Chapter 3675 — What Comes Next
The Blossom Guardian · Page 1 of 3
"Indeed," Ghost Thing said with a nod.
"Then how did you end up in this state?" Wei Zhao asked, his face full of puzzlement.
By Ghost Thing's strength, he should have ranked among the mighty even across all of Cloud Terrace Island, and down in the mortal world he ought to have been utterly without rival. So how had he fallen to such a sorry pass? His very flesh was gone, leaving nothing but a broken, crippled primordial spirit!
Ghost Thing answered with a bitter laugh. "You know it yourself, boy—a barrier of spiritual qi lies between Cloud Terrace Island and the mortal world. It's no easy thing to climb from the mortal world up to Cloud Terrace Island, and to descend from Cloud Terrace Island to the mortal world is every bit as troublesome."
"Is that so?" Wei Zhao was briefly stunned. He had known only that the spiritual qi barrier shut the gate from the mortal world to Cloud Terrace Island; it had never occurred to him that the return journey was the same. Did that mean that when he went back to the mortal world in the future, he too would have to go to enormous trouble?
"When you people were transmitted from the mortal world to Cloud Terrace Island, you needed a cultivator of one of the five elemental attributes to work together with the seven inheritors to suppress the five-element spiritual qi barrier, and then a disciple of the demonic sect to absorb the five-baleful-qi demonic energy the barrier released, before a gap could be opened. It was the same for this old man descending from Cloud Terrace Island to the mortal world—except I had no inheritors to help me, and could only force my way through on my own strength." Even now, Ghost Thing seemed to feel a lingering dread at the memory.
Wei Zhao was speechless. So many of them, himself included, had gone to vast pains merely to barely break through the spiritual qi barrier—and Ghost Thing had forced his way through alone! Just how monstrously powerful did a man have to be for that?
"In the end, this old man did succeed in descending to the mortal world, but the price was grievous wounds. And the spiritual qi of heaven and earth in the mortal world is so poor that there was no way to heal or recover. I wandered for several years, never finding the Great King's bloodline, until at last my wounds proved beyond cure and my lamp burned dry." Ghost Thing sighed and lamented.
Wei Zhao very nearly offered the customary condolences—but looking at the ball of black mist before him, he forcibly swallowed the words back down.
Wei Zhao rolled his eyes and choked on his words for a good while, unable to keep from grumbling inwardly: if you were already beyond cure with your lamp burned dry, then just what in the world is this blob in front of me?
Catching Wei Zhao's peculiar expression, Ghost Thing deigned to explain. "Any other spirit beast would long since have been reduced to ash. But this old man's innate ability is rather special—after death, I can preserve my primordial spirit."
"I see," Wei Zhao said, understanding dawning.
Though Ghost Thing did not say just what his innate ability was, Wei Zhao could not help thinking of Zhong Yongliang, whose body had been seized by the primordial spirit of Patriarch Mad Dragon.
Wei Zhao guessed that Ghost Thing's innate ability was probably not much different from the secret method the Morrow-upon-Morrow sect used to preserve the primordial spirit.
Ghost Thing fell silent afterward. As for what had happened after he became a primordial spirit, he did not go on—but Wei Zhao could guess well enough: a wretched, miserable drifting from place to place, until at last he encountered Wei Zhao himself.
Until now, Ghost Thing had struck Wei Zhao as unfathomable, and carrying with it an indescribable arrogance and hardness besides. But having heard all this, he suddenly felt that this Senior Ghost's experiences were nothing but a tale of bitter tears—and only the one who suffers knows how bitter.