I couldn’t find Xie Zhuo.
I searched in the Immortal City, in the forest enclosed by the Immortal City, and in the snow and wind outside the Immortal City. I even searched many places in the Northern Wilderness, but…
I couldn’t find Xie Zhuo.
I don’t know if one month passed, or two, or three.
Time seemed to stand still for me. Each day without eating or drinking, I only knew to keep walking, examining everyone I met, changing from looking for Xie Zhuo to seeking out anything in others that resembled him.
But I couldn’t find anyone who resembled Xie Zhuo in the slightest.
Only now do I understand how special Xie Zhuo was to me—so special that in countless worlds, I couldn’t find even a pair of eyebrows that resembled his.
Finally, I returned to that forest, the home of the Snow Wolf clan.
Time seemed frozen here too, perpetually in deep autumn, with orange-red fallen leaves painting the only color in my eyes.
I stayed in the forest for a long while, until… Xi Wang Mu came.
It had been so very long since I’d seen anyone from my past life.
Now, seeing Xi Wang Mu, I felt a familiar warmth, as if seeing family. After this brief moment of familiarity and closeness, I looked at Xi Wang Mu like the most helpless little immortal in Kunlun. I stepped forward, clutching the hem of her robe, and begged my deity:
“Please help me find Xie Zhuo.”
Hoarsely, softly, I pleaded, “I’ve lost him. Please help me find him.”
Xi Wang Mu sighed deeply and stroked my head. “Jiu Xia, come back to Kunlun.”
She said, “During his life, Xie Zhuo carried Kunlun’s mark. The scenes of his battles with evil spirits outside were transmitted back and preserved. Originally, I used them to study the evil miasma…”
I stared blankly at Xi Wang Mu.
Her expression was resigned and somewhat sorrowful: “This time, before his sacrifice, Kunlun’s mark also transmitted the scene back. Come and see.”
Finally, I…
Went back…
I never knew that behind Kunlun’s main hall, there was a hidden palace.
It was concealed within a spirit stone formation behind Xi Wang Mu’s main seat.
Xi Wang Mu led me inside. In the hidden palace, there was only a huge stone.
The stone had been split into a mirror-like flat surface. Xi Wang Mu guided me to stand before the stone mirror. She gently drew a formation on the mirror’s surface—the mark of Kunlun’s art.
Then, mist slowly rose from the stone mirror, swirling around me, finally condensing into the shapes of people and objects.
Through these mist-outlined figures, I finally saw Xie Zhuo again.
The stone mirror, through the mist, restored the scene from that day.
“The mark cannot bring back scenes from five hundred years ago, only the events after you returned,” Xi Wang Mu explained.
In the scene recreated by the mist, traces of the space-time rift still lingered in the air.
Xie Zhuo had laid me on the ground. At that time, the forest was still snow-white, with tree trunks like ice, leaves like snow, and the ground like a frozen lake of ice.
“I lay on that ice lake, with Xie Zhuo kneeling on one knee beside me.
On the ice lake beneath us was a formation.
From my current perspective, I could see what this formation was—a formation to draw out the evil miasma.
Earlier, when evil miasma had entered Xie Zhuo’s body, I couldn’t bear to see him suffer, so I drew the evil energy from his body into mine. That was why he began to take me on our journey to the Immortal City.
He had always said we were going to a place that could heal me, that there was a way to cure me.
I believed him and didn’t ask many questions.
Now I finally understood—there was no cure. He simply planned to draw the evil miasma from my body back into his.
But…
Why did it have to be in this place?
As if to answer my question,
Xie Zhuo activated the formation beneath us.
The formation began to rotate, and the evil miasma from “my” body started to drift toward Xie Zhuo.
However, this evil miasma did not transfer as simply as when I had drawn it before. It seemed very reluctant to leave “my” body.
Although it had already burst through my meridians and skin before, when it was being drawn into Xie Zhuo’s body, it was still so unwilling.
The formation Xie Zhuo had drawn beneath “me” was powerful, seemingly leaving no escape for the evil miasma.
It was gradually extracted from “my” body. However, as it left, the blood from “my” body was also drawn into Xie Zhuo along with the black evil miasma.
Was Xie Zhuo… draining all my blood?
Just as I realized this, I saw on the other side, at “my” other wrist, a stream of white energy flowing in.
This energy seemed to come from this pure land-like “ice lake.”
While Xie Zhuo drew out all the blood and evil miasma from “my” body, he let the energy from the ice lake fill every inch of the blood vessels in “my” body… as if he were…