When Xue Huai was halfway there, he realized that Yun Cuo had seen his message and knew that he had left already.
He built a three million miles, immortal barrier for him, with red clouds filling the way. When he ambled on the back of the green bird and flew away from the mountains, rivers, lakes, and seas under the name of Murong Mountain Sect, the sky above his head was still bright and warm.
The closer he gets to Dongzhou, where he has been growing for over a decade, the more gloomy the sky above him becomes and the colder the wind blows. It snows all year round in Dongzhou. When Xue Huai sleeps on the green bird’s back for a while, he wakes up and finds himself covered in a thin layer of snow, he knows he has arrived.
He wondered why he had been able to sleep until now, the closer he got to his destination, the emptier his heart became.
The empty and deep consciousness told him that he needed rest. There was deep weakness and exhaustion pent up there, but hatred sustained him soberly in the present.
When he arrived at the Xue family mansion, it was already late at night. Dusk has passed, and heavy snow is falling. The night sky was shrouded in a faint silver light, as if the Milky Way were falling, revealing an unreal dullness.
“What is that in the sky? Is it an immortal barrier?” Someone on the roadside pointed at the sky and exclaimed, “How could there be such a big immortal barrier?”
The person was originally sweeping the snow, and the slender broom made a rustling sound as it scraped against the ground.
Xue Huai followed the sound and stood still, then said softly, “Uncle.”
The old man, along with the servants around him, stared in disbelief for a long time before realizing it. Just as they were about to call, “Young…” They were interrupted by Xue Huai.
“Is there anyone at home now?” Xue Huai asked calmly.
The old man hesitated and said, “The Second Lady is inside, and the little Young Master went to Shenhua Terrace to deliver late-night snacks to the old master. Young Master, the Master brought the Second Madam back two days ago, and the Second Madam cried very much. Together with the little Young Master, they swore to pay homage to the Xue family’s ancestors for three hundred years, said to be bent on repenting later……”
Sure enough, it was done first and then reported.
Xue Huai interrupted him calmly, “At home is good.”
After speaking, he pushed the door open and walked in without looking back.
His tone was unprecedentedly cold, even the old man who had seen storms was surprised.
Xue Huai has always been cold and aloof.
The person—born with a cold appearance, thin lips, and long eyes with a red mole under his eye, can be described as bright and attractive or as severe and cold. When he smiles, he can capture people’s souls. Once he did speak, or carry a fierce and murderous aura, he seemed like an evil spirit walking out of the underworld.
The Butterfly Twin knives could sense their master’s emotions, they had never seen a manipulator with such a strong will to kill before—the sharp, cool knives followed suit, excited and restless, and the bloody light increased, almost to the point of dazzling. At first glance, it seemed as if blood would gush out from the tips of the knives.
The servant looked at his back in a daze and said, “Is the Young Master in a bad mood? Why did the Young Master suddenly come back this time? I’ll go make the bed for the Young Master—”
He was about to follow him, but the old man grabbed him and shook his head. The old man made a gesture of silence and anxiously told him, “Seal off the mansion and don’t let anyone hear about this. Hurry up and get the Master here. Something big is going to happen! Hurry up!”
The Xue family’s mansion has a main road that leads directly from the entrance to the backyard garden, with a north-south straight line and symmetrical on both sides.
Seeing him enter the door, some of the servants didn’t react and rushed after him, serving him tea and taking his cloak. However, Xue Huai kept walking, his butterfly knives in his hand were almost on the verge of chilly, forcing them to retreat.
For a moment, no one dared to approach him.
“Where is that woman?” Xue Huai stopped behind the main hall and asked coldly.
“In-in… in the ancestral hall! The Second Madam is offering incense in front of the shrine. Young Master, why did you come…”
Xue Huai left the others’ words behind him; he hadn’t even heard what the others had said afterward. His hands that were holding the knives grew steadier, and his footsteps got lighter, like a white butterfly silently approaching death on a snowy day.
There was a group of people kneeling in the middle of the backyard outside the ancestral hall, and it was silent inside.
As the current mistress of the Xue family, Mrs. Liu’s presence was not insignificant—eighteen maids kneel and wait for the hostess to worship before getting up, while four guards guard the entrance tightly. These people used to be the old members of the Xue family, but this time they came back with a new batch of raw faces, which seemed to be people from Mrs. Liu’s mother’s family.
Xue Zong treated her and Xue He with great honor and favor, believing that this was his generosity as a husband and stepfather. Precisely because the Xue family lacked nothing, no one ever counted who had an extra share of a guard, a few pints of pastries, and were all polished and cordial families on the outside. The relationship between Mrs. Liu and Xue Huai was originally like the relationship between Xue Zong and Xue He—neither close nor distant, everything was just right.
Xue Huai has always been someone who, if others treat him with eight points good, he is willing to repay them with ten points.
“Who are you?” The lead guard stopped Xue Huai.
He had only been in this house for two days; he was brought over by Mrs. Liu. He looked cautiously at the young man in front of him, who was full of murderous intent.
Xue Huai glanced at him, didn’t answer, and went straight inside.
He was so contemptuous and proud that he didn’t even care that the empty door behind him was wide open. That guard didn’t think, the sword in his hand was sheathed directly toward Xue Huai—but before he could completely pull it out, his throat was pierced through, and he fell softly to the ground. At the same time, one of the maids behind him screamed and was knocked out.
The blood puffed and sputtered a bit before gurgling down and staining the frozen snow. The woman’s soft body fell back, her face still tinged with frantic fear.
The old man was panting slightly and following behind, pulling back his hand with a solemn expression. Behind him followed the entire Xue family’s guards—near the mansion, everyone who could be mobilized was neatly arranged, waiting for the master’s order.
The old man’s voice echoed like a bell. “Welcome the Young Master back to the mansion!”
The rest of the people spoke together, their voices thundering like thunder: “Welcome the Young Master back to the mansion!”
The newly arrived maids and guards all turned pale in fear and kneeled down with a thud. A large flock of birds flew in the backyard forest, fluttering in the cold breeze.
The noise is so loud that even the dead can be startled from the grave.
When Xue Huai stepped into the courtyard door, he saw Mrs. Liu get up from the ancestral hall in a panic. After seeing him, she was stunned for a moment and then squeezed out a smile: “Xiao Huai? Why did you come back?”
She tidied up her disheveled dress from kneeling and burning incense, dignified and reserved, elegant and noble, with each strand of hair fitting precisely in its rightful position, bringing a breathtaking fragrance.
Xue Huai had never noticed before that Mrs. Liu’s beauty could be considered very rare. There are many immortals that are beautiful in many ways, it is their temperament, knowledge, and character that make the biggest difference. She is gorgeous, cold, and unfriendly. Xue Huai had vaguely heard about the scene of Xue Zong pursuing Mrs. Liu back then. There were many competitors in the clouds, but Mrs. Liu was actually the indifferent one.
She understands the nature of the other person and is more than capable of catering to the traits of someone like Xue Zong—successful in their careers, bold and stubborn—the only thing that he cannot get is the moon in the sky. So when he sees the cold beauty above the clouds, he wants to do everything possible to get his hands on her.
But once he gets his hands on it, the person from the clouds falls to earth, and that coldness becomes meanness and jealousy. Xue Zong can also be considered to have married only as a front cover and returned home—the Liu family is not weak, only slightly inferior to the Xue family. Among her pursuers back then, there were also those who were even more prominent than the Xue family. And her reasons for doing so couldn’t be clearer—no matter how powerful they are, they are not as powerful as a family like the Xue family that holds weapons and private prisons, which is the foundation of Heng Chang’s foundation.
Humble and insincere, you come and I go.
She is not smart, but she has insight into the human heart. She knew both Xue Zong and Xue Huai, and coincidentally, this pair of father and son were not very guarded against her family, so Xue Huai never realized anything was wrong with her in his previous life.
When she first married into the Xue family, Xue Huai accepted her and his stepbrother but always kept a grudge against Xue Zong—because what he cared about was not asking his father to remain consistent but that he had broken his promise.
A child who is only eleven or twelve years old and has just lost his mother. His grandparents is thousands of miles away. His only reliance is on his father.
Murong Mi lived a free and easy life and left without regret. Xue Huai couldn’t understand it when he was a child, and sometimes he was angry at his mother. When he was in kindergarten, other children had their parents or mothers pick them up. But he was the only one who not only had to walk back on his own through the clouds but also had to buy snacks on the side of the road to bring to his mother, for which he was teased many times.
He’s a proud little immortal boy who chooses to ignore small thoughts when he has them—Xue Huai believes that boys should not be so stingy, and he is also willing to spoil his mother, willing to see her live a life that is not burdened by anyone.
And at that time, Mrs. Liu shushes and mends his quilts with her own hands, making pastries and snacks for him and even making time to ask about his homework to please him everyday. This kind of meticulous care once made Xue Huai very uncomfortable, but later he realized that most of the mothers were like Mrs. Liu, not like Murong Mi.
Xue Huai thought of himself as a guy with a bad personality that no one liked except for his parents and grandparents. Therefore, once someone treats him like this, he is at a loss and can only be twice as good to them. He is a big child now, he’s unable to completely let go of his diaphragm and embrace her like a filial son, but he can be kind to Xue He and spoil his stepbrother in everything.
He thought that by being kind to her biological son, she would be able to perceive it.
“Why did you come back without saying a word?” Mrs. Liu was still smiling gently at him, but in just a moment—she caught a glimpse of the knives in Xue Huai’s hand and the fierce killing intent in his eyes.
Her smile stiffened in an instant, making it difficult for her to even breathe. “Xiao… Xiao Huai?”
When faced with the threat of death, her instinctive reaction made her visibly flustered: “That… Xiao Huai, Auntie Liu did something wrong last time. Can you forgive Aunt Liu? I shouldn’t have used bats to monitor you. It was Auntie Liu’s carelessness. I was afraid that you kids would go out and play and something might happen, it would be better to feel at ease. I came back this time to apologize to you. Don’t blame Auntie Liu, okay?”
The years have left their mark on her face, and the fine lines at the corners of her eyes have added some strange vicissitudes and pity to her appearance.
Xue Huai stared at the fine lines on her face and remembered the withered and green bone inside his sleeve. He whispered, “I’ve killed Xue He, Auntie Liu. You also don’t blame me, okay?”
As soon as he finished speaking, Mrs. Liu was completely stunned for a long time. Followed by her broken expression, she immediately burst into tears—her eyes were round and slightly red, and those were already frantic gazes. She rushed up to him and asked, “What? What did you say? What did you do to Xiao He? What did you do to Xiao He? Ah! You tell me!”
The extreme fear and breakdown made her voice burst out, piercing into people’s ears causing them pain. Without waiting for her to get close, Xue Huai’s hand rose up—triggering even more brutal screams.
The snow flattened a deep red as Mrs. Liu screamed and fell to her knees. She didn’t kneel down due to collapse and pain, but—she no longer had the parts to support her to continue standing.
Xue Huai cut off her patella with the knives—this was a punishment for the defected soldiers in the military, cutting off their knee bones, so that they had no chance to escape in this lifetime. With a cold face, he mercilessly grabbed Mrs. Liu’s collar and dragged her to the front of the ancestral hall!
Mrs. Liu cried and struggled, feeling pain, fear, anguish, hatred, hostility, and other emotions rushing towards her, overwhelming her mind. For more than half a year, Xue Huai grew rapidly in the Immortal Mountain, with both his size and strength growing rapidly due to daily cultivation and training. He became more stable and calm but also harbored more violent murders.
He dragged her in such a way that even the guards outside couldn’t bear to look at her—it was almost no different from dragging livestock.
He has always acted with integrity and decisiveness, never dragging his feet. But he learned these tricks in his past life—how to torture people, how to force them to reveal their secrets—he is Yun Cuo’s left protector, and he can do anything for him.
Xue Huai threw Mrs. Liu to the ground, followed closely by the second knife—from the top of her heart, exerting a slight force, cutting through the woman’s stunning face from the center, leaving a mark that could never be healed.
Xue Huai’s voice remained unchanged: “Now that everyone is present, before the faithful crows from the underworld come, you can confess all your sins one by one. If I compare them and you miss any of the things I have found out, then your son will lose one finger.”
There was no warmth in his voice: “The sum of his hands and feet is twenty, is that enough, Auntie Liu?”
Mrs. Liu was panting heavily, hissing and wailing in pain, tears and snorts streaming down her face. She couldn’t speak for a moment, so Xue Huai narrowed his eyes—
The third knife fell, chopping off her slender right hand.
“I won’t let you survive, but maybe you can save your son’s life before you die.” Xue Huai pressed against Mrs. Liu’s neck and injected her with the mind-clearing technique—which can make people stay awake for a long time and perceive external things more keenly, including pain.
Before Murong Mi’s death, she was very sick and often had sleepless nights. She had to rely on Xue Huai’s grandma’s hypnosis to obtain a moment of peace. But she never shouts pain in front of Xue Huai, she only asks him: Can Xiao Huai go buy another pastry for Mother? Mother only wants to eat what Xiao Huai bought.
On the day she left, Xue Huai was walking on his short legs, creating a small cloud to buy food for his mother. He firmly believed that if a greedy mother like Murong Mi still had the desire to eat, it meant that her condition was improving.
A ten-year-old beanpole, on tiptoe in a serious manner, pointed out to the shopkeeper that a little of each should be wrapped up. He gasped for breath and tried to stuff these things into the almost full storage ring. Then he saw a person he didn’t know rushing towards him, telling him, “Aiyo, Young Master Xue, what are you doing here? Your mother’s gone! Hurry back!”
That kind of pain is like a hammer piercing his bone.
Mrs. Liu was almost scared crazy by him. Perhaps because she heard Xue Huai’s words and had hoped that Xue He had not died. She panicked and spat out her crime. “I-I will say! You don’t touch Xiao He, don’t touch Xiao He…”
One after another, apart from the three major events that the underworld’s faithful crows helped him investigate, there were also countless other small crimes—from her replacing Murong Mi’s tablet wood to her estrangement with Xue Huai’s friend.
She said later, with resentment and hatred, desperately trying to look back at Xue Huai, “By what……by what right. How did you find out? How did you……”
Xue Huai whispered, “I also want to know why.”
He gently released his hand, causing Mrs. Liu to collapse to the ground.
Then he turned around, wiped away the blood splattered on his hands, and the tip of his knives continued to point at Mrs. Liu, saying, “I’m practicing family law today, and you’re all here to witness it.”
The old man kneeled down first and said in a deep voice, “We listen to the Young Master’s orders, please follow the family rules!”
“Please follow the family rules!”
Everyone kneeled down in the darkness, except for Mrs. Liu’s closed maid, who looked at them in panic before screaming and escaping. Someone wanted to chase her but was stopped by Xue Huai.
He said in a faint voice, “Let her go.”
“Young Master, she went to spread the word! Young master—that sinful son is still out there and hasn’t come back!”
Xue Huai tilted his head. “If he hasn’t come back, then let him be.”
He crouched down to look at Mrs. Liu and smiled slightly. “I’ll always find a way to find him and slowly torture him to death, won’t I?”
Mrs. Liu, who was already silent and seemed to have died, suddenly moved and said hysterically, “You said you would let go of Xiao He! Let go of my son, surname Xue. You let go of him. You let go—”
The fourth cut, slashing through her vocal cords, made her second half of the sentence an airy sound flooded with blood bubbles.
Xue Huai stood up and gently said, “I won’t let him go. You’ll die a horrible, painful death; he’ll die a much worse, much more painful death than you ever did. I will make him suffer from the pain of being torn apart by the primordial spirit, let him enter the cycle of animal life, and let him suffer countless cuts and tribulations. I am a vindictive person……what are you going to do if I don’t keep my promise?”
……
When Xue Zong rushed back, Xue Huai had already stopped.
He soaked in the hot springs in his bloody clothes, gazing silently into the sky. The beautiful young man has calmed down, like a pear blossom floating in the water.
Mrs. Liu suffered a total of 127 cuts—Murong Mi suffered a total of 127 days from illness before her death. Xue Huai truly returned the pain of those hundreds of days.
He used healing techniques to hang her life, as if being tortured, he used all kinds of cruel methods until she was so painful that she died.
The old man stood by the spring pond holding tea and cautiously asked him, “Young Master, do you want to eat something?”
Xue Huai remained silent for a long time before gently answering, “Okay.”
He looks very well behaved, just like when he was a child. He sank himself into the water and stared at the dim and twisted world underwater, floating to the surface just before suffocating. The slightly hot spring water flowed and smoothed out the blood and murderous aura on his body, creating a peaceful atmosphere.
He whispered a sentence, and the old man was pouring tea for him. After hesitating for a moment, he asked, “Young Master, what are you saying?”
Xue Huai shook his head and said, “It’s nothing.”
He said he wanted to go home.
Go back to that home in the Murong Mountain Sect, inhabited by a pair of kind elderly. He keeps a cat and a gluttonous ghost in his Warm Pavilion.
There is someone he wants to see there too.
He murmured softly, “Yun Cuo.”
He misses him.
