The Light of the Righteous Path Has Gone Offline - Chapter 16

When Ming Jing looked up, she saw Murong Chi standing there with her graceful figure outlined by the light.

Her blood-tinged eyes were moist, reflecting the last three inches of sunset through their haze. She looked cold and solitary, grief concealed beneath that chilling stillness.

Ming Jing watched her for a while.

Seeing that Murong Chi still had no intention of moving, she supported herself against a rock and rose unsteadily.

She slowly walked to Murong Chi’s side and raised a hand, using her wide sleeve to block the glaring sunlight.

Pretending not to notice the tears glimmering in Murong Chi’s eyes, she asked,

“Murong Chi, don’t your ankles hurt?”

Murong Chi froze.

Her heart had been surging with complicated emotions at seeing daylight and regaining her freedom—desolation, melancholy, and joy all tangled together.

But the instant Ming Jing mentioned it, a piercing pain erupted through the soles of her feet, striking in wave after wave like a rising tide.

All the strength seemed to drain from her body at once.

She collapsed softly into Ming Jing’s arms and, with practiced familiarity, tugged on her sleeve.

Her expression became pitiful.

“My feet hurt.”

Her voice trembled with pain, and the end of her sentence even carried a faint sob.

She raised her face and looked expectantly at Ming Jing.

With robes redder than flames and exquisitely beautiful features, she possessed a peerless elegance capable of startling the world.

Yet at that moment, she resembled a helpless little kitten.

The breath in Ming Jing’s chest caught.

She stood frozen, completely beyond her own control.

A moment later, helplessness crossed her eyes.

She cleared her throat and was about to say something when Murong Chi, apparently addicted to the performance, continued tugging insistently on her sleeve and buried her face against Ming Jing’s chest.

Her shimmering eyes were as clear and crystalline as colored glass.

She weakly extended her arms, her voice so soft it seemed capable of dripping water.

“I want to be held.”

Something struck Ming Jing’s heart instantly.

Looking at Murong Chi’s deliberately delicate frown, she instinctively remembered a kitten she had raised long ago.

Unable to resist, she pinched Murong Chi’s cheek.

Visible happiness spread across Ming Jing’s face.

Enduring all the pain throughout her body, she lifted Murong Chi into her arms and carried her back to the smooth rock in only a few steps.

After setting her down with exceptional gentleness, even Ming Jing’s voice became bright with delight.

“Where are we going next?”

Murong Chi: “?”

Why did it feel as though she had just been petted?

She raised her head and looked at Ming Jing.

The red-robed woman stood beneath the sunlight, smiling brilliantly.

The gaze she directed downward contained a rare warmth and sparkling brightness.

So Ming Jing liked this sort of thing!

Murong Chi’s eyes rolled thoughtfully.

As though she had discovered an extraordinary secret, she narrowed her eyes in pleasure.

She did not answer.

Instead, she extended a hand toward Ming Jing with an arrogant expression.

“First, help this sovereign over there.”

Her fingers were long and pale, pointing toward the cavern dwelling only a few steps away.

She looked even more like a kitten!

Ming Jing stared at Murong Chi without blinking, her eyes still sparkling.

She bent down and lifted her, moving with unprecedented gentleness and care.

Completely disregarding the fact that her own body was covered in injuries, she immediately began walking.

Clang!

She seemed to kick something.

Ming Jing paused and lowered her gaze.

Beneath the drifting dust, the blood-red chain lay broken into several pieces.

Under the brilliant sunlight, white starlight flashed across it, carrying a faint trace of sharp sword aura.

Blood and dust had merged together, obscuring the pure whiteness of the starlight.

At the sight of it, the Asura energy stirred by the sword aura seemed ready to surge once more, roaring for another upheaval.

Holding Murong Chi, Ming Jing tightened the arm around her waist.

The smile at the corner of her lips froze.

Her heart suddenly became unbearably heavy.

Only that tiny trace of sword aura had remained fused within the depths of her flesh.

Her cultivation of the Asura demonic path had not yet reached perfection.

She had no way to balance the two currents flawlessly.

Summoning the sword aura, forcing it through her qi sea, and condensing it upon her fingertips had already been her absolute limit.

There would never be a second time.

The only reason she was still standing here alive was that, for some unknown reason, Murong Chi had given her a strand of an ancient demon’s pure essence.

Murong Chi had used one of her finite, life-preserving measures upon Ming Jing.

And it was only because Ming Jing’s Asura energy was still too weak compared with Murong Chi that it could be easily suppressed, preventing it from invading her organs or turning against its master.

There would be no second time.

When Ming Jing helped Murong Chi remove the two shackles in the future, she would have to use some other method.

Sword cultivators.

Sword aura.

The sword path.

From this moment onward, everything in the world connected to the sword had nothing more to do with the name Ming Jing.

Not even the faintest possibility remained.

Murong Chi had been wondering why Ming Jing had suddenly stopped.

When she raised her head, she happened to see the fleeting determination and darkness within Ming Jing’s black eyes.

After a moment of silence, Murong Chi tugged on her favorite section of Ming Jing’s sleeve and lifted herself with some effort.

She raised her face and muttered carefully, as though reporting someone’s misbehavior.

“Ming Jing.”

Ming Jing lowered her head in confusion.

She saw the red-robed woman curled within her arms, blinking cautiously.

“Would you like to see fireworks?”

Ming Jing: “?”

Now it was Ming Jing’s turn to be completely bewildered.

Under Murong Chi’s urging gaze, she walked to the designated spot.

The path was winding and shadowed.

Outside, clear sunlight poured down.

Behind them, the dark cavern resembled an enormous mouth waiting to devour anyone who entered.

Ming Jing stood at the boundary between light and darkness.

Murong Chi gave her a brilliant smile and lightly moved a fingertip.

A vivid crimson flame appeared in her palm.

It danced and twisted with extraordinary vitality, swaying endlessly within the air.

No matter how violently the wind roared, the flame showed no sign of going out.

It carried a scorching aura capable of destroying heaven and earth and incinerating everything.

The aura felt familiar.

Ming Jing instinctively leaned her head back.

Her soul trembled slightly, and even her breathing stopped for a moment.

A cultivator’s instincts warned her that the flame dancing upon Murong Chi’s fingertips was terrifying.

Only one wisp would be enough to burn Ming Jing’s body and soul into nothingness.

“This is Red Lotus Karmic Fire,” Murong Chi said softly.

She guided the flame in a circle through the air with her fingertip, then flicked it into the cavern.

A deep smile remained upon her face, while tears glimmered within her eyes.

Red Lotus Karmic Fire.

It was the supreme flame used to forge the chains of the Human Realm Prison.

Born on the far shore of the River of Forgetfulness, it was naturally a ninth-rank existence and stood at the pinnacle of heaven and earth.

According to legend, it was the flame used to burn away the sins of those condemned to hell.

Those with goodness in their hearts could stand within a sea of fire and remain completely unharmed.

Those with evil intentions would be reduced to ashes the instant even the smallest spark touched them, never to reincarnate again.

The Human Realm Prison used it to temper the black-iron chains that bound criminal cultivators.

That alone proved that the legends were not empty.

But they were far more than merely true.

Ming Jing clenched her fist and suppressed her body’s instinctive terror and trembling.

In the past, she had lived without shame before heaven or earth.

Her sword had only slain those who deserved to die, and the path she cultivated had been the purest and most magnificent sword Dao.

Yet during those three months in the Human Realm Prison, aside from the three thousand sword auras gnawing at her bones and disrupting her mind, the remnants of Red Lotus Karmic Fire upon the black-iron chains had joined with the Black Lotus Mark between her brows to torment her consciousness and devour her vitality without pause.

Part of the reason might have been the sinister demonic aura that haunted her endlessly.

But Red Lotus Karmic Fire’s ability to distinguish between good and evil was clearly nowhere near as pure and absolute as the legends claimed.

Ming Jing lowered her head and looked at Murong Chi.

An uncontrollable smile faintly appeared at the corner of her lips, both mocking and cold.

If they were discussing good and evil, Murong Chi was a calamitous great demon opposed by the entire world.

Yet an existence like her had managed to subdue Red Lotus Karmic Fire and use it as her own.

Was that not so absurd it was almost laughable?

Ming Jing thought she was becoming increasingly curious about Murong Chi.

In the past, she had never possessed such a powerful desire to understand anyone.

More precisely, aside from the sword path that had been engraved into her bones at birth and had once mattered more than her life, she had never given any person or matter more than ordinary attention.

Boom!

A thunderous explosion sounded, followed by a series of dull crackles.

The strand of flame leaped joyfully from Murong Chi’s pale fingertips.

The moment it entered the cavern, it erupted into a raging inferno.

Withered vines, rotting wood, mountain rocks, the white-jade couch, glazed lamps, the ancient pavilion, and the swing were all swallowed by the flames.

Ripples of fire spread from the cavern’s center, expanding outward in concentric circles.

The continuous crackling really did resemble the clear explosions of fireworks in the mortal world.

Ming Jing had never known what fireworks sounded like.

Yet for some inexplicable reason, she felt that the two sounds overlapped and alternated, evoking the flourishing image of a mortal world illuminated by countless lights.

The deep cavern instantly became a blazing sea of fire.

Brilliant colors.

Scorching heat.

The thin formation patterns in the air now unexpectedly acted as a dividing line.

Inside the cavern was an inferno filled with blooming flames.

Outside was a vast landscape bathed in sunlight.

It was as though the two existed in entirely different worlds.

Ming Jing was still staring in a daze when a shadow suddenly appeared before her.

Murong Chi placed her left hand upon Ming Jing’s shoulder.

The five pale fingers of her right hand curled together and rose high before Ming Jing’s face.

Their joints were clearly defined, their shape elegant, resembling a piece of polished jade.

Under Ming Jing’s focused gaze, Murong Chi raised her fist to its highest point beside her eyes.

Then she suddenly opened it.

Like a snow-white flower bud blooming without warning, it opened directly within the deepest part of Ming Jing’s heart.

“Bang!”

Murong Chi’s cool, laughing voice exploded beside Ming Jing’s ear.

Without realizing it, she opened the smallest crack in the armor Ming Jing kept sealed tightly around herself.

Murong Chi collapsed into her arms, laughing so hard that her body trembled like flowering branches in the wind.

“Are the fireworks beautiful?”

Author’s Note

Ming Jing: Oh no, is this what it feels like to fall in love?! (Not really.)