Chapter 371
Chapter 372: Yun Qing Zi’s Intel
After a lot of coaxing and nagging, Rapunzel finally finished that nightmare of an essay, then in the blink of an eye dashed out the door; Yu Sheng watched as she turned her hair into a glider and jumped from the Cloud Viewing Terrace, and he thought: [If I’m being optimistic, she’s probably already halfway down the mountain to meet up with Cinderella and the others.]
He added in his head: [If I’m not optimistic, she’s hanging from a tree right now.]
Little Red Riding Hood put down her phone and, wearing a helpless look, went over to help. She gathered the pile of worksheets and practice books Rapunzel had tossed onto the coffee table the moment she finished, sorted them by category, and tucked them neatly into the backpack.
Yu Sheng watched from the side, and his eyes accidentally landed on the title of her essay again. His eyelids twitched.
Little Red Riding Hood spoke offhandedly: “She’s been like this since she was little, super hyped when people are around, but even so she ended up a ‘parent’ in Fairy Tale. At least when she goes out to take missions, she can be pretty reliable.”
Yu Sheng tugged at the corner of his mouth, then grew thoughtful: “Right… it’s just that her essay really caught me off guard. Also, if I think back, wasn’t she the first one in Fairy Tale who started calling me brother? A lot of the others just say it politely. She says it all the time. I’m almost used to hearing it.”
Little Red Riding Hood put away the pencil case, thought for a moment, and said: “Maybe it’s because she really did have a brother once.”
Yu Sheng stared and blurted out: “Wait, she actually had a brother?!”
Little Red Riding Hood nodded as if stating something normal and said: “Yeah. A long time ago.”
Yu Sheng frowned and asked: “A long time ago? Then what happened?”
Little Red Riding Hood lifted her eyelids and answered like it was matter of fact: “Her brother didn’t want her. A lot of us were thrown away by our own parents. She was thrown away by her brother.”
Yu Sheng fell silent: [So that’s the story.]
Little Red Riding Hood shook her head and added: “But that was when she was very, very small. I even suspect she doesn’t remember at all. I was still in kindergarten back then. I only heard about it later from other ‘parents’. Maybe she just kept a vague impression of the word brother, or deep down she feels like she should have a brother.”
She paused and glanced at Yu Sheng, then said: “That’s why I’ve always thought it’s good she calls you brother. That word has become something happy for her now.”
Yu Sheng didn’t answer. He just watched Little Red Riding Hood’s quick hands. After a long moment, he sighed with real feeling and said: “You take good care of your brothers and sisters.”
Little Red Riding Hood looked up and asked with a small smile: “What made you say that all of a sudden? Though, I do think I’m doing a decent job.”
Yu Sheng spread his hands and said: “You are. Just look at Rapunzel’s mood right now. You can tell you did well. Sometimes I wonder if she even believes there are bad people in the world. She’s excited everywhere she goes.”
Little Red Riding Hood’s expression turned a bit complicated as she muttered: “I’ll take that as a compliment.” Then she smoothly changed the subject as if by chance and said: “By the way, about that Otherworld you all went to recently, I heard Little Fish mention it. It’s another suspected ‘abnormal type’?”
Yu Sheng’s face turned more serious as he talked business: “Right now, the odds are high it’s an abnormal type. It had almost all the scene types: ‘wilderness’, ‘fortress’, and ‘kingdom’, but every scene changed at random. There were strong signs of Illusion Arts or some kind of resonance. That structure, built of ‘scenes’, is a bit like Fairy Tale, but we haven’t found anything like Fairy Tale’s action rules.”
Little Red Riding Hood nodded and said: “Anyway, be careful. If you need people, just call me or anyone in Fairy Tale. We’re always ready to help.” Then a smile slipped onto her face as she added: “I don’t count as child labor anymore.”
Yu Sheng laughed and raised his hand to give the girl a light high five.
Then he casually grabbed an Irene from the house, tossed her up onto his shoulder, left No. 66 Wutong Road, and used Door Opening to head straight to the Parted Clouds Palace.
He arrived at the Grand Hall, and not long after, he saw Immortal Yuan Ling hurrying in, with Xuan Che following behind.
Immortal Yuan Ling spoke as soon as they met: “I was refining pills and got your message late.” He looked anxious and asked: “You said there’s something urgent. What happened?”
Yu Sheng got straight to the point with a Door Opening kind of directness and asked: “Have you heard of the name ‘Yun Qing Zi’?”
Immortal Yuan Ling froze, then searched his memory fast and said while thinking aloud: “It sounds familiar… Where did you hear that name? Why ask all of a sudden?”
Yu Sheng didn’t hide anything and laid out the Illusion Arts he had been through: “I heard it in a dream, but it might have been more than a dream. The scene seemed tied to certain ‘information’ carried by the new Otherworld I’ve been in. Everything pointed to the Sovereign’s Legacy. That Yun Qing Zi appeared at the end. He seemed like me, an onlooker, but when he saw me, he got shocked and angry. He attacked the moment we met…” He described the figure who called himself Yun Qing Zi in detail, then added: “I keep feeling like his mental state is off. He seemed twitchy and unstable.”
Before Immortal Yuan Ling could reply, Irene, sitting on Yu Sheng’s shoulder, widened her eyes and said: “What? You ran into something that big in a dream and didn’t call me?”
Yu Sheng asked helplessly: “Call you for what?”
Irene spoke as if it was obvious: “To help you fight! Did you forget I’m great at fighting in dreams? And the stuff you can’t see through, maybe I can!”
Yu Sheng rubbed his neck and said, a little embarrassed: “I… didn’t think of it. Also, I had no time to call you. He rushed me without a word. Before I could react, he’d already finished the trash talking part.”
Irene puffed up for some reason and said: “I don’t care. Next time you call me first thing, especially in weird dreams like that. It’s dangerous. And your reactions are slow in dreams. You could eat a loss without knowing it.”
Yu Sheng gave up and said: “Okay, okay, got it.”
By the time Yu Sheng finished, Immortal Yuan Ling’s face had turned grave. After a short silence, his eyes narrowed; he looked up and made eye contact with Xuan Che, as if something had clicked.
He said in a low voice: “Could it be… the Exiled Immortal of the Frontier, Yun Qing Zi?!”
Yu Sheng stopped bickering with Irene and asked: “Exiled Immortal of the Frontier? So he’s famous?”
Immortal Yuan Ling shook his head and said with weight: “Not a celebrity, an ancient. He’s someone from the last ‘era’.”
Yu Sheng blinked and said: “Huh?”
Immortal Yuan Ling reminded him: “Remember what I told you about the early years of the Grand Void Spiritual Axis’s historical reshaping, before the current Five Sects co-governance became stable? Back then, many great ancestor-level figures appeared on the Grand Void Youth Form. Later, with the aftershocks of the second singularity fading and new powers of the Grand Void Spiritual Axis rising and reaching consensus, those ancestors slowly left the stage. The ones who died early were gone. The rest either fled far away, secluded themselves to cultivate, or hid their names and wandered the mortal world for fun.”
Yu Sheng nodded again and again and said: “I remember. So this Yun Qing Zi is one of those hidden ancestors?”
Immortal Yuan Ling frowned even tighter and said: “He’s the only one I can think of. But he did more than just hide. According to the records, we all thought he died a thousand years ago.”
Yu Sheng echoed: “Died?”
Immortal Yuan Ling’s voice dropped: “The last time anyone saw him was on a barren alien star near the Featherwing-13b Border. After the Five Sects order stabilized and those great ancestors withdrew, he disappeared too, but he still showed up every three to five hundred years, usually near the Border. Until a thousand years ago, a border outpost observed a terrifying shock. A desolate star was struck by an unknown force.
“In the investigation that followed, we found some damaged monitoring devices. The recordings showed Yun Qing Zi was on that desolate star. He seemed to be fighting something but was losing. At the last moment, he burned his essence and soul to draw in a Void Devouring. That caused the terrifying shock.
“Afterward, we only found some fragments of a body drained of spiritual power and a large field of charred soil made from blood essence burned dry. He never appeared again in the thousand years since.”
Yu Sheng listened, stunned into silence. Irene blinked and said: “That sure sounds dead. His body turned into a field of charred earth.”
Immortal Yuan Ling stroked his beard and said seriously: “That has been the conclusion. But now it seems this senior might still be alive. People like him have many unbelievable ways to survive. Some even hide methods close to Reincarnation. Back then we only found some remains after the fight. We can’t be one hundred percent sure he fell.”
Yu Sheng grew curious and asked: “No way to confirm what he was fighting? And what was he like before? Was he as jumpy as when I met him?”
Immortal Yuan Ling shook his head: “No way. A thousand years ago, the Grand Void Spiritual Axis wasn’t as strong and advanced as now. Most of Featherwing-13b was still empty alien stars. Especially near the Border, many places hadn’t even been explored. At best there might be an Outpost or a few automatic Automatons. No one would approach places like that unless they were a great Cultivator who could form a small cycle of heaven and carve out a cave on a barren star. The intel we could gather is far too little.
“As for his temperament… I don’t know firsthand, but from what I’ve heard, he was not that crazy. In fact, he was known for being gentle and courteous.”
[If he was gentle, then what in the world broke him?] Yu Sheng wondered.