Where Immortals Once Walked

Chapter 788: He Chunhua’s Dilemma

He had needed to secure a protective talisman of sorts before he could return to Yuan.

The mirror asked curiously, “Huh? Since you don’t want to lay everything out completely, why did you still confront him head-on this morning?”

“There’s no way to explain away everything I experienced during the year I was gone. No excuse could dispel his suspicions.” He Lingchuan’s experience had grown rapidly, and he now understood He Chunhua far more thoroughly than he had half a year earlier. “Our relationship as father and son can never return to what it was. At best, we can maintain harmony on the surface while remaining divided at heart.” Not that our relationship has ever been particularly good. “Since that’s the case, I might as well expose the rift and draw a clear boundary. Otherwise, he’ll still try to use the authority of a father to treat me as a chess piece.”

He Chunhua possessed an extremely powerful desire for control, while He Lingchuan was no longer a piece that could be manipulated at will.

The unspoken premise of concealing one’s abilities and biding one’s time was insufficient strength. A player who possessed real power had to demand corresponding respect.

Only then would it be easier for him to act later.

He Lingchuan continued slowly, “Besides, my plan has always contained one enormous uncertainty.”

“Hm? And that is?”

“He Chunhua’s feelings toward his son... Mm, I mean his feelings toward me.” He Lingchuan looked at the mirror. The version of himself reflected within had a wolfish gaze—cold, ruthless, and filled with calculation. “What I fear most is that he won’t be able to harden his heart.”

In truth, He Chunhua’s feelings toward his eldest son were both complicated and conflicted. His paternal love had never vanished; he merely wavered constantly between that love and practical interests. If He Lingchuan continued imitating the original owner’s personality and caused He Chunhua to lose his nerve when the time came to summon the god, that would be an enormous problem.

He Chunhua might not summon the god now, but he would do so one day in the future.

When someone held a deadly weapon, thoughts of killing naturally arose. If you possessed the strongest card in the deck, sooner or later you would start calculating when to play it.

Even if He Chunhua abandoned all thought of summoning the god from this day onward, the divine seal mark still remained inside He Lingchuan’s mind. He had no idea when Naluotian might forcefully descend.

He had to eliminate such an unknown and uncontrollable risk as quickly as possible!

“I need to force him to make up his mind and stop hesitating.”

“...”

The mirror could not understand the complexity of human emotions, and He Lingchuan did not explain.

He intended to provoke He Chunhua through both words and actions, forcing him to walk down a single path to the very end instead of wavering between choices.

The stronger and more independent this eldest son became—or rather, the less he resembled the former He Lingchuan—the more likely He Chunhua would be to summon the god.

In other words, He Lingchuan had to make He Chunhua resolve to perform the summoning, yet prevent him from doing so immediately. He even needed to reach the point where, whenever He Lingchuan wanted the ritual performed, He Chunhua would perform it then and there.

How well he could judge that delicate balance and keep the ideal moment firmly within his own control would depend on the contest between him and He Chunhua.

No, this should be considered a contest between Naluotian and me.

“So have you figured it out yet?” the mirror nagged. “What exactly are you going to use against ‘fate’?”

This master kept everything hidden in the depths of his heart. Even the mirror did not know the specifics of his plan.

“I figured it out long ago.” He Lingchuan stretched lazily. “There is one thing that neither fate nor the gods can resist. Perhaps it is the most powerful weapon we possess.”

“Oh? What is it?” The mirror listened attentively.

“Greed.”

* * *

He Chunhua returned to his study. Before he could even sit down, the candle on the desk suddenly sputtered and produced a bright blossom of flame.

He Chunhua instinctively stared at it.

Under his gaze, the flame swayed once more and burst into another fiery blossom.

There was clearly no wind inside the room.

He immediately dismissed every servant, shut the doors and windows, then placed a statue facing east. He set down an incense burner, lit seven sticks of incense, and began praying with complete sincerity.

Once smoke filled the room, he pricked his fingertip and dripped blood into the incense burner.

The smoke immediately took on a faint sanguine tint and slowly condensed into a human face.

Calling it a human face was generous. It possessed only the rough outline of the five features, without any clearly discernible appearance. Yet He Chunhua felt it gaze at him with supreme authority.

He lowered his head and bowed. “My lord.”

A deep, indifferent voice sounded, “He Chunhua, has your eldest son returned?”

“Yes.” He Chunhua appeared utterly respectful, though a trace of shock rose in his heart. Chuan’er has only just returned. How has Naluotian already discovered it?

“Where has he been during the past half year?”

He Chunhua summarized everything truthfully in a few sentences.

After listening, Naluotian gave a cold laugh. “He is spouting nonsense with a perfectly serious expression.”

“Yes, but we have no way to verify it. He also brought back the money and Rongshan personnel, lending credibility to his claimed whereabouts.” On this point, He Chunhua was somewhat impressed.

After not seeing him for half a year, he now saw his eldest son in entirely new light.

“There is something abnormal about him,” said Naluotian. “Because the divine seal mark remains, I knew he was still alive. At times, however, I lost all sense of him. He most likely entered other minor worlds.”

“Did he truly go to the State of Xuluo?”

“He did indeed go to Beijia, but the divine seal mark alone cannot pinpoint his exact location.”

Otherwise, why would Naluotian’s first divine descent still require He Chunhua, the summoner, to perform a ritual?

It was precisely because barriers existed between the two realms, preventing the divine seal mark from locating the skin-sack with perfect clarity, that the ritual was needed to guide the way!

Without the ritual, Naluotian would have to search for the skin-sack’s location itself in order to force a divine descent. That would require an enormous effort.

“Make preparations. Perform the divine descent soon!” Naluotian informed him. “The sooner, the better!”

“My lord!” He Chunhua raised his head in alarm. “Everything is peaceful. Why is a divine descent necessary?”

“His thread of fate has changed drastically. It was once clear and readily distinguishable, but now it is murky and obscure. I can no longer transfer his fortune to you. Some power must be interfering. Furthermore, I sense that certain changes connected to me have appeared somewhere beyond perception. I dislike that very much!”

The final sentence was spoken with exceptional severity.

He Chunhua did not understand. “What has happened on your side?”

His instincts told him that the final statement was the true reason Naluotian suddenly wished to descend, rather than any genuine curiosity about his eldest son’s experiences.

A god of fate disliked surprises. Isn’t that ironic?

Naluotian offered no explanation. Instead, it said, “I must descend personally and inspect the matter before I can determine the cause!”

He Chunhua remained silent.

“What? Are you reluctant again?” Naluotian sneered. “When you begged me for help in the past, didn’t you swear that you would offer your eldest son to me?”

He Chunhua’s Adam’s apple bobbed twice, and bitterness filled his mouth.

Although he had prepared himself long ago, now that the day had truly arrived, pain still pierced his heart like a needle.

Seeing that he did not respond, Naluotian softened its tone. “You need not worry excessively. The divine descent will not cause him much harm.”

“It won’t?” He Chunhua was not so easily deceived. “I investigated several divine descents recorded over the years. The human bodies that received them were almost torn to pieces in the end!”

Because of that, whenever he spent time with He Lingchuan, he could not help imagining his eldest son’s body ripped apart. At times, such visions even woke him from nightmares.

When he had possessed nothing, he had been able to sacrifice what he loved.

However, as his official career prospered and his power continued to grow, the regret in his heart had increased with every passing day.

If I hadn’t borrowed Naluotian’s power back then...