Chapter 85 — Old Grounds
劍問蒼天 · Page 4 of 6
Tian Lingsu frowned and glanced around, a little puzzled. "What is it, Da Huang? Oh, that's right—where's Xiao Hui? Why isn't he with you?"
Whether Da Huang understood her or not, he kept barking at the sky, hoarse with effort.
Tian Lingsu looked up at the sky, but saw only blue sky and white clouds, boundless and endless, and faintly a strand of cloud-mist seemed to trace its way out of the clouds and gallop across the heavens—a magnificent sight. Somehow a sudden bewilderment came over her, and she stood gazing, transfixed.
South of Canglan Mountain, thousands of li away in a desolate place, stood a high mountain called Fox Qi Mountain, the seat of the Nether King Sect of the Demonic Cult.
Over these ten years the Demonic Cult's power had flourished day by day and masters had come forth in numbers, yet its internal strife had grown ever more savage—fiercer, indeed, than its contests with the righteous path. The Nether King Sect had long been one of the four great factions of the Demonic Cult, and in this decade its sect master, the Nether King, had governed with vigor and grand strategy, building the sect up until it faintly seemed poised to supplant the Ten Thousand Venoms Sect as the foremost faction of the cult.
In today's Nether King Sect, besides the mysterious Four Holy Envoys, who had surfaced from the shadows, a mysterious figure called "Mr. Ghost" had appeared at the Nether King's side—usually only his voice was heard, never his person. But what drew the most attention was the younger generation of the Nether King Sect, foremost among them Ming Li, whom the Nether King valued above all; the Nether King had not scrupled to break precedent and promote him to vice sect master, treating him as his own son. Now all the world knew that Ming Li would surely be the next sect master of the Nether King Sect.
Within the Demonic Cult, infighting was not only fierce but stopped at nothing; who could say how many had tried to sow discord between the Nether King and this foremost warrior of his, and all had failed.
And in the hearts of the very few who knew something of that past, that bond between the two—nearly unbreakable in its strength—roused a faint, quiet sorrow.
A black veil gently covered her face. That mysterious woman in black—You Si—sat in silence in one of the most important rooms of the Nether King Sect. The room was not large, but it was very cold, and the reason lay at its center: a translucent white platform of ice, from which threads of cold vapor drifted upward.
A beautiful woman, dressed in the green garments she had loved, lay quietly upon it. Amid the drifting white cold, her face looked somewhat pale, almost translucent, with a chill beauty.
Her hands were folded before her, and in her palms, as though already grown one with her body, was a small golden bell, glimmering with strange light, as if gazing out upon the world.
Just then a low rumbling came from behind her; the heavy stone door of the room was pushed open, then shut again.
Footsteps sounded, and someone came to stand beside You Si.
You Si slowly raised her head. Those who could enter this room numbered no more than four in the whole Nether King Sect.
Ming Li's somewhat pale face swam into view before her, and behind her black veil her heart gave a faint tremor; dimly she recalled that each time this man entered here, his face grew paler still.
Yet in the man's eyes there was no trace of You Si at all; the beautiful woman lying so peacefully there now filled his whole being.
The stone chamber suddenly grew very still, still as death.
You Si rose lightly and stepped back, but her gaze remained fixed on the man. His figure seemed lonelier still, and that dreadful reek of blood that so often clung to him in the world outside could not be sensed here at all.
Who could say whether this place alone was where he found any peace.