GB Chapter 15

It is said in the martial world that the Xuanmen has three lords, and the Ghost Domain has three gods. These three lords are Dao Lord Qingxu Zi, Demon Lord He Huan, and Sword Lord He Ku. With He Ku’s closed-door cultivation for his tribulation, these three can be considered the strongest cultivators in the mortal world. Correspondingly, the three gods are the strongest ghost deities in the Ghost Domain, known as the Sea Corner Ghost Goddess, the Academy of Lamentation, and the Joy of Yindu.

Among them, the Ghost Goddess is a woman who lives in the Sea Corner Xiaoyu Mountain, so she should have nothing to do with Zhuge Qingtian. However, the remaining two are quite suspicious.

In the data known to Qianren, the God of Lamentation was a former official who turned into a ghost many years ago. Throughout his life, he worked to purify the officialdom and punish corrupt officials. However, several students he taught all became corrupt officials. After painfully killing them, he was ambushed by a Xuanmen fairy and ended his life with a single sword, being wrongly seen as an evil person.

After his death, his resentment was hard to quell, and he eventually became the God of Lamentation. According to He Huan, who has seen him, this ghost wears plain white mourning clothes and always looks sad. The negative emotions of those around him will be magnified to the extreme. Without a strong will, even a Nascent Soul cultivator would lose the motivation to live, either dying in endless frustration or having their Dao hearts confused and going into demonic cultivation.

According to Xuanmen records, three Nascent Soul cultivators once tried to convert the God of Lamentation. At that time, the God of Lamentation just sat there drinking tea and reading books while they cast their spells. In less than three days, one blew himself up and died, one fell into the demonic path, and only one escaped, whose cultivation hasn’t improved since then. The person who escaped is Ling Sui Daoren, the current leader of the Tian Shi Mansion.

No one knows how strong the God of Lamentation is, but thankfully, he was dedicated to the world in his life and does not want to bring disaster after his death. Since his birth, he has only stayed in the Wanguishu Academy in the Ghost Domain, teaching fierce ghosts how to seek rebirth. Over the years, he has been at peace with the cultivators.

As for the God of Joy, it is the opposite of the God of Lamentation. He was transformed from someone who was always successful and then died suddenly. Although his life is unknown, he often walked in the world in earlier years, and many cultivators have seen him. It is rumored that the God of Joy wears red clothes and is full of smiles. Good things will happen to those around him, but these good things will eventually become the nightmare of the owner.

For example, he once drank at a rich family’s birthday banquet. The old man he toasted did live to be a hundred years old, but all his relatives died in accidents one after another. He could only watch the family’s memorial tablets, eventually unable to bear it and threw himself into the river and died.

He also met a washerwoman in Jiangnan. He simply admired her beauty and said a few words of blessing. Her husband was immediately named on the golden list as the new champion. However, after becoming famous, this man married the prime minister’s daughter, killed his wife, and abandoned his children, becoming a traitor who wreaked havoc on one side.

Such things happened frequently when the God of Joy walked in the world, but his evil aura was not as obvious as that of the God of Lamentation. In the beginning, he was even worshiped as a god of good fortune by mortals. The cultivators only noticed something was wrong after a long time and immediately reported it to Xuanmen, requesting a Tribulation Transcending cultivator to eliminate the harm. Later, under the encirclement and suppression of the Heavenly Dao Alliance, the God of Joy nearly scattered his soul. Fortunately, the God of Lamentation arrived in time to bring him back to the Ghost Domain, and he was able to survive. Even so, the God of Joy was still forced to make an oath to never set foot in the mortal world, thus hiding in Yindu for thirty years, disappearing without a trace.

The terrifying aspect of ghost gods is that no matter if they harbor ill intentions or not, as long as living people are with them, they will be affected by their evil aura. It is extremely difficult to resist without a Tribulation Transcending mind. Therefore, whether mortals or cultivators, they all pray not to encounter these three evil stars, and they even dare not call them ghosts, only bestowing upon them the name of gods.

The identities of those who can become ghost gods are never simple. Qianren, as the Great Protector of the Demonic Cult, has met many well-known figures in the martial world over the years, but he has never seen someone like Zhuge Qingtian. On second thought, his enthusiastic behavior is quite similar to that of the God of Joy, but that god has already vowed to never set foot in the mortal world again, and Xuanmen has never issued an alert. Logically, it should be impossible for him to appear in Zhu Jiaji.

Moreover, compared with these famous ghost gods, Zhuge Qingtian’s situation is also very strange. All ghost gods are born with evil aura, but Qianren has been with Zhuge Qingtian for several days, and his Dao heart has not been affected, nor has he experienced any discomfort. At this time, he couldn’t help but wonder if it was because he himself had no hope for life, so even the evil aura of ghost gods had nowhere to take hold?

While Qianren was meditating in contemplation, Zhuge Qingtian changed his clothes. He liked the bright clothes prepared by the Tian Shi Mansion, but unfortunately, no matter what clothes he wore, they would be stained red and white by his evil aura, looking no different from before.

Zhuge Qingtian has always been restless. After pacing around the room three times, he started harassing the only living person in sight again, taking a red egg and waving it in front of Qianren’s closed eyes, “Darling, do you want to eat an egg?”

“No.”

Without any intention of opening his eyes, Qianren instantly overturned his conclusion—okay, it’s not completely unaffected; his temper is obviously much more irritable than before.

So, could this person’s evil aura turn people into homosexuals? If that were the case, then he would indeed be resisting it at all times…

Qianren fell into contemplation again, trying to decipher the mystery that is Zhuge Qingtian. After being coldly rejected, the unknown ghost god could only lazily lie on the table, rolling the egg around. Finally, a flash of inspiration came, and he looked up expectantly, “Darling, do you want dinner?”

“No.”

With just one word, Zhuge Qingtian once again listlessly lay back down. Knowing that cultivators shouldn’t be disturbed during practice, he didn’t dare to speak. Even though he didn’t remember how he knew these things, having never seen a cultivator, he could only maintain this posture, watching as the sky gradually darkened. When the moon rose into the clouds, he excitedly stood up, “Darling, do you want supper?”

With this ghost god in the room, Qianren naturally didn’t dare to enter deep meditation. From time to time, he had to spare a sliver of his consciousness to secretly observe him for a while. He originally thought that with Zhuge Qingtian’s talkative nature, he wouldn’t be quiet for long, but who knew that this person actually lay motionless on the table like a corpse. Qianren used to find him annoying, but now that he was quiet, he felt the figure looked very lonely.

Although his reason kept warning him not to provoke this ghost, he couldn’t resist. He opened his eyes and slowly spoke, “I have already achieved the stage of abstaining from grains and do not need food.”

Zhuge Qingtian originally thought that this time, he wouldn’t even bother to refuse him, and he was feeling depressed. But he suddenly heard such a long sentence, and instantly became happy. But then, he remembered that Qianren did nothing but cultivate and travel on the way, and his face never showed any expression on normal days. If he wasn’t occasionally provoked into losing his temper, he wouldn’t seem like a living person. In the eyes of mortals, cultivators who live forever must be the happiest people in the world, but Zhuge Qingtian always felt that the person next to him had never been truly happy.

Thinking of this, even he, who rarely spoke seriously, couldn’t help but sigh, “You don’t eat, don’t drink, and never go out to play. What’s the fun in life?”

“Heh, even if I did those things, I wouldn’t feel any fun.”

Qianren replied with a cold laugh, his expression unchanged. He was He Huan’s disciple, and his life had always been good. However, once he reached the Golden Core stage, when he could abstain from grains, he stopped eating any mortal food. It wasn’t so much that he liked or disliked it, but rather that food was the easiest way to be poisoned. Although he wasn’t afraid of poison, it was still a hassle. Since it wasn’t a necessity for survival, then there was no need to consume it.

In Qianren’s life, there had never been likes or dislikes, only what was needed. Therefore, he could still handle the Demonic Cult’s work, which everyone found troublesome, methodically and cleanly. He had no weaknesses, nor did he have any attachments. He could perfectly execute all tasks. Whether he was by He Huan’s side or in the Demonic Cult, he had become the most useful person. That was the meaning of Qianren’s existence in the world.

He just didn’t understand. This kind of disciple was clearly enough to make all demon cultivators overjoyed, but why did his master always look worried when looking at the “useful” him…

Sometimes, Qianren also wondered if he let Zhuge Qingtian harass him because this person always found joy in all sorts of things. For him, this was a talent he could never possess in his life.

Cultivators were very good at analyzing themselves. Seeing that Qianren’s expression was somewhat dazed, Zhuge Qingtian didn’t know what he was thinking, but he looked at his pale skin, and said with much emotion, “I really don’t understand you big shots. When I was alive, I was always disliked by everyone around me. Being able to have a good meal at night was the happiest thing. It’s a pity that I’ve lost my sense of taste now and can’t eat anything. No matter how good the dishes are, I can only look at them…”

For the past ten years, he had been living with Zhu Ge Qingtian’s memories, and even if he had confirmed that it wasn’t him, it was difficult to break free from the role temporarily. But he had always been an optimistic person. After sighing, he recovered again. He went up and started shaking Qianren’s arm, “So, darling, you eat for me! If you just let me watch once, I promise I’ll be very quiet tonight!”

Was this fierce ghost getting more and more presumptuous? Did he feel uncomfortable if he wasn’t kicked away at least once a day?

Frowning at the boy who wouldn’t leave him alone, and considering the trouble it would be to find his head, Qianren didn’t attack him after all. But looking at this scene, he suddenly thought that if he really was the God of Joy, he probably had been so enthusiastic in trying to befriend everyone in the past. But those who got good luck because of him ended up so miserable. He wondered what he felt seeing all of that… Just existing is a disaster to the world. As someone born as a demon, Qianren was already used to it.

That’s right, it was just eating a meal for someone to watch; this simple effort, if done occasionally, wouldn’t be such a troublesome thing.

Thinking this, Qianren raised his head, thinking that the condition of having a quiet night was indeed extremely tempting. Therefore, even though he had not eaten a meal in forty years, he finally got up and simply said, “Let’s go, to the kitchen.”

Author’s note: Zhuge Qingtian: Darling, choose, eat or eat me?

Qianren: You win, I’ll eat!

He Huan (banging bowls): Heaven, my disciple who has been abstaining from food for so many years is actually eating! Quick, live broadcast!

He Ku (double bowl banging): Live broadcast! Live broadcast! Let’s lead all the disciples of Xuanmen to spam the comments!