IS Chapter 53

“How could this Daoist, who has been wise all his life, encounter such an ancestor?” Wei Sheng Xian muttered through gritted teeth as he began picking up the chess pieces.

“You’re all going?” Feng Jiang’s voice suddenly came from above. In the next moment, the Fourth Palace Master hung upside down from the tree, “Anyway, my puny nascent soul can’t go. I’ll flip through some books to see what kind of medicinal herbs grow in the underworld, and then you guys can pick them for me, how about it?”

Wei Sheng Xian: “Come down first, and we can talk about everything. With such clumsy skills, aren’t you afraid of falling?”

Then he muttered to himself, “Hiding one after another in a tree, aren’t you afraid it’ll fall?”

Feng Jiang landed with a smile, “I sent the person away.”

“Didn’t poison them to death, did you?”

“Don’t worry, even if the Dao Sect can’t detoxify it, wouldn’t asking the Dan Sect be able to?” A hint of mocking smile appeared in the corner of the Fourth Palace Master’s eyes, “It just depends on whether he has the face for it.”

“What did Master Xia say?”

“Master Xia is peacefully embroidering. I know what he means, you guys just go.”

Wei Sheng Xian: “Very good. With you two guarding the house, this Palace Master doesn’t have to worry about the Micro-Snow Palace changing its name to Micro-Blood Palace.”

Feng Jiang pondered: “But if it were Micro-Blood Palace, wouldn’t I be revered as the Supreme Elder?”

——Wei Sheng Xian coldly left with his chess pieces.

On the way back to Misty Green Peak, Ye Zhuo noticed that Li Yuan was always intentionally or unintentionally looking at his wrist.

So he asked, “What is it?”

Perhaps it would have been better not to ask.

With this question, Li Yuan leisurely replied: “I want to see your Buddhist beads.”

Having said that, he reached out to grab his wrist in a grand manner.

Ye Zhuo blocked him with his sword: “Can we go back first?”

“Why?” Li Yuan said, “Can’t I look here?”

“Your gaze is too blatant.” After Ye Zhuo said this, he took off the Buddhist beads and threw them to the dragon, walking straight away.

Really, there’s something wrong with Ye Zhuo’s eyes.

It’s just a brief conversation with someone who knows the inside story, and in his eyes, it becomes as if his nose isn’t his nose and his eyes aren’t his eyes, and now he can’t even look.

The moonlight all around was clear, and he could see his faint shadow cast on the ground. Li Yuan wasn’t in a hurry to catch up with Ye Zhuo.

What’s the point of returning to Misty Green Peak so quickly? He’ll just find him eventually.

The Buddhist beads were between his fingers, as cold and clear as the moonlight. Although they had just been taken from that person’s wrist, they didn’t seem to have been stained with any body temperature at all. He remembered that person’s skin, always like this.

Yet, each and every bead was so intensely colored.

Holding the blood-colored beads in his hand, it was like holding a handful of cold, gleaming blood.

The night wind blew, and Li Yuan raised his head to see the spring mountains in all their glory. After thinking for a while, he broke off a flowering branch and slowly walked towards the direction of Misty Green Peak.

Ye Zhuo was in the library.

The entire wall on the west side was filled with Buddhist scriptures. He took a few books related to the way of ghosts and quietly read them at the desk.

He hadn’t even finished one book when someone pushed the door open and entered.

“You’re burning Dragon Brain incense again.” The voice of the person who came was exceptionally dissatisfied.

He always burned Dragon Brain incense in his library. Ye Zhuo acted as if he hadn’t heard it.

But after hearing a rustling sound, he raised his eyes and saw Li Yuan first insert a flower branch into the white vase on the desk, and then look unkindly at the Dragon Brain incense flakes burning nicely in the incense burner, as if wanting to replace them.

As if the word “dragon” was attached to it, others couldn’t even burn it.

Ye Zhuo: “I’m not changing it.”

“This incense is too cold and bitter.” Li Yuan said, sitting down beside his desk and glancing at the scripture in his hand.

Ye Zhuo: “The Buddhist beads.”

Li Yuan took out the string of beads. Under the glass lamp, the seventeen blood-colored Buddhist beads shone with a secluded light. On closer inspection, it seemed that fresh blood was surging within, and it also seemed that karmic fire was burning.

“Those seventeen blood crystals, they were used to make this?”

Ye Zhuo nodded lightly.

“I see.” Li Yuan said, “But I’ve looked at it many times and didn’t think it looked like blood crystals. What’s inside?”

“The resentment of the ten thousand blood demons who died a violent death surrounded me.” Ye Zhuo said lightly, “I didn’t like it, so I refined them all and sealed them inside.”

“Then what’s engraved on it?”

“For suppression.”

Not knowing how to evaluate it, Li Yuan: “…And then you carry it around with you?”

“Why not?” Ye Zhuo said, “One day they’ll yell enough and naturally dissipate, which will also count as me saving them.”

“You really are.” Li Yuan couldn’t help but laugh, taking this person’s wrist and slowly putting the Buddhist beads back on for him, “No wonder I always feel that although there is Buddha-nature on these beads, there is also more baleful aura.”

The string of beads, returning to his wrist, carried a bit of someone else’s body temperature. Ye Zhuo felt a slight discomfort and wanted to withdraw his hand.

But Li Yuan didn’t let go, instead looking at that section of wrist.

“Were the ten thousand blood demons easy to kill?” he asked.

Ye Zhuo recalled the scene at the time.

“Not easy to kill.” he said.

“Then why did you want to kill them all?”

“I encountered them, so I killed them.” Ye Zhuo said, “It was good for practicing the sword.”

“See, you do know how to do good deeds?” Li Yuan grabbed his hand, slowly pushing the string of beads back to its original position, “Commit less sins, accumulate more merit, and do this from now on, wouldn’t that be good?”

“I don’t need worldly merit, nor do I want it.” Ye Zhuo raised his eyes, looking into Li Yuan’s eyes, “As for whether sins are committed or not, it has never been up to me. You think I’ve accumulated merit, but hasn’t it also sown the seeds of hatred between Micro-Snow Palace and Upper Purity Mountain?”

“That’s because they are hypocritical and self-serving. You just need to have a clear conscience.”

“Naturally.” Ye Zhuo said, “I took your scale, also with a clear conscience.”

Li Yuan: “Are you deliberately trying to anger me?”

——Then he saw Ye Zhuo looking at him, a hint of a smile gradually appearing in his eyes.

This person seemed to like this. Li Yuan didn’t even want to pay attention to him. If he really got angry, wouldn’t he be letting this person get his way?

“Then what do you think?” Li Yuan said, “Killing the blood demons, bringing peace to the mortal realm, what do you think of that? The Upper Purity Mountain plotting against you, plotting against Micro-Snow Palace, do you think they are hateful?”

He asked, and he also saw Ye Zhuo thinking.

But those eyes were still devoid of love and hate. Looking into them, there was only a patch of silent coldness.

“I cultivate the path of ruthlessness.” Finally, Ye Zhuo said.

These words made it impossible for Li Yuan to empathize, but hearing them from this person’s mouth, he didn’t feel surprised at all.

The affairs of the Immortal Dao were complex and intricate, but as long as you saw the root cause, everything would become clear.

And Ye Zhuo, with nothing external in his heart, was precisely the most unclear.

“How can there be someone like you in this world.” Li Yuan slowly released his wrist.

Ye Zhuo: “What kind am I?”

“Anyway, a very hateful kind.” Li Yuan said.

It seemed that there was a smile in Ye Zhuo’s eyes again.

Li Yuan didn’t want to be blinded by this empty smile, so he shifted his gaze, seeing behind him a deep, solemn, and splendid collection of Buddhist scriptures.

…He couldn’t help but look at his wrist again.

The hand that held the sword, naturally, he was very familiar with.

But the hand with the string of beads, it seemed that he hadn’t studied it much.

——Wearing Buddhist relics always seemed solemn; sometimes, just holding it seemed like blasphemy against the gods and Buddhas.

However, this wasn’t even a completely Buddhist string of beads; it was the ten thousand blood demon grievances that this person was suppressing himself.

So it really was the red lotus karmic fire, a single thought of Buddha or demon.

Then could he bite it?

Quietly looking at that section of wrist, just as the thought surfaced, he saw that person raise his hand.

The blood-colored beads and the flowing cloud red sleeves fell together naturally. The dark patterns on the sleeves shone faintly under the lamp. Before he could see them clearly, they were already close at hand.

The sleeves stirred up the fragrance in the library. The cold Dragon Brain incense wafted over his face. This incense was like a green lamp and an ancient Buddha, how cold and bitter, but at this moment, the unique ethereal moisture on that person’s body became clear in an instant, setting it off, it was extremely like a faint sweetness.

In the next moment, that person’s cool fingertips covered his eyes.

——As if not allowing him to look anymore.

Li Yuan: “This is too blatant?”

Did he even need to ask?

Ye Zhuo: “It’s good that you know it yourself.”

Li Yuan couldn’t help but grab his wrist again, his voice with a smile: “Person Ye Zhuo, you’re so fun, if I can’t bear to skin you, tear out your bones, and scatter your ashes after a year, what should I do?”

“Dragon Li Yuan, whether I or you will skin, tear out the bones, and scatter the ashes is still unknown.” Ye Zhuo firmly covered those restless eyes, smiling slightly, “Remember to take care of yourself.”