Seeking Immortality 04

Only when Fang Zhiyi’s face appeared before her did Mengdie’s eyes light up.

“Gousheng, how did you…”

Fang Zhiyi hushed her with a “Shh” and said, “Come on, I’m taking you away.”

He reached out and took Mengdie’s hand. The moment they touched, the small, pitch-black eyes that had been like mere decorations suddenly flew wide open, and a new surge of memories flooded into Fang Zhiyi’s mind.

Xu Mengdie had not originally been called by that name. She was Xu Xiaoya. Unlike Fang Zhiyi, Xiaoya remembered her early childhood and knew she had a home. Her parents didn’t like her, but life had been tolerable.

Then came Widow Li. The widow promised to buy her a sugar-coated hawthorn stick—candied hawthorn on a skewer. Xiaoya had only ever seen others eating them. Tempted by greed, she followed the woman a short distance. By the time she realized what was happening, it was too late.

Widow Li, through a mix of threats and deceit, brought her home. The widow taught her many things, especially how to serve men. Xiaoya dared not refuse. Whenever she showed reluctance, the widow would beat her back with an impossibly thin bamboo rod. She was just a child—how could she fight back?

She had no friends. Apart from Widow Li, the person she saw most was Gousheng. But Gousheng was always simple-minded. She once asked him if he had a home, but he just scratched his head and said he couldn’t remember.

She had learned many new characters and wanted to give Gousheng a proper name, but before she could do it, she was taken away by Young Master Gao.

She thought she had escaped a den of wolves, only to walk into a tiger’s lair. They simply wanted to use her to curry favor with Governor Huang. And when she was shoved into the bridal sedan chair, Xu Xiaoya mustered the courage to make her first real choice in life.

When Governor Huang gleefully lifted the sedan curtain, what he saw was a young girl covered in blood. She had slashed her own face with a thin bamboo shard.

The Huang household erupted in chaos. Young Master Gao was cursed out harshly.

Xu Xiaoya thought that would be enough. What she didn’t expect was that Gao, furious after being scolded, ordered her tendons in her hands and feet cut, and then had her thrown into the wilderness to die.

Yet Xu Xiaoya survived. Relying on fragmented memories, she searched for her home.

She found it. But from the villagers, she learned that not long ago, a woman had led several burly men to beat her parents. Her father collapsed that same day and didn’t make it through the night. Her mother jumped into the river the next day.

Xu Xiaoya’s eyes were full of hatred, but she could do nothing.

Until she met an old beggar. The old beggar wandered everywhere and possessed a sinister repertoire of tricks.

He harbored no good intentions either. But Xu Xiaoya, consumed by vengeance, with a heart twisted like a venomous snake, turned the tables: when the old beggar tried to sacrifice her, she killed him instead.

From then on, Xu Xiaoya ceased to exist. In her place was a notorious sorceress.

Xu Xiaoya vowed to slaughter all those people. But before she took action, she encountered a cultivator named Zhou Lian. Zhou Lian was then still green and naïve, bearing goodwill toward everyone—a trait that got him badly swindled by some street thugs.

Xu Xiaoya, watching from the sidelines, couldn’t stand it and secretly helped him out, albeit with ruthless methods. That same day, the thugs’ skin began to rot. They wailed all night and died in terror.

She thought nothing of it, still high on the thrill of punishing evildoers. But as she was about to leave, Zhou Lian blocked her path.

It turned out that Zhou Lian came from a prestigious family. Since childhood, an immortal had visited his home and taken him on as a nominal disciple. He had clearly seen through Xu Xiaoya’s methods. What she hadn’t expected, though, was that Zhou Lian hadn’t come to thank her. Instead, he solemnly accused her of disregarding human life.

“Heaven is watching. Those people did wrong, and they’d get their retribution in time. You have no right to decide life and death on your own—that’s wrong!”

Xu Xiaoya stared at the impassioned Zhou Lian, wanting to mock him. But in the end, she said nothing and simply walked away.

She thought to herself that at least Zhou Lian was a good man.

Yet fate seemed to tie them together. They kept running into each other. She saved Zhou Lian; he saved her. An unspoken bond began to form—until the day she found Widow Li.

By then, Widow Li had used her connection with the Gao family to open a brothel. Xu Xiaoya knew it was Widow Li who had led her parents’ attackers to them. She wanted Widow Li dead. As she killed her, Zhou Lian rushed in. Seeing Widow Li’s gruesome end, he began to accuse Xu Xiaoya again—the same spiel about heaven watching.

“If heaven really had eyes, why did they have to live like that?” It was the first time Xu Xiaoya had ever argued back. She pointed at the underage girls in the brothel. Zhou Lian just frowned. “Xiaoya, you’re a cultivator. You shouldn’t meddle in mortal affairs…”

At that moment, Xu Xiaoya understood: she could never walk the same path as Zhou Lian.

With Widow Li dead, they went their separate ways.

Young Master Gao had bought himself a court official’s post. How could she bear to watch the murderer of her parents live so comfortably?

She gave her own flesh, her own hair, her own life as a price to cast curse after curse, determined to wipe out the entire Gao family. But what stopped her in the end was Zhou Lian once more.

He stood atop a high ritual platform, denouncing her as a murderous evil cultivator.

Xu Xiaoya laughed. She tore off the face veil she always wore, revealing her hideous scars. She shouted out her entire past. Zhou Lian listened, frowning deeply.

“An eye for an eye will never end. The dead are already dead. Why can’t you let it go? If you can’t let go, you’ll never achieve the Great Dao! Xu Xiaoya, stop being so stubborn!”

Xu Xiaoya laughed bitterly. Zhou Lian was a good man—too bad he had never been there when she was suffering.

She knew her revenge could never be completed, because Zhou Lian had also summoned his master. The master’s face was utterly detached from worldly concerns—clearly an intimidatingly powerful figure.

Fang Zhiyi suddenly let go of her hand, squinting as he looked at the girl before him.

Xu Xiaoya stared back at Fang Zhiyi with wide eyes.

After a long moment, Fang Zhiyi asked, “Are you coming with me?”

“Ah? Okay.” Xu Xiaoya clutched tightly at Fang Zhiyi’s sleeve, still that frightened little girl.

“Xiaoxiaohei, is she a transmigrator?”

Xiaoxiaohei’s eyes flickered a few times. “No,” it said, then added, “There are no transmigrators in this world.”

Fang Zhiyi froze for a moment, then smiled and shook his head. “That Xiaoxiaohei…” He knew Xiaoxiaohei was worried he couldn’t handle it, so it had deliberately picked a world with no other transmigrators.

But that was fine. After all the chaos of the previous worlds, that thing must have grown wary. The system he’d encountered in the last world was quite unusual. Playing a game of “harass the enemy when they’re tired, retreat when they advance” was still a good strategy.