After the Great Dao Died

Chen Lingxi waited for Wang Kong in Liujie Alley.

He climbed onto an eave and gazed at a distant house.

The house was old. Moss crept up the base of its walls, weeds choked the gaps between the roof tiles, and the courtyard door hung crooked on its hinges. The vermilion paint had long since peeled away, leaving only deeply splintered wood.

Nostalgia filled Chen Lingxi’s eyes.

He didn’t take Liujie Alley every time he went to the government office just because it was a shortcut.

It was because his father had rented a house here during his early years as an official, back when he served as the Deputy Judge of the Judicial Office in Yuanjiang Prefecture.

The alley wasn’t large, home to only eight or nine families in total. The Chen family lived at the very end, with the Xi family next door and the Zhao family right across from them.

The three households shared a single well, and its water was incredibly sweet and clear.

He had lived here until he was five.

Even though he had been young, he remembered many things about this alley with vivid clarity. He remembered always playing with the young daughter of the Xi family. She was a year younger than him, fair and delicate as jade and snow, and she followed him around all day calling out, ”Brother Lingxi!”In spring, they would squat by the corners of the walls to count ants. In summer, they splashed barefoot in the puddles on the bluestone slabs. In autumn, they stuffed their pockets full of plane tree seeds, and in winter, they huddled together to watch the snow fall.

One time, he climbed a tree to reach a bird’s nest and slipped from the branch. His pant leg tore, and he scraped a patch of skin off his knee, blood welling from the wound.

The little Xi girl turned pale with fright. She tore her own handkerchief to bandage his injury, and once she finished, she felt so distressed that she burst into tears.

Later, his father was promoted to the capital, and the family left Liujie Alley.

Moving day was the third day of the third month. The willow tree at the alley entrance had just sprouted fresh buds, and fluffy catkins drifted across the street.

The little Xi girl stood at her door, clutching a willow twig in her hand. Her eyes were red, but she didn’t cry.

He only glanced back once before climbing into the carriage, and he never returned.

Later, the Xi family experienced a sudden rise to prominence. Having rendered meritorious service by offering up a treasure, Father Xi was appointed to Luyang as its Prefecture Lord. The two families remained close for many years, constantly exchanging letters.

By the time Chen Lingxi was seventeen, rumors even circulated in the capital that the Chen and Xi families were going to arrange a marriage.

It was total nonsense, of course, because Chen Lingxi hadn’t seen the little Xi girl since he was five.

He only remembered that her name was Xi Yu.

His mother used to laugh and say that it was a good name, and that she would be Lingxi’s wife in the future.

Then, the Chen family met with catastrophe. The entire clan was executed, leaving only a few young men under twenty with scholarly honors to be made official bondservants.

Tossed about by fate, Chen Lingxi eventually returned to Yuanjiang Prefecture. Only then did he hear that not long after they had left Liujie Alley, a plague had broken out there, killing over a hundred people.

He heard that the dead were covered in black spots and suffered from unrelenting high fevers, breathing their last in just three to five days.

The government office dispatched a coroner to investigate, but they found no root cause, ultimately declaring it a seasonal epidemic.

This once-bustling alley was thus abandoned. A few disbelievers had been tempted by the cheap rent and moved in, but they often contracted the disease and died within a year.

As the death toll rose, no one dared to approach the place anymore. The matter was simply too eerie. The commoners of Yuanjiang believed the alley was haunted by malicious ghosts; they would shake their heads, click their tongues, and take long detours whenever it was mentioned.

Chen Lingxi, however, was not afraid.

Every time he went to the government office to report in, he would bring Liu Changle here, treating it as a nostalgic visit to his old home.

Strangely enough, despite visiting many times, neither of them ever caught any illness. Liu Changle had once joked that the medicinal toxins in their bodies were so heavy that even malicious ghosts found them repulsive.

Chen Lingxi had laughed too, though he vaguely felt that wasn’t the case.

He was no longer the young child of the past. Having suffered every kind of hardship over the last two years, he saw the dangers of this world with crystal clarity.

Yet to him, Liujie Alley always held an inexplicable warmth, as if those who had died and scattered had left something unseen behind.

He narrowed his eyes, gazing at his ruined former home. Half of the roof on the Chen family house had collapsed, exposing charred wooden beams.

He then glanced next door—the courtyard where the Xi family used to rent. The willow tree there had lush branches and leaves, standing a full nine zhang tall, its trunk easily two chi thick.

’Hm?’

’I’ve always come and gone in a hurry, never looking at it closely.’

’Looking at it now... this willow tree is far too strange.’

Chen Lingxi raised his eyebrows.

This was the very willow tree he had planted with the little Xi girl, Xi Yu.

It had been the day of the Awakening of Insects. An old flower peddler at the alley entrance had given him a willow cutting, saying he had snapped it off by the river and that it would take root as long as it was planted in the soil. He had run home excitedly, found an empty patch in the Xi family courtyard, and dug a hole with a wooden stick. Just as he was about to plant it, the little Xi girl ran over, insisting on planting it with him.

One of them held the branch while the other packed the soil. Then, they hauled over half a bucket of well water and poured it down.

He still remembered how clumsy she had been when watering it; half the bucket had splashed right onto her skirt, making her stamp her feet in anger.

It had only been fourteen or fifteen years since then.

The reason Chen Lingxi found the tree bizarre was that no matter how fast a willow grew, it shouldn’t be nine zhang tall and two chi thick.

An ordinary willow tree would only be as thick as a bowl after ten years. If it grew as thick as a person’s waist in twenty years, it would already be considered incredibly old.

The tree before him wasn’t old at all. On the contrary, its branches and leaves were so lush and verdant they looked as though they could drip emerald sap.

’Can a willow tree really grow this sturdy?’

Doubt took root in his heart. He vaulted over several courtyard walls and dropped into the yard.

He approached the willow tree, hesitated for a moment, and reached out to gently stroke its rough bark.

The bark was icy cold. The chill seeped into his palm and traveled straight up his meridians, as if something were probing his depths.

In that instant, Chen Lingxi felt a sudden sensation—a mysterious power diffusing into his palm.

The power was faint and minuscule, bordering on imperceptible. It was like smoke or mist, lingering around the gaps of his fingers on the verge of dispersing, showing neither intimacy nor rejection.

He froze slightly, sensing something, and opened his Divine Chamber.

[Perceiving Clear Divine Ability: Essence Restoration Progress 52%]!

Chen Lingxi frowned in sudden, intense shock!

Over four days of breathing exercises with the Six Qi True Art, the essence restoration progress of his Perceiving Clear Divine Ability had only climbed to 4.3%.

The progress had been excruciatingly slow.

But now... just because he touched this willow tree, the progress of his Perceiving Clear Divine Ability had spiked by this much?

’Just what is so bizarre about this willow tree?’

Chen Lingxi pulled his hand back, standing in place as he pondered.

’Should I send a thread of spiritual qi inside?’

He tried to slowly circulate the spiritual qi in his dantian, wanting to pass a wisp into the willow tree to investigate.

But the moment the spiritual qi flowed into his palm, he hesitated again.

’There are too many eerie things in this world. Recklessly sending in spiritual qi isn’t wise; if it’s dangerous, the losses will outweigh the gains.’

He had learned a lesson in his past life—never be too curious about things you don’t understand.

He was currently only at the Qi Circulation 2nd Floor. He knew too little. If he recklessly probed with spiritual qi and triggered something he shouldn’t, he absolutely wouldn’t be able to bear the consequences.

After mulling it over, he finally withdrew his hand.

He gave up the idea.

’This willow tree isn’t going anywhere. It won’t be too late to investigate the next time I can circulate the Undying Willow.’

Chen Lingxi vaulted back over the courtyard wall, concealing his traces at the base of the wall as he resumed his wait.

At that exact moment, space shifted!

A thousand li away on a mountain peak, a sea of clouds surged like ocean waves, the glowing rays of the sun dyeing the cloud layer a pale gold.

A pine tree stood on the peak, and beneath the pine lay a square bluestone. A young woman sat cross-legged atop the stone.

She was stunningly beautiful. Her eyebrows were like distant mountains, her eyes like autumn waters, and her face was so fair it was almost translucent, like a perfect block of suet jade soaked in moonlight.

Her eyes were tightly shut, her breathing long and steady as she circulated her cultivation technique.

Suddenly, she opened her eyes.

There were no ripples in her gaze; it was as dead and tranquil as a pool of stagnant water.

She glanced down at the back of her right hand, where a faint willow-leaf mark had surfaced, radiating a slight heat.

She furrowed her brow almost imperceptibly, as if sensing something from that willow tree.

She raised her right hand, lightly pinching her thumb and index finger together, about to flick her fingers.

But the motion stopped halfway.

Her brow smoothed out. A hint of faint surprise flashed through her eyes before returning to flat serenity.

That surprise lingered for barely a breath before it vanished completely, as though it had never existed at all.

”Chen Lingxi?”

She murmured to herself, her voice feather-light.

The name lingered on the tip of her tongue for a second.

Of course she remembered him—Liujie Alley, the bluestone steps, her childhood playmate.

And later? Later, news came from the capital that the Zhong family had offended the Emperor. The Chen family had been implicated, their entire clan executed, leaving their only son condemned to be an official bondservant.

She had only shaken her head upon hearing the news, and she had never thought of him again since.

But right now, Xi Yu’s eyes were placid as her hand hovered in midair.

She slowly lowered her right hand, letting the willow-leaf mark on her skin gradually fade until it disappeared completely.

”He is trapped in a cage and has faded into the mundane masses,” she said, shaking her head. ”Why waste the fragmentary power of the Undying Willow on him?”

Her tone was perfectly flat, like she was stating a fact that had nothing to do with her. There was no disdain, no regret, not even a trace of pity.

Their paths had already diverged. She had stepped onto the immortal Dao; she was no longer a mortal.

Forget it.

She didn’t flick her fingers.

The mountain wind rustled through the pines, blowing a strand of black hair by her temples as she closed her eyes and entered meditation.

”A dead wyrm coils ’round the Undying Willow, fed on dripping blood for three thousand years. One day a Heavenly Eye blooms on the branch, piercing the world’s tome of life and death.”

The four-line chant echoed by her ears once more. Every word was distinct, the lingering echoes swirling around her, refusing to scatter for a long time.

”If I enter secluded cultivation for a year starting today, I will be able to... climb another floor.”

Then, she closed her eyes again.

Only the soughing of the pines remained on the mountain peak.

Right at that moment, several thousand li away, Chen Lingxi finally saw the person he was waiting for.

With a flicker of thought, he slid several steps back without a sound, using a patch of withered wormwood at the corner of the wall to conceal his figure. Tapping the base of the wall lightly with his toes, he vaulted onto the eave like a night cat.

The roof tiles sank slightly under his feet, but they didn’t make a single sound.

The Concealed Edge Method flowed silently through his body, keeping his vitality and blood from leaking in the slightest. He flattened his body against the roof ridge, looking like a splatter of ink melting into the shadows of the tiles, utterly untraceable!

The Concealed Edge Method was truly profoundly useful.

Down at the alley entrance, Wang Kong strode forward, wearing his usual outfit and a dark, heavy expression.