55: Chapter 55 The Story of Wilfrid Wilfrid

[There is no human face beneath the hood.]

[It is a mask made of some kind of grayish-white material, or rather... that is its "face" itself.]

[Its smooth surface has no texture, no pores, no scars; only the outlines of the facial features have been precisely carved out—the brow bone, the bridge of the nose, the lips, and even the depth of the eye sockets have been calculated.]

[But those eyes are dead.]

[No eyeballs, only two hollow depressions.]

[You reach out and press against its chest; it is hard, ice-cold, and there is a vague, complex structure inside, resembling bones, yet not entirely so.]

[This is not something that the Mechanism Art of the Martial Forest can produce.]

[Puppets created by the Mechanism Art of the Martial Forest have an upper limit of only Innate, but this one—you sensed its aura before the mountain gate—is comparable to an Earthly Immortal.]

[A creation of this level can only come from one place.]

[A higher world.]

[You stand up and turn your head to look at Wei Feisen.]

[Wei Feisen vomits another mouthful of blood.]

[You previously poured a violent Mountain-Shattering Palm True Qi into his body. His own True Qi could have originally resisted a portion of it, but once his Dantian shattered, the True Qi within him began to dissipate, losing the ability to suppress your strand of True Qi.]

[These two forces are tearing each other apart within his Meridians; he will not live much longer.]

[The reason you did not directly shatter his Dantian before, but instead chose to seal his Meridians first, was because you wanted to keep him alive to question him slowly.]

[But what you did not expect was that he could still control that Puppet from hundreds of steps away while his Meridians were sealed.]

["No..." Wei Feisen gasps for air, his eyes bloodshot as he stares at the sky, his words popping out intermittently, "I cannot die... I cannot die here..."]

[But as for whether he is willing to share this information now, it depends on him.]

[If not, you can just interrogate him in the next simulation.]

[His fingers dig into the soil beneath him.]

["I have not yet collected all the Cultivation Techniques of Great Qing! I have not yet achieved a Breakthrough to Earthly Immortal! I have not yet broken through beyond the Earthly Immortal!"]

[His voice grows louder and louder, every word sounding as if it were scraped from his throat.]

["I have not yet made her regret..."]

[His eye sockets redden, his teeth chattering with a clacking sound.]

["I have not yet let her see... that I have already stood at the pinnacle of this world... I have not yet told her in person, you were wrong... you chose wrongly..."]

["Why... on what grounds..."]

[His voice weakens, like a string stretched to its limit finally beginning to slacken.]

[His body goes limp, bit by bit.]

[You watch him.]

[He lies there on the scattered rocks by the stream, his head tilted, his eyes staring hollowly at the gray sky above, his chest rising and falling faintly.]

[In those eyes that once controlled the entire Martial Forest of Great Qing, there is no longer that gleam of "everything is under control."]

[What remains is only decay.]

[And a certain indescribable sense of relief.]

[You walk up to him and look down at him.]

[Wei Feisen also looks up at you, gasping for breath, blood foam continuously flowing from the corners of his mouth, dripping down his jaw into the soil.]

[He seems to know that he is dying.]

[There is no longer the madness from before in his eyes, nor that confidence of "I can give you anything"; it is just a pair of eyes about to be extinguished, looking at you calmly.]

["What is really going on?" you say.]

[Wei Feisen's mouth twitches.]

["You want to know?"]

["Mm."]

[He smiles slightly.]

["Let me go. I am going to die anyway, so telling you is no harm."]

[You look at him for two breaths.]

[Then you draw your sword and cut the ropes behind him.]

[Wei Feisen is clearly stunned for a moment; he looks down at his untied hands, then looks up at you.]

["You really did let me go."]

[You say nothing.]

[He says nothing more, either, and simply sits down on the ground.]

[Seemingly thinking of something, an unnatural flush rises on his pale skin, and even his lips turn to a color approaching normal.]

[He looks up at the sky.]

[He is silent for a few breaths.]

[Then he speaks.]

["You know that I am an orphan," he begins, his voice hoarse, "adopted by the Black Tiger Gang. There were many others adopted along with me, among whom was a girl."]

[His gaze becomes unfocused, passing through you, through the stream, through the pine forest, looking toward a place very, very far away.]

["We grew up together. When it was cold in the winter, I would wrap my quilt around her; when she was beaten, I would take the blows for her. If the gang didn't give us food, I would go steal it. When I was caught stealing and beaten half to death, she would squat beside me, crying while applying medicine to my wounds."]

[He pauses.]

["When we were fifteen, I told her that when I became the gang leader, I would marry her."]

["She said okay."]

[When these three words are spoken, the corners of Wei Feisen's mouth curve upward; it is the most normal smile of his you have ever seen.]

["When we were seventeen, a person fell from the sky."]

["He was wearing white clothes, clean and tidy, his feet not touching the ground. He stood before us and examined us for a while, as if looking at two ants."]

["Then he said that she had a Spiritual Root and could cultivate to become an Immortal."]

Outside the simulation.

Lin Shuangwan's hands clench tightly.

Spiritual Root, cultivating to become an Immortal.

Her heartbeat suddenly accelerates, and her temples throb.

It really exists.

In this world, there really is cultivation to become an Immortal.

If the third simulation reaches its end, she will already be invincible in the Martial Forest of Great Qing. Simulating ten, a hundred more times after that would just be repeating things in this Mortal world.

But now, the ceiling has been blown off.

She takes a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down, and refocuses her gaze on the light screen.

The scene continues to flow.

[You ask him: "Did you not ask that Immortal Cultivator to take you with him?"]

[Wei Feisen lets out a laugh.]

["Of course I asked."]

[When he says these words, he clenches his fists.]

["That Immortal said that only those with a Spiritual Root can cultivate to become an Immortal. Even in their Cultivation World, the number of people with a Spiritual Root is less than one in ten thousand, and most are just useless Spiritual Roots that are not worth cultivating."]

["And in a 'Land of Sparse Qi' like ours, this ratio is one in ten million."]

[When he says the four words "Land of Sparse Qi," his voice carries a kind of crushed humiliation.]

["And I..."]

[He looks at you, a layer of moisture rising in his eyes, but his mouth is smiling, smiling very hard.]

["I am just one of those nine million, nine hundred ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred ninety-nine out of ten million, a Mortal who doesn't even have the qualifications to enter the game."]

[He bursts into laughter, his laughter echoing in the pine forest, laughing until it finally turns into violent coughing, and another mouthful of purplish-black blood sprays onto the ground.]

["So don't you bother thinking about it either, Lin Shuangwan." He wipes the blood foam from the corner of his mouth, his tone filled with a deep weariness, "We are all just grains of sand among the masses. The Dao of Immortality? Heh... just something ethereal and elusive. I gambled for thirty years, turned the entire Great Qing upside down, and in the end, I didn't even get to touch what the threshold looks like."]

["Do you think you can be any better than me?"]