We Agreed On Experiencing Life, So Why Did You Immortals Become Real?

Chapter 669: Nothing More Than Ants

"Ningxi, where are you off to?"

Just as Ningxi had transformed into a stream of light and was flying downward toward the mortal world, a woman's voice reached her ears.

Ningxi slowed to a stop and turned to look. A woman dressed in light, gauzy clothing was walking toward her, step by unhurried step.

She went barefoot, her small white feet treading across the clouds with each step. Wherever her pale-pink soles lifted away, a delicate little footprint was left in the cloud's surface, only to be smoothed away again almost at once.

The rosy-edged cloud-silk draped over her shoulders slipped across skin smoother and softer than the clouds themselves, a white that seemed almost like warm jade, catching the sunlight in a faint glow. Dark hair poured like a waterfall down her smooth back, and she wound a loose strand around the tip of one finger, letting it coil there.

She lifted her head, her captivating eyes looking toward Ningxi with a softness like autumn water. Her golden irises held something that seemed sweet with warmth, touched at the edges with a kind of languid ease, like a white cat in the middle of a long yawn.

And the slight, teasing arch of her brows was the kind that, with a single glance, could set a heart trembling.

"Going to take a walk through the mortal world. Is there something the matter?"

Ningxi replied with her customary composure.

To Ningxi, who oversaw the great cycle of reincarnation, this divine spirit who commanded authority over "birth" and "love" was not someone she knew particularly well. Nor did she actively dislike her. Their relationship was ordinary, no more. It was simply that this particular divine spirit, whose name was Shengfei, had a tendency to come and trail after Ningxi.

"The mortal world? What are you going to the mortal world for?"

Shengfei's delicate pale-pink lips parted slightly, showing the gleam of fine teeth and a small, pretty tongue, her voice full of curious interest.

A divine spirit visiting the mortal world was nothing unusual in itself. What was unusual was Ningxi. Ningxi's entire existence was devoted to cultivation and closed retreat. The number of times she had visited the mortal world could be counted on one's fingers.

"My going to the mortal world has nothing to do with you, and I have no obligation to report to you. If you have something to say, say it." Ningxi replied without elaboration, in no mood to explain herself further.

"Honestly, you... you really are no fun at all. You're just as beautiful as I am, but your expression is always so severe. The way you are, not a single divine spirit will ever like you..."

Shengfei stepped closer, a small hand settling lightly on Ningxi's shoulder. Beneath her gauzy cloud-silk wrap, certain attributes shifted subtly with each breath, the fabric stretched into a series of lush, dramatic curves.

Ningxi paid her no attention whatsoever, simply lifting Shengfei's small soft hand away from her shoulder and walking on. "I have no need for other divine spirits to like me."

"Ningxi! Where are you going? Wait a moment! Shou says she hunted a golden crow. A fat one, apparently. She wants to know if you'd like to come eat."

Shengfei rose on her toes and called after Ningxi, who was already flying hundreds of li ahead but Ningxi did not respond.

"This woman... if you weren't so beautiful, I wouldn't bother with you at all. Fine, if you won't come, I'll go without you."

Shengfei gave an indignant little sound and turned to leave, making her way toward the Hall of the Hunt God. The breeze moved through the fine silk of her gown, pressing it against her legs, outlining the smooth, rounded curves of her thighs, faint blue veins just barely visible beneath the pale skin.

"Hm?"

Shengfei had not gone far before she stopped, raising her wrist as though sensing something.

She pressed her fingers together in a quick calculation, her gaze turning back in the direction of the woman who had long since vanished from the Divine Realm.

"That can't be possible."

The arch of Shengfei's brows rose slightly.

"It really can't be... surely not..."

Shengfei laughed to herself, let her gaze fall away, and hummed a little tune as she walked on.

"Ningxi of all people? Even if the sky fell down, that would be impossible."

Ningxi descended like a meteor, falling straight from on high.

Through the eighth tier, the seventh, the sixth...

Every divine spirit below the eighth tier who sensed her presence along the way stopped where they were, bowed deeply as she passed, and watched her grow smaller in the distance without daring the slightest impropriety.

"Boom!"

With a great crack of sound, Ningxi broke through the Gate of Heaven and pierced the dense clouds above, and arrived in the mortal world.

The whole landscape of the mortal realm spread out before her.

Ningxi had no particular destination in mind. She simply flew forward without purpose, intending to land wherever she ended up.

One incense stick's time later, Ningxi descended slowly from the sky and came to rest at the foot of a mountain.

"I will begin my travels from here." Ningxi murmured to herself.

She did not know how long it might take before she found what she was looking for. But for Ningxi, who possessed no limit on her years, however long she spent in the mortal world, it made no great difference. In the Divine Realm, she had nothing to occupy her anyway.

Before setting off, Ningxi suppressed her divine nature and divine power as much as she was able. She wished to travel the mortal world as much as possible in the guise of an ordinary person, and had no desire to attract the attention of other idle divine spirits who might track her movements.

The small feet beneath her gown took their first step. Ningxi walked through the snow of the mortal world.

She moved entirely by instinct, with no fixed direction but as she walked, her brow gradually furrowed.

She had detected the smell of blood drifting through the air.

Ningxi followed it to its source, and before long she found herself looking at a landscape of the dead.

Most of the bodies were no longer whole. Severed limbs and pieces of flesh were scattered across the ground in every direction.

Ningxi felt nothing in particular at the sight.

Though she rarely came to the mortal world, scarcely once in ten thousand years, she understood well enough in her mind that the countless races of the mortal world were each left to fend for themselves. And among the humans of the mortal world, those who fell prey to wild beasts and monster-beasts were beyond counting.

Humans hunted wild beasts too. The strong prey upon the weak. That was simply how things were.

She withdrew her gaze without a second look and continued walking but just as Ningxi descended the far side of a slope, making toward a nearby kingdom, something caught the tip of her foot.

Ningxi looked down, and saw a small hand extending from the snow.

She could sense it: a child was buried beneath this snowdrift. The child was still alive, but the wellspring of their life force was draining away. They would not last much longer.

Ningxi looked at it and moved on.

In Ningxi's view, this person's fate had nothing to do with her. Their life or death was for heaven to determine.

In the eyes of divine spirits, every race of the mortal world amounted to nothing more than ants.

Ningxi raised her foot and stepped over the child buried beneath the snow but as she walked on, that small outstretched hand, and the faint, fading breath she had sensed, kept returning to her mind.

She pressed her lips together, her head lowering slightly. Her steps slowed, and then stopped.

The woman turned, and walked back the way she had come.

At last, she stood again over that patch of snow.

Ningxi lifted a hand and swept it through the air. The snow covering the small boy scattered entirely.

Looking at the unconscious child, Ningxi's brow furrowed, and she murmured under her breath.

"Nothing more than ants."