I Am Not Wrong!

Because the imperial carriage lacked its canopies, Xu Ying constantly felt unsafe, possessed by a chronic paranoia that wicked subjects were always out to harm his royal self. Both canopies of the imperial carriage had been destroyed in battle, proving that riding atop it not only provided no safety, but actually brought a host of additional perils. Yet with the Dragon Bell cradled in his hand, Xu Ying felt his sense of security return once more. Recently, he had cultivated up to the Ascension stage. His cultivation was consummate, and he could undergo the tribulation at any moment. The previous two realms—the God Bridge stage and the Third Knocking on the Pass stage—had not granted him especially large increases, but the Ascension stage was different. Once he crossed this realm, he would become an immortal, and every facet of his being—his vital essence, divine consciousness, and everything else—would undergo a qualitative leap! This breakthrough was of paramount importance to him. Xu Ying noticed an immortal raft in the sky and was momentarily taken aback. He quietly raised the Dragon Bell overhead to shield his scalp, lest someone lop his head off with a sword stroke. "The Imperial Monarch?" He recognized the man aboard the raft: none other than the Imperial Monarch, the very architect of his forty-eight thousand years of tragic destiny! *What is he doing here? And alongside Xiao Xixian, no less. How bizarre. Does he plan to threaten her life to force me to submit?* Xu Ying weighed Xiao Xixian's importance in his mind and thought, *I definitely wouldn't submit.* However, the Imperial Monarch showed no intention of attacking him, and Xiao Xixian on the immortal raft appeared perfectly safe, looking not in the slightest bit coerced. *In Master Dragon's current condition, we can't afford to fight lightly. If we engage, he could easily shatter into pieces.* Xu Ying hesitated, deciding against making a move against the Imperial Monarch. The Dragon Bell had only just merged; the big bell's cultivation realm was not yet high, and the Primordial Ancestor's primordial spirit head was covered in cracks. Forcing a fight right now would likely see the bell shatter and the dragon perish in mere exchanges! Xu Ying took out an incense stick, bowed low, and chanted incantations under his breath. After a moment, the portal to the Heavenly Dao Ancestral Court materialized. Xu Ying stepped down from the imperial carriage and entered the gateway. Behind the gate, the Earth God came hurrying over, beaming. "Ah, Young Master Xu! What brings Young Master Xu to the Ancestral Court today? What bad timing, though—the Ancestral God is busy today and receiving no guests." Xu Ying pushed his way inside with a laugh. "Senior Brother Earth God, since when am I just a guest? I'm the Ancestral God's personal disciple, an inner student taught hand-in-hand! Why, I was the one who emptied the Ancestral God's chamber pot!" The Earth God stood atop his war drum to block him, chuckling, "Yes, yes! You're also the one who stole the Ancestral God's chamber pot! How dare you show your face here again!" Xu Ying feigned astonishment. "The chamber pot went missing? Such a thing happened? Senior Brother Earth God, who on earth could be so despicable as to steal a chamber pot?" The Earth God flew into a rage. "You grabbed the bucket right in front of my face and bolted! I chased you relentlessly without catching up, and Senior Brother Tian went after you too, yet you still slipped away! How dare you ask who could be so despicable?!" Xu Ying leaned down, draped an arm around his shoulder, and chuckled heartily. "Senior brother, I was only joking! I did indeed borrow the chamber pot. Times were just a bit tight, you know? Things were somewhat lean, so... hahaha! My return to see the Ancestral God this time is actually to ask if he could reforge the bucket and enhance its power a little. Does the Ancestral God still piss blood?" The Earth God glared at him from atop the war drum and barked, "Why are you so shameless? I told you, the Ancestral God is receiving no guests today!" Xu Ying strode inward, smiling. "The guest here today is extraordinary; the Ancestral God must see me. Senior brother, your standing isn't quite high enough, so don't block an honored guest's path. Otherwise, when the Ancestral God punishes you shortly, I won't put in a good word for you!" Fury surged in the Earth God's chest. His great drum drifted up, zooming in front of Xu Ying, and he shouted, "You don't mean to say the honored guest is *you*, do you? You bucket-thieving scoundrel!" Just as he said this, Senior Brother Tian's voice suddenly echoed from within: "Earth God, do not make things difficult for him, lest our honored guest laugh at us. The Ancestral God has commanded: invite the honored guest inside." The Earth God froze, looking thoroughly reluctant, and muttered, "What happens when they meet? Won't they start brawling?" Hearing this, Xu Ying grew suspicious. "Senior Brother Earth God, is there another guest in the Ancestral Court besides me?" The Earth God stammered evasively, unwilling to give a straight answer. Xu Ying threw an arm around his shoulder and smiled. "What kind of bond do we two brothers share? We've known each other for a full fifty thousand years! We're close enough to have shared the same pair of pants growing up! Spill it." The Earth God still shook his head, refusing to answer. Xu Ying's suspicion deepened. He secretly took out the Heaven-Measuring Ruler and sent a divine voice transmission: "Master Dragon, Master Bell, when we see the guest later, the moment I say 'attack', strike with everything you have and beat that guest to death! Shenpo, can you divine where that guest hails from?" From the Yingzhou cave abyss, Shenpo's voice replied, "Immortal Master, this place is shrouded by the Ancestral God's magic power; I cannot divine it." Xu Ying followed the Earth God toward the Ancestral God's dwelling. Arriving before the thatched cottage, he saw from afar a burly, dignified man prostrating on the ground, kowtowing toward the cottage without rising. The moment Xu Ying made out the man's features, vicious fury flared in his chest. Without a second thought, he brandished the Heaven-Measuring Ruler and shouted, "Strike!" The Heaven-Measuring Ruler whistled through the air, and the Dragon Bell soared upward, ready to slaughter the burly man. Right at that moment, a wooden bucket suddenly flew out from his Realm of Xiyi, sucking the Landscape Heaven-Measuring Ruler right into itself with a whoosh! The Dragon Bell was also pinned down by the bucket's power. The great dragon wanted to struggle, but fearing damage to its own primordial spirit, it could only hold still—though the bucket could not draw it in either. Lacking treasures in his grasp, Xu Ying charged forward nonetheless. A Taiyi Golden Bridge pressed down, flattening the burly man prostrate against the earth. Xu Ying condensed vital qi into a sword, thrusting toward the back of the man's skull. Suddenly, the Ancestral God's voice rang out: "Xu Ying, no killing is permitted within the Heavenly Dao Ancestral Court." Turning a deaf ear, Xu Ying gripped the immortal sword qi and stabbed straight toward the back of the man's head. Suddenly, a finger-force struck from the side with a crisp clink, shattering the immortal sword qi. Beside himself with fury, Xu Ying let out a long howl. His dark hair whipped wildly as he instantly established communion with the damaged immortal sword on the wasteland outside Biyou Palace, stirring world-ending killing intent, prepared to fight to the death. Even if the Ancestral God sheltered him, he was going to kill the Heavenly Venerable! The Heavenly Venerable was the mastermind behind the Kunlun bloodbath, where every soul in Xujiaping had been butchered, leaving only their family of three! Of all the Undying People, the vast majority perished at the hands of the Thunder Department, while the survivors fled into exile, spreading nuofa throughout the myriad worlds! The subsequent trend of harvesting people like leeks could be said to have originated from the Kunlun bloodbath. All of Xu Ying's kinsmen, every relative and friend besides his parents, and every childhood playmate had perished in that great purge! His hatred for the Heavenly Venerable surpassed even his hatred for the Imperial Monarch! Between him and the Imperial Monarch lay only personal enmity, but between him and the Heavenly Venerable was the blood debt of an exterminated clan! Nearly fifty thousand years of separation from father and mother—a grudge deeper than the sea, an irreconcilable enmity beneath the open sky! So long as there was a chance to kill the Heavenly Venerable, he would never let it slip! The Ancestral God walked unsteadily out from the thatched cottage and said, "Xu Ying, I am not siding with him. Rather, this Ancestral Court is my bodhimanda, and no killing may take place here. If you wish to kill him, wait until I expel him outside, and then kill him as you please." The raging flames in Xu Ying's heart gradually subsided along with his flowing dark hair. He bowed and said, "Disciple obeys." The Ancestral God turned to the burly man. "Yuan Daohai, you heard him. You are now an exalted Heavenly Venerable of the Immortal Court and no longer my disciple. You may return." That burly man was none other than the Heavenly Venerable. Kowtowing, he said, "Disciple has reached the end of the road and had no choice but to seek an audience with the Ancestral God. Otherwise, my body will perish, my Dao will vanish, and I shall be reduced to ash and smoke! I implore the Ancestral God to have pity on the bond between master and disciple and save my life!" The Ancestral God shook his head. "When you betrayed the Ancestral Court and defected to the Immortal Court back then, all ties between us were severed. To this day, my old wounds have yet to heal, still throbbing with ache. Do you realize your wrong?" The Heavenly Venerable kowtowed and said, "Disciple did nothing wrong! I know not what fault I bear!" The Ancestral God sighed. "Yuan Daohai, the affection between master and disciple is gone. Please leave." The Heavenly Venerable knelt prostrate on the ground, motionless. Senior Brother Tian said, "Yuan Daohai, the Ancestral God has no time for you. Go back! You brought this upon yourself; no one can save you!" The Heavenly Venerable remained kneeling there, motionless. The Ancestral God turned away and asked, "Must I throw you out myself?" The Heavenly Venerable fell silent for a moment, then spoke: "If I leave now, I will surely die. You were my master, teaching me skills; the greater part of my abilities was learned from you. Though you no longer recognize me as your disciple, I must still kowtow in gratitude for the master's grace." He kowtowed deeply. The Ancestral God paid him no mind. The Heavenly Venerable silently stood up. His towering frame was covered in wounds deep enough to show bone. With the slightest movement, fresh blood welled from the gashes. He said, "Senior Brother Tian, the days spent learning the arts alongside you were the happiest time of my life." Senior Brother Tian sighed and said, "If you had known it would come to this, why do it in the first place? Had you stayed in the Ancestral Court..." The skin on the Heavenly Venerable's face twitched, and he said haughtily, "If I had stayed in the Ancestral Court, I would have achieved nothing, just like you! Back then, millennia had passed since the Dao weeping blighted the world. The Heavenly Dao changed, and the people had no means of livelihood. As cultivators of our generation, only by making changes and conforming to the grand trend of the Great Dao under heaven could we seize a sliver of hope! What future was there in remaining in the Ancestral Court?" Anger rose in Senior Brother Tian's heart. He sneered, "So, you still believe you were in the right?" "That's right!" The Heavenly Venerable faced him, the fervor in his eyes burning undiminished. In a deep voice, he declared, "What we did back then was of course right! You ancestral courts clung to your old ways, monopolized resources, coerced the common folk, and disregarded the people's livelihoods. You cared only for your own tiny plots of land and your own survival after the Dao weeping! You refused to change, entirely blind to the common mortals of the world! I, along with many comrades of noble purpose, rose in rebellion—rebelling against the Ancestral God, rebelling against the Dao Ancestor, rebelling against the Immortal Court! We wanted to overthrow you aloft old relics, forge a brand-new heaven and earth, and carve out a glimmer of survival for all living beings!" The Earth God couldn't help saying, "If you would just admit your wrong..." "I am not wrong!" The Heavenly Venerable cut in decisively. "I came here to plead for the Ancestral God's help, not to betray my past! Shattering the ancient era and burying the ancestral courts was the greatest achievement and glory of my entire life. What fault did I commit?" He possessed a natural arrogance, his gaze sharp and untamed. Scanning the Ancestral God, Senior Brother Tian, and the Earth God, he proclaimed loudly, "None of you—not even Teacher Ancestral God—possesses the qualifications to judge my right or wrong! When the Dao weeping descended, even you, Ancestral God, merely huddled in the Heavenly Dao Ancestral Court thinking of self-preservation. You too were decayed! Living such ignoble, compromised lives, what standing or face do you have to speak of my rights and wrongs?" The Ancestral God sighed. "Then why did you fail?" The flesh of the Heavenly Venerable's face twitched. In a stiff tone, he said, "I lost the political struggle at court. My skill was inferior. What more is there to say?" The Ancestral God asked, "When you engaged in political struggles at court, did you spare a thought for the common people of the world?" The Heavenly Venerable turned pale, falling silent. The Ancestral God said, "When you rebelled against my school back then, I was proud of you. When you became one of the leaders of the new Immortal Court, I was proud as well. But before the Dao weeping of your new Heavenly Court has even arrived, why have you already decayed? Why did you cast aside the original aspiration that drove you to rebel against the Ancestral Court?" The Heavenly Venerable clenched his fists, threw his head back in laughter, and shook his head. "Ancestral God, you are not me. You do not understand my plight or the bitter difficulties I faced..." Still laughing, he turned around and walked toward the outside of the Heavenly Dao Ancestral Court. "None of you understands me. You are merely bystanders. If any of you stood in my position, you would surely have done the same as I." Tears flowed as he laughed, shaking his head. "You would have ended up just like me..." Xu Ying sprang forward, set aside the chamber pot, retrieved the Landscape Heaven-Measuring Ruler, and followed closely behind his footsteps. The Heavenly Venerable walked outward, blood pouring from his wounds. After a short while, he arrived before his stone statue. The statue's arms were spread wide, as though offering its body, sacrificing itself. He stopped in his tracks, gazing at the statue. Xu Ying halted behind him. "I did not do anything wrong. Any one of you would have done the same," the Heavenly Venerable repeated, seemingly speaking to Xu Ying. Xu Ying said indifferently, "Yuan Daohai, I do not care about your rights and wrongs. I am here only for vengeance." The Heavenly Venerable laughed heartily. "Vengeance? You are not the Xu Ying I knew. The Xu Ying I knew was open-hearted and noble as a breeze after rain, magnificent in spirit, possessing the talent to aid the world—a towering, indomitable hero. I saw reflections of myself in him, which is why I swore brotherhood with him. If the Celestial Venerable Xu of back then had been like you, I never would have sworn brotherhood with him. You are not him." He shook his head and said, "Celestial Venerable Xu Ying—even his enemies could not help admiring him." Xu Ying walked to his side, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with him as he looked at the stone statue. "I am indeed not him. He was a great hero, adaptable and resilient, possessing lofty ideals and ambitions, with talents that could encompass heaven and earth. His schemes were far-reaching and his connections vast; even all of you admired and held affection for him. But I am not him." He paused, then continued, "Sometimes I can be stubborn and single-minded. Sometimes a rush of blood to the head makes me throw caution to the wind. If I like someone, I like them; if I hate someone, I hate them. I don't hide or conceal it. I am merely an ordinary mortal, a snake catcher—a person who fought with venomous vipers for his life just to survive. If I don't like you, I won't be your friend. If you harm me, I think only of beating you to death. I have no grand ideals; I do not act for the realm or the common masses. I only right injustices when I see them." The Heavenly Venerable chuckled. "Your vision is far too shallow. You are just a common mortal—a common mortal who happens to look very much like Celestial Venerable Xu." He took a step forward, heading toward the Ancestral Court portal, and laughed. "Yet I firmly believe that one day Celestial Venerable Xu will return. He will return, continue along my path, vie with the Imperial Monarch, clash with the Supreme, and test his mettle against the old monsters above the Nine Heavens!" Arriving before the portal, his physical body suddenly walked forward through the gateway, while his primordial spirit remained behind. "Xu Ying, do not rush to kill me. First, look at the Dao wounds the Imperial Monarch left upon me." The garments of his primordial spirit vanished, revealing the Dao wounds across its form. Those were wounds carved into his indestructible primordial spirit by the divine ability the Imperial Monarch had created by combining the Purple Nether Saber with the Nine Heavens Ten Earths Extermination Immortal Array. The Heavenly Venerable's primordial spirit smiled faintly. "Remember these Dao wounds. Do not lose to the Imperial Monarch again. The Ancestral God's lineage cannot afford to lose three times in a row." Xu Ying fell silent, scrutinizing every single Dao wound upon the indestructible primordial spirit. After a long while, he committed all of them to memory. Having a foundation in the Nine Heavens Ten Earths Demon-Breaking Secret Art, deciphering the profound mysteries and principles hidden within these Dao wounds was not difficult for him. "Rest assured, I will give you a swift death without much pain," Xu Ying said. The Heavenly Venerable's primordial spirit donned its garments again, its primordial spirit generating a new physical body. He remarked coldly, "Don't be so confident. We hail from the same lineage, and you are my junior brother. In whose hands the deer will fall has yet to be decided." "Oh, and..." He turned his head back with a smile. "In the future, do not end up like me."