Chapter 42

#A Mistake That Needs Redemption

Xie Zhuo brought me into the city.

Inside the city, just like outside, everything was shrouded in mist—a dead silence hung in the air.

On the streets, the buildings were in ruins and the roads dilapidated. Their lingering traces seemed only to serve as proof that people had once lived here, normally—but now…

I looked around, my thoughts in turmoil. Only after a long while did I turn to Xie Zhuo.

Did he grow up in a place like this?

If so, his guardedness in Kunlun, his refusal to let me go to Cuihu Platform or any chaotic place, all seemed to have an explanation—he didn’t trust people.

Because he didn’t know who might be a demon in disguise, no one could be trusted.

Understanding this, I suddenly realized much about how he had tried to control me throughout these five hundred years of entanglement.

“Why didn’t you tell me about this?” I asked him. “If you had told me how hard it is to tell evil spirits apart…” My voice trailed off as I looked at the devastation around us.

Now I understood what Xie Zhuo had meant when he said, “It’s for your own good.”

If I had known that anyone in this world could be a demon in disguise, then playing with Mengmeng alone, training with the guards, and even just everyday life would have taken on a whole different tone.

I would have become wary, suspicious, paranoid—living each day with unease.

“Not knowing is what makes people happy…” That sentence Xie Zhuo once said suddenly echoed in my mind.

So this was what he meant.

If I knew, it would be my disaster. If everyone in Kunlun knew, it would be Kunlun’s disaster. If the whole world knew, it would be the world’s disaster. All cities would become Undying Cities, and all people would become city dwellers.

“How was something like this kept secret?” I asked Xie Zhuo. “Why is it that no one in the world knows about the Undying City?”

“The Undying City, once entered, cannot be left. All cultivators who enter either become evil spirits or are locked in eternal combat with them.”

My jaw tightened. It sounded like such a simple sentence, but it was a sentence built atop countless bones.

“All the Mountain Lord Deities know.”

“Queen Mother of the West too?”

Xie Zhuo silently affirmed.

I pressed my lips together and said nothing.

Carrying me on his back, Xie Zhuo continued walking as he spoke: “Qin Shuyan knows as well. They’re the final line of defense the Undying City has placed outside.”

“What do you mean?”

“The demons inside the Undying City aren’t just hard to identify—they’re far more powerful than those outside. The city is meant to prevent them from escaping. Qin Shuyan and the others act as its arms in the outside world. They send any cultivators who accidentally learn the truth into the Undying City. They also transmit messages from outside to the snowy barrier that surrounds the city.”

Silencing information…

Cruel, and yet inevitable.

“They?” I seized on that word in Xie Zhuo’s sentence.

“Throughout the Eight Desolations, wherever there are places of cultivation, there are places like Cuihu Platform—disorderly, but full of information.”

And so, a net cast by the Mountain Lord Deities, woven by countless people like old Qin, was spread across the Eight Desolations.

It locked in the evil spirits of the Undying City—and also locked away the knowledge of its existence—so that the people of the world could live in blissful ignorance, indulging in drunken dreams atop the edge of a blade.

That’s why Xie Zhuo kept it from me. The rules of this world made it necessary. Not a word could be told. “For my own good” meant keeping me from being sent into the Undying City, and from living in constant fear.

That’s why Xie Zhuo was willing to trust Old Qin—because they both knew the truth of this world. There was nothing left to hide between them.

“And you?” I asked Xie Zhuo. “What kind of role do you play in all of this?”

The Undying City only allowed entrance, not exit. But Xie Zhuo had been outside—and now he could bring me in.

He knew the truth, yet was left unchecked by Queen Mother of the West and Qin Shuyan.

Before, I’d thought that Queen Mother of the West had been moved by our love and thus allowed us to marry. But now, it seemed she had merely made an exception for Xie Zhuo.

Why could he exist outside the rules constructed by the Mountain Lord Deities?

His connection with the demons seemed stranger than anyone else’s in this world.

“I am…” Xie Zhuo thought for a long time. Walking through the mist, I studied his side profile. I could tell he wasn’t stalling. He wasn’t avoiding the question. He was truly thinking—as if…

As if he didn’t know what his place in this world was, either.

Only after a long silence did he curve his lips ever so slightly.

“I am a mistake that needs to be redeemed.”

I didn’t understand…

Xie Zhuo turned to glance at me. His throat moved slightly, as though swallowing back a thousand words.

I was familiar with his evasions, but at this moment, it felt unfamiliar—a strange, unspeakable feeling lingered in my heart. It reminded me of that day, when he said he would save me—not because of a blood oath.

Lately, Xie Zhuo had become somewhat strange and distant.

Up ahead in the foggy sky, an orange light suddenly appeared—like a flame being lit.

As the first fire ignited, others along both sides began lighting up one after another, like signal fires. One by one, they burned in midair, forming a slightly curved line.

Only then did I see, beneath the orange flames, a city wall a hundred zhang tall. It was still far from where we stood.

“There’s another wall ahead?”

“Mm.” Xie Zhuo had already pushed his earlier emotions aside and calmly said, “The Undying City is a city, yet not a city. It’s more like a closed, massive ring-shaped city.”

A ring-shaped city?

I turned around to look at the towering wall behind us. Sure enough, it had a faint curve, stretching off into the mist: “That’s the outer wall. The ones now lit with eternal fire are the inner wall. Inner and outer walls connect end to end, forming a ring.”

“The inner and outer walls are both over a hundred zhang tall. If they’re only meant to imprison demons, there’s no need to build a second inner wall.” I frowned. “Unless… there’s something inside the inner wall?”

A ring-shaped city. If the inner wall is the first defense line, the outer wall the second, then the towering, transparent barrier we passed through earlier must be the third.

So many layers of containment—what exactly were they guarding against?

Xie Zhuo glanced at me. Today, he was surprisingly forthcoming:

“Fifty li inward from the inner wall is the heart of the city—Mingjing Forest. It’s the homeland of my Snow Wolf Clan.”

The Undying City enclosed Xie Zhuo’s homeland?

“What’s in your homeland?”

“Countless demons. And an icy lake that can purge the aura of corruption from you. That lake is where we’re heading.”

“A place crawling with demons… but with a lake that can purify corruption?” I found it incredible. “How did that lake form? If it can cleanse the corruption, can’t those infected simply walk into the lake and be healed?”

“If they do, they’ll be reduced to ash.”

I fell silent. “Then you’re planning to bring me onto that lake? Why are you so sure I won’t be reduced to ash?”

“Because I’ll be there.”

Those two overly confident words ended the conversation.

I shut my mouth and realized that Xie Zhuo had actually stopped walking. Instead, he turned into a small alley.

“We’re not continuing on?”

“The Undying City is shrouded in mist, making it hard to tell day from night. Only the Everlasting Flame distinguishes dusk from dawn. When the flame burns, it’s nighttime—and time to rest.”

“Rest?”

His words were truly out of the blue. How could I rest? The Undying City, so strange and unheard of, had me completely shaken. And now Xie Zhuo wanted me to rest? I’d be more surprised if I could fall asleep.

“I don’t need to rest. I can keep going.”

Without giving me a chance to object, Xie Zhuo was already carrying me to the deepest part of the alley.

He untied the rope at his waist and set me down. Kneeling on one knee in front of me, he stared at me. The alley was boxed in on three sides by unnaturally hard stone walls, and the only exit—Xie Zhuo had blocked it.

He faced me with a serious expression.

His intensity, combined with the setting, made me even more tense. “What’s wrong? Did something happen?”

I lowered my voice. “Is someone following us? Did you say we should rest just to lure them out?”

The corner of Xie Zhuo’s mouth twitched. “No.”

After denying it, he fell silent for a moment. Then, without warning, he reached out and pressed down on my shoulder. “Don’t move…”

I didn’t dare. I figured it must be something important, so I obediently froze like a block of wood.

Then I saw Xie Zhuo lean in—and bite my neck.

“Huh!?”

Was this really the time for this?

Here, of all places…

I stared wide-eyed at the head buried in the crook of my neck, completely forgetting to push him away. “Xie Zhuo,” I asked in a daze, “what are you doing?”

He didn’t answer right away. He lingered at my neck for a while, waiting until three waves of mist rolled past before finally standing up. As he moved away, I felt the skin on my neck tug—he’d really bitten down hard!

He straightened up. I looked at him questioningly, only to catch a fleeting trace of black mist at the corner of his lips—

The aura of malevolent energy…

He was helping me purge malevolent energy?

“I knew it…” I muttered instinctively, “As if you suddenly got any ideas about me…”

Then I realized—that probably wasn’t the best way to put it.

Why did I sound… almost regretful?

Xie Zhuo, wiping the black mist from his lips with his thumb, froze slightly when he heard me.

He looked up at me.

Our eyes met…

I was the first to feel awkward. I shifted my gaze and tried to explain, “I just mean, we’re divorced now, and doing this seems… a bit inappropriate. I mean, we were married for five hundred years and barely ever…”

I was sounding more and more like I regretted it…

I shut up.

Xie Zhuo stared at me for a while before speaking seriously. “The malevolent energy won’t leave your body unless there’s physical contact. It makes the transfer easier.”

“Oh…”

The air grew quiet. Just as I was trying to find a new topic, Xie Zhuo continued, “During those five hundred years, I did this often.”

“Hmm?” I didn’t quite register. “Did what?”

Xie Zhuo looked at me. “When you were in Kunlun, after drinking or visiting… complicated places, you’d get tainted by malevolent energy. I’d find time to purge it for you.”

He paused, then added, “I never told you.”

I opened my mouth, stared at him, wanting to say something—but no words came.

Speechless. Probably how Xie Zhuo felt all the time.

“So that’s why you never let me drink or go out to play?” I finally managed to squeeze out a question. “What about spicy food? Does that also attract malevolent energy?”

“Spicy food aggravates your temper. It’s not good for your cultivation,” he said after a pause. “And if you eat too much, your stomach hurts.”

Spicy snow bamboo shoots, delicious enough to make your mouth water—but yeah, overdo it and it hurts.

Now I understood why he never told me. There were too many things to hide. Explain one and you’d have to explain the next, and eventually it would all circle back to the mysterious malevolent energy.

So he said nothing at all. Hid everything.

And became the silent partner in the marriage.

After a moment, I asked, “So now that you’re telling me this… are you saying you’ve bitten my neck many times?”

“There are still several nights before we reach the Mirror Forest and the Ice Lake. Each night, the malevolent energy grows stronger than during the day. To keep it from overtaking you again, I’ll help purge it each night.”

He said calmly, “So don’t be surprised next time. I’ve done it many times before.”

I was silent for a moment…

“Just biting the neck? Anything else you’ve done many times that I don’t know about?” Thinking about how cooperative he’d been lately, I decided to press for more.

Xie Zhuo stared at me. For a while. Then he looked away. “No…”

He dodged. He’s lying!

I saw how his gaze shifted and his face turned away—no point in asking more. He wasn’t going to tell me.

So I cleared my throat and changed the subject. “I pulled the malevolent energy out of your body earlier, and now you’re transferring it back. Won’t that just pass it back and forth? What if I’m not healed yet, and you end up worse?”

Xie Zhuo glanced back at me. “That only happened because I was seriously injured.”

He paused, his lips twitching faintly. “Don’t worry.”

“I-I’m not worried about you,” I turned away too. “I just don’t want you getting hurt before you’ve delivered me to the place to remove this evil energy.”

“I won’t.” Xie Zhuo turned his back to me, shielding me. “Even if something happens, I’ll still make sure you’re safe.”

Something in my chest stirred. Looking at his back, I really felt like… he’d changed.

Just as I was wondering about it, a flash of silver appeared in Xie Zhuo’s hand. A sword gleaming with icy light materialized in his palm.

I’d rarely seen Xie Zhuo use a sword. This one exuded cold, the blade like solid ice—just like Xie Zhuo himself. I was still wondering why he’d drawn it when—

A rustling sound came from the end of the alley, like a snake flicking its tongue, scales scraping along the ground.

A wisp of black mist drifted across the foggy street ahead.

I covered my nose and mouth, holding my breath.

Malevolent energy…

From the mist at the alley’s mouth, a black shadow slowly stretched out. There was no telling what it was—until a little girl hopped into view, like she was playing hopscotch.

Only then did I see that the shadow belonged to a scrawny little girl, hair in two pigtails. She looked just like the sweet girl next door—until she turned around.

“Heehee…”

Her grin stretched all the way to her ears.

“Found you…”

Xie Zhuo is such a liar! What did he mean, malevolent energy’s hard to detect in the Undying City?! Like hell it is! If that girl isn’t obviously a malevolent spirit, I’ll do a handstand and eat sh*t right now!