Rustle, rustle~
As the black banner, engraved with gilded formation patterns, swayed and danced, the air above the Bagua Platform seemed to grow much colder.
No, not seemed. When Huaiqing waved the soul-summoning banner, dark clouds gathered in the sky above the Stargazing Tower, blotting out the sunlight as they churned layer upon layer.
Woo woo…
The airflow passed through the banner pole, forged from Sounding Stone and riddled with holes, producing a wail like sobbing and lamentation.
Song Qing frowned, feeling as though his soul was about to be dragged out of his body by the crying.
This damned banner is about to summon my soul out… Song Qing fumbled a wooden stopper out of his robes and stuffed it into his ears, only then feeling a little better.
Sounding Stone was also known as “spirit-calling stone” and “ghost-summoning stone”. Wherever it appeared, ghosts were bound to gather in droves, which was why it was one of the essential main materials for a soul-summoning banner.
“Woo woo woo…”
The wailing suddenly intensified. Inside and outside the capital, wronged souls were awakened one after another. Some crawled out of damp, icy rivers, some rose from abandoned old houses, some drifted out of overgrown graveyards…
Yin wind howled, dark clouds massed overhead, and the entire Sitianjian was shrouded in a grim and terrifying atmosphere.
The white-robed Arcanists of the Sitianjian had long since been notified and had all gone downstairs. Above the third floor, no living person was permitted to remain.
“Wei Yuan, ye soul return!”
On the swaying soul-summoning banner, the gilded formation runes lit up one by one and, carried by the currents stirred up by the waving banner, drifted into the distance like a twisted road of guidance.
…
Mount Jing City.
On the towering sacrificial altar, the statue of the young man in magnificent robes and a thorned crown trembled lightly.
In the distant sky, the yin wind carried light like shattered gold, stretching from the end of heaven and paving a road of broken golden colour.
Above the head of the Warlock God statue, a figure in azure robes slowly surfaced, then sank back down, over and over again.
Each time the azure-robed figure surfaced, a clear light lit up at the statue’s brow and forced the soul back into the statue.
“Wei Yuan, ye soul return!”
From the end of the shattered-gold road came a clear, ringing call.
The insubstantial azure-robed figure surfaced again. Its illusory body shuddered repeatedly, as if struggling desperately to float upwards and break free from the statue.
Inside the statue, streams of black qi surged up behind the azure-robed figure, as though helping him along.
But all three forces were suppressed at once by the sealing power at the brow of the Warlock God statue.
After several repetitions, the black qi and the azure-robed figure both grew listless and no longer tried again.
No matter how the call from the end of the shattered-gold road sounded again and again, the azure-robed figure did not reappear.
…
“Wei Yuan, ye soul return!”
Huaiqing only felt her arms turn icy cold. A thin shell of frost formed over the hand gripping the pole.
This was where the advantages of a martial artist showed. If Song Qing had been the one waving the soul-summoning banner, both his hands would already have frozen into stone and shattered inch by inch.
As for the poison inherent to the magical artefact, although it made Huaiqing feel mildly unwell, with the physique of a fourth rank martial artist, it would not cause problems in the short term, so long as she stopped within a quarter of an hour.
The dark clouds above the Sitianjian grew larger and larger, the temperature dropping lower and lower. The power of the soul-summoning banner influenced the surroundings, causing the Sitianjian to vaguely transform into a “nether realm”, while yin souls from inside and outside the capital flocked over.
Some drifted above the Bagua Platform. Some passed through walls and windows and invaded the Sitianjian. Some circled around the Stargazing Tower.
Inside the Sitianjian, the Arcanists held up various storage artefacts, catching the yin souls dancing wildly through the rooms like children chasing butterflies.
“Quick, quick, gather them all up, these are excellent materials for forging artefacts and refining medicine.”
“This is practically a windfall.”
“Be careful, don’t collect Wei Yuan’s soul by mistake.”
While the white-robed Arcanists were excited by the quantity of “materials”, they also sighed with emotion, thinking that too many people had died in and around the capital recently.
After a person died, the soul would gather for seven days, then within half a month completely disperse into nothingness, unable to linger in the human world by itself.
In other words, the yin souls summoned by the soul-summoning banner were all newly dead ghosts, people who had died within the last half month.
Another fifteen minutes… Song Qing glanced at the incense, now growing fewer, shorter, and on the verge of burning out, and his expression immediately turned rather ugly:
“Why hasn’t Wei Yuan’s soul come yet?
“It makes no sense. Can it really be because he isn’t familiar with Your Majesty, so he refuses to come back?”
Huaiqing’s lovely face had already turned pale greenish-white. Frost clung to her eyelashes, and a trace of anxiety slowly gathered between her brows as she snapped:
“Less nonsense. Look for where the problem is.”
Song Qing said nothing more. He first inspected the formation. Although he had not planned to advance as a formation master, he had learned all the formations he ought to have. Given enough materials and a geomantically blessed location, Song Qing could also set up a formation of tremendous power.
He simply could not do as a formation master did, letting formations arise at a mere thought.
“The soul-summoning formation is fine, the soul-summoning banner is fine, the body and spirit are also fine…”
After saying this, Song Qing raised his head and glanced at the graceful, slender back of the female Emperor.
“You’re saying that we are the problem?” Huaiqing’s brow arched.
She swore that if Song Qing dared to court trouble at a time like this, she would turn round and sentence him to execution at the vegetable market.
Song Qing frowned, pondered for a long while, then said:
“There are two possibilities. Either Wei Yuan’s soul has already been completely wiped out, or it has been subjected to some kind of seal, so that even a top-grade magical artefact like the soul-summoning banner cannot summon it.”
He wore the same rigour he did during alchemical experiments.
Huaiqing pondered a moment, then asked over her shoulder while continuing to wave the soul-summoning banner:
“What can be done?”
Song Qing replied:
“I was joking just now when I said Xu Qi’an was more suited to summoning the soul. Unless of course he carries Wei Yuan’s bloodline… hmm, that isn’t quite accurate, but you understand what I mean.
“But the main reason is actually that Xu Qi’an has sufficient fortune.”
Huaiqing frowned.
“Fortune?”
What she did not understand was this, did summoning a soul require luck as well? If such a thing were so childishly arbitrary, what was the point of the soul-summoning banner?
Song Qing shrugged.
“I don’t understand it either. This was what Zhao Shou personally instructed when he sent Wei Yuan’s remnant soul to the Sitianjian. He said that if, in future, there came a time to call Wei Yuan’s soul back, then Xu Qi’an should do it, because his fortune was sufficient.”
Huaiqing thought for a moment, then asked in return:
“Does Xu Qi’an know about this?”
“Naturally he does.” Song Qing gave an affirmative answer.
“Then we can do it!”
Huaiqing spoke with firm certainty.
Because it had been a task Xu Qi’an had entrusted to her in the first place.
Taking a deep breath, a streak of golden light rose in the depths of Huaiqing’s pitch-black pupils. The golden light transformed into a dragon shadow that swam within her eyes.
In an instant, the feeling she gave changed completely. Majestic, powerful, a sovereign of the mortal world standing high above all, making Song Qing behind her almost drop to his knees in worship, not daring to meet the kingly majesty head-on.
She drew upon the Dragon Qi within her body.
Before ascending the throne, she had used the Earth Book fragment as a bridge to absorb three main strands of Dragon Qi, as well as several hundred scattered fragments of Dragon Qi.
This Dragon Qi had lain dormant within her body, impossible to control.
Only after she ascended the throne and became Emperor, with fortune settling upon her, did the dormant fortune within her body finally submit to her and become something she could use actively.
“Wei Yuan, ye soul return!”
With both eyes transformed into brilliant dragon pupils, Huaiqing sank her fortune into her dantian and her voice rang across the heavens.
…
“Wei Yuan, ye soul return!”
At the end of that avenue of shattered gold in Mount Jing City came a shout like spring thunder.
Along with the voice came two dazzling golden beams, shooting straight from the end of the avenue onto the brow of the Warlock God statue.
At its brow, the seal formed from clear qi slowly peeled away, as though splitting apart.
At the edge of the altar, Sarun Agu’s figure emerged. He strode to the front of the statue and said with a smile:
“That’s more like it. Fortunately, the Great Feng still has one person whose fortune is sufficiently deep.
“Wei Yuan, when you sealed the Warlock God that day, the Warlock God claimed your soul. That was the cycle of cause and effect. You used the power of your life to mend the Confucian Sage’s seal. Today, having you erase this seal yourself is likewise the cycle of cause and effect.
“I shall grant you one more measure of strength.”
He drew out his shepherd whip. It flared with blazing white light, crackling with electric current, like a whip of thunder.
Crack!
Sarun Agu flicked his wrist and lashed the azure-robed soul. The white light within the whip instantly fused into the soul. The azure-robed soul burst with a piercing white radiance and was suddenly filled with power.
At the same time, the black qi within the statue surged violently, little by little forcing the azure-robed soul out.
On the other side, under the golden light’s illumination, the clear light at the brow was finally worn away completely.
Boom!
The thorn-crowned figure gave a violent shudder. Black qi gushed out like a spring, shoving the azure-robed soul away.
Crack! The brow of the Confucian Sage statue split once more, exactly as it had before Wei Yuan had repaired it.
The instant the azure-robed soul broke free, the guiding avenue formed from yin wind extended over, swept him away, then abruptly contracted and vanished into the end of the sky.
Meanwhile, that black qi continued to surge upward, forming in the high air into a gigantic, blurred human face that looked down over the whole of Mount Jing City.
Sarun Agu let out a breath, partly relieved, partly disappointed.
From Wei Yuan’s sealing of the Warlock God to the latter’s revival, five months had passed.
Those mere five months had cost the Church of the Warlock God its best chance to swallow up the northern frontier, then use it as a foundation to sweep south and devour the Central Plains.
“Now Jiuzhou is in upheaval. That demon wearing a false skin has returned to Jiuzhou, the half-step Martial God has broken free and reassembled, and if Luo Yuheng succeeds in crossing tribulation, the Daoist schools will gain another earthly immortal. The situation is becoming ever more complicated.
“Such is the will of Heaven!”
Sarun Agu shook his head regretfully.
As he spoke, the blurred face of black qi in the sky rapidly collapsed and broke apart, all of it shrinking back into the Warlock God statue.
In the statue’s originally hollow eyes appeared two dark glimmers, fixed upon the Confucian Sage statue opposite.
If one looked carefully, one would discover that the crack in the Confucian Sage statue’s brow was slowly spreading and extending under that “gaze”.
The process was exceedingly slow, but unwavering.
…
“Time’s up!”
Song Qing said in a low voice:
“Your Majesty, a quarter of an hour has already passed. You should throw away the Soul-Summoning Banner. Holding it too long will harm your dragon body.”
Huaiqing clenched her silver teeth and ignored Song Qing’s warning, continuing to wave the Soul-Summoning Banner.
Amid the rustling sounds, the incense Song Qing had lit lost its last warmth, and the ash fell away.
Song Qing shook his head and sighed.
After a little while longer, Huaiqing’s body swayed, and the Soul-Summoning Banner slipped from her hand, striking the ground with a clang.
It was not that she wished to give up, but that she had already reached her limit and could no longer keep hold of the Soul-Summoning Banner.
Her fair, beautiful cheeks were covered with blue-black veins. Her vivid red lips had turned blackish purple. A thick shell of ice had formed over both her arms.
A top-tier magical artefact like the Soul-Summoning Banner had principal materials that all involved the beyond-mortal realm. As a fourth rank, she had found it difficult to wield it for long.
The overcast sky full of dark clouds dispersed completely, and the yin wind ceased with it.
The wandering souls circling the Stargazing Tower gradually departed.
“Your Majesty, drive out the poison.”
Song Qing pulled a porcelain bottle from his robes and tossed it over casually.
He did not even have the awareness to present it with both hands.
People who studied research simply were not clever enough.
So Huaiqing did not catch it. She staggered to Wei Yuan’s side and gazed silently at his handsome face, her eyes full of deep disappointment.
At that instant, Song Qing had actually seen a trace of sorrow on the female Emperor.
In a daze, he recalled that when Huaiqing had still been a princess, she had seemed to have studied Go under Wei Yuan for several years, if he remembered correctly.
Suddenly, the soul-summoning array beneath Huaiqing lit up. Then a patch of scattered golden light surged into view at the horizon, rolling forward in layer upon layer and speeding towards the towering Stargazing Tower.
The golden light came extremely fast. Within a few breaths it had neared the Bagua Platform and, under the “escort” of the yin wind, plunged into the body of the man in azure robes within the array.
By then, Huaiqing had withdrawn from the array. Without blinking, her beautiful eyes stared fixedly at that azure robe.
A moment later, the eyelashes of the azure-robed figure trembled once, and he slowly opened his eyes.
He looked at the sky in silence for three seconds, slowly sat up, swept his gaze around, and finally let it fall on Huaiqing.
His temples were streaked with white, and his eyes held the vicissitudes carved out by the washing of years. He smiled gently:
“Long time no see, Your Majesty!”
Huaiqing’s eyes reddened, and tears slid silently from them:
“Duke Wei…”
…
Outside the capital, a man in black rode out through the city gate and galloped along the rammed road.
…
Yongzhou.
Xu Pingfeng sensed something, and used teleportation to open the distance and evade the old fellow’s sabre qi.
Then he turned his head and gazed north. Though it was broad daylight, a brilliant star hung on the northern horizon.
“Wei Yuan…”
As a Second Rank Arcanist, interpreting omens was within his domain of ability.
Xu Pingfeng slowly clenched his fist, the veins on his forehead standing out.
Wei Yuan’s revival in itself was not frightening. What storm could a frail body stir up?
But if Luo Yuheng crossed tribulation successfully, then the Great Feng would not only have the confidence to contend with Yunzhou in beyond-mortal battle strength, on the battlefield as well, no matter how highly Xu Pingfeng rated Qi Guangbo, he had no confidence that the man could wrestle arms with Wei Yuan.
“I must make a trip to the northern frontier, even if only with an aspect…”
Xu Pingfeng glanced at the old fellow below and rubbed his brow with a headache.
To grind a Second Rank martial artist to death was by no means something that could be done in a day or two.
That stinking stone in the toilet.
…
The Southern Marches.
In the primeval forest outside the Abyss, Heaven Gu Grandma peered north through layers of dense branches and leaves.
“Wei Yuan has been resurrected.”
Heaven Gu Grandma narrowed her eyes. A slight smile appeared on her deeply wrinkled face:
“You lot need not worry that all your efforts were for nothing.”
Hearing this, the several shaman clan chiefs, including Longtu, were first delighted, then frowned.
The enchantingly seductive Luanyu knitted her delicate brows:
“Can he recover the cultivation he had before death?”
Heaven Gu Grandma shook her head.
Longtu at once looked disappointed:
“Then what’s the use? It still depends on whether Xu Qi’an can hold out through the tribulation-crossing battle.”
Youshi then said:
“If the Great Feng is defeated, not only will we lose everything we invested, we might even be screwed over.”
What he was thinking was: Xu Qi’an still has not given me that ancient corpse.
In response to the chiefs’ pessimism, Heaven Gu Grandma merely smiled.
…
Stargazing Tower, Bagua Platform.
Wei Yuan sat behind the desk that had originally belonged to the Jianzheng, holding a cup of hot tea in his hands. He took a sip, then shook his head and said:
“Is there no Flower God tea?”
Huaiqing, who sat opposite him, had by then gathered all her emotions back in. The corners of her mouth twitched almost imperceptibly:
“Duke Wei can ask Xu Qi’an for some.”
Song Qing had already been driven off the Bagua Platform. Of course, he himself had been quite willing, since a trivial matter like Wei Yuan’s resurrection was hardly enough to make him set aside the alchemy experiment at hand.
Wei Yuan set down his teacup and said:
“Xu Qi’an did not come, which means the Great Feng has already reached a desperate state. Who sealed that old thing, the Jianzheng?”
Huaiqing, who had never revealed to him the slightest bit of intelligence before, glanced at the man with white at his temples and sighed:
“Duke Wei, had you already calculated before setting out on the expedition that you would resurrect?
“The Great Feng really has reached a desperate state now. Huaiqing wishes to seek your guidance.”
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