Chapter 96 — Old Sentiments

In midair the blue light rose, hovering for a moment, then suddenly—ignoring the others in the forest—shot like thunder, swift as lightning, into the darkness on the other side. There someone gave a hum, and then a dark blue-green light flared, but with no intent to fight; it turned and left at once. The blue light, refusing to let it go, immediately gave chase.

Those two were of what cultivation! In a flash they left only afterimages, and in another moment, not even shadows remained.

In the field, Fa Cheng and the others gave a shout and rose together into the air, leaving the ground. The giant ants, finding no opponents and having lost so many of their fellows for nothing, were no doubt furious, and hissed and roared at the sky without pause.

Fa Cheng and his companions could not be bothered with the beasts below. They hastily searched the distance, but in that short span the forest had fallen into pitch darkness again, and the two streaks of light, one blue-green and one blue, had vanished—where, they could not tell. They could only stare at one another in dismay.

After a long while, Zeng Shuyan suddenly said in a low voice, "Is it him?"

Fa Cheng fell silent for a moment, complex emotions shifting in his eyes, but at last he sighed and said, "It should be him!"

The two exchanged a glance, then looked at Lin Jinghong together. They saw only that the young man stood suspended in the air; the night wind blew past, snapping his clothes, and on his handsome face there was no expression at all. But his eyes were fixed unblinkingly on the dark forest, staring blankly, lost in thought.

The night was deep.

The ancient forest lay in utter stillness, as though even the chirring of insects deep in the darkness had suddenly vanished.

Even the wind that brushed through the trees grew ever more shrill and plaintive, as though lamenting the grief of the night.

A blue-green light flashed through the darkness, like a light-footed traveler stepping into the dark. But the blue light behind it suddenly appeared, so dazzlingly bright, and pierced the darkness, forcing it all back as it clung close to the blue-green light.

The blue-green light wove among the trees, now darting, now soaring high, faster and faster—yet by no means could it shake off the blue light behind it. Seen from the darkness below, the blue light seemed to carry a momentum of utter desperation, pursuing relentlessly, unwilling to give up.

Who is it that sighs softly in the darkness?

Who is it that opens the heart in the night?

Darkness surges in from all sides and recedes; the wind strikes the face and swiftly vanishes; that once-familiar figure drifts ceaselessly through the night—echoing in whose eyes?

"Sss!"

A soft sound, and the blue-green light suddenly halted, then dispersed, revealing the figure of Ming Li standing quietly upon the highest tip of a great tree.

No more than a few feet away, the blue radiance of light too stopped the instant it halted, coming to a dead stop behind him—that Tianya Divine Sword, dazzling even in this night, grasped in a pale hand, coldly pointing at him.

The night lay heavy.

The wind moaned bitterly.

Their clothes fluttered softly in the wind.

Ming Li slowly, slowly turned around, and faced that face.

She was a woman of such clear beauty in this world, a beauty beyond all comparison, untouched by even a trace of the years' erosion—breathtaking, intoxicating.

Her face was cold, her hand held the sword, and she pointed it at him!

The frost-cold edge of the Tianya was but a foot from him; even at his throat he seemed to feel that thread of chill.

And, inexplicably, deep in the bottom of his heart, that faint sorrow.

The wind stirred the treetops, and their bodies too swayed gently in the night wind.

No one spoke; they only gazed in silence.

These ten years of time, all at once, slowly began to churn up from the bottom of the heart, bit by bit, surging into the mind.

Her hand, holding the sword, was pale as it had been ten years ago—had there ever been a time when he had held it in his palm?

He smiled faintly, with a touch of bitterness, and said softly, "How have you been?"

Lu Xueling did not answer, not a single word. Her lips were pale from biting down hard, and her figure, embraced by the night, was desolate and quietly beautiful.

Ming Li—no, Zhang Qingyue—on this moonless, pitch-black night, before this woman, suddenly seemed to have returned to ten years ago. His body too, it seemed, trembled faintly in the shadows, in a way no one knew.

"Why do you not kill me?" the beautiful woman said quietly, the frost-cold Tianya still in her hand, still pointing at him.

He gazed into her eyes, so bright there, like silent flames.

He lowered his head slightly, and after a long while, looking at his own figure, and at her swaying gently before his shadow, he said mildly, "Ten years ago, in the Jade Balance Hall, why did you defend me at all costs, and speak for me?"

Lu Xueling did not answer; only the corners of her lips moved slightly, and the hand holding the sword gripped so tightly—as though afraid of something.

In those bright eyes, whose figure was it that flickered?

Zhang Qingyue!

So it had not changed after all? In these ten years, had nothing truly changed?

She stared, transfixed, and bit her lip, keeping herself still cold, willing her gaze never to blur.

But whose heart was this, beating so, beating fiercely within a heart long grown icy? That faint tenderness, silent so long, wandering unseen through countless deep nights, now sudden as flame, blazing hot, burning upon her breast!

At the corner of her lips there came, all at once, a faint bitterness, a trace of moisture.

The hand that held her sword slowly fell away.

She lifted her head and looked to the sky.

The wind stirred her soft, lovely hair and brushed across her pale cheeks.

So it was that the sky had begun to rain again?