Who is he?
If it were in the past, Sang Dai would have had only one answer: He is Su Xuan.
He is the king of the Beast Realm, and also a wielder of a Heaven-grade spiritual root. He is her archenemy.
He is Su Xuan.
But now it is different. When the poison under the Sword Sect was removed by Ling Yin, and Sang Dai spat out the black blood, the memories she had lost in the past all returned. For a full month, before the Beast Palace, she and Su Xuan had spent thirty days together.
“Sang Dai, who am I? Tell me.”
Not receiving an answer from the sword cultivator, Su Xuan asked again, his voice dull and urgent.
Sang Dai finally responded, looking at the face that had grown a lot more than what she remembered.
She softly said, “You are the little fox.”
Su Xuan’s eyes immediately turned red.
“I thought you would never remember this lifetime.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It doesn’t matter. I won’t forgive you. I’m angry.”
“I’m sorry, Su Xuan.”
Su Xuan turned his head away, his breath unsteady. The fireworks in the night sky were still going off, and Sang Dai sat beside him.
He was still gripping her wrist, his hand trembling, his body also shaking. The moonlight cast upon his silver hair, and the colorful fireworks added some brightness to him.
“How could you forget me…”
His voice trembled, filled with endless grievance.
Sang Dai did not struggle, allowing him to tightly grasp her delicate wrist.
She closed her eyes and sighed deeply.
“I’m sorry, Su Xuan.”
How long had it been? A full one hundred and twenty years.
She had forgotten him for so many years, and only Su Xuan remembered their past promise, remembering when Sang Dai and he had first met.
When Sang Dai was ten years old, Ying Heng abandoned her and fled from the Sword Sect.
A few years later, the traitor Ying Heng was “executed” in the demon realm.
While the world cheered, glad that the traitor was gone, only Sang Dai hid in a bamboo house and cried the entire day. The next day, she packed everything up and was still the same cold, noble young lady of the Sword Sect.
Sang Dai, under the guise of going down the mountain for worldly experience, actually went alone to the demon realm after leaving the mountain to retrieve Ying Heng’s body.
But Ying Heng’s soul had already dissipated. There was no corpse to speak of. Sang Dai searched for half a month and, in the end, only found a piece of torn cloth.
The lingering scent of Ying Heng remained on it.
In the vast, heavy snow, she held the piece of torn cloth. That rare heavy snow was the first snow she had ever seen in her life. She looked up in a daze, allowing the snowflakes to fall on her face.
At that time, Sang Dai had not yet learned to hide her emotions. Realizing that Ying Heng might truly be dead, she knelt on the ground, breaking down into tears, her cries desperate like a trapped beast. The snow fell upon her, and also drifted into her heart.
“Master… Master…”
The heavy snow covered her, and from a distance, she looked like an ice sculpture.
Sang Dai cried for half the day. In the end, her tears dried up, leaving only the thick snow on her body and the tear stains on her face to bear witness to her despair.
She shakily stood up. Under the dim, dark sky, the vast, boundless border of the demon realm had only her.
The command jade tablet at her waist rang. Sang Dai numbly answered it.
“Dingnan City has a malicious spirit. Are you near there?”
Sang Dai’s voice was slightly hoarse: “Not far from there.”
“Then go exterminate the evil.”
“Mm.”
They didn’t even tell her the level of the evil spirit. The Sword Sect had always trusted her. At that time, Sang Dai hadn’t even reached the Golden Core stage, but she had already crossed borders to kill Golden Core demonic cultivators.
She put away the cloth, wiped away the tears on her face. At that time, she still couldn’t use teleportation and could only ride a sword.
“Zhiyu.”
The Zhiyu sword appeared, extending before her.
“Go, to Dingnan City.”
But the Zhiyu sword did not move.
The obedient Zhiyu sword stood in place, buzzing, the sword hilt pointing in a certain direction. Sang Dai immediately frowned.
“You’re saying there’s a Heaven-grade spiritual root awakener here?”
Zhiyu: “Mm, and it seems to be heavily injured, close to death.”
Sang Dai’s heart suddenly tightened. There were only seven Heaven-grade spiritual root awakeners in the entire Four Realms. These were the people that every sect tried their best to protect and teach. Who in the Four Realms would dare to kill them?
She took out the jade tablet: “Senior Brother Shen, I need your help with something.”
The reply from Shen Ciyu came quickly: “What is it?”
“There is an evil spirit in Dingnan City, but I have something to attend to and can’t go. Can you go in my place?”
“Alright, I’m not far from there. I’ll go now.”
“Thank you, sorry to trouble you.”
Sang Dai quickly ended the communication with the jade tablet and jumped onto the Zhiyu sword: “Zhiyu, let’s go!”
The Zhiyu sword soared through the thick snow, the distance from Kongsang Realm was vast, and recent fluctuations in the spiritual veins of Kongsang Realm had affected the boundaries of the demon realm. The snow had been falling for over ten days.
Eventually, the Zhiyu sword stopped near a cave. Sang Dai looked at the barrier at the entrance, her slender brows tightly knitted.
“You’re saying that the Heaven-grade spiritual root awakener is locked inside?”
Zhiyu: “Yes, and there is…”
Sang Dai’s face turned completely cold: “There is a spiritual vein here.”
Inside the cave was a massive spiritual vein fluctuation. It was a spiritual vein derived from the Guixu spiritual vein, used for cultivation across the Four Realms.
Because it was derived from the Guixu spiritual vein, it was closely tied to Heaven-grade spiritual root awakeners. The barrier at the entrance was no match for Sang Dai. She could easily enter.
After stepping through the barrier, the rich aura of the Heaven-grade spiritual root immediately became clear, rushing toward Sang Dai.
“Heaven-grade… Fire-type spiritual root?”
The Heaven-grade Fire-type spiritual root belonged to the prince of the Beast Realm, Su Xuan.
Sang Dai felt lost and helpless. The spiritual root seemed to be saving itself, moving behind Sang Dai and urging her to move forward, slowly entering the spiritual vein realm of the Beast Realm.
The spiritual veins derived from the Guixu spiritual vein were not as vast as the original Guixu spiritual veins, but thousands of veins intertwined, glowing with golden light like falling stars.
These spiritual veins nourished the cultivation of tens of millions of Beast Realm citizens, flowing like an underground river across the entire Beast Realm.
But Sang Dai felt an overwhelming chill.
She looked at the spiritual veins that intertwined into a giant tree before her.
A person was hanging, kneeling on the ground, with large chains passing through his shoulder blades, linking his wrists. His body was covered in blood, with countless wounds, each one containing several golden threads connected to the spiritual veins behind him. His crimson blood flowed along the golden threads toward the veins.
It was as if the veins were parasitic on his body.
His head was lowered, his figure slender. He was shirtless, his silver hair falling over his body, hiding his muscular form. But from his shape, he did not appear to be an adult; he was a young man.
Sang Dai gasped for breath, unable to hold the sword in her hand.
Her voice was soft, but it awakened the youth who was hanging motionless, unaware of life or death.
He slowly lifted his head, as though he hadn’t moved in a long time. His movements were stiff, and when he moved, the chains rattled, causing more blood to fall, which was then absorbed by the golden threads extending from the spiritual veins.
His glass-like eyes showed no emotion, cold and murderous, gazing at her as though she were a dead person.
He faintly parted his lips: “Heaven-grade spiritual root awakener, and a Thunder-type spiritual root. You are the Sword Sect’s Sang Dai.”
Recognizing her identity was not difficult, and Sang Dai was also able to recognize him.
“Prince of the Beast Realm… Su Xuan?”
The long period of imprisonment and constant torment had made Su Xuan look nothing like a prince. His body was covered in dried blood, his silver hair stained with blood, and his white pants were already stained red with the blood that had leaked from him. It looked as though he had been pulled out from the blood.
Countless golden threads were absorbing his blood, feeding it back to the spiritual veins behind him, providing nourishment for the slightly weakened veins, allowing the cultivators of the entire Beast Realm to continue their cultivation journey.
Su Xuan let out a cold sneer: “I advise you to leave as soon as possible. The people of the Beast Realm come every day. You haven’t reached the Core Formation stage yet, have you? The dogs of the Twelve Palaces love cultivators like you—weak but with abundant spiritual roots.”
Sang Dai’s sword crashed to the ground.
She understood.
The Guixu spiritual vein had been destroyed, and the spiritual veins derived from it that nourished the cultivation world were gradually weakening. The elders of the Twelve Palaces in the Beast Realm were fond of war, and over the years, the Beast Realm had suffered great losses in terms of military strength, and its spiritual veins were nearly depleted. Yet, the Beast Realm had not found new spiritual veins, and at this rate, they would eventually dry up completely.
But the spiritual roots awakened from Heaven-grade spiritual root users were bestowed by the Guixu, and their blood and flesh… contained immense vitality, which could activate and sustain the spiritual veins that nourished the Beast Realm.
The Beast Realm was using the blood and flesh of Heaven-grade spiritual root awakeners to supply the Beast Realm’s spiritual veins, keeping them from drying up and ensuring that they always had vitality.
The cultivation power of the demon cultivators came from Su Xuan’s blood and flesh.
Sang Dai looked at him and saw the faded, indifferent emotion in his eyes.
He was, like her, just a teenager.
Zhiyu spoke in her sea of consciousness: “He is about to die. His blood is almost completely drained, and he has been locked up for at least two years.”