Chapter 45

Chapter 45: Perish Together

After the battle at the Ming River ended, the surviving cultivators turned back.

Fang Xu Cheng lingered.

He didn’t dare return.

They had come as two.

Only he was leaving.

Mo Chou had fallen into the Ming River, and he hadn’t even recovered her body.

His thoughts spiraled as he sat in a roadside tavern, fingers digging into his own hair until his scalp ached.

What was he supposed to do?

How was he supposed to explain it to his mother-in-law?

Second Lady Hu had never liked him. If Mo Chou hadn’t insisted, she would never have agreed to the marriage.

For years he’d tried every trick he knew to win approval. He’d crawled, flattered, smiled until his face hurt.

None of it had been enough.

If she learned Mo Chou died here…

Would she kill him and make him follow Mo Chou into death?

The fear clenched his skull until it felt like it might split.

Then a voice spoke from beside him, casual as if offering wine.

“Brother Fang, why worry? If you’re afraid she’ll blame you, give her someone else to hate. Doesn’t that solve it?”

Fang Xu Cheng lifted his head.

A plain face stared back—forgettable, the kind of face you couldn’t describe two breaths later.

Fang Xu Cheng remembered him from the battlefield. Somehow, they’d run into each other again.

“Someone to hate?” Fang Xu Cheng echoed, confused.

“Tell your mother-in-law Madam was murdered,” the man said easily. “Then she’ll focus on avenging her daughter and won’t come after you.”

His eyes narrowed slightly, as if measuring Fang Xu Cheng’s greed. “If you stand with her against the enemy, she might even pass her legacy to you.”

Fang Xu Cheng’s eyes brightened. “Would that work?”

“Of course.”

Hope loosened the knot in his chest—until doubt returned.

“But… my mother-in-law is Divine Transformation Stage. If she finds someone and questions them, won’t she learn the truth?”

“Then name someone she can’t find,” the man said, as if it were obvious.

Fang Xu Cheng leaned forward. “Who?”

The man’s smile was thin. “Someone who vanished in this battle, and whose name is loud enough.”

He tapped the table once.

“The Limitless Sect’s Immortal Lord Ling.”

Ling Bu Fei’s eyes flew open.

The memory he’d ripped from Fang Xu Cheng’s soul was too vivid—like living it himself.

“What… is this?” he murmured, turning to look at Bai Meng Jin.

Under his palm, Fang Xu Cheng’s screams weakened, cracked, and then stopped entirely.

Second Lady Hu swayed.

Poison and wounds had already left her half-dead. She’d forced out a little toxin, but the moment she moved again it surged back through her meridians like ice.

She collapsed, lips and face turning blue in an instant, eyelids twitching as her breath thinned.

Ling Bu Fei’s heart lurched. He released Fang Xu Cheng and caught Second Lady Hu. “Senior! Senior!”

Bai Meng Jin pressed fingers to Second Lady Hu’s pulse, face turning heavy. “It’s too late. The poison has reached her heart meridians… and even her primordial spirit…”

“A Chou…” Second Lady Hu whispered, eyes already unfocused. Tears gathered at the corners as if her body remembered grief even when her mind was fading. “Mother… avenged you…”

Ling Bu Fei’s throat tightened.

Second Lady Hu’s love for her daughter was fierce enough to burn the world—and it made something in his own chest sting.

His mother had been the same. She would have traded her life for his without blinking.

Bai Meng Jin’s gaze sharpened as she made a decision. She leaned close, voice steady. “Senior. Your body can’t be saved. But if we draw out your primordial spirit now, you can still cultivate yin methods. Are you willing?”

Second Lady Hu’s gaze drifted. Her mind turned sluggishly. “What…?”

Bai Meng Jin shifted tactics, voice gentler but no less precise. “Miss Mo Chou only fell into the Ming River. Her death isn’t confirmed.”

Second Lady Hu’s breath hitched.

“They say Immortal Lord Ling also fell into the Ming River,” Bai Meng Jin continued. “Our Young Sect Master will investigate my father’s whereabouts one day. Do you want to come with us?”

“The Ming River…” Second Lady Hu’s eyes cleared by a fraction. She nodded hard, sudden hunger in her gaze. “Good. I’ll go with you. I want to see for myself…”

Bai Meng Jin flicked her wrist and opened the Yin-Yang Umbrella.

The bone-white ribs spread, black and white surfaces catching dawn light as if drinking it.

“Hold my hand,” Bai Meng Jin said. “Let your primordial spirit come out slowly.”

“Okay…”

The Yin-Yang Umbrella began to spin, yin and yang cycling in a steady loop.

Second Lady Hu’s primordial spirit lifted from her body like smoke drawn from embers. It slid along the umbrella’s handle and dissolved into the treasure as if sinking into water.

On the ground, Second Lady Hu’s body went still.

Her eyes closed.

Her breath stopped completely.

Bai Meng Jin released the hand that was turning cold and shut the umbrella with a soft click.

She let out a slow breath and turned—

To find Ling Bu Fei staring at her.

“What?” Bai Meng Jin asked.

He didn’t answer immediately. His gaze held hers with a new wariness. “You seem to have… a lot of secrets.”

After tonight, if he still believed she was merely a successor of the Gu Family, then his head must have been kicked by a donkey.

He replayed everything in his mind.

Hours ago, three people had been trapped in a tomb: a Divine Transformation cultivator whose cultivation was sealed and poisoned, a young master who couldn’t cultivate, and a Golden Core cultivator who’d advanced by sheer luck, facing a Nascent Soul cultivator and his henchmen.

There had been almost no way out.

If they were lucky, they could have hidden until the Limitless Sect arrived.

If they were luckier, Second Lady Hu might have forced the poison out and regained enough strength to fight.

But Bai Meng Jin hadn’t gambled on luck.

She’d taken the valley’s existing wards—Second Lady Hu’s own layered defenses—and stitched them into a Grand Array.

While Fang Xu Cheng searched, she’d moved through the valley placing talismans and connecting points, turning the terrain into a net.

Then she’d forced the crucial step.

She’d helped him summon the Devil-Suppression Cauldron and anchor it as the array-eye, locking the Formation into stability.

After that, she and Ling Bu Fei had played their roles—Mo Chou and Second Lady Hu—dragging Fang Xu Cheng’s emotions up until he struck with everything he had.

His thunder had fed the Formation. The Devil-Suppression Cauldron had held it down like a divine nail.

By the time the Formation broke, Fang Xu Cheng had burned himself nearly empty.

Then they’d killed him.

Ling Bu Fei had seen masters of formations. The Limitless Sect was full of schemers. But he’d never seen someone braid both together so seamlessly.

“So what?” Bai Meng Jin raised her brows. “You want to interrogate me here?”

Ling Bu Fei’s lips pressed thin. “Don’t you think you should be honest with me?”

He leaned in slightly, voice dropping. “After all, we’re going to be husband and wife.”

Bai Meng Jin glanced around at the shattered tomb, the scorched ground, the bodies cooling in dawn air. “Here?”

He opened his mouth—

She cut him off. “Shh. Someone’s coming.”

The long night finally ended.

Sunlight slid over the horizon, turning the valley pale gold.

Several streaks of light tore across the sky and landed in the nameless valley.

The first to arrive was a tall, clear-browed female cultivator. Spells were already gathering in her hands—then she froze at the sight before her.

“Young Sect Master?”

Ling Bu Fei answered lazily, as if he’d only been woken from a nap. “Mm.”

“You’re fine?” Her gaze flicked over him, then over the bodies. “And they’re dead?”

Ling Bu Fei rolled his eyes. “Can’t you see?”

More people arrived one after another. The moment they saw the scene, confusion spread like ink in water.

There had been a battle.

There were corpses everywhere.

Yet the two supposed hostages looked bright-eyed and energetic, without a scratch.

So who had kidnapped whom?

It wasn’t until Bai Li Xu landed that the stunned silence broke. He shouted in raw relief and rushed forward. “Young Master! Are you all right? That’s wonderful!”