Butterfly Rebirth

Some things, once past, may never return. Time can wear away every trace of what was once.

In years gone by, Xiao Chen and Yan Qingcheng had shared many stories. The seasons turned, the years flowed like water, and many old matters had gradually blurred.

Ahead, Yan Qingcheng moved with the grace of a peerless beauty, her ethereal steps light as lotus blossoms. Her face could topple kingdoms, stirring the hearts of countless deathless cultivators; those of weaker resolve felt a suffocating tightness in their chests.

For years, Xiao Chen had walked through blood and death. His experience made it difficult for him to be moved as easily as ordinary men. Now, facing Yan Qingcheng again, he could barely find the breathless astonishment of their first meeting. The subtle feelings he once harbored had slowly faded.

What consumed his thoughts now was survival and resistance.

The devastatingly beautiful Yan Qingcheng, clad in white robes like snow, approached like an immortal untouched by the mortal world. She looked at Xiao Chen and saw someone both familiar and alien—very different from the person she had once known.

"If it's convenient, walk with me for a while," Yan Qingcheng said softly, her voice like chimes.

Xiao Chen said nothing, only nodded and walked alongside her into a mountain range. Some cultivators nearby knew of the grudges and entanglements between them, but no one pried, and no one dared block their path.

Xiao Chen was no longer what he had been; he had dared to contend with Otherworld Ancestral Gods. Even the Hundred Races, who had once held grievances against him, now gave way and dared not provoke him.

In the distance, the snow-white beast Keke and the Golden Lion King clashed in a fierce battle—a pair of natural-born rivals.

They walked further and further, deep into the mountains, and for a long time neither spoke. At last, Yan Qingcheng said, "You are very different from before."

"People always change. Everyone is constantly changing, but sometimes we don't notice it ourselves. You are different too."

Yan Qingcheng nodded. "Yes. Each of us is composed of many different selves. Looking back along the path, at every fork stands a different figure."

Silence fell again. They walked in silence until they emerged from the mountain range onto a plain. Only then did Yan Qingcheng reveal a bewitching smile. "Let me reintroduce myself. My name is Yan Qingcheng."

Xiao Chen was startled. The woman before him felt very different—less real, more ethereal and elusive.

"What is this?"

"The Shatter Demon, Plant God—break the old self, shape a new one. Let the divine seed grow, let the demon body decline."

Yan Qingcheng was still smiling, beautiful as a holy flower, like an orchid with dewdrops rolling on its petals—ethereal and pure, a smile untainted by any impurity.

"You..." Xiao Chen's expression tightened.

"Let me reintroduce myself. I am Yan Qingcheng."

The woman before him, whose beauty could outshine the moon, spoke with a voice like celestial music, but Xiao Chen could not be moved.

"Is such a you still you?"

"It is me. A new self, sublimated according to my will. Cast off all of the past, begin anew. That is the true essence of the Shatter Demon, Plant God—ultimate sublimation."

"If you discard the past, how can you still be yourself?" Xiao Chen gazed at her.

"I have my choices. Whatever I am unwilling to recall, I cut away. Whatever I wish to keep, I keep. Everything is subject to my will. That is the wonder of the Shatter Demon, Plant God: to give oneself a chance, to forget what one does not wish to remember."

"So then, your reintroduction means ending everything between us from the past?"

Yan Qingcheng smiled radiantly. "Not quite. Right now I am using myself as the cauldron, which makes breakthrough very difficult and risky. I am first tempering my heart through you, cutting away the demon body of the past will make it easier. Of course, I am not using you as a cauldron; that relationship with you is over. I am using a shadow of you as a false cauldron, a starting point. Then I will use myself as the true cauldron for ultimate sublimation."

Hearing this, Xiao Chen nodded. "Can I help you in any way?"

"I very much want to return to the Nine Provinces and the World of Immortality, to walk the path I once trod. Only then can I truly break through and advance my cultivation."

"Very well. I was about to go to the Nine Provinces and the World of Immortality myself."

When Xiao Chen gave this answer, Yan Qingcheng nodded. But he seemed to hear a faint sigh. At his level of cultivation, only a sigh of the heart could escape his perception, so he was somewhat doubtful.

Back at the God Village, the battle between Keke and the Golden Lion King had already ended. The snow-white beast seemed to be the Lion King's natural nemesis, once again forcing him to taste defeat.

"Ya-ya! Yellow Fur, you are actually very strong, but you just can't compare with me."

Hearing Keke's consolation, the Golden Lion King nearly spat blood. He turned into a beam of golden light and fled.

The little beast scratched its head, looking confused as if it did not understand why its goodwill was unappreciated. It grumbled, "Next time I will defeat you even faster."

"Keke, cultivate well. When you reach the Half-Ancestor Ninth Heaven, you can receive the ultimate gift your parents left you."

"Mm!"

Keke nodded seriously, then yawned, rubbed her big eyes, and said, "I'm sleepy again. Going to cultivate." She wobbled toward the God Village.

The most diligent little beast. All the cultivators around were speechless.

The Nine Provinces remained as they had been—mountains and rivers still beautiful and majestic.

But returning again, Xiao Chen felt a strange sensation in his heart. All the cultivators had fled to the Death World; they were a defeated army. Coming back today, he always felt he had let down this ancient land.

Yan Qingcheng's journey was one of life review. They did not stay long in the Nine Provinces before entering the World of Immortality. In the Southern Wastes near the South Sea, the Undying Sect's hallowed ground stood deserted. After ten years of absence, cobwebs covered the windows and doorways—a scene of desolation.

Here Yan Qingcheng stood in silence for over ten days. Then they went to the Forbidden Sea. Dragon Island was no longer there. They walked across the sea and returned to the Nine Provinces, appearing on the Dragon Island that now lay overseas.

The trees were lush, but all the dragons had long since migrated away.

Tracing the path she had once walked, Yan Qingcheng moved in silence. Finally she sighed and said, "Eternal life may not be as happy as an ordinary life."

As she spoke, the left side of her crystalline, jade-like face developed a very strange crack, as if she were delicate porcelain.

Xiao Chen looked at her in surprise, but Yan Qingcheng said no more.

When they reached the Dragon Clan's Sacred Mountain, they circled it for a long time. At last, Yan Qingcheng asked Xiao Chen, "If we had not been enemies on Dragon Island back then, what would have happened later?"

"I don't know," Xiao Chen shook his head.

Hearing this, Yan Qingcheng seemed to give a soft sigh.

"Didn't you cut away everything related to me from your past?" Xiao Chen looked at her in astonishment.

"Just making conversation—and you took it seriously," Yan Qingcheng replied blandly, as if speaking of something that did not concern her. "I just want to break through in cultivation."

Xiao Chen felt that the Yan Qingcheng before him was very contradictory, inconsistent with what she had said earlier, but he could not press the matter.

"Let's go." Yan Qingcheng sighed, no longer lingering, and walked out of Dragon Island.

By the seaside, Yan Qingcheng pointed, and a towering ancient tree splintered into a wooden boat. She stepped onto the waves and descended onto the boat like a cold fairy.

"The last stretch of water," she murmured.

"This is not the South Sea of the World of Immortality, nor is there a Forbidden Sea or a King Ship here. Leaving Dragon Island from here is not the same stretch of water as before," Xiao Chen reminded her.

"The present is not the past. Now I am going to experience this stretch of water," Yan Qingcheng insisted, steering the boat.

"Very well." Xiao Chen stepped onto the wooden boat and headed for the Nine Provinces continent.

"The stronger a person becomes, does he forget more and more of the memories he should have?" Yan Qingcheng suddenly asked out of nowhere.

"Perhaps so." Xiao Chen was silent for a moment, then answered.

Since emerging into the world, he had always walked on the edge of death, even been shattered and utterly annihilated. Naturally, he had overlooked many ordinary things.

"Is this the price of your strength?" Yan Qingcheng suddenly turned, her beautiful eyes like still water, gazing at him. "To become as strong as an Ancestral God, do you have to forcefully cut away many thoughts? Even if not intentionally, do you become colder and more indifferent, even ruthless?"

Thinking back on everything he had experienced, Xiao Chen was silent. It was true. He had missed many things that ordinary people should experience. It was less an indifference and more a helplessness.

He had been almost constantly fighting bloody battles and struggling to survive. How could he have time for romance and moonlight, how could he have the mood to experience all kinds of emotions?

Now, with the looming confrontation with the Otherworld, how could he have time to savor the so-called myriad beauties of the world? In these desperate times, he was barely a significant combat force; naturally, he had no heart for a different life.

His personal feelings had long been cast aside. It was not his wish, but the constraints of the era.

Xiao Chen nodded without a word.

Seeing this, Yan Qingcheng suddenly smiled, but it seemed a little bitter. Then she bloomed fully, like a rare flower greeting the dawn—radiant, beautiful, and holy, making others feel unworthy.

"Crack."

At that moment, tiny fissures spread across Yan Qingcheng's entire face. Time seemed to freeze at that instant.

Resolutely and without a trace of lingering attachment, she shattered her self.

This beauty marked with wounds was profoundly stirring.

Xiao Chen's spirit jolted. Hastily, he reached out and pressed his hand against Yan Qingcheng, pouring out boundless divine power to rekindle her vitality.

Her immortal body, which had been nearly drained of life and on the verge of complete destruction, slowly began to pulse again with the rhythm of life.

Flecks of life-radiance blossomed. A crackling sound issued forth as Yan Qingcheng's body fractured like porcelain. In the next instant, a perfect, naked form emerged from the already peerless immortal body, transformed anew.

Celestial robes naturally draped over her. Like a dancing butterfly, she circled the wooden boat three times, revealing a brilliant smile.

"Thank you. Let me reintroduce myself. My name is Yan Qingcheng."

Hearing this, a wave of bitterness surged in Xiao Chen's heart. Perhaps he truly should not have answered as he had earlier. In the past, Yan Qingcheng had not cut away anything. But now, she had made a firm, decisive choice all on her own.

At this moment, she had transformed like a butterfly, light and ethereal, transcendent and peerless.

Although she was right before him, she felt very distant.

In that instant, Xiao Chen realized he could not quite let go. Despite his inner disappointment, he revealed a brilliant smile. "Good. Let me reintroduce myself. My name is Xiao Chen."

The two left the wooden boat and walked side by side across the waves. The golden morning light seemed to bathe them in a hazy, holy radiance as they slowly faded into the distance...

At that moment, on the coast of the Nine Provinces, a tall figure stood with his back to the vast ocean, as still as a heavenly stele. His left arm was the most solid and fearsome stone arm, perfectly fused with his flesh and blood.

"I have not emerged for three civilization eras. The Nine Provinces have not disappointed me. I sense the presence of a powerful one."

This tall figure, his back to the sea, spoke in a flat tone, but his words struck fear into the hearts of the four Otherworld Ancestral Gods standing respectfully at his side.