“A-Rong…” Wenren Li carefully cradled the phoenix egg, which was only the size of his palm. His heartbeat sped and slowed uncontrollably.
He was certain this was Chen Yixin, yet never had he been so desperate for some response from him. Only Chen Yixin answering him could put Wenren Li at ease and make him truly believe that they had found each other again.
But in the Sea of Ice Extremity of the Upper Realm, even Chen Yixin’s divine soul had nearly frozen solid. The Wheel of Reincarnation and Wenren Li had both played decisive roles in successfully drawing him here, and for the moment his divine soul still could not awaken immediately.
Wenren Li held the phoenix egg like that for a very, very long time. Only when all eighty-one Soul-Gathering Lamps had gone out and Han Zichuan and the others waiting below Shuanghe Mountain approached did he gradually return to himself.
“Prepare a quiet chamber for me here on Shuanghe Mountain,” Wenren Li ordered before Han Zichuan could ask anything.
“Yes.” Han Zichuan nodded. When he looked over, he could still see only Wenren Li’s back. Beyond that, he sensed no other aura whatsoever. He still had no idea whether the rite had truly succeeded, and his heart remained suspended in uncertainty.
Han Zichuan left and ordered disciples to quickly build a small one-room residence halfway up Shuanghe Mountain. Time was short, so they could not make everything perfect, but it was more than sufficient for the quiet chamber Wenren Li had requested.
“Demon Lord, please come with me. The quiet chamber is ready.”
Han Zichuan lifted his gaze as he spoke and saw Wenren Li walking toward him. The icy-blue phoenix egg in Wenren Li’s arms immediately caught his eye, and a smile unconsciously appeared at the corner of his mouth.
At last, Taixuan’s final hope had been preserved.
“If the Demon Lord requires anything at all, please say so. Everyone in the Tianji Sect will cooperate to the best of our ability.”
Wenren Li gave a slight nod and went directly into the residence. Han Zichuan seemed to want another few looks at their divine scion in phoenix-egg form, but Wenren Li shut the door before he could. A barrier appeared at the same time, completely cutting off any possibility of Han Zichuan peeking inside.
Wenren Li walked to the bed and sat cross-legged with the phoenix egg in his arms. Once he had steadied his emotions, he began doing everything he could to help Chen Yixin awaken. The egg was cold enough to hurt his hands, yet the life force inside it was boundless.
As Wenren Li circulated his cultivation art with all his strength, a sentence suddenly flashed through his mind.
“This lifetime is not yet the time for it to be born. Even I cannot comprehend why…”
Wenren Li opened his eyes. Clear ripples moved through his silver irises, lending them an almost otherworldly quality. At that moment, the phoenix egg that had shown no reaction until now suddenly shifted in his arms, then bounced straight upward and struck him under the chin.
Wenren Li caught the phoenix egg while helplessly rubbing his chin. Not just anyone could withstand being rammed by the egg of a divine bird.
“A-Rong.” Wenren Li stroked the phoenix egg as its blue glow and freezing aura gradually receded. Unable to suppress his joy, he lowered his head and kissed it. “A-Rong came back.”
The phoenix egg settled under Wenren Li’s kiss, then rubbed from side to side a few times. A moment later, a childish voice sounded directly inside Wenren Li’s sea of consciousness.
“A-Li, why are you the only one here? Where are my Elder Brother Qingruo and Big Brother Lin Yu and everyone else? They promised they’d come take me home when I woke up this time. A-Li’s place is very nice, but I can’t let Big Brother Lin Yu move into Elder Brother Qingruo’s and my home that quickly…”
The childish voice continued chattering without pause. Aside from understanding that Chen Yixin was calling him A-Li, Wenren Li could barely make sense of anything else he was saying.
“Hmph. Don’t think I don’t know Big Brother Lin Yu wants to steal Elder Brother Qingruo from me. Of course, Sovereign A-Li, you’re very good too…”
“A-Rong…” Wenren Li frowned slightly, wondering whether passing through the Wheel of Reincarnation had disturbed Chen Yixin’s memories. “A-Rong, I am your A-Li, yes. But I am not any kind of Sovereign.”
“Ah! A-Li became mine?” Chen Yixin completely seized on the wrong point. His voice turned excited and a little shy. As a hopelessly brother-obsessed phoenix egg who had followed Qingruo everywhere, he had seen far too much to be treated like an ordinary egg simply because he had never hatched.
“A-Li became mine! Mine, mine… my A-Li!”
“Mm.” Wenren Li had no idea why this fact could make Chen Yixin so happy that he bounced around excitedly, but the cheerful tone gradually loosened the tension that had been gripping him.
“I’m not leaving anymore! I’m going to live in Yuxu Palace. I’ll keep watch over my A-Li. Nobody is allowed to steal him!”
After that childish yet domineering declaration, a pair of bright spiritual wings spread from the phoenix egg. He clung tightly around Wenren Li’s neck and rubbed himself frantically against him, then resumed his excited chatter.
“Mine. A-Li is mine. The strongest A-Li is mine. The A-Li who can beat Elder Brother and Big Brother Lin Yu is mine…”
Chen Yixin’s voice grew weaker and weaker, and his spiritual wings gradually faded. Before the egg could roll down, Wenren Li caught him. Holding the phoenix egg again, he carefully thought over everything Chen Yixin had just said.
“Did A-Rong mistake me for someone else? Who is Qingruo? Who is Lin Yu?”
The quiet-chamber door did not open again until half a month later. Wenren Li had already fed the phoenix egg a considerable number of precious things, but Chen Yixin seemed like a bottomless pit. Wenren Li could not even fill him up, much less get him to hatch.
“Let’s return to the Demon Palace first. I’ll try some other methods once we’re there.”
After feeding Chen Yixin more than half of the valuable things he carried, Wenren Li finally abandoned this most primitive approach. He emerged from the quiet chamber carrying Chen Yixin in phoenix-egg form. Before long, Han Zichuan and most of the Tianji Sect had gathered outside.
“We welcome the divine scion’s return.” Han Zichuan bowed slightly. Everyone except him knelt in greeting.
“I’ll have someone send your reward of thanks later.” Wenren Li swept his gaze across them, left those words behind, then disappeared from the palace on Shuanghe Mountain with Chen Yixin in his arms. Chen Yixin, whom they had all come to welcome, likewise had no interest in paying them much attention. He had already begun to sense that something was wrong.
Even the aura of Heaven and Earth had changed, much less the difference between the Upper and Lower Realms. Wenren Li had not yet figured out how to ask Chen Yixin about it, while Chen Yixin himself became completely unlike the lively egg of the previous few days. Until they reached the Southern Territory, he remained silently curled in Wenren Li’s arms, a thoroughly melancholy phoenix egg.
“A-Rong, don’t worry. This is our home.” Wenren Li swept a hand forward. The hidden defensive grand formation that had been activated shortly after their departure dispersed, and Wu Fei and the others inside immediately came out to receive them.
“We welcome the Demon Lord’s return!”
“Rise.” Wenren Li waved a hand and went straight to the council hall to sit down. He gave Wu Fei and the others no opportunity to ask questions before issuing an order. “Reorganize the Demon Guards. Before long, you will follow this lord to campaign against the You Domain, and afterward we will unify the Southern Territory.”
“Yes!” Wu Fei, Ping Cheng, and the others answered several degrees louder than usual. Although Likui Demon Palace was effectively the uncrowned king of the Southern Territory, the territory was still divided among the Ten Demon Lords, each ruling independently. Whenever they confronted the righteous path, the various factions had never truly acted with one heart.
They also had the vague feeling that unifying the Southern Territory would only be the first step. Wenren Li’s ambitions likely went far beyond that.
But the furthest these people could imagine was the unification of Taixuan. At this moment, they could not yet conceive of the achievements that awaited them in the future.
Everyone else withdrew from the hall. Wu Fei and Ping Cheng lagged two steps behind, clearly still wanting to ask something. “The Demon Consort and Nan Ke and the others…”
“Nan Ke and the others should return within a few days. A-Rong is here.”
Wenren Li’s sleeve completely covered the phoenix egg, who had been almost excessively well-behaved these past few days. Only when Wenren Li lifted the sleeve did Wu Fei and Ping Cheng manage to steal a glance. Naturally they still had many questions, but asking even this one had already pushed the limits of what they dared. Nothing more came out.
They bowed and left. Only then did Wenren Li uncover Chen Yixin from beneath his sleeve.
“A-Rong, I don’t know who the Qingruo you’re talking about is, and I don’t know who Lin Yu is either. I am only Wenren Li, Demon Lord of Taixuan’s Southern Territory. I am not a Sovereign.”
But Chen Yixin still refused to give up. Clinging to Wenren Li’s hand, he quietly asked, “Then what about Uncle An Cheng?”
“I don’t know.” Wenren Li shook his head.
“Shu Wen? Tian Yun?… What about Da Bai, the immortal crane you kept in your back courtyard, and Hong Yu, the qilin?”
Naturally Wenren Li’s heart softened toward Chen Yixin like this, but he could not lie about these things, nor should he. “I don’t know.”
“What about Fairy Heng Le, who secretly liked you?” Chen Yixin sounded rather reluctant to ask this one, but he felt that if Wenren Li remembered anyone, surely it would be people like that.
“I don’t know.” Wenren Li shook his head as before.
“Then where did my Elder Brother Qingruo go? Did he elope with Big Brother Lin Yu and abandon me…?”
Wenren Li increasingly felt that the people Chen Yixin spoke of belonged beyond this present time and space. Yet he understood Chen Yixin’s feelings remarkably well. Wenren Li had lived for thirty thousand years, while the longest-lived cultivators in Taixuan survived only around three thousand. He had endured far too many deaths and departures.
“I want you.” Wenren Li gently stroked the phoenix egg, doing everything he could to soothe Chen Yixin. Only then did he begin telling him about their present: how they met more than a hundred years ago in the Fentian Nether Abode, the wedding they announced to the world ten years earlier, their sudden separation in the North Sea, their reunion, and then another separation.
Wenren Li told it all in his usual plain, straightforward way. By the time he finished, the red sun had already sunk beneath the horizon, while the phoenix egg in his arms had become completely absorbed in the story.
“So after I originally hatched, I married you, and now somebody has gone and turned me back into this…”
These bizarre, twisting experiences angered Chen Yixin enough to make him temporarily forget his sadness. His blue spiritual wings spread again and wrapped around Wenren Li’s arm. “A-Li, since we were already married, I won’t deny it.”
“I’ll fall in love with you again very soon!”
After saying this, Chen Yixin rubbed himself against Wenren Li again, then asked softly, “What about A-Li? Will A-Li dislike me and stop liking me because I forgot?”
“No.” Wenren Li still had some uncertainty over whether the “A-Li” in Chen Yixin’s memories truly referred to him, but words like these were nevertheless pleasing to hear. “I like A-Rong.”
“Mm.” The phoenix egg rubbed his way toward Wenren Li’s chest. When he accidentally pushed the collar open slightly, he immediately burrowed straight inside. “This place is nice. This is the tree I want to sleep in…”
Wenren Li covered the phoenix egg nestled very conspicuously against his chest. After a long while, a faint smile finally appeared on his face.
“It’s enough that you came back.” As long as Chen Yixin had returned, even if he had forgotten, the two of them could fall in love with each other all over again…
Still, falling in love with an egg was something that required a certain amount of technique.
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