I’d sought it out to help find the last demon seed.

At first it had been all arrogance.

“A mere cultivator thinks herself worthy of hearing this divine beast speak? You could get on your knees and beg, you could jump off this mountain, and I still wouldn’t tell you!”

Then I’d pinned it down and beaten it from one end of the snowfield to the other.

With its face swollen like a pig’s head, it wailed, “Please, I’m begging you! Just ask me to tell you!”

It had resented me ever since.

Unfortunately for it, things didn’t go as it hoped.

I was dragged away.

Then I was dragged back.

In fresh clothes, scrubbed clean.

The disciple escorting me muttered, “She really does look like the portrait.”

“What portrait?” I asked curiously.

He rolled his eyes at me.

“The one in the sect leader’s hall, obviously. Three hundred years ago, Shao Hongning died fighting the Heavenly Demon. The sect leader’s Dao heart nearly collapsed, and he almost slit his own throat to follow her. The former sect leader arrived and took him away.”

“After that, he secluded himself for thirty years. When he emerged and inherited leadership of the sect, he ordered everything belonging to Shao Hongning destroyed. The only thing he kept was a portrait.”

I wasn’t angry. But hearing news of Master, I couldn’t help asking, “If he took over, what happened to the former sect leader?”

For three hundred years, I’d wandered to every corner of the world. I longed to ask after old friends and familiar places, but those demon seeds were insidiously cunning.

Once I’d caught the first one, the slightest stray thought of someone could lead a scattered seed to possess and devour that person, bringing calamity on innocent members of the sect.

I had no choice but to keep away and ask no questions.

Only now had I destroyed every seed I’d found. The final one was already in Fanyun Sect, so there was no longer any point in staying away.

“After Shao Hongning died,” the disciple said, “the former sect leader was devastated by the loss of his beloved disciple. He went into seclusion and stopped concerning himself with worldly affairs.”

My hand slowly clenched.

“Then why does Chu Wuji—I mean, the sect leader—hate her so much? Wasn’t she his senior sister?”

What had turned the gentle, good-tempered Chu Wuji into this cold, brooding man?

The disciple made a small sound of understanding. He glanced furtively around before lowering his voice.

“You haven’t even heard that, and you still had the nerve to come here and pull this scam?”

“Everyone knows. The day Shao Hongning died with the Heavenly Demon, the sect leader’s cultivation partner was there too. She must have been caught in the battle and killed. Why else do you think he went mad and tried to cut his own throat?”

“And why else would he refuse to give up when he couldn’t find Shao Hongning’s body? He’s plainly avenging his wife. He won’t stop until she’s dead.”

“…He had a cultivation partner?”

As far as I remembered, that fellow had followed me all over the world for a hundred years. He never left my side, even when I tried to chase him off. When had he found time to take a partner?

Besides, before my supposed death with the Heavenly Demon, I’d cleared everyone out well in advance to avoid harming the innocent.

How could anyone have been caught in it?

My question stumped the disciple. Recovering, he glared at me.

“Why should I answer everything you ask?”

“Get inside! The sect leader wants you!”

He shoved me into the hall.

But why was the sect leader’s hall…

My old bedchamber?

The doors shut at once.

Pitch darkness surrounded me.

For some reason, the spirit beast had fallen silent as soon as we approached this area.

Until now, I’d assumed it was keeping quiet because of the disciple. But even now it made no sound.

I finally realized something was wrong.

My hand closed warily around the sword at the back of my waist. I swallowed.

“Sect Leader?”

No answer.

Tentatively, I walked forward, following the layout I remembered. I didn’t bump into a thing.

Strange. Three hundred years had passed. This had long since become the sect leader’s hall.

Yet everything was exactly where it had always been.

I even found the wine flask I used to drink from.

Then I felt a chill.

Cold. A cold that pierced my bones.

I looked over.

“…Chu Wuji?”

My body was held fast. A pair of broad, long-fingered hands reached from behind and traced my brows and eyes.

His tall figure completely enveloped me, enclosing me within his grasp.

I panicked. A bead of cold sweat slid down my skin.

My back pressed firmly against a broad chest.

“Senior Sister…” he murmured.

Cold. His whole body was as cold as ice.

Feeling my warmth, he nestled closer, resting his forehead on my shoulder.

“Senior Sister…”

Was he…

Dreaming?

What exactly would he do in his dreams?