Qushan Town, Yun Family Manor.
The afternoon sun was especially fierce. Its rays struck the skin with a burning pain.
Yet on the martial training grounds, several dozen youths were practicing diligently.
Their upper bodies were bare and their skin bronze-colored. Their muscles stood out in thick cords, plainly containing abundant strength.
“Ha! Ha! Ha!”
The youths held horse stances, fists clenched, every punch raising a gust of wind.
A few particularly sturdy youths were still more formidable. Their punches seemed to produce faint, rumbling booms.
The youths’ sweat was hot as well, but their expressions were exceptionally resolute.
Every punch was fierce and forceful. Every youth was striving without pause.
Just then, a girl of eleven or twelve came carrying a basket. She had delicate skin and a petite figure, yet the basket in her hands was as large as a water vat.
As though it weighed nothing, she set it on the ground with a bright smile. “Time to eat!”
The youths immediately burst into activity. They drew back their fists and ran over, still streaming sweat. “Xiaoyu, what’s on the menu today?”
The girl laughed. “Uncle Cheng made it himself. You’re in for a treat!”
The food in the basket was soon distributed, leaving just one lonely portion inside.
The girl looked at it and frowned. “Tianheng didn’t come again?”
The youths were eating heartily. One replied, “He came, but he still couldn’t produce any force. He left before two hours had passed.”
She sighed. “He’s probably gone to the back mountain again. I’ll find him.”
The youths assented and let her go.
The girl’s name was Yun Tianyu. Famous among the present generation of Yun Family Manor for her beauty, she had cultivated the martial art taught to the manor’s women to the fifth level of Houtian and was an extraordinary favored daughter of the direct line.
Yet she was gentle by nature. After finishing her martial training each day, she personally delivered meals to the disciples practicing on the grounds. She was very popular throughout the manor.
The person she was looking for now was her younger brother by birth, Yun Tianheng.
Yun Tianheng was nine years old. Like the other children of the direct line, he practiced the ancestral Wind and Thunder Art. This technique was supremely forceful and yang in nature, and only men could practice it. Its cultivation was also extremely painful, requiring endurance beyond what ordinary people could bear. Once mastered, however, it enabled its practitioner to defeat experts of the same realm. It was an exceptionally powerful art. Cultivated to its pinnacle, it could even raise someone to the Xiantian realm, proving how precious it was.
Every child of the direct line began martial training at six. Within two years, most reached the Flesh-Refining stage. At this stage they could generate internal force within their meridians, laying the foundation for further tempering.
As a direct-line child of the “Tian” generation, Yun Tianheng had trained alongside the others. For some unknown reason, though, every child of his generation had produced internal force except him. However much suffering he endured, he could not sense the slightest trace. Over time, he had gradually begun avoiding his training.
The other disciples sympathized with him. Even the martial instructor who taught him turned a blind eye.
When Yun Tianyu discovered that her brother had evaded practice yet again, she could only pick up the remaining portion of food and go to the stream behind the mountain, where he often stayed.
But this time, she found nobody there.
Outside the courtyard of clan head Yun Zhenhai, a boy a little over six chi tall bent low and hurried along the shadows, stopping at a corner.
He suddenly crouched and leaped, catching hold of the top of the wall.
From where the boy perched, he could see a window of one of the rooms inside. He hid quietly beneath the shade of a large tree behind him and stared at that window for a long time without moving.
Around an hour later, seeing that it was nearly time for the others to eat, he quickly jumped down. Taking secluded paths, he reached a small valley outside the manor, nestled between two high mountains.
The boy was Yun Tianheng. Looking at the white mist spreading before him, he secretly drew a breath.
The mist of Misty Valley had appeared one day ten years earlier.
Before then, it had been a place where the Yun Family Manor children often played. Since the white mist appeared, however, no one had managed to enter the small valley.
Some experts had come to investigate, but none had discovered anything. Those who insisted on forcing their way through were injured at best and killed at worst.
In time, no one dared enter again.
Misty Valley had become forbidden ground.
Yun Tianheng hesitated, his eyes revealing conflicting feelings.
Deeply concealed inferiority lay in them, along with a quiet struggle and a trace of hope.
At length he pinched his fingers, then ran quickly into the mist.
He had gone only two or three zhang when he felt something coil around his waist.
Relief filled him. The same thing had happened yesterday. The more he struggled, the tighter it wound around him, but in the end he had never been harmed.
So he stopped moving and allowed it to carry him rapidly away.
With several rushing whooshes of wind past his ears, Yun Tianheng was set down.
Standing securely, he called hesitantly, “Senior… Senior?”
A very gentle voice came from ahead. “Tianheng, you’re here.”
Yun Tianheng immediately answered respectfully, “Yes, Senior.” He paused. “I’ve brought the information you wanted.”
The next instant, a light appeared ahead of him.
The mist that had surrounded him dispersed entirely, leaving a clear path.
At the end of the path stood a bamboo cottage.
Yun Tianheng pushed open the door. Directly opposite him, someone dressed in green sat cross-legged upon a couch.
It was an elegant, handsome young man, looking over at him with a mild expression.
The young man smiled faintly. “Sit.”
Yun Tianheng sat down somewhat stiffly. “I found the person you asked me to look for yesterday.”
A flicker crossed the young man’s expression. “Oh?”
Yun Tianheng explained, “Seven boys were born in the same year as me, in months close to mine. Six of them are ordinary people of Yun Family Manor, nothing special. Only my eldest uncle’s first son, Yun Tiangang, is rather unusual.”
The young man tilted his head, listening attentively.
Yun Tianheng’s nervousness eased a little, and he continued, “Cousin Tiangang was very weak when he was born. Even a breeze was too much for him. Eldest Uncle specially invited a famous physician to nurse him back to health, and he gradually improved a little. Even so, Cousin Tiangang can’t practice the Wind and Thunder Art like the rest of us, and he almost never appears outside.” He thought for a moment and added, “Even I only see him once a year, at the family banquet. I only know that his skin is extremely pale, unlike any of ours, and that he’s cold and distant by nature. Everyone says it’s because he can’t practice martial arts.”
After listening, the young man finally nodded. “Then it should be him.”
Yun Tianheng closed his mouth, not daring to ask more.
Yesterday, his frustration had driven him away from the manor. Without noticing where he was going, he had reached Misty Valley. Then it seemed he heard someone calling him. He entered the valley, was brought to this bamboo cottage, and met the young man.
The young man had asked about the manor, chiefly about the boys born nine years ago. Yun Tianheng had no idea why he was asking, and he knew little about them himself. He had given a few careless answers and intended to return to report the matter to his uncle, the clan head. But the young man touched a finger to his forehead, after which he could no longer tell anyone what had happened.
Naturally, Yun Tianheng was frightened. The young man, however, said he meant him no harm. He even offered to teach Yun Tianheng martial arts if the boy would investigate more thoroughly and come back with an answer.
Quite naturally, Yun Tianheng was tempted.
He had quickly gathered some information today. After struggling with himself for quite a while, he had finally returned.
The young man was, of course, Xu Ziqing.
Ten years earlier, Xu Ziqing and his senior brother Yun Lie had agreed to marry and were returning to their sect for the wedding. On the way, however, Patriarch Ultimate Bliss and his lover intercepted them. Yun Lie was grievously injured and brought to the brink of death, most of his primordial spirit shattered. He had no choice but to send his primordial spirit to be reborn, using the innate qi of gestation to recover.
At that time, Nan Zhengya performed a divination and learned that a child being conceived at Yun Family Manor in the Hengwu Small World would be most compatible with Yun Lie’s primordial spirit. He employed his methods to send the spirit onto the path of rebirth. But the art was so mysterious that although both men knew Yun Lie had successfully been reborn, they did not know exactly whose body he had entered.
Xu Ziqing soon parted from Nan Zhengya. Nan Zhengya concealed his trail, and Xu Ziqing relied on his own strength to force his way through the Dragon Ascension Gate, finally reaching the Hengwu Small World.
Despite the relatively weak laws governing this small world, the Dragon Ascension Gate put him through considerable hardship. Xu Ziqing had already shaken his foundation by attempting a forced breakthrough. After passing through the gate, his injuries worsened severely. He barely managed to reach the outskirts of Yun Family Manor before being compelled to remain in the valley to recuperate.
A shaken cultivation foundation was no trivial matter. Knowing that his senior brother would live, Xu Ziqing would certainly not abandon hope. Nor would he allow his own essence to remain damaged, lest he fall too far behind Yun Lie when he returned. So he settled down, arranged a formation around the valley, and devoted himself to recovery.
Ten years passed in this fashion. Xu Ziqing’s foundation slowly became stable, and he was preparing to leave the valley to search for his senior brother.
Just then, a child wandered in. For reasons Xu Ziqing could not explain, he felt something stir within him. On an impulse, he summoned the boy.
After seeing Yun Tianheng, Xu Ziqing experienced another premonition.
He pressed a finger to Yun Tianheng’s brow and examined both his previous life and his present one.
What he saw startled him.
In his previous life, this Yun Tianheng had actually been someone Xu Ziqing knew. He had shared some entanglements with Xu Ziqing, and with his senior brother as well.
He had been Dongli Zhao, a prince of the Kingdom of Chenghuang.
How strange. Dongli Zhao had clearly possessed an emperor’s destiny and should not have reincarnated so soon. It was his elder brother, Dongli Xi, who had been fated to die young.
Yet only thirty years had passed since their farewell. Had he already entered another life?
After examining matters carefully, Xu Ziqing vaguely sensed something more.
Dongli Zhao’s reincarnation here might well have something to do with the two senior and junior brothers.
Originally, he had been nothing more than a mortal prince. Meeting Xu Ziqing had given him an opportunity to encounter the immortal path. Had Xu Ziqing merely walked away, Dongli Zhao would never have yearned so deeply for the cultivation world, nor developed any ties with it. Instead, Xu Ziqing had helped him resolve a national crisis, awakening his desire to pursue immortality. That had created a karmic connection carried into his next life.
During those events, Yun Lie’s heavenly soul had resided in Xu Ziqing’s storage ring, and he had taught Dongli Zhao a little swordsmanship. That connection had drawn him into rebirth here as well.
Perhaps it was also so that Dongli Zhao, in his reincarnated body, could meet Xu Ziqing again.
Understanding this, Xu Ziqing naturally followed the will of Heaven.
Searching for his senior brother on his own might prove awkward because of the identity involved. With Yun Tianheng’s help, however, his approach would not seem out of place.
Thus, after discovering that Dongli Zhao possessed dual Wood and Earth spiritual roots, Xu Ziqing tempted Yun Tianheng with the promise of martial instruction and had him make this inquiry.
As expected, the information had come.
It seemed he would have to find an opportunity to go and see Yun Tiangang.