Xu Ying’s mind was in a muddle. The people who had seen him had turned from youths into octogenarians, yet he had never changed at all.
Yet he clearly possessed memories of only the past few years. In the memories of those vanished years, who had he been?
Was he still Xu Ying?
His head throbbed as if splitting apart. He strained to remember, to dredge up his memories of Xujiaping, yet the harder he tried to recall, the more disparate memories surged forward. Different voices, different scenes, the voices and faces of different parents—all crammed into his brain until it felt ready to burst!
"What on earth are you?" the old man asked tremulously.
Xu Ying was lost. "Who on earth am I?"
In those vanished years, what had he truly been doing? Who was he back then?
Where had those lost years gone? Why couldn't he remember? Why didn't he age? Why had Xiao Fengxian claimed to have seen him three thousand years ago?
The world spun around Xu Ying. He fell backward, a clamor of myriad voices ringing in his ears.
Collapsing alongside him was the old man who had recognized him. In an instant, the village fell into utter chaos.
"The young one is still breathing! Quick, save him!" someone shouted.
"The old one is the young one! The young one is the old one! Which young one are you talking about?"
Muddled and drifting, chaotic scenes flashed across Xu Ying's mind. Many faces swayed before him, seeming to say something to him, but the voices were a cacophony, impossible to discern.
Some visions were exceedingly blurry—panoramas of epochal change: great mountains weathering and collapsing, lakes receding, the parched ground locking away dead fish with mouths agape.
There were also new mountains rising abruptly from the earth, and new lakes rapidly forming.
He saw fertile fields turn into vast deserts, and deserts revert back to oases.
He saw the winds and clouds shifting swiftly, sunrises and moonsets becoming blindingly fast, and the cycle of the four seasons seeming accelerated countless times over.
He woke at times, only to sink back into slumber soon after. Faintly, he seemed to hear the toll of a bell.
Opening his eyes groggily, he saw the bronze bell hovering above him, the various designs carved into its inner walls seemingly coming to life.
He heard the bronze bell's voice drifting from afar: "I'll first help him stabilize his scattered divine sense. It shouldn't be anything serious. He was just too severely shaken..."
Xu Ying saw the surrounding peaks shifting, and he fell asleep once more.
Unfamiliar voices sounded by his ears, somewhat familiar, yet somewhat alien.
"What name should we give him?"
"Let's name him Xu Ying. He will be renowned across the realm; not a soul under heaven will fail to know him!"
He felt a gentle hand caress his face, and a voice both familiar and strange murmured softly, "Xu Ying, Xu Ying. Remember your family name, and never forget your given name."
Xu Ying fell back into slumber amid the jolts. He seemed to see someone walking toward him again, someone deeply familiar, yet whom he had never laid eyes upon.
He saw himself holding someone's hand on a cliff's edge, gazing out over mountains and rivers shrouded in pure white mist and clouds.
"Be it a thousand lifetimes or ten thousand, I will find you, and we shall never part again!"
Xu Ying jolted awake and scrambled to sit up, only to smack his head hard against the bronze bell. His skull buzzed violently, and he collapsed back down.
"Lord Bell, Lord Bell, what happened?" Yuan Qi's anxious voice came.
"I was too close to him. He bumped into me and knocked himself unconscious," the bronze bell replied sheepishly.
When Xu Ying woke once more, he did not rush to sit up. Instead, he opened his eyes and surveyed his surroundings so as not to hit his head on anything else.
This was a room. Judging by the furnishings and decor, it appeared to be a young woman's boudoir, though everything was ancient and the bronze mirror on the vanity was tarnished and dim. It had likely sat vacant for many years.
Inside the bronze mirror was a female ghost peeking out at him. Seeing him look her way, she hastily ducked out of sight.
Seeing that Xu Ying did not move, the female ghost grew bolder. She began grooming herself within the mirror, then detached her head, placed it on the table, and leisurely combed her hair.
Xu Ying sat up. The female ghost in the mirror glared at him, blood trickling from her seven facial orifices as her spectral face turned sinister.
Xu Ying rubbed his head. There was still a swollen lump on his scalp.
Ringing buzzed in his ears, and only after quite a while could he hear properly.
Finding him boring, the female ghost lay down on the bed inside the mirror, let out a languid yawn, curled up like a cat, and pulled the quilt over herself.
Xu Ying climbed out of bed and muttered under his breath, "Could Qi and Lord Bell be lodging in a haunted house?"
The female ghost in the mirror sat up immediately and nodded vigorously.
Xu Ying stood up, his legs giving a slight stagger.
The female ghost covered her mouth and giggled, as if mocking him for being weak-kneed.
Xu Ying paid her no mind. Steadying himself, his head still feeling as though it were splitting open, he walked out of the room. An open expanse greeted his eyes. They were within an ancient mountain, complete with residences, courtyards, and an ancient palace hall that appeared dilapidated, neglected for ages.
The place was not vast, but relatively level, the ground paved with brick and stone, and the buildings were quite refined.
Looking down the mountain, Xu Ying could even spot a mountain gate.
The buildings and halls on the mountain indicated this had likely been a small sect from three thousand years ago; once the Qi Refiners vanished, the grounds had fallen deserted.
"Where is this place? Where are Lord Bell and Little Qi?"
Xu Ying walked to the entrance and looked back. There, he saw the massive collapsed body of Mount Wuwang, smashed against two neighboring peaks. Mount Wuwang's remaining bulk was still extraordinarily enormous, resembling a snapped tree trunk, its fractured top bristling with jagged peaks.
This unnamed sect from over three thousand years ago had been built on the sunny southern slope of Mount Wuwang, whereas Qinyan Cave lay on the shaded northern slope. When Xu Ying had lived here previously, he had never noticed the ancient sect ruins on the southern slope.
Xu Ying stretched his limbs, but broke into a cold sweat and had no choice but to sit down.
"Who knows what Lord Bell and Little Qi are up to, leaving me here like this. Aren't they afraid the female ghost might eat me?"
Xu Ying shook his head. Once he caught his breath, he slowly mobilized the yuan qi within his body, stimulating his vital qi and blood and reawakening his physical functions.
At the same time, his Mud Pill and Crimson Palace secret depositories opened one after the other. Gradually, Xu Ying returned to peak condition, though his head still ached a bit—whether from being struck by Lord Bell or from his mind spiraling out of control when trying to recall the past, he could not tell.
Xu Ying turned his senses inward to inspect the Realm of Xiyi. Finding it undamaged, he let out a sigh of relief. It was just that Lord Bell was not inside the Realm of Xiyi, having gone who-knew-where.
He tried to remember what had transpired when he fainted, but another barrage of strange scenes and voices flooded his mind, his head threatening to split apart again, so he hastily stopped.
"Over sixty years ago, someone saw me. Why don't I have the slightest impression, not a shred of memory?"
He composed himself. Could it be Meng Po soup? Could that sorrowful old man have truly given him Meng Po soup to drink, washing away his memories from back then?
Yet the tea the sorrowful old man had brought on both occasions tasted quite good, and drinking it hadn't caused him any amnesia!
Suddenly, the bronze bell's grumbling voice drifted over: "I told you long ago that the Mud Pill Palace Grotto-Heaven at Qinyan Cave was no blessed land, just a sham to trick people, yet you wouldn't believe me and insisted on digging it out! Now I'm covered in mud, too! And you left Ah Ying here—who knows if the female ghost has sucked him dry by now!"
Yuan Qi's voice came back: "That female ghost definitely couldn't harvest Ah Ying. I saw that she was trapped in the mirror. Besides, the female ghost from the coffin said this was an ascension site. If it's an ascension site, there must be something extraordinary about it!"
Just then, the bronze bell noticed Xu Ying sitting there. Surprised and overjoyed, it flew over at once and chuckled, "Ah Ying, you're finally awake! Quick, let me take a couple of sips! That bastard Qi refused to let me absorb his qi and blood, claiming it felt like being harvested by female ghosts three hundred times a day. What nonsense! Could a female ghost's harvesting ever be as refined as mine?"
Xu Ying said hurriedly, "Lord Bell, I was unconscious for so long, my complexion is still poor. Let's wait a couple of days!"
The bronze bell had no choice but to drop it. With earnest gravity, it said, "You must step up your cultivation. Look, you were in a coma for over ten days, which means you fell behind by over ten days. Learning is like rowing upstream: if you do not advance, you fall back."
"Lord Bell's teaching is wise," Xu Ying humbly accepted the advice, then asked, "What is the deal with the female ghost in the room?"
Yuan Qi slithered over, caked in mud, and grinned. "She's sealed in the bronze mirror and can't harm anyone. Seeing how pitiful she was, we kept her around. We went off just now to search for Mount Wuwang's ascension site, and fearing wild beasts might harm you, we left her in your room."
Xu Ying's face darkened. "Is that something a person would do?"
Promptly, he relented in his heart. Neither of these two were human to begin with; no need to hold them to human standards.
He stretched his limbs and said, "That day, the maiden in the coffin said..."
Mimicking her tone, Xu Ying softly chanted, "'South of the Xiaoxiang, Cangwu Abyss. Beneath Mount Jiuyi, the ageless immortal. This ascension site has turned desolate after all.' Did she mean that Qinyan Cave on Mount Wuwang was the ascension site, or was Mount Jiuyi the ascension site?"
Yuan Qi said, "It must be here! You said so yourself—the ascension site inside the Chaozhen Taixu Cave-Heaven on Mount Jiuyi was fake. That ascension rosy glow wasn't left behind by someone who ascended, but was the residue of a Qi Refiner being blasted to smithereens! Therefore, the ascension site the ghost spoke of has to be Mount Wuwang!"
Xu Ying nodded gently. Looking back at the snapped Mount Wuwang, he murmured, "Yet even Mount Wuwang is broken now. Where could that ascension site possibly be hidden?"
Right at that moment, two old oxen were seen slowly trudging up the mountain. Both were covered in wounds; cuts large and small had scabbed over but were not yet healed. There was no telling how many battles they had fought to reach this place.
Looking at the two old oxen, Xu Ying felt puzzled; he could not shake the feeling that he had seen them somewhere before.
Suddenly, the two old oxen looked up and spotted him. Overjoyed, they picked up their pace and galloped up the mountain.
Yuan Qi was ecstatic. Gliding forward to meet them, he shouted, "I happen to be feeling a bit hungry. Time to break my fast with two oxen!"
As he drew closer to the two old oxen, he found them rather familiar, and his heart gave a sudden lurch. Could it be them?
His expression changed drastically. He hastily swerved to flee back up the mountain, but his body was too massive, making it clumsy to turn around in an instant.
Mid-gallop, billows of black smoke and chilling ghostly energy suddenly surged around the two old oxen. They transformed into two bull demons standing amidst the sinister gale. Brandishing white-bone soul-thrashing whips, they lashed out without a word, sending the charging Yuan Qi sprawling to the ground with a crack of the whip.
The two bull demons crowded around Yuan Qi, flogging him repeatedly until Xu Ying rushed over and barked an order for them to stop, after which they finally ceased.
Utterly astonished, Xu Ying looked the two bull demons up and down. "Lord Bell, is it them?"
The bronze bell replied, "They are indeed the bull demons that followed you back then. But weren't there five of them?"
Back at Shuikou Temple, five bull demons had followed him and accompanied him to Mount Wuwang. Later, when Mount Wuwang collapsed, they had followed him all the way back to Shuikou Temple.
When Xu Ying boarded Zhou Qiyun's dragon carriage, the bull demons couldn't get on and were left behind at Shuikou Temple. The dragon carriage flew for a long time before reaching the giant locust tree, where Xu Ying stayed for many days before heading to Guizailing, visiting the Nether Court, and then going to Cangwu Abyss. Passing through Cangwu Abyss, he reached Mount Jiuyi, and later made his way all the way to Qiyang.
After that, Xu Ying had fallen unconscious, and Yuan Qi had carried him back to Mount Wuwang!
Xu Ying had originally assumed that these bull demons would leave on their own, never expecting that they would remain loyal and steadfast, scaling mountains and crossing ridges to catch up!
Five bull demons had originally followed Xu Ying, but now only two remained; the other three had most likely perished along the way. Judging by the wounds covering these two bull demons, the hardships they had endured on this journey were immense!
The present new territory was fraught with peril, not only for living beings of the mortal world like Xu Ying, but for Netherworld creatures like bull demons as well.
Xu Ying was deeply moved. He stepped forward.
"Since you have chosen to follow me, I will never abandon you again. Today, the two of you shall be the eldest disciples of myself, Monster King Xu Ying!"
Xu Ying laughed heartily. "As monster cultivators, you mistakenly strayed into the divine path. I shall impart to you the art of Qi Refining, unlock the Six Secret Depositories of the Human Body, and teach you to cultivate both qi and Nuo simultaneously!"
Yuan Qi picked himself up, glanced at the two bull demons, and said, "I always get the feeling they aren't very bright. You didn't just take in two fools right off the bat when starting your lineage, did you?"
Xu Ying's heart skipped a beat. Remembering the two bull demons' past antics, he too had an uneasy feeling.
The bronze bell chimed in, "These two bull demons used to herd cattle in the Netherworld, beating anyone they ran into. When they failed to whip you and got whipped by you instead, they stubbornly latched on and followed you ever since. Their intellect really does seem a bit questionable..."
Veins throbbed on Xu Ying's forehead. He cleared his throat and said, "Don't panic. They're merely poisoned by the divine path; they absorbed incense smoke qi and lost their true nature! Once they practice my Qi Refining methods, they can definitely revert into proper bull monsters!"
Yuan Qi whispered, "How about expelling them from the sect?"
Xu Ying said guiltily, "I just opened for business. If I expel them before even teaching them any skills, my reputation will be ruined."
He paused, lowering his voice: "We'll expel them after some time has passed. By the way, Master Seventh, you're well-read. Help me pick some resounding names for them."
Yuan Qi pondered. "The Classic of Changes says of Wuwang: supreme success, favorable perseverance; Zhen below, Qian above. We have returned to Mount Wuwang and reunited with them, so why not call them Niu Zhen and Niu Gan?"
Xu Ying was delighted and laughed. "Master Seventh is cultured after all."
He surveyed the two bull demons and said to the one missing an ear, "From this day forth, your name is Niu Zhen."
The other bull demon had all its facial features intact, but crisscrossing scars covered its body, shocking to behold. Xu Ying said, "You shall be called Niu Gan."
Hearing this, the two bull demons exchanged a look. Standing in the swirling vortex of sinister wind, they bowed and clasped their hooves before their chests. "We thank Master for granting us names and a clan name!"
Xu Ying was astonished.
Yuan Qi was also greatly shaken, blurting out, "They aren't fools!"
Niu Zhen said in a deep, booming voice, "We were originally mortal bull monsters who cultivated into monster kings. How could we possibly be fools? We were merely afraid of our lifespans running out, so we had no choice but to serve as ox-demons and serpent-spirits for the Nether Court. Today we have met a worthy master who has even bestowed upon us names; naturally, there is no longer any need to play dumb."
Chapter 81