Chapter 1885: Father and Daughter
Xiao Sect, another courtyard.
Yun Wuxin picked up that Mysterious Shadow Stone that Chi Wuyue had given to him. With a light exhale of profound energy, the image within was immediately projected beneath the night sky.
The light was dim, and the faint sense of spatial movement indicated that this might be upon a speed-hurtling mysterious ark.
In a narrow corner, a black figure sat slanted. His entire body was curled up, as if exposed to a bone-piercing cold wind.
His complexion was murky and dark; his half-open eyes showed almost no glimmer of spirit, murky like a pool of hopeless stagnant water.
The three-color Luminous Sound Stones she had made with her own hands were gently pressed against his chest. His fingers stroked them mechanically, over and over again.
His lips kept moving slightly, his eyes clearly without any luster, yet they overflowed with pain that pierced straight to the depths of the soul.
Yun Wuxin stood there stunned. Her fingers unconsciously covered her lips.
"This was the day of your eighteenth birthday."
Chi Wuyue had come over at some unknown time. She stood beside Yun Wuxin, her gaze upon the man in the projection: "That day, he killed the son of the one he hated the most, Zhou Xuzi, and pushed Zhou Xuzi to the brink of collapse. How terrifying he was that day, how twisted his face was... you must not be able to imagine it... and he will never want you to see it."
Yun Wuxin: "..."
"But when your image fell into his heart, he would become the most pitiful person in this world."
Chi Wuyue gently let out a breath: "I know that over the years, you must have had many grievances towards him. He lost you again and again, broke his promises to you time and again, but..."
"Please believe that in this world, there is no one who loves you more than he does."
"Over these years, your waiting and worry have been unbearable torment, but he has endured the most direct and complete pain and despair. After all, he witnessed with his own eyes as you turned to ashes along with Lan Ji Star... that kind of pain is something no one else can empathize with."
"Along with that pain was a death wish so intense it was terrifying. The emotions he exuded during that time... I dare not even recall them." Chi Wuyue slowly closed her eyes, her demonic voice faint: "At that time, he had already resolved to die after taking revenge. If not for some later events, I wouldn't know how to erase his death wish."
This was also why, when Qianye Ying'er, who made no attempt to hide her hostility, first appeared before Chi Wuyue, Chi Wuyue said with a smile: "On the contrary, I am very grateful to you."
Yun Wuxin's fingers pressing against her lips tightened bit by bit. She suppressed her sobs with all her might, but could not stop the tears from falling. Her delicate body also began to tremble uncontrollably.
Chi Wuyue continued: "Your father is far more remarkable than you imagine. His most remarkable quality is not saving the God Realm or trampling the Four Regions, but that after experiencing all this, he still did not fall into the abyss of evil, but instead offered more forgiveness."
"So, do not resent him any longer. To reunite with you, he has crossed the most cruel and difficult obstacles in this world. Even to this day, his heart still bears many deep hidden wounds. And these wounds, perhaps only you can give him the best comfort."
The image faded. Yun Wuxin suddenly turned, her figure darting into the distance, disappearing into the night in an instant.
"You really do dote on him excessively."
A cold voice sounded from behind Chi Wuyue.
"Dote?" Chi Wuyue smiled slightly, elegantly turning around: "That word is used well."
Chu Yuechan: "..."
Chi Wuyue's gaze lingered on Chu Yuechan for a long moment. Her smile carried a hint of allure: "You and that girl Feixue, whether in appearance, aura, or expression, indeed have several similarities. No wonder..."
"Feixue?" Chu Yuechan's brows furrowed slightly: "What do you mean?"
"You will meet her in the future... perhaps." Chi Wuyue's lips curled slightly: "Speaking of which, there is one thing I wish to ask your advice on."
Chu Yuechan said: "You are the Demon Empress of the Northern Domain, the Empress of the God Realm. Your status is far beyond what I can reach. The words 'ask advice' are too great for me."
Everyone knew what the term "Empress" meant... it was the absolute primary consort in the eyes of the world. Even someone as ice-hearted as Chu Yuechan could not completely disregard it.
"You exaggerate." Chi Wuyue smiled: "Between us, we speak only as sisters. There is no so-called Demon Empress or Empress. And according to the customs of your Tian Xuan Continent, I should instead call you elder sister."
"...No need." Surprised that Chi Wuyue, the Empress who controls the God Realm, could lower her own posture so much, Chu Yuechan's gaze lost some of its coldness: "What do you want to ask me?"
"Ask about a person." Chi Wuyue's breath between her lips became slow and faint: "Xia Qingyue."
"Qingyue?" Chu Yuechan frowned slightly.
"Yes." Chi Wuyue said: "As far as I know, in her early Xuan path, she took Bing Yun Fairy Palace as her sect and studied under your younger sister Chu Yueli, and you also took great care of her. Including when you first met Yun Che, it was while seeking a breakthrough opportunity for Xia Qingyue."
"Why do you ask about her?"
"Because she is hard for me to let go." Chi Wuyue sighed softly: "I have a bad habit: I cannot keep unresolved matters in my heart, otherwise they stick like a fishbone, hard to release for a long time. So, I want to know as much as possible about her, at least to understand where my judgment of her went wrong."
Hearing Chi Wuyue's words, Chu Yuechan's brows deeply furrowed. Sensing something, she said in a low voice: "When he came back last time, he mentioned Qingyue several times. But this time, he hasn't mentioned her at all... What exactly happened to her?"
Chi Wuyue: "..."
"I can tell you whatever you want to know about her." Chu Yuechan turned to meet Chi Wuyue's gaze, her beautiful eyes reflecting the lonely cold night moon: "But you must also tell me what happened to her... After all, she is also my disciple."
"Good." Without hesitation, Chi Wuyue slowly nodded: "However, you must first tell me everything about her. If I speak first, it will surely affect the memory you have of her."
"...Ask whatever you want."
Around the two women, Chi Wuyue had already set up a soundproof barrier.
Yun Che was absolutely unwilling to mention, and was even unwilling to hear the name "Xia Qingyue", so naturally Chi Wuyue would not let him hear her asking Chu Yuechan about her.
However, Chi Wuyue did not hold too much hope. After all, when Xia Qingyue was at Bing Yun Fairy Palace, she was still a young girl, and her character might not have been fully formed.
But the deep confusion in her heart had already formed into a kind of unwillingness... unprecedented in its intensity.
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On the rooftop, Yun Che, who had been gazing at the night sky for a long time, turned his gaze downward. A graceful, beautiful figure drew near on the night wind and landed beside him.
"Wuxin." Looking at his daughter, who had grown into a beauty as stunning as her mother, a beauty that could topple the world, Yun Che's lips curved upward as he called out softly.
Yun Wuxin did not speak. She stared at her father for a moment, then took a light step and sat beside him. Her head slowly leaned on his shoulder, her hands wrapping around his arm, her fingers silently tightening.
The melancholy and complexity in his heart immediately turned into endless warmth. He tilted his head, the tip of his nose brushing his daughter's hair, and smiled: "Moving from the Eastern Domain to the Southern Domain, the night sky is indeed different, but my feelings and mood are exactly the same."
"This is our homeland. No matter how lofty the world, it can never be replaced."
"Father," Yun Wuxin said softly, "In a while, will you take me to travel through that world called the God Realm? I want to see the places you have been."
"Alright!" Yun Che smiled in response, his tone full of heroic spirit: "You can go wherever you want. Now this entire universe is beneath our feet. There is nowhere we father and daughter cannot go, only places we don't wish to!"
"Hehe..." Yun Wuxin laughed, gently nuzzling her head against Yun Che's shoulder, as if she had returned to those days when she was a little girl freely acting spoiled and laughing in her father's arms.
In the distance, Qianye Ying'er watched from afar. Her long sash fluttered in the night wind for a long time, yet she never approached. Even she found it hard to bear breaking this scene.
"Is it just a daughter!" she muttered indignantly: "If he likes them so much, I'll just have a few more in the future... Hmph! A bunch of mortal women from the lower realms, how could they be worthy of competing with me!"
With that, she turned and walked away, not bothering to look anymore.
Yun Wuxin closed her eyes, her delicate nose vibrating lightly with each breath.
Every one of her aunts, even her master and sometimes her mother, would openly or secretly compete for his attention. Only she never had anyone compete with her. So in those years, she monopolized the most of her father's time and had long grown familiar with his scent.
Over the years, his world had been turned upside down, yet the scent at the tip of her nose had hardly changed at all.
Having reached such heights, he had never changed his attachment to his homeland, and his love for her had never gained even a trace of impurity.
Chi Wuyue's words made her heart ache as if suffocating. The last remnants of resentment in her heart all turned into a deep, warm pain.
"Father," Yun Wuxin said softly, "I really like the birthday gift you gave me. Actually, I also have a gift for you."
"Oh? What is it?" Yun Che's eyes clearly lit up.
Yun Wuxin smiled gently. She raised her hands and opened them, revealing a small, gleaming white jade stone.
The jade stone was a pure ice-white color, faintly covered in icy light. Under the soft moonlight, it gave off a mysterious glow, reflecting the snow-like jade skin of the girl's palm.
"Eternal Shadow Stone?"
This was exactly the Eternal Shadow Stone he had obtained from Mu Feixue back then and given to Yun Wuxin.
The Eternal Shadow Stone was essentially a type of Mysterious Shadow Stone, but it was a Mysterious Shadow Stone that would never decay. No matter how much time passed, one need not worry about losing the images imprinted on it.
With a light push of her slender fingers, a faint icy light bloomed, spreading a clear image before the two. In the image was the familiar Yun family courtyard, and the daughter who was beautifully charming in the deep memories of these years.
"Daddy, today is my fifteenth birthday. I received many very precious gifts, but Daddy didn't come back on time."
That youthful face, that voice from back then, which had lingered in his dreams countless times over the years... Yun Che's soul and tear ducts were struck with immense intensity in an instant. A warmth he could not control surged in his heart and eyes.
"But that's okay, I know Daddy must be held up by something very important," the girl smiled brightly, pure and beautiful like an immaculate angel. "But when Daddy comes back, you have to make up for my birthday gift."
"Also, breaking your word must be punished... this is proof, so you can't deny it, hehe."
The scene switched. In the image, the girl had shed some of her childishness, gaining a more dazzling beauty. Her jet-black hair now reached her waist... In just one year, it was a transformative change.
"Daddy, I'm sixteen now. Why haven't you come back yet?"
"I've grown a lot. Grandfather, Grandmother, Master, and my aunts all say I've become as pretty as Mother. I really want you to see it."
"I'm so worried... but I know Daddy is the greatest person in the world, so nothing can happen to you. I'll be very good and wait for you to come back."
The projection changed again. In the scene, Wuxin was now seventeen. She had no trace of childishness left, only a graceful standing posture and a jade-like face so beautiful it was hard to look directly at. Between her brows and in her clear eyes was a hint of the coldness inherited from her mother.
"Daddy, this is what I looked like at seventeen... Mother said that missing my growth will surely be your greatest regret. So, I will use the Eternal Shadow Stone you gave me to imprint the traces of my growth."
"But why do you still refuse to come back... Why did you leave me alone for so long again..."
Yun Che: "..."
The background of the projection turned into an endless pale snow domain. The eighteen-year-old Yun Wuxin, whose figure was now similar to Chu Yuechan's, stood amidst a flurry of snowflakes like a solitary, aloof snow lotus born from the snow.
"Father, at my coming-of-age ceremony, you were still absent. You once told me more than once that you wanted to see me grown up early. Now I have grown up, but where are you..."
"Everyone is very worried about you. In Tian Xuan Continent and Illusory Demon Realm, rumors have started that you have fallen in the outside world. I know those rumors are false. You must be safe, right? Even if... even if it's just that you are attached to that higher world and don't want to come back."
The wind and snow faded. In the image, the girl now had hair reaching her hips. It was again her birthday, but she stood alone atop an unknown high peak, gazing up at an unknown distant sky:
"I want to go to the God Realm to find you, but no one allows it. I also don't want Mother and the others to have more worry and concern."
"If you don't come back, I will hate you, hate you until the day you return..."
"Ah!" With a soft cry, the image was hastily put away. Yun Wuxin lowered her head, twisting the hem of her skirt, speaking nervously and flustered: "This... this doesn't count... I... I was just talking nonsense then. I don't hate Father at all."
Hearing no response from her father, she stealthily glanced sideways and found him tightly pressing his lips together, his half-closed eyes glinting with starlike sparkles.
She lifted her eyes and said softly with a playful hint: "Father, you wouldn't be... crying, would you?"
Yun Che abruptly turned his face away and said with a snort: "Nonsense! Your dad is the Divine Emperor of the God Realm, and to put it grandly, the Lord of Chaos. I've seen all kinds of scenes. How could I cry so easily?"
As he spoke, he quickly activated his profound energy, rather embarrassedly dispersing the mist in his eyes.
Yun Wuxin did not tease him further. She leaned her body, snuggling back against Yun Che, and said softly: "Aunt Qianye said that when you were emperor in the God Realm, you enfeoffed many imperial consorts. In the future, there will surely be many other children. At that time, will you still dote on me like this?"
Yun Che's face heated up slightly: "Don't listen to her nonsense. Actually... not that many."
"Is that so?" Yun Wuxin pinched Yun Che's arm with her fingers: "Aunt Chi said that just the demon girls she brought as dowry are nine."
"Cough cough cough." Yun Che's face grew even hotter, and he said guiltily: "That was her acting on her own. I knew nothing about it beforehand!"
"Aunt Qianye also said that when you made that engagement with that young aunt surnamed Shui, she was only fifteen."
"~!@#$%^..." Yun Che nearly spat out his saliva... In his mind, a hundred and eighty ways to punish Qianye Ying'er quickly flashed by!
"But, speaking of it, it's quite strange." Yun Wuxin tilted her head, her lovely face pensive: "I have so many aunts, and you have so many imperial consorts in the God Realm. Why, after all these years, haven't you given me a younger brother or sister?"
"Father, you wouldn't... really have some strange problem, would you?"
"How could that be!!" Yun Che practically shouted instantly as if electrocuted, his face unchanged but heart pounding wildly: "I just don't want to! For someone as formidable as your father, controlling such things couldn't be simpler!"
"And besides, I already have you as such a good daughter. Even if I never have any other children in this life, I won't feel any regret." he said half-seriously.
"Hmph! As expected of a naturally philandering father, you come up with sweet-talking words effortlessly... but they don't work on your daughter!" Yun Wuxin said with a smile, feigning reproach.
Yun Che was left speechless.
"Oh, right!" Yun Wuxin suddenly thought of something, looked up and asked: "Father, was the transfer of Lan Ji Star on the tenth day after you left back then?"
Yun Che thought for a moment and said: "That's right... How do you know?"
He had mentioned everything from back then to them, but in his memory, he hadn't mentioned a very specific time.
"As expected." Yun Wuxin said knowingly: "Because on that day, both Tian Xuan Continent and Illusory Demon Realm experienced a brief anomaly. I used the Eternal Shadow Stone to record it at that time... Father, look."
The Eternal Shadow Stone in Yun Wuxin's hand again released that special icy light, and another image was cast before Yun Che.
The scene in the image was an endless distant sky. The firmament trembled, the entire space was visibly shaking. High above, clouds were scattering, and a trace of red light spread rapidly, becoming denser as it spread. In just a blink, it covered the entire sky within sight.
Although a bit dim, far from the soul-piercing red light of the scarlet rift, Yun Che recognized it at a glance—that was the unique spatial divine light of the Cosmic Thorn.
A planet transfer across star regions, a spatial divine power forcibly driven by one's own strength... Even as powerful as the Cosmic Thorn, the red light covering the sky lasted for five or six breaths before finally dispersing... Though, this time can only be called brief in the eyes of mortals.
The spatial tremor also gradually ceased.
Looking from afar, the scene in the distant sky had undergone a subtle change. But with the spiritual perception and eyesight of the beings on Lan Ji Star, it was almost impossible to detect clearly.
The image faded, and Yun Wuxin said slowly: "At that time, many people guessed either that an earthquake had affected both continents, or that Lan Ji Star had collided with a huge meteorite rich in intense fire elements."
"Since it lasted only a short time and didn't cause any serious consequences, not long after, no one talked about it anymore."
"But at that time, no one could have possibly imagined that it was the entire planet making an ultra-long-distance journey. The wonder of the world is truly beyond imagination, simply a great miracle."
"It truly is a miracle." Yun Che said with emotion. Without this miracle, he couldn't imagine what he would be like now, nor what the God Realm would be like now.
"Are the Eastern God Domain and Southern God Domain very far apart?" Yun Wuxin asked.
"Yes, very far." Yun Che replied: "So far that the distances of billions of Tian Xuan Continents and Illusory Demon Realms cannot match it."
Yun Wuxin blinked her beautiful eyes, as if trying to imagine what kind of distance that was. She suddenly said softly: "That young aunt surnamed Shui who transferred Lan Ji Star, she is really a very gentle person."
"Hmm? Why do you say that?" Yun Che asked curiously.
Yun Wuxin had never had any contact with Shui Meiyin, and in his own descriptions, he had not mentioned her temperament.
"It's easy to guess." Yun Wuxin smiled: "For such a huge spatial transfer over such a vast distance, for a massive planet, it would almost inevitably cause changes in the planet's entire climate."
"But after the anomaly back then, no matter which place, it seemed that there was no abnormal seasonal change. Liu Yun City still had spring all year round, and the Ice Extreme Snow Domain remained as cold as ever."
Yun Che: "..."
"If Liu Yun City had become bone-chillingly cold, and the ice and snow of the Ice Extreme Snow Domain and its ice palace had gradually melted, what a great pity that would have been. But after such a distant spatial transfer, nothing changed."
"This must be because that young aunt surnamed Shui chose the best region during the transfer, not only the environment most similar to that in the Eastern Domain, but even the planet's position and the orientation of each continent were adjusted to the most perfect state. It must be so."
A starlight flickered in the girl's eyes: "She not only saved all of us, but is also such a gentle, kind, and thoughtful young aunt. I really want to meet her soon."
Yun Che was stunned for a moment, then smiled: "Maybe it's just a coincidence."
Shui Meiyin had never been to Lan Ji Star, and even less knew where Liu Yun City or the Ice Extreme Snow Domain were.
"I don't believe in such a miraculous coincidence." Yun Wuxin giggled.
Yun Che was momentarily lost in thought.
The night sky was vast. The bright moon and stars draped a layer of faint light like a jade robe over the girl. Yun Wuxin snuggled against her father and quietly fell asleep without realizing it. Her long eyelashes curved, her jade lips held a faint smile... Yun Che gently kissed her forehead. The girl's carefree, unblemished sleeping face was a supremely beautiful painting that he would guard with everything in his life.
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