Chapter 27 Reaching the Shore "What exactly is in Kunlun that you yearn for so much..."
Where are you going?
In the darkness, Shen Cangyu heard a soft voice asking her.
Her eyelashes trembled, and dappled light and shadow seemed to float before her eyes, but through the water, she couldn't see clearly. Her consciousness was somewhat clouded, but the answer was already etched into her bones. Whenever someone asked, she would answer without hesitation: "Kunlun."
"What's so great about Kunlun? Why do we have to go to Kunlun?"
A gust of wind blew up, and Shen Cangyu suddenly opened his eyes. Before him was the familiar Water Moon Mirror Flower, with a tree full of flowers falling down in a flurry. That person leaned against a branch, the hem of his skirt hanging down, swaying gently in the wind: "What a coincidence, we meet again."
“Kunlun is dangerous. Once you go there, you won’t be able to leave,” the woman tilted her head, causing the beaded curtain covering her face to clink together. “The person you wanted to kill is already dead, so why bother going to Kunlun again?”
"What?" Shen Cangyu was stunned for a moment. "Shen Qingyan is dead?"
Shen Qingyan is dead... No, before she fell into the water, she only remembered that he was undergoing a tribulation of lightning, and was struck unconscious by heavenly lightning, but she didn't see him die with her own eyes, and she was worried.
This person either lives well or dies at her hands, without a proper burial, so that the time traveler can't come, and only then can she be at ease.
Even if he were to die, she would have to personally witness his body being burned and his ashes scattered.
“Yes,” the woman said, “your wish has been fulfilled, so why not skip Kunlun and come with me instead.”
"No." Shen Cangyu refused decisively. Even if Shen Qingyan died, she would stay in Kunlun to guard it. She didn't know if that transmigrator would transfer to a new body and repeat the same events. He was going to Kunlun eventually, so she would wait there for him. If he dared to come, she would kill him.
What is it about Kunlun that you can't forget about it?
Shen Cangyu bit her lower lip.
Besides killing the transmigrator and avenging herself, she had many, many reasons to go to Kunlun. The most important reason was probably... she was unwilling to accept it.
Kunlun was a long-cherished wish of hers. In her previous life, she was sent on a mission to a far-off place just before the disciples' competition. She rushed to Kunlun day and night, but ultimately failed to make it. She made a fatal mistake, and in the end, she only heard the news that Shen Qingyan had entered the inner sect and gained the appreciation of the elders.
She always felt that a certain position in Kunlun should have been hers, and she wanted to reclaim it. If it weren't for Shen Qingyan back then, she could have become an inner disciple of Kunlun. In this life, she had already witnessed her own ability to learn mental arts; she was cut out to be a cultivator. If it weren't for Shen Qingyan, she could have lived a very good life.
She went to Kunlun to prove that she was no less capable than anyone else, and also to become famous throughout the world, so that the people of Kunlun in the past would regret choosing Shen Qingyan instead of her.
Even among everyone, she was the only one who carried the memories of her previous life.
"You can learn the art of mind anywhere, you don't have to go to Kunlun. I can teach you. If you want to become famous, I can help you. I can make your name known throughout the four seas and eight wastelands. Not just Kunlun, everyone will know you." The woman seemed to sense her thoughts and said.
“No, I not only want to be famous throughout the world, I also want to seize the throne of the Kunlun Immortal Lord,” Shen Cangyu said.
Back then, besides Shen Qingyan, this thing was also responsible for her death. This worthless inheritance killed her senior brother, and it killed her too. Either she gets it, or she destroys it.
Hearing her words, the woman's voice chuckled: "As expected of someone I have high hopes for, you certainly have guts. Since you've made up your mind to go, I won't try to persuade you anymore. However, once you're in Kunlun, I won't be able to keep an eye on you. You have ambition, but remember, ambition and humility are not mutually exclusive. Too much rigidity leads to breakage, and excessive wisdom can be harmful."
The woman spoke earnestly. Shen Cangyu could distinguish between good and bad words, and knew that the woman was saying all this for her own good.
As Shen Cangyu listened to her words, her tightly furrowed brows gradually relaxed. She suddenly felt that the Copper Coin Eye should not be considered one of the Five Evils.
People with eyes that look like copper coins are not inherently bad. Jiang Qian in his previous life was like that, and so is the person in front of him this time.
As the wind blew, the beaded curtain that the woman held in front of her face swayed. Through the gap in the curtain, Shen Cangyu saw her eyes and felt that they were very familiar.
“You…” she wanted to ask her name, when suddenly, a voice appeared in her ear.
“Wan Qianzhong, you are Wan Qianzhong!” Shen Cangyu shouted.
The person sitting in the tree paused for a moment: "How do you... know my name?"
A strong wind blew, scattering flowers and blinding them. Shen Cangyu pushed aside the flowers in front of him, about to chase after her figure, when she pushed them away with both hands, and the sunlight was just right in front of him.
"You're awake?" Xu Qiubai leaned closer, his head blocking out the sun.
Shen Cangyu opened his mouth but couldn't speak. He felt a sharp pain in his throat, as if it were being cut by a knife.
She struggled to get up, but someone behind her helped her up and brought the spout of the kettle to her lips.
Pei Wenjing fed her water. Shen Cangyu looked around. Beside her was still the boundless sea, and in front of her were the wreckage of a ship and many people lying there.
They're still at sea, so where is this place...?
She reached down and touched something that felt like leather, hard yet slightly elastic. Her eyes widened in surprise.
Beneath them was a huge fish, as wide as an island, which lifted them and the boat up, keeping them afloat on the sea.
“This is Lu Yuan,” Pei Wenjing explained.
Lu Yuan actually transformed from a lizard into a giant fish?
"Lu Yuan is a disciple of Wen Cang Sheng. Wen Cang Sheng believes that Heaven and Earth are ruthless, treating all things as straw dogs, and that humans and all things are equal beings. Their souls can reside in the bodies of other beings, and other beings can also borrow their bodies. She must have been trying to establish a connection with this fish these past few days, so that she could transfer her soul to the big fish before the ship sank and lift the entire ship up."
Shen Cangyu nodded knowingly, but his gaze couldn't help but drift to the people lying in the distance. Some of the people in the distance were alive, some were dead, but Shen Qingyan was not among them.
He disappeared.
All around was the vast sea, with no islands. Shen Qingyan wasn't here; before falling into the water, he had been struck by lightning, his fate unknown. If he hadn't sunk into the sea, he would have had nowhere else to go. This person is most likely dead. If he's still alive after going through so much, then God is truly blind.
Shen Cangyu asked, "Did you ask about that Boundless Life and Death?"
Xu Qiubai scratched his head: "What is Wuliangsheng?"
Shen Cangyu realized that they probably didn't know anything about the Five Evils, only that they were demonic cultivators.
“It’s… that demonic cultivator on the ship, that steward,” Shen Cangyu gestured.
Xu Qiubai pointed into the distance: "The steward's body is right there, long since cold, and his soul has vanished. He must be dead."
Pei Wenjing continued, "Wuliangsheng is indeed difficult to deal with. If it weren't for the ship sinking, we might not have been able to handle him." After Pei Wenjing finished speaking, Shen Cangyu realized that he seemed unaware that she was the one who killed Wuliangsheng.
She looked at Xu Qiubai, who only echoed, "We can only go back and report to the elders so they can deal with these demonic cultivators." Judging from his expression, he probably didn't know either.
Thankfully, they didn't see anything. If they knew that Wuliang was dead at her hands, she would have a hard time explaining how she dealt with him. She couldn't very well say that she killed him with her copper coin eyes, could she?
"Where are we going?" Pei Wenjing asked.
At this moment, Xu Qiubai took out a stick of incense from his sleeve, raised his chin and said, "See? Luckily I had the foresight to keep this last stick of incense as a guide. If we didn't have this stick, we would have been swimming on the sea for a year without ever getting out."
“That’s not necessarily true,” Pei Wenjing suddenly said, raising his head and pointing to the sky.
At that moment, a huge fish floated in the air, blotting out the sun. The person lying on the fish's back saw this and exclaimed in surprise.
"It's Xiaoyao You!" Xu Qiubai's eyes widened. "Are my senior brothers here?"
"Wrong!" A voice came from above, and a figure floated down from the sky, surrounded by wind. She landed gracefully, "It's my senior sisters."
"Greetings, Senior Sister Qiu." Pei Wenjing bowed to her.
Just then, the giant fish in the sky floated down and fell into the sea, slowly submerging without making a splash. The fish was huge, yet as light as a goose feather. A girl dressed in a silver-white Kunlun uniform sat on the fish's back, her head drooping, as if she were asleep and hadn't woken up.
"After hearing that you had met with disaster, Qianhe and I came to look for you," Qiu Sheng said, hands on his hips. "I sent messages to your name tags, but I didn't receive any replies for a long time. I thought we were doomed. Surely you weren't dead. I sent a message to Shizi, and she said you should be at sea. So we searched for several days and finally found you."
After saying that, she patted the big fish beneath her and said, "Deer, what happened to you? How are we supposed to take you back like this?!"
Lu Yuan responded by spraying water at the opportune moment.
Water splashed up, soaking everyone.
“Let’s go ashore first and send these mortals back,” Pei Wenjing said.
Qiu Sheng clicked his tongue: "You want to boss me around? You think I'm too noisy?"
Pei Wenjing quickly lowered his head: "I wouldn't dare!"
"Alright, enough with the pleasantries," Qiu Sheng said, looking at their dry clothes still covered in salt. "I need to take you back and wash you right away; you're all filthy."
"Qianhe, wake up." Qiu Sheng turned around and called to Lu Qianhe. Lu Qianhe struggled to open her eyes and glanced at them. She slowly placed her hand on the Kun under her. The Kun grew larger and carried Lu Yuan and the entire boat onto the fish. After doing this, she drooped her head and went back to sleep.
"Never mind, you go to sleep. Just don't fall asleep while driving the fish truck," Qiu Sheng sighed.
Qiu Sheng clapped his hands: "Let's go, let's get to the nearby shore first."
As soon as she finished speaking, the fish cart took off, and the huge thrust almost overturned Shen Cangyu. She quickly lay down.
In an instant, they soared into the sky, riding the clouds and mist.
Exclamations of surprise came from the mortals around her. Shen Cangyu recalled that she had the same reaction when she first rode in the fish carriage. She turned her head to look at the scene beside her. She could feel the immense force of the wind pushing her backward. They were moving forward at great speed, but the clouds beside them did not move. It seemed that compared with the endless sky, the distance the fish carriage had traveled was insignificant.
Shen Cangyu had heard that enlightenment could happen in an instant, and if she could grasp that inspiration in that instant, she could comprehend the essence of Taoism. Suddenly, the wind around her stopped.
"Um?"
She sat up and looked around, only to see Pei Wenjing making a hand seal, dispelling the wind around them.
The familiar mental manipulation reminded her of when she accidentally entered Kunlun with a cargo box on her back then. Pei Wenjing had used the same mental manipulation to dispel the wind and snow that was blocking her way.
She thought she needed to learn this skill too, so that she could protect herself from the wind and snow in the future.
Shen Cangyu looked at the bloodstains at the corner of his mouth and asked softly, "Your injuries haven't healed yet, why did you dare to use mental techniques?"
“It’s nothing, I’m going home now,” Pei Wenjing said. Shen Cangyu sensed the tenderness in his words, and in that instant, a feeling of desolation welled up in her heart.
Yes, for the current senior disciple, Kunlun is still his home...
Qiu Sheng leaned closer, stroking his chin, and asked, "Who is this little girl? Where did you find her?"
Pei Wenjing replied, "She is a cultivator from Penglai, and she is coming back to Kunlun with us. She helped us a lot during this training trip, and without her, we would not have been able to return unscathed."
"Wow, Penglai!" Qiu Sheng squeezed over curiously, pinched Shen Cangyu's arm, and commented, "Skinny little kid, do you want to train with me when we get back to Kunlun?"
Upon hearing her words, Shen Cangyu's eyes lit up: "Great!" Coincidentally, she had just been looking for a way to train properly, improve her physique, and lay a solid foundation so that she could learn more mental techniques and master more life-saving methods in the future.
"Look at them!" Qiu Sheng slapped his thigh with satisfaction. "No wonder they're cultivators from Penglai. They've got determination. Look at yourselves!"
Xu Qiubai coughed weakly a few times, indicating that he was naturally weak and sickly, and would not practice anymore.
Pei Wenjing shut his mouth, remaining silent.
Lu Yuan's ears were positioned a bit far away, so he couldn't hear their chatter.
The Fish Cart traveled very fast, and soon it reached the shore and began to descend. The mortals around them began to scream. Hearing the commotion, Qiu Sheng said to Shen Cangyu, "Don't be afraid, you can hold me." She now found Shen Cangyu pleasing to the eye in every way.
Shen Cangyu hugged her arms: "..." Actually, she wasn't that scared.
After the fish cart landed, it dispersed like bubbles. Lu Yuan and all the people on the boat landed on the ground together.
She shook herself violently, but the person on her back, along with the wreckage of the ship, seemed glued to her and she couldn't shake them off at all.
Looking at Lu Yuan's enormous body, Qiu Sheng felt a bit troubled: "Girl, how did you manage to crawl into such a big fish body? This is too difficult to move. Fine, I'll just have to trouble you to go inside the pot." She raised her hand, and a golden pot fell into her hand, sucking Lu Yuan inside.
The boat landed on the ground with a thud.
Those who finally stepped onto solid ground came to their senses and quickly kowtowed to thank them. Qiu Sheng waved his hand and ignored them.
Shen Cangyu stared at the crowd. She didn't see Shen Qingyan, but she did see Jiang Qian.
Jiang Qian looked at her too, but hid behind the crowd, solemnly kowtowed to her, and then turned and left. She didn't say anything, only watching his back disappear into the distance. Jiang Qian had knelt before her so many times, but only this time did Shen Cangyu see that he was sincere.
Pei Wenjing and Xu Qiubai knew that Jiang Qian had connections with demonic cultivators. If they really let him go to Kunlun, he might be severely tortured by the Kunlun people to find out about his relationship with the Copper Coin Eye.
It's a good thing we don't go to Kunlun. Let's run, let's go somewhere farther away.
"Alright, now that things are settled, we need to head back. Gouzi is still waiting for you in Kunlun." Qiu Sheng said this to Pei Wenjing. "As soon as they heard you were in trouble, they insisted on coming with you, but I thought they were in the way, so I ignored them. When you get back, you need to visit them one by one to prove that you're alive and well, understand?"
"I will follow your instructions, Senior Sister," Pei Wenjing nodded in response.
“You brat,” Qiu Sheng ruffled his hair, “you’re all dirty. It’s rare to see you like this.”
Although Qiu Sheng complained, Shen Cangyu could tell that she genuinely loved Pei Wenjing like a younger brother. From her words, Shen Cangyu could sense that there were many people in Kunlun who liked Pei Wenjing.
Why was it that in his previous life, when he fell to such a state, no one ever stood up for him?
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
