Chapter Fifteen: Purifying the Fallen Sword Immortal

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“You won… Senior Brother?”

Tang Qianxue had a hundred questions she wanted to ask.

Yet when the words reached her lips, all that remained was this dry, awkward sentence.

Xiao Lin said nothing. Pinching the blade between two fingers, he gave it a sharp flick, scattering all the blood upon it onto the ground.

Only then did he reply, “Senior Sister, are you asking how I defeated Senior Brother?”

“Mm-hmm!” Tang Qianxue nodded hurriedly.

After all, even Second Senior Sister had been slightly inferior to Senior Brother in the grand tournament.

If Little Qilin could defeat Senior Brother, did that not mean even Second Senior Sister was no match for him?

Xiao Lin deliberately lowered the audience’s expectations of him, offering a brief explanation.

“That simple?” Tang Qianxue furrowed her brows slightly, her face full of suspicion.

See?

Even Tang Qianxue, a fellow cultivator, thought he was being modest and concealing his true ability. How much more so would the audience?

Xiao Lin could only feel somewhat helpless about it, but he did not explain himself again.

That would have been beneath him and would have cost him his dignity.

“Senior Sister, stay here and take good care of Senior Brother. I’ll be back soon.”

Xiao Lin put away Immortal Annihilation and gazed toward the distant mountain, whose summit was brushed with a veil of white.

The Sword Pool lay above it.

Tang Qianxue suddenly fell silent. Pressing her red lips tightly together, she finally whispered after a long while, “Must it really… be this way?”

“Yes.”

Xiao Lin’s voice was very soft, yet in Tang Qianxue’s ears, it fell with the weight of ten thousand tons, leaving her unable to recover for a long time.

By the time she came to herself, Xiao Lin had already vanished into the distance beneath the setting sun.

All around her, there was only desolation and silence.

Tang Qianxue suddenly felt cold.

Though, at the early Qi Refining stage, she had long since become immune to heat and cold,

she still silently crouched on the ground, wrapping both arms around her legs and burying her head between them. Curling into a ball, she squeezed her eyes shut, her lashes trembling faintly.

If only…

If only she could become a little stronger…

“Waaah, don’t cry, darling. Come here and let me hug you.”

“This is already the second time the story has emphasized Third Junior Sister feeling that she’s too weak. She’s definitely headed toward a dark transformation.”

“Exactly. Darkness makes you three times stronger; redemption makes you thirty percent weaker.”

“Wait, she’s only at the early Qi Refining stage. No matter how dark she becomes, how strong could she possibly get?”

“To the person above: go watch those awful historical fantasy dramas. Even the Heavenly Emperor can be framed, and Immortal Venerables can suffer severe injuries and amnesia. What’s so strange about Third Junior Sister’s cultivation skyrocketing?”

“Now that you put it that way, it does sound reasonable.”

…

Upon the sheer cliff face, Xiao Lin climbed step by step.

The path appeared perilous.

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Yet to someone at the Qi Refining stage, it was no more difficult than walking on level ground.

Xiao Lin was even climbing while silently watching the comments streaming past.

From those remarks alone, he could completely imagine Tang Qianxue’s reaction.

But there was truly nothing he could do.

They certainly possessed thoughts of their own, yet they were likewise influenced by something invisible.

It was an existence even more unfathomable than the Heavenly Dao.

For example, if the production team wanted to pad out an episode with ordinary daily life,

then on this journey, Li Changhe would bring Tang Qianxue along no matter what.

It was precisely because he had recognized this fact

that Xiao Lin had watched helplessly as Li Changhe was manipulated by the Fallen Sword Immortal into attacking him.

After all, he alone could not be influenced by the production team.

His every action could even, in turn, influence the production team,

making them believe that the plot they were creating was what they themselves wanted, when in truth it was merely the result of his every genuine action.

Thus, cause and effect were reversed.

In that case, the only thing he needed to do was grow stronger without pause.

Strong enough that even if Heaven and Earth collapsed, he could hold up the falling sky with his own strength!

“You brat…”

“You brat!”

“You brat—!”

After an almost hoarse roar of rage, Xiao Lin finally withdrew from his thoughts.

Only after returning to his senses did he realize that the Fallen Sword Immortal had called out to him dozens of times.

Xiao Lin continued climbing and said only, “What are you mourning for?”

“You wretched disciple! You have betrayed your master, destroyed your ancestors, defied all natural order, and committed the ultimate act of treachery!”

“Shen Wuya” was livid.

It had to be said that after spending so many years at Shen Wuya’s side, the Fallen Sword Immortal had absorbed his mannerisms through constant exposure and truly managed to imitate some of his bearing.

“Why do you keep repeating the same few phrases?”

Xiao Lin did not even raise his eyes, his tone casual.

Then, as though he had suddenly thought of something, he drove one foot viciously into the stone wall, as if stamping on the Fallen Sword Immortal himself, and laughed.

“You old relic, you’ve made me very unhappy. So I’ve decided to make your death a little more painful.”

“Shen Wuya’s” expression froze.

Once fear had reached its extreme, it had instead given rise to a surging fury within the Fallen Sword Immortal, prompting him to speak without restraint.

It was truly a case of extremes reversing themselves.

Yet now, with only a few words, Xiao Lin had brought him back to his senses.

After all, this was a ruthless man capable of striking down even his own senior brother.

The point three inches from the heart.

One more fraction of an inch, and he would take a life.

“Brat—no, Fellow Daoist…”

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The Fallen Sword Immortal lowered his tone and changed the way he addressed him. His attitude transformed completely.

Xiao Lin knew that the Fallen Sword Immortal was about to beg for mercy.

But anything he said here would be nothing more than wasted breath, earning him little in the way of popularity points.

So Xiao Lin treated the Fallen Sword Immortal’s words as though he had heard nothing and accelerated his ascent.

“Fallen Sword Immortal: Brother Lin, I surrender.”

“Haughty at first, servile afterward. Just thinking about it makes me laugh.”

“Xiao Lin: I preferred you when you were arrogant and defiant at the beginning. Go back to being like that.”

“The Little Junior Brother said nothing. He simply devoted himself to sending the Fallen Sword Immortal on his way.”

At last, Xiao Lin planted one foot upon the snow-covered ground, where a thin layer of frost clung to the earth, and set foot upon the mountaintop.

The Sword Pool stood atop the mountain. It was neither especially high nor especially low, just enough to gather a thin blanket of snow.

Xiao Lin flipped his hand and took a token from his Universe Ring. The character “Sword” was engraved upon it.

It was the symbol of identity worn by disciples of Sword Mountain,

as well as the pass required to activate the restrictive formation here.

As the air rippled and distorted,

Xiao Lin immediately felt sharp sword qi flash past on both sides of him.

The thin snow beneath his feet melted in an instant.

Had he not been holding the Sword Mountain Token,

anyone else who managed to break through this formation would surely have been pierced until they were riddled with holes by the sudden sword qi.

Even so, the face of “Shen Wuya” condensed and manifested by the Fallen Sword Immortal was instantly torn to shreds.

“Fellow Daoist, release me—release me, and I can make you my right-hand man. No, my closest companion in the Dao! Together, we can join hands and rule this world!”

After sensing the ancient sword qi that had existed within the Sword Pool for at least several centuries, the last trace of hope in the depths of the Fallen Sword Immortal’s heart vanished completely.

No wonder Shen Wuya had repeatedly claimed that this place could purify him.

What kind of blessed land was this?

It was clearly a land of slaughter!

“On the verge of death, and you still dream of ruling the world?”

Xiao Lin laughed from the bottom of his heart.

This boss might have been terrified of death and utterly lacking in dignity,

but in this regard, he possessed a persistence far beyond that of ordinary people.

Indeed, he had persisted to the point of becoming almost comical.

The Fallen Sword Immortal still wanted to say something, but Xiao Lin took out the Sword-Suppressing Box and tossed it forward.

“Go tell it to the Sword Pool.”

It was a pool of water that looked utterly ordinary apart from being crystal clear to the bottom.

But the instant the Sword-Suppressing Box fell into it, the Fallen Sword Immortal let out a shriek of utter agony.

“Ahhh—!!!”

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