At that time, the purple-clad young man stood over Zhuang Wei, looking down with arrogant bearing and a trace of impatience in his eyes. “How foolish. Aren’t you going to get up?”
Zhuang Wei was taken aback. Only then did he notice a refreshing current circulating through his body and a faint medicinal fragrance lingering on his lips and tongue. He understood that this man must have given him a pill. His spiritual energy had also been restored to abundance.
The young man had indeed saved him, and had even helped him recover from most of his injuries.
Zhuang Wei subsequently learned that the man’s name was Yuezheng Hezhi. Although his temper was far from gentle and he rarely said anything pleasant, for some reason he kept Zhuang Wei at his side and protected him throughout their journey.
Only then did Zhuang Wei discover that the spatial rift led to a small secret realm within the Upper Three Thousand’s Qianyuan Great World. Yuezheng Hezhi had been traveling outside his sect and happened upon the place. Seeing that a demon beast was about to kill Zhuang Wei, he had intervened to save him.
Because of this, Zhuang Wei believed that beneath the man’s cold exterior was a kind heart. Compared with those he had met in the small world and the Qingyun Great World, Yuezheng Hezhi seemed a hundred times more upright.
Thus Zhuang Wei continued traveling beside Yuezheng Hezhi, watching him slaughter countless demon beasts. Even creatures whose sheer presence could overwhelm Zhuang Wei were often dispatched by Yuezheng Hezhi’s techniques within only a few exchanges.
Gradually Zhuang Wei came to realize that the man’s cultivation must have reached a realm beyond anything he could imagine. Its pressure exceeded even that of the Nascent Soul ancestors he had occasionally seen passing overhead.
Imagining the two of them together, Xu Ziqing smiled faintly. “And so, Brother Zhuang, you followed Palace Master Yuezheng all the way to the present?”
Zhuang Wei smiled. “There were a few more developments along the way.”
A debt for saving one’s life was as heavy as a mountain. Zhuang Wei’s cultivation was too low for him to repay it through strength, so he sought other ways to be useful. He attended carefully to every task within his abilities.
As time passed, he became increasingly attentive to Yuezheng Hezhi, and this attentiveness unexpectedly gave rise to a feeling of familiarity.
In particular, when Yuezheng Hezhi grew dissatisfied with his slow, deliberate manner, he would occasionally give him instruction. Though his explanations were not always detailed, they were nevertheless quite conscientious. Whenever he grew impatient, however, he invariably called Zhuang Wei “foolish.” In those moments, the sight of the purple-clad figure brought memories of childhood drifting back into Zhuang Wei’s mind.
Over the long years, those memories had gradually faded into scattered images and a distant sense of warmth. Yet as the days passed, they became clear again.
The young Miss Ziluo’s every smile, expression, and movement seemed to overlap with those of this man.
The thought both frightened Zhuang Wei and made him feel that he had shown his benefactor disrespect.
His benefactor was a man, while Miss Ziluo had been a girl. How could he possibly mistake them for one another?
Yet their mannerisms, tone of voice, and even the impatient rebuke “foolish” left him utterly confused.
As Zhuang Wei spoke, he seemed to find the memory very amusing. His expression grew more cheerful and his smile deepened.
Xu Ziqing asked, “Then… Palace Master Yuezheng was the Miss Ziluo you cherished all those years ago?”
As he said this, he could not help glancing at his senior brother.
In the past, he might have been bewildered. But after his senior brother’s primordial spirit had been reborn in another body and his heavenly soul had left his body, Xu Ziqing could make an educated guess.
It was similar to what had happened to Yun Lie. For some reason, Yuezheng Hezhi must have entrusted his primordial spirit to the body of the young Xu Ziluo, and thus the person who had spent time with Zhuang Wei had actually been Yuezheng Hezhi. Later, Yuezheng Hezhi had departed for reasons unknown, leaving behind the original Xu Ziluo, who was naturally no longer the Miss Ziluo Zhuang Wei remembered.
Limited by his knowledge of the small world, Zhuang Wei could not have understood such a strange possibility. He had simply assumed that Xu Ziluo had forgotten him and undergone a great change of temperament as she grew older.
Although this mistake had caused him immense suffering, one blessing remained: he had mistaken the person’s identity, but he had not given his heart to the wrong person.
Sure enough, Zhuang Wei explained what had happened afterward.
Distracted by his confusion, he continued traveling with Yuezheng Hezhi for many days until it was time for Yuezheng Hezhi to leave.
Only then did Yuezheng Hezhi ask, “It’s been many years. Would you rather cultivate alone, or come back with me and be my book attendant again?”
To Zhuang Wei, the words struck like a thunderbolt. Still dazed, he followed the man back to the ice palace.
Xu Ziqing laughed delightedly. “Palace Master Yuezheng is certainly interesting! He must have recognized you long before, yet kept you in the dark, only to drop that thunderbolt on you at the end. No wonder you were frightened!”
Zhuang Wei looked both amused and exasperated. “I asked Hezhi about it afterward. He said he’d recognized my aura, which was why he saved me. He assumed I would recognize him too, but when I never asked even after he’d finished his travels, he decided to startle me as punishment.”
There was also a story behind why Yuezheng Hezhi’s primordial spirit had entered Xu Ziluo’s body.
Yuezheng Hezhi had been born to two ordinary disciples of the Ice Palace who married each other. Although both parents possessed only middling aptitude, their child was born with a single mutated ice-attributed spiritual root. Ordinary water-spiritual-root cultivators could practice the palace’s methods, but an ice spiritual root was naturally the ideal aptitude.
An ice spiritual root was by no means commonplace. Even a single mutated root among two or three spiritual roots was rare, let alone a pure single ice root. The Palace Master of that generation calculated the child’s location, immediately brought him back, and accepted him as a direct disciple. It was the Palace Master himself who gave the child his name.
So highly valued, Yuezheng Hezhi had naturally grown up cherished and indulged. His talent and comprehension indeed surpassed those of his peers, and in little more than two hundred years, he had formed a Nascent Soul.
Yet this Young Palace Master, gifted in almost every possible respect, had one particularly serious flaw: an exceedingly violent temper.
As everyone knew, those who pursued immortality had to be patient. If meditation could last days, or even years, how could a person endure it without patience? At first, Yuezheng Hezhi’s extraordinary aptitude concealed the problem. But after forming his Nascent Soul, it began to interfere with his progress.
He practiced the Ice Palace’s finest cultivation method, the Ice-Yuan Great Enlightenment Record, a mid-grade Heaven-Rank art already among the foremost methods in the world. It was extremely compatible with his single ice spiritual root, allowing his cultivation to progress at tremendous speed.
Yet as its name suggested, ice-attributed cultivation methods placed particular emphasis on calm. Unfortunately, the person cultivating this one was impatient and easily angered.
Inevitably, not only did Yuezheng Hezhi encounter a bottleneck, but if he continued as before, heart demons would arise. He might never advance again, and could even fall to a lower realm.
The situation became extremely serious.
The Palace Master naturally could not bear to see his direct disciple ruined in this way. But Yuezheng Hezhi showed no concern at all and made no effort to control his temper. Eventually he could no longer concentrate. After meditating for only half a day, he would rise immediately and go looking for someone to fight.
Watching his disciple gradually lose control and approach the point of developing heart demons, the Palace Master flew into a rage. He seized Yuezheng Hezhi, forcibly drew out his primordial spirit, and placed it within a half-immortal artifact. He allowed the artifact to send the spirit into a small world so that the disciple could learn patience.
The half-immortal artifact was evidently remarkable. It delivered a tiny wisp of Yuezheng Hezhi’s primordial spirit to the lower world, where it attached itself to Xu Ziluo, a girl only seven or eight years old, and suppressed her own will.
Yuezheng Hezhi was a mighty Nascent Soul ancestor, a grown man nine chi tall. Now he had to live as a little girl. Worse, a restriction had been placed upon his primordial spirit, leaving him with no power at all. Trapped in a small, weak body, he had no choice but to forcefully suppress his temper lest his abnormal behavior be discovered and his life endangered.
Those days were truly unbearable for Yuezheng Hezhi.
Zhuang Wei’s gaze grew distant as he recalled the past. “When I first met Miss Ziluo that year, I was only a little beggar.”
Xu Ziqing’s expression changed slightly, and he listened more attentively.
Zhuang Wei had originally been born to a declining branch of a minor clan, the Zhuang family. That branch had few descendants and had long since fallen into obscurity, living much like ordinary farmers and knowing nothing of immortal cultivation. Before his father died, he gave Zhuang Wei a token and told him to seek refuge with the main family. Zhuang Wei set off alone, but his innocent disposition led others to cheat him of his money. After enduring numerous hardships, he nearly froze to death during a snowfall.
Yet he was fortunate. The place where he collapsed happened to be beside the Xu clan’s side gate.
Yuezheng Hezhi had been surrounded by ice and snow from birth. Whenever it snowed, he always wanted to go outside and enjoy it. But no one was willing to let a little girl go out alone, and he was often confined indoors. Even while controlling his temper, however, he was still someone who had spent his life in a lofty position. Why should he obey the words of a few low-ranking clan cultivators? As usual, he did as he pleased and slipped outside.
And so he happened upon Zhuang Wei.
Perhaps moved by a sudden moment of compassion, or perhaps simply bored by his prolonged lesson in patience, Yuezheng Hezhi checked Zhuang Wei’s pulse. Discovering that the boy possessed spiritual roots, he brought him inside and saved him.
Everything that followed happened just as Zhuang Wei remembered.
After being washed clean and given a hot meal, Zhuang Wei was no longer in danger. Grateful to the young girl who had rescued him, he abandoned the idea of seeking his own family’s main branch. Instead, he stayed as her book attendant and playmate.
Yuezheng Hezhi had little else to occupy his time and set Zhuang Wei to work. Zhuang Wei was so good-natured and accommodating that Yuezheng Hezhi found himself unable to grow angry with him. In his spare moments, he also taught Zhuang Wei to read and write.
This Young Palace Master had an extraordinary breadth of experience. Even in the body of a young girl, his bearing far surpassed ordinary people’s, and his conduct never resembled that of a child. To Zhuang Wei, a boy of only thirteen or fourteen, there was nothing about the young girl that was not admirable. He even found her temper endearing. Later, when he first awakened to love, no one else could occupy his heart.
Yuezheng Hezhi treated Zhuang Wei far better than he treated other people. The guidance he gave the boy would later prove of considerable help in his cultivation.
A little over a year passed. The Ice Palace Master decided that Yuezheng Hezhi had learned sufficient patience and resolved to summon him back.
Before departing, Yuezheng Hezhi only had time to order that Zhuang Wei be sent back to the main Zhuang clan. Then his primordial spirit was drawn away, and he never saw Zhuang Wei again.
Zhuang Wei was puzzled but obedient. He thought only of studying diligently so that he might one day repay Miss Ziluo. He did indeed cultivate with great determination. As it happened, the Zhuang clan had long been subordinate to the Xu clan, so his growing cultivation eventually earned him a place to train at the Xu clan’s main residence.
Later, Xu Ziluo of a branch family reached the appropriate age and was sent to the main clan. Zhuang Wei took care of her at every turn, leading to all the events that followed.