ATEG Chapter 68.2

Although people still found his appearance terrifying and ugly, they were no longer afraid of him. Even after drinking the bitter vine juice, they would come to the grass hut to see him.

Mutou opened his hand toward the child, and a small white flower bloomed in his palm. The child’s tender little hand reached onto his, touching it without any fear.

Mutou plucked the flower and placed it in the child’s hand, saying, “All done.”

The woman holding the child thanked him again and retreated to let the next person enter.

When the sky darkened and all those who came for detoxification had left, Mutou opened his palm. Another small white flower slowly bloomed, its petals gently trembling, transmitting a qin melody.

Mutou closed his eyes. On that pitch-black, terrifying face, a smile gradually appeared.

This was a white flower manifested through divine arts, which Ding Qin had given him when she came to visit him before. The qin music flowed like water—though temporarily low and constrained, the water’s momentum would not cease, and one day it could break through rock and alter shores. The end of the melody was expansive—heaven and earth were vast, and this was her blessing for him.

Mutou loved this qin piece. He was listening quietly when he suddenly opened his eyes and looked outside the hut.

Several more people had arrived outside. Leading them was that person who had previously run into the mountain wanting to be a well-fed ghost, named Meng Er. Following behind were several strangers he’d never seen before. Their bearing and clothing didn’t look like nearby villagers. When they saw Mutou, their expressions clearly showed they were startled, but they quickly composed themselves and showed no disrespectful attitudes.

Mutou dismissed the divine arts in his palm and asked Meng Er with a smile, “Didn’t you just come this morning? Why are you here again?”

“These people are searching for relatives nearby. When they heard you were here, they wanted to come ask for your help,” Meng Er said, pointing at the people following behind him.

Zhong Yongwang introduced himself and bowed to Mutou.

“I’m not skilled in this type of magic. Fortunately my memory is decent. If they’re people I’ve seen before, perhaps I can help. If I haven’t seen them…” Mutou shook his head.

“I dare not make demands,” Zhong Yongwang said politely. He took out a portrait. After Mutou looked at it, he had no impression of it.

Zhong Yongwang wasn’t disappointed either. The person in the portrait wasn’t actually a relative he was searching for, just a portrait of someone possibly connected to the rebels. His greater purpose on this trip was to have a conversation with this peculiar-looking cultivator before him, but Meng Er was still present.

Zhong Yongwang didn’t take his leave but directly redirected the conversation, “My matter is already settled. Brother Meng Er also has something to consult you about.”

Mutou shifted his gaze to Meng Er.

“I’d like to ask you about something,” Meng Er said, not concerned about Zhong Yongwang and the others being present on the side. What he wanted to ask wasn’t anything secret. “This morning, my sister brought her child back from the neighboring village. She said some strangers arrived in the neighboring village these past two days. Those people told them that as long as they believed in some sect, they’d have food to eat. What do you think—is this matter reliable?”

Hearing this, Zhong Yongwang couldn’t help but pay close attention. He was investigating the forces secretly inciting and organizing rebel armies. Sects like this that appeared during natural disasters and enticed common people with food usually had unspeakable ambitions and purposes.

Mutou had never experienced such matters. He paused, then asked, “What else did they say? What sect is it?”

Meng Er recalled as he spoke, “They said their sect leader was for rescuing suffering beings from disaster… what was it again? The title was too long and my sister didn’t remember. She did remember the sect’s name though—said it’s called Xuanqing Sect. Immortal, do you know about this sect? Are they reliable?”

Zhong Yongwang’s expression couldn’t help but change. With his official position in Lu Kingdom, he had access to certain secrets. After the Taiwu County incident, while the Divine Court investigated, Lu Kingdom had also been busy. Among the results they obtained was the name “Xuanqing Sect.”

After hearing this name, Mutou froze. He sat there in a daze, not noticing Zhong Yongwang’s change, murmuring repeatedly, “…Xuanqing Sect?”

“It should be that name. Do you know them?” Meng Er asked.

But Ye didn’t answer. This name gave him a strange sense of familiarity. Yet since his birth, he had never left this great mountain and had never encountered any sects.

This sense of familiarity came from the remnant soul in those bones within the Soul-Breath Vine.

Who was he? What connection did he have with Xuanqing Sect? And what sect was Xuanqing Sect?

“…Immortal? Immortal?”

Mutou came back to his senses and urgently asked, “What else did they say? What’s the situation with Xuanqing Sect?”

“I didn’t pay attention. If you want to know, shall I help you inquire?” the person asked tentatively.

Mutou nodded, then suddenly paused and said, “I’m not clear whether they’re good or bad. You… be careful.”

The person patted his chest in assurance, “Don’t worry!”

Zhong Yongwang noticed Mutou’s reaction. He suggested without revealing his thoughts, “I can help as well.”

Mutou hesitated, then nodded his thanks, “Thank you for the trouble.”

He gave a few more instructions. After everyone left, Mutou slowly bent down and held his head.

Xuanqing Sect… Xuanqing Sect…

Something was appearing in his mind, but it was blurred into mottled patches of color. Some sounds were chanting endlessly in his mind, but they overlapped into indistinguishable noise.

He had never known what he was, why he had been trapped in the mountain’s belly, why he had to endure such suffering. But then he met the deity. The deity helped him find the bones in the vine coffin.

He had inherited the remnant soul of those bones.

Who was he?

Mutou breathed with difficulty, enduring the pain, struggling to grasp one phrase from all that noise:

…Xuanming Netherworld, clearing and correcting causality…

…..

…The world has a Netherworld, judging causality. Nine springs and nine hells, determining sin and cleansing karma. Grievances and sorrows have recourse, good and evil find their results…

An ethereal sacrificial song arose.

Within the vast fog, the deity followed the song forward and descended into another memory fragment.

This was the first sacrifice when Xuanqing Sect was established. The worshippers sang ancient and vast sacrificial songs, their devout heart-thoughts rising gently with the incense smoke.

No one could see the deity, but the deity had already descended upon the altar. His gaze fell upon the beings bowing below the altar.

Among them were not only mortals but also beasts born with spiritual essence, beasts born with divine abilities, cultivators of different attainments and different paths, and even spirits who had already lost their physical bodies and become ghosts.

Beings of different races gathered together because of a common heart-thoughts. Using faith as the connection, those above giving guidance and those below following—this was called a sect.

Believing in the Xuanming Netherworld, holding clarity and justice in causality as their heart-thoughts, hence the name Xuanqing.

The heart-thoughts of the worshippers were pure and firm. It fell into the deity’s palm, combined with that vast divine power, guided by the deity’s will, and transformed into the illusory form of the Netherworld. Through thousands and ten thousands of years, or perhaps even longer, one day this world would no longer have grievances born from severed causality. Causality would finally treat all things justly.

The name of Xuanqing Sect spread throughout the world. Because the deity’s lifespan was endless, its existence also continued for long ages. The illusory Netherworld became increasingly solid under the deity’s power and the heart-thoughts of all beings.

The deity held the seemingly real yet illusory Netherworld in his left palm, his right fingertips holding the jade-white bone-like brush, the brush shaft trembling gently.

This brush, made from the deity’s finger bone as its body and the causality of all beings as its bristles, after being washed by countless heart-thoughts through long ages, had given birth to its own spiritual essence.

The deity looked at the brush in his palm. Whether or not it possessed spiritual essence made no difference to the deity. He could also erase the spiritual essence within the brush, but what need was there?

“Speaking of which… I seem to have never given you a name,” the deity said, his fingertip gently tapping the brush shaft. The brush affectionately nuzzled his palm.

“Let’s call you the Destiny-Reconding Brush.”

…

Days rose and moons set, seas transformed into mulberry fields. As long as the deity existed, Xuanqing Sect existed. The vow power of all beings accumulated grain by grain into mountains. The Destiny-Reconding Brush bore the complex heart-thoughts within. After ages unknown, the Netherworld in the deity’s palm was finally completed.

A trace of a smile appeared on the deity’s face. Next, he only needed to connect this Netherworld to heaven and earth, making it become part of heaven and earth, and it would be accomplished.

He opened his left hand, revealing the Netherworld protected in his palm. Under the deity’s vast will, it emanated a marvelous rhythm, gradually merging with heaven and earth…

Boom.

Heaven and earth suddenly trembled.

No, not heaven and earth, but rather this world—this small world of dream memories—suddenly trembled.

The memory was interrupted. The deity suddenly paused.

The white fog trembled. The world in the dream gradually shattered and collapsed. The deity looked around—the river water froze, flying birds halted, and heaven and earth seemed to suddenly pause into a scroll painting that was beginning to shatter from its edges. Even the rhythm of the Netherworld in his hand and the trembling of the Destiny-Reconding Brush had stilled. Only he remained real.

Where the scroll’s edges shattered, dangerous chaos was revealed, contending with the power of the white fog.

To resist that dangerous force shattering the dream, the thick fog enveloping the entire dream gathered toward the edges. The fog in the center of the world dissipated, revealing the essence of the dream.

This was not reality. The deity’s confused consciousness suddenly awakened.

What he had experienced was merely distant memory, the past that had long since occurred and could not be changed.

He was experiencing all this in the identity of the deity, but who was the deity?

He raised his hand to press below his left eye. That place burned with alarming pain.

Heavy and chaotic memories churned endlessly in his consciousness, producing profound suffering.

Why had he appeared here?

Who was he?