Ze Tian Ji (Way of Choices)

Chapter 355 – For Reasons of Sorrow

Xu Yourong gazed out the window, not saying a word, waiting for that person to come out of the Garden of Zhou. Even though the azure curtain of the carriage window was let down, it could not obstruct her sight.

Time continued to pitilessly march on and the sun slowly rose up. The light in the sky gradually shifted, moving from the walls of Hanqiu City to the official road, until finally illuminating the entire world. The light pierced through the curtain, shining into the carriage and resting upon her face, making her face grow paler and paler.

After she came out of the Garden of Zhou, she immediately told archbishop Mei Lisha and Zhu Luo what had happened in the Garden of Zhou. The Garden of Zhou’s sky was collapsing. There was enough time for others to escape because in the plains at the top of the Mausoleum of Zhou, a youth was using an umbrella to hold up the sky, so they should use every method to save him as soon as possible.

If she were not Xu Yourong, Mei Lisha and Zhu Luo would definitely think she had gone crazy. Yet even if she was Xu Yourong and Mei Lisha and Zhu Luo did believe her, there truly was no means of saving that solitary youth that was holding up the sky atop the Mausoleum of Zhou—only those at Ethereal Opening could enter the Garden of Zhou, and if it was as she had described, someone that could save that youth needed to be an expert at an even higher level of cultivation. Perhaps Zhu Luo had the ability, but the Garden of Zhou was in the midst of collapse and was exceptionally unstable. He would only need to take a single step into the Garden of Zhou and the entire miniature world might be instantly annihilated.

No one could save that youth; only the youth himself could do so. Thus, Xu Yourong could do nothing else, only wait. At this moment, a senior sister from the Thirteen Divisions of Radiant Green hurried over to the window and reported to her, “There’s no one called Xu Sheng. In addition, I’ve checked and found that no disciples came from the Snow Mountain Sect.”

After a moment of silence, Xu Yourong asked, “How many people have yet to come out?”

“There are still a bit more than forty people.” After a moment’s hesitation, the senior from the Thirteen Divisions of Radiant Green also softly said, “Orthodox Academy’s Chen Changsheng… also has not come out.”

Once she said these words, the senior grew very concerned about Xu Yourong’s situation. She thought Xu Yourong was worried about the safety of her fiancé, which is why she had asked to make these inquiries. Yet Xu Yourong had no reaction, making the senior somewhat surprised.

The person Xu Yourong was waiting for was not Chen Changsheng—amongst the cultivators that had registered their names, there was no Snow Mountain Sect disciple called Xu Sheng, but she knew very well that the Snow Mountain Sect disciple called Xu Sheng was still in the Garden of Zhou. Moreover, he was at this very moment at the summit of the Mausoleum of Zhou, wielding the ten thousand swords as a massive umbrella.

Entering the Garden of Zhou under a false name, even changing one’s sect under the tacit approval of the Li Palace, was a very common occurrence. In her view, since Xu Sheng was the secret sect genius disciple upon which the Snow Mountain Sect placed its hopes of revitalization, then he would be like her and use some other identity to enter the Garden of Zhou. That his name could not be found on the register was highly likely.

In reality, she had no hopes that the youth’s name would be found on the register. After she had gotten out of the Garden of Zhou, she had silently sat in the carriage by the window, staring into the foggy depths of the forest at each person that walked out or was carried out. She firmly believed that she had not missed a single one, because her eyes had never once blinked.

She had seen many of her senior and junior brothers from the Longevity Sect as well as some of her fellows from the South Stream Temple, saw those injured cultivators that she had saved in those nights, saw that wolf youth carrying Qi Jian that ran into four trees before finally reaching the roadside, but she never saw him.

At the end, several figures walked out of the fog supporting each other, then an unimaginably terrifying Qi erupted from the dense fog. That rainbow which landed in the fog instantly began to falter, as if it could snap at any moment. That magnificent courtyard faintly discernible through the fog abruptly twisted into countless images, like it was about to vanish.

Seeing this scene, Mei Lisha seemed to grow even older. Zhu Luo flew up, rushing into the air above the clouds. When the rainbow finally fractured, a bright and beauteous sword light emerged from his hands and chopped at the earth, creating an incredibly powerful protective screen, separating the world in the fog from the true world.

There was a massive boom which could be heard even several hundred li from Hanqiu City.

Even Zhu Luo, one of the Eight Storms and one of the most powerful cultivators on the continent, putting his full strength behind this slash, failed to completely seal off the explosion of this powerful Qi. A hurricane gathered up the leaves and earth and rolled them into the forest, shrieking all the while. In an instant, the hurricane engulfed the official road. Only when it collided against the sturdy walls of Hanqiu City did it finally cease.

As the wind died down and the dust settled, the world became clear and bright once more. The forest was filled with coughs and groans. As the crowd looked into the forest, they saw that the dense fog had already completely scattered. As for the green hill that should have been behind that fog…it had already disappeared without a trace.

The gate to the Garden of Zhou had disappeared, and the Garden of Zhou itself had also vanished. It was a mystery whether there would be anyone else who in the future would be able to open the gate to the Garden of Zhou. Even if it could be opened, there would be no meaning. The energy that the Garden of Zhou released before its collapse had disintegrated a real green hill, so how could the Garden of Zhou itself still exist?

The forest was silent. Those birds that had taken flight in alarm had been struck dead by the Qi shot out by the destruction of the Garden of Zhou, their stiff corpses dropping down amidst the leaves and dirt.

Breaking the silence were the sounds of mournful weeping. Many teachers from the sects and schools adopted expressions of grief while there were also many young cultivators who bitterly wept without end by the corpses of their fellow disciples. The priests of the Li Palace and the government officials put away their emotions and once again began to take count. They determined that out of the human cultivators that had entered the Garden of Zhou, twenty-seven had not come out. But they did not know if these people had been killed in the course of the demons’ schemes or if they had lost their lives in the destruction of the Garden of Zhou. In addition, in the forest, there were more than ten corpses.

The curtain was covered by a thick layer of dust, blocking out the light, and also blocking her sight. It also caused Xu Yourong’s face to become rather darker.

She closed her eyes, her long lashes gently blinking.

She said nothing, her right hand trembling as it softly caressed the pheasant at her side.

“Let’s go,” she whispered.

The carriage of the Thirteen Divisions of Radiant Green, following the official road, rolled off into the distance.

The wind on the road blew off the dust on the curtains, letting her see the scene on the side of the road of the wounded groaning on their stretchers.

This made her feel somewhat aggrieved.

In that first night in the Garden of Zhou, she and Chen Changsheng, without once meeting, had continuously saved lives. These wounded people were people that they had saved together.

And Chen Changsheng had also not come out of the Garden of Zhou.

Only then did she understand that the young Daoist boy she had exchanged letters with several years ago… was also dead.

She originally felt that she would not grieve over his death, but now she felt rather upset.

If it were not for that engagement, he would not have come to the capital, would not have participated in the Grand Examination, would not have entered the Orthodox Academy, and would not have entered the Garden of Zhou. Naturally, he also would not have died. Presumably, he would still be in that old temple in Xining village reading through those three thousand scriptures of the Dao.

She had originally long forgotten about those letters, but for some reason, she suddenly began to recall them. She remembered that Chen Changsheng used to write to her that every day, he had to recite Daoist scriptures, something he found very laborious, and yet… no matter how laborious it was, it must be better than death, right?

The wheels of the carriage rolled across the official road, rumbling along as they went. This was to leave.

Every person had to learn about leaving.

Leaving was always a most sorrowful and grievous affair. Even if she was Xu Yourong, she was still just a fifteen-year-old girl.

What made her sad most of all was that the person she was waiting for did not come out in the end.

Were you really called Xu Sheng? Were you really a disciple of the Snow Mountain Sect? Did you still not know that I was Xu Yourong? Does anyone know that in those plains, we shouldered responsibilities together, overcame life-or-death situations together, and calmly faced crises together? Your relatives and teachers might mourn for you, but I…I don’t even have the qualifications to mourn for you. Ah, this is a truly sorrowful affair.

Not long after the carriage of the Thirteen Divisions of Radiant Green had taken its leave, another sorrowful affair occurred.

A person was about to die.

In this year’s opening of the Garden of Zhou, because of the demons’ schemes, the human cultivators had suffered disastrous casualties. By all reason, death should be a very normal affair.

However, the person that was about to die was the Mount Li Sword Sect’s Liang Xiaoxiao.

This affair was no longer normal and was very grievous.

Then, this grief very quickly transformed into anger.

Because everyone on the scene believed that it was not the demons that had killed Liang Xiaoxiao, but Zhexiu.