“No, Miao Feng is dead,” the person replied with a serene, faint smile. “My name is Yami.”
The Summer Garden was still lush and green.
By the hot springs, two figures sat in silence. The air was thick with heaviness.
Yami had finished telling him everything that had happened at the Grand Light Palace, then fell into a long silence. Huo Zhan Bai said nothing, uncorking the jar of buried wine and sitting by the water’s edge, drinking alone until he was drunk.
The snow falcon fluttered onto the table, muttering and sharing the wine from his cup. The bird seemed to be drinking even more vigorously than he was, soon stumbling and flapping its wings before collapsing onto the table.
“She said that drinking alone harms the body,” Yami observed, still with that faint expression on his face.
“Well… then drink with me!” Huo Zhan Bai smiled and raised his cup, extending an invitation to this strange opponent—he didn’t ask what kind of history Yami had with Zi Ye. On the snowfields of Urga, this man had risked everything to fight the Seven Swords alone, all to rush her to seek medical help.
Yet, in the end, she had still died before his eyes.
The former top assassin of the Demon Palace continued to wear a gentle smile, but the more Huo Zhan Bai saw it, the harder it was for him to imagine how deeply this man’s heart had been buried with sorrow in that moment.
“No, wait for someone else to drink with you,” Yami replied quietly, flipping through a medical book, his hands still fragrant with the scent of herbs. “My master said that wine can lead to mistakes. As her last disciple, I must never indulge in drink as Valley Master Xue did.”
Huo Zhan Bai was a little surprised. “You actually took a master?”
Yami nodded, smiling. “Who can predict the events of this world?”
Just like how you never know who you will meet, what events will unfold, or when your fate will suddenly change. Sometimes, a glance, or a chance encounter as you pass someone by, can rewrite a person’s entire life.
He had once been a noble prince, surrounded by wealth and luxury, but his life had been shattered by the destruction of his kingdom and the loss of his family. He met the Holy Leader of the sect and became an emotionless killing machine. Then, he met the woman who awakened him and allowed him to rediscover himself.
But she had soon passed away.
He had accompanied Liao Qingran for a thousand miles to return Xue Zi Ye’s body. Then, he knelt in the deep snow outside the White Stone Formation, begging Master Liao to take him in as a disciple. He knelt there for three days without rising.
“Why do you want to study medicine?” Master Liao asked him. “You used to be nothing but a killer.”
Yes, he was nothing but a killer—but even killers can experience moments where life feels worse than death.
He simply didn’t want to feel that way again: running with nowhere to go, the heavens and earth showing no mercy, helplessly watching as the person he loved suffered in agony, dying slowly by his side, wishing with all his heart to take their place.
He didn’t want anyone else to endure such suffering either.
Master Liao was silent for a long time before finally nodding slowly: “Did you know? The founder of Medicine Valley was once a killer too.”
And so, he stayed, hiding his name and becoming Master Liao’s last disciple. He channeled his former passion for martial arts into medicine, locking himself in the library of the Spring Garden every day, studying the ancient texts that filled the walls: Biaoyou, Yulong, Zhouhou Fang, Waitai Miyao, Jinlan Xunjing, Qianjin Yifang, Qianjin Fang, Cunzhen Tu, Lingjiu, Suwen Nanjing...
Since that snowy night on the barren plains, he had been completely transformed.
He looked at Huo Zhan Bai, who was drinking alone without pause, and suddenly sighed softly—"Do you hate me? If it weren’t for me, she wouldn’t have taken the risk to leave the valley; if I had protected her better, she wouldn’t have been gravely injured on the peak of Kunlun; if I hadn’t taken her away, the two of you wouldn’t have missed each other in the end, separated by just a thread..."
But these questions, in the end, he did not ask.
What was the point of asking now?
Huo Zhan Bai’s fingers tightened around the cup, and the white porcelain cracked with a faint sound, as if he had summoned all his courage to finally ask in a low voice, “Did she… pass away peacefully?”
“She had a smile on her face.”
“…That’s good.”
After this brief exchange, silence fell between them once more.
Yami turned his face away, not wanting to meet his eyes. His hands, which held the flute, trembled uncontrollably—
Her death had, in fact, been excruciating and decisive, something he would never forget for the rest of his life.
He would always remember how she trembled as the poison took hold, how her fingers gripped his shoulder with all their strength, and how, in her final moments, she looked up at the cold gray sky, rejoicing like a child at the sight of the falling snow. That memory was like a knife, cutting a new, bloody wound in his heart every time he recalled it.
It was enough for him to bear that memory alone—why should another person suffer as well?
“Where… is she buried?” Huo Zhan Bai finally couldn’t resist asking.
“In the cemetery of Mo Jia village,” Yami replied quietly.
That person… in the end, it was that person, wasn’t it?
Huo Zhan Bai stared at the empty water’s surface, the young man sleeping beneath the ice long gone.
Suddenly, he felt a deep sense of peace. The flames of torment that had consumed him for so long were extinguished. He no longer resented the one who had stayed by her side in her final moments, nor did he grieve over the love that had slipped through his fingers—because, in the end, she belonged to the cold earth.
Winter nights, summer days. After a hundred years, all return to their resting place.
“I heard you’re about to become the master of Dingjian Pavilion,” Yami said, changing the subject with a faint smile. “Congratulations.”
“There’s no other choice. If I had a choice, I’d rather grow old in Medicine Valley like you,” Huo Zhan Bai exhaled deeply, devoid of joy. “But unless, like you, I die completely and start over, I’ll never be able to live freely.”
“Such words don’t sound like they belong to someone who’s about to become the ruler of the Central Plains…” Yami smiled, though his tone changed subtly. “Tong has recently ascended to the throne of the Demon Sect at the Grand Light Palace—from now on, you’ll face each other again at the peak.”
“What?” Huo Zhan Bai raised his head in shock. “Tong has become the Holy Leader? How do you know?”
“Of course I know,” Yami shook his head. “I came from there.”
A flash of sorrow passed through his eyes as he turned to Huo Zhan Bai. “You were her best friend, and Tong is her brother. Now, the two of you are sworn enemies—if she knew this from the afterlife, how heartbroken she would be.”
Huo Zhan Bai lowered his head, pressing his cold hands to his burning forehead.
“And what would you have us do?” he murmured with a bitter smile. “Since ancient times, good and evil have never coexisted.”
“I only want you both to sit down and share a drink,” Yami said with a quiet smile, his gaze shifting past Huo Zhan Bai, looking behind him.
Who? Who was behind him?! The alcohol in Huo Zhan Bai’s system immediately evaporated as he turned in shock, instinctively reaching for his sword. From the corner of his eye, he saw a black cloak draped to the ground. The person in the cloak had a pair of ice-blue, brilliant eyes. How long had they been standing there, listening silently? Now, they simply walked out from the woods and into the pavilion.
“Tong?” Huo Zhan Bai stared in disbelief at the new Holy Leader of the Demon Sect who had suddenly appeared in Medicine Valley, his hand still gripping his sword.
—This was the man who had seized supreme power in the Grand Light Palace through a bloody rebellion, yet now, instead of guarding the Western Regions, he had come here. Had he learned that Nan Gong, the old pavilion master, was seriously ill and come to disrupt the balance of the Central Plains martial world?
However, at that moment, Yami quietly withdrew, leaving the two men alone.
The young Holy Leader didn’t say a word, nor did he exude any killing intent. He simply sat down in front of Huo Zhan Bai, silently picked up the wine jug, and filled his own cup. Then, lifting the cup to him with a slight nod, he threw his head back and drank it all in one go.
Huo Zhan Bai watched in a daze as Tong drank three cups in succession, watching the wine flow down his pale neck and into his collar.
Tong drank too quickly, and his throat caught. He let go of the cup and braced himself on the table, coughing violently, his pale face flushing with a sickly red. But the new Holy Leader paid no mind to this, continuing to pour cup after cup, coughing continuously, tears gradually welling up in his ice-blue eyes. At that moment, he no longer resembled the new ruler of the Demon Sect, but rather a helpless child.
Huo Zhan Bai stared at him in silence, and suddenly a rush of warmth surged through his heart. In that instant, all thoughts of good and evil, of the martial world, were completely forgotten. He threw his Mohun Sword to the ground, grabbed the wine jug, filled his own cup, and raised it high—
“Come!”
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