Nightfall

Yu Lian jumped off Peach Mountain and darted north. She had to pass the small town.

Right then, the Butcher was randomly chopping around, while Jun Mo looked pale and was staring blankly at the north. Then he saw the yellow dress.

Like the others from the Academy who were currently on the plateau, Jun Mo knew that she had a thing for him. It further proved that the Eldest Brother must be in danger in the north. Silently he sat back onto the snowy ground.

If she could change the result, she herself would be enough. No one else could catch up with her. If she could not, she’d better go alone. Because when she mourned she would rather not be seen.

Jun Mo thought so. Not even to be seen by him.

…

…

Yu Lian kept darting. Her embroidered shoes were worn out. Her charming feet smashed the remaining snow and mud and quaked the earth. Her yellow dress fluttered like a yellow but not falling leaf. Because it was not a dying leaf in deep autumn. It was rather a premature and vital leaf in early spring.

She passed through the fields of the West-Hill Divine Kingdom and the hills outside Linkang in the South Jin. The yellow dress flashed in the reed marshes and went out hundreds of miles in a few seconds. She kept toward the north.

The yellow dress passed by the slightly chilling Great Swamp, pierced through the freezing wind and mist, as well as the mist over her own life. Her bare feet stepped onto the rippling lake and left some everlasting marks.

Yu Lian was determined to go across the tens of thousands of miles to the north to make sure he was fine.

…

…

“Impressively fast.” The Abbey Dean looked at somewhere in the south and sighed. Then he turned to the heart of the collapsed cliffs and said, “But you know she could never surpass me.”

Yu Lian could cross a few miles in a single step. No one could be faster than her in the human world. But even though the Drunkard was dead, there were the Abbey Dean and the Eldest Brother who were Distanceless. These cultivators could no longer be defined as being fast.

The Eldest Brother sat on the rubble, stained in blood and looked pale. Previously he had been holding the cudgel in front of his face. Now it was placed by his side.

Obviously he was defeated. He could no longer lift the cudgel. Nor could he keep the Abbey Dean any longer in the chilling snow peaks far away from the human world.

It was not even halfway through the seven days he mentioned at the beginning. But the Eldest Brother was not frustrated at all. He was as calm as always.

The Abbey Dean ranked the first in the world, and he ranked second. It was a matter of fact for a second ranking to be defeated by the first. The Academy had always emphasized the matter of fact. Therefore they never regretted nor enraged.

“Haotian is back to Chang’an. The Academy is at the West-Hill… You used to say a just cause would gain great support… Now it seems we are the true just cause.” The Eldest Brother looked at the Abbey Dean and said, “In Jun Mo’s words, what is Tao? Tao is reason. We have every reason. Then why shouldn’t we win?”

“There are various reasons and we have different stands. The Academy’s reasons are not necessarily right. And my reasons might not be accepted by all. Therefore, nothing is definite.”

The Abbey Dean stared calmly at him and continued, “As for Haotian, although she returned to Chang’an with Ning Que, you should know clearly that it doesn’t necessarily mean I am wrong.”

He said this to the Eldest Brother previously and made him worried. Because even if Chang’an could protect Ning Que, it might not be able to protect Sangsang. Could that be because of the Seven Volumes of Arcane Tomes?

“Before I left Peach Mountain, I already realized that Taoism and the Academy actually shared the same goal. Why is that? Because every human being is a collection of social connections. Therefore the world is a collection of everyone’s consciousness. How people think leads to the formation of the world. That was how Haotian was created.”

The Abbey Dean looked at him and continued, “You, the Academy, regard yourself as the representative of the will of the majority. While I think I represent the benefit of the majority.”

The Eldest Brother asked, “Don’t human beings deserve to make their own decisions?”

The Abbey Dean said, “Not exactly. Human beings have no idea what they really want.”

The Eldest Brother disagreed. “So you think you could impose your own will onto them?”

The Abbey Dean asked, “How would parents teach their children?”

The Eldest Brother said, “But we are no parents to the human beings. You know it. Besides, who would ever want an extra pair of parents to tell them what to do?”

The Abbey Dean said, “I love the people, no matter whether they love me.”

The Eldest Brother paused for a long while then said, “I am not sure whether we and our Headmaster are right. But I am certain that you are wrong.”

“Probably.”

The Abbey Dean sensed the quake coming from the south and knew that the girl in the yellow dress was approaching. He turned to head downward, and almost disappeared in a blink.

The Eldest Brother looked at his receding figure and said, “I’m still alive.”

The unwitnessed fight was over. The winner was obviously the Abbey Dean. But he would not kill the Eldest Brother. Why?

The Abbey Dean smiled silently. And the Eldest Brother got it.

Someone who sought for eternity must be afraid of loneliness. The one least willing to kill the second must be the first. To live an endless or eternal life, it was most important to have some company. In other words, they needed someone that could understand them.

It was likewise for the Drunkard and the Butcher. The Abbey Dean insisted that he was right. Then he wanted to prove it to someone. But to whom? Who would be qualified? Of course it could only be Li Manman.

“In fact you should know that I came here mainly for the Bright Volume.”

To kill Sangsang was important for the Abbey Dean. But in order to seize her divine character, it was obviously more important to collect the Seven Volumes of Arcane Tomes.

Taoism had kept six volumes of the Arcane Tomes. The seventh had been in the Academy with the Eldest Brother. If the Abbey Dean wanted to gather the Seven Volumes of Arcane Tomes, he had to conquer him.

The Eldest Brother said, “Right. Therefore I don’t have the Bright Volume with me.”

At the beginning of the fight he knew he would lose to the Abbey Dean. If he had carried the Bright Volume with him, it would almost be like presenting it to the enemy himself.

The Abbey Dean said, “It doesn’t matter. Because you are as important as the Arcane Tome… As long as you are defeated, who else in the world could keep me away from the Bright Volume?”

…

…

The meadow in the front yard of the Academy was still fresh and green in deep winter. Those peach trees that were moved from Peach Mountain were blooming as if they had become the cold-resistant winter sweets. Or was it because they were welcoming its former master?

The indigo gown swayed in the breeze and the Abbey Dean arrived at the Academy. He proceeded inside.

No one could stop him.

The female math professor who was wearing a loose indigo gown and sweeping the courtyard fell onto the ground. Professor Huang He was still recovering and could not move much.

The Cloud Gathering Array was broken through with no efforts.

The Abbey Dean came to the plateau on the Back Hill of the Academy. There was no old cattle, white goose, or waterwheel on the brook. There was only a tranquil lake and the houses scattered in the woods by the lake, secluded and uninhabited.

He stood quietly by the lake and pondered for a long while. He had never been to the Back Hill of the Academy. It meant a lot to him. Then he left for the Arcane Tome. There was a place in the Academy where they kept the largest collection of books. That was the cave. The Abbey Dean came to the cave and realized that there was someone else in the Back Hill of the Academy. There was a Bookman.

…