The Cause of Father's Death

A Stargazer? Seeing the young man burst into the dining room, Sophia instantly entered combat mode. She threw up a wall of wind between them while reaching out to snatch at the young Stargazer. Following her motion, the surrounding airflow coalesced into an invisible giant hand, closing around the young man like a tight cage. With just a thought from Sophia, the immense air pressure would crush him to pieces. *Snap!* Bound and with his arms hanging at his sides, the young man rubbed his thumb and middle finger together and snapped. With that crisp sound, some unseen rule seemed to vanish into thin air. To Sophia's shock, the giant hand of airflow she had summoned passed right through the young man's body and immediately collapsed. "Sophia, he is the Lord of the Sun we are meant to support." Chen Shu's words instantly dispelled Sophia's vigilance, fighting spirit, hostility, and tension. Her eyes went wide with bewilderment. *This young man is the Lord of the Sun cultivated by the Relief Society—by the President?* Sophia scrutinized him from head to toe as if trying to see through every single cell in his body. Only then did she realize the young man looked familiar. She seemed to have seen him somewhere before, but couldn't place it. Sophia turned to the chairwoman. "He is..." Chen Shu smiled. "You should have seen him in the files. His Spirit Realm ID is Yuanshi Tianzun." Sophia snapped her head back, exclaiming in disbelief, "Yuanshi Tianzun?! No, isn't Yuanshi Tianzun dead?" Now she recognized his face; she had indeed seen it in the files. But Yuanshi Tianzun had returned to the Spirit Realm two months ago. That was a fact known to the entire world. "How could the Lord of the Sun cultivated by the President fall so easily?" Chen Shu gazed warmly at the son she had not seen for a year, a smile gracing her lips. "You're finally willing to see me. Have a seat. I'll have the chef sear a steak for you." Her tone was domineering as ever, never asking if he had eaten or what he felt like having. Zhang Yuanqing bickered back, just as he always did. "I'm not eating!" Chen Shu had already summoned a maid and sent her to pass the message to the chef. Zhang Yuanqing pulled out a chair and sat down, cutting straight to the chase. "I've met the family scum." He was implying to Chen Shu that he already knew everything. Neither meek nor fragile, the elegant and composed Chen Shu nodded. "I never planned to keep it from you forever. Back when you were still a Saint, I wanted to lay all my cards on the table, but he insisted on stopping me." "Lay what on the table with me?" Zhang Yuanqing looked at her with deep eyes. Confess why she had neglected him all these years? Confess that she was so busy that she never came home all year round and couldn't even be bothered to make a phone call? If it had been a year ago, Zhang Yuanqing certainly would have asked. Now, he no longer had any interest in doing so. Complaining about a mother's neglect was something only little kids cared about, and he was no longer a child. Still, after so many years of a strained relationship, he couldn't simply let bygones be bygones and put on a show of maternal love and filial piety. Sophia looked at Zhang Yuanqing, then at Chen Shu. Her intuition told her that the chairwoman and Yuanshi Tianzun shared an extraordinary relationship. Noticing her subordinate's scrutiny, Chen Shu smiled faintly and introduced him, "This is my whelp!" Zhang Yuanqing raised an eyebrow and scoffed, "Could you change your phrasing for once?" Chen Shu readily obliged. "Fine. Doggy." Zhang Yuanqing rolled his eyes. Sophia was dumbfounded. Yuanshi Tianzun was the chairwoman's son?! The most eye-catching genius in the Second District, a young powerhouse who had risen like a comet, was actually the chairwoman's son! If this gossip spread through the organization, the entire Relief Society would erupt. Chen Shu continued, "This is Sophia, a Dominator of the Relief Society. She joined when she was still an Extraordinary Wanderer, starting out as my assistant and working up to where she is now." Sophia was a Dominator whom Chen Shu had personally groomed. Zhang Yuanqing looked at the Overlooker with her minimalist, stoic attire, and then at his mother, who wore no makeup and looked brisk and capable. "I can tell. You two share the exact same style." Without years together, their temperaments and presence wouldn't match so closely. "Sophia, wait in the living room. I have things to discuss with him," Chen Shu said. Sophia nodded, stood up, and left the dining room. Once she was far away, Chen Shu picked up a glass, took a sip of warm water, and said, "Your uncle must have told you everything. Coming here tonight, did you want Mommy's hugs and kisses, or do you have doubts you need me to clear up?" The corner of Zhang Yuanqing's mouth twitched. "Where is your dog of a husband's avatar?" Chen Shu knitted her delicate brows, displeased. "That's your father." "If the son's a dog, isn't a dog's dad a dog too?" Zhang Yuanqing countered tit for tat. Knowing better than to pursue their mutually hurtful banter, Chen Shu said, "Your father's avatar is in a very safe place. You don't need to know for now, nor is resurrecting him something you need to worry about. At least at this stage, you don't need to consider it, because the difficulty is far too high." Instead of whining with excuses like "Why can't I know?" or "He's my dad," Zhang Yuanqing changed the subject. "Do you know where the avatars of Chu Shang and Master Wuhen are?" Chen Shu looked tenderly at her son. "Don't ask such foolish questions." Zhang Yuanqing took a deep breath, thought for a moment, and said, "Tell me about your past with Celestial Master Zhang. I'll decide what to ask after I hear it." An ordinary mother might shy away from recounting youthful romances to her son, but Chen Shu didn't. She spoke without hesitation: "When your father was young, he worked as an auxiliary police officer. He did an outstanding job; both his investigative skills and personal martial prowess were exceptional. Your maternal grandfather admired him greatly and tried multiple times to give him permanent officer status, but he turned it down every time. "Once, your father helped the Public Security Bureau crack a major case, and Old Chen invited him home for dinner. That was the first time I met him. After that, he dropped by the house constantly, asking me out to movies, to dance halls, and to karaoke. As time went on, we fell in love. "Your grandparents approved of the marriage. Their only complaint was that Zhang Zizhen stubbornly refused to register his residency in Songhai or accept permanent officer status. He earned a meager wage doing the hardest, most exhausting work, grinning cheerfully all day like a fool. "Although the old couple was frustrated by his lack of ambition, they couldn't bear to break us apart in the end. They let me go with him to the countryside to live a hard life." Zhang Yuanqing had never imagined his old man had once been an auxiliary cop. "Why didn't he go permanent?" Chen Shu smiled. "He was already a Spirit Realm Wanderer back then. He went around all day claiming to be a true heir of the Xiaoyao Sect, saddled with the heavy responsibility of defending world peace. He only became an auxiliary cop to punish evil and root out scoundrels more effectively. The reason he wouldn't go permanent was that eating from the public bowl meant being bound by public rules, which ran counter to the concept of Xiaoyao." *Chuuni as always...* Zhang Yuanqing mused, "For an unaffiliated wanderer to openly serve as an auxiliary cop, the system back then really was chaotic." "Society's systems were chaotic back then, that's true. But when it came to Spirit Realm Wanderers, both the government and wanderer organizations took things extremely seriously and never slacked off. Your father was able to blend into the Public Security Bureau as an auxiliary cop because he had another identity." Just then, the chef arrived with the seared steak, and Chen Shu paused. Once the chef set down the silverware and departed, Chen Shu gestured for her son to taste it. Zhang Yuanqing sliced off a piece perfunctorily and chewed as he said, "Wagyu is too greasy. Go on." "Your father was able to work as an auxiliary cop in the Public Security Bureau and freely display his abilities as a Spirit Realm Wanderer because Elder Dog was shielding him," Chen Shu said with a smile. "He used to be Elder Dog's informant." *So that's how it was!* A lingering doubt in Zhang Yuanqing's mind was finally cleared. No wonder the Three Xiaoyao Sons hadn't known Celestial Master Zhang's true identity while Elder Dog had known every detail. Back then, Elder Dog must have played the role of backer, protector, and elder. "Later on, as your father leveled up and the enemies he faced grew higher in status, he became increasingly careful to conceal himself..." Chen Shu calmly recounted the past, describing the small details of their daily life. "I didn't know about most of the things he did, nor did I ever ask. It wasn't until after the battle for the Compass of Light that everything changed." Chen Shu's eyes held nostalgia, reminiscence, and the profound weight of savoring old memories. "One day, your father came home covered in blood, saying he had caused major trouble—that he had entered a place he shouldn't have entered and touched things he shouldn't have touched. He fell gravely ill and never went out again after that. We spent a peaceful period together, and during that time, I became pregnant with you. Meanwhile, his health deteriorated steadily, never regaining its former glory. "After that came the extermination of the Chu family, and your father brought Yu'er back with him. Jiang Yu'er's real name is Chu Yu; Jiang was her mother's maiden name. She couldn't keep the surname Chu, nor did she want the surname Chen, so she took her birth mother's name. "After the Chu family was wiped out, your father often woke in the middle of the night drenched in cold sweat. He seemed terrified of something, though he wouldn't say what. I asked a few times, but he refused to answer. Occasionally, I would hear him muttering to himself: *Impossible... There's no way I couldn't have foreseen it...*" *No way he couldn't have foreseen it...* Zhang Yuanqing frowned. Zhang Zizhen had already been a peak Dominator by then. Even if his primary path wasn't the stars, he could still use Stargazing to observe the evolution of all things and see the direction of worldly affairs. Yet there was something he hadn't foreseen, leaving him brooding over it. What had happened at that point in time? "Did you ask Uncle afterward?" Zhang Yuanqing asked directly, seeing no point in guessing or making wild assumptions. Chen Shu shook her head. "If your father wouldn't even tell me, how could he tell your uncle?" Pausing briefly, she continued: "Not long after the Chu family fell, he began going out frequently again, investigating something unknown. Then, one day out of the blue, he said he was going to do something momentous. If he didn't return, I was to pack up and take my parents abroad. "Fortunately, he came back before long. That was the last time he ever went out, and from then on, he never left home again. Then you were born. Until you were six years old..." A flicker of anguish crossed Chen Shu's eyes. "When you were six, he suddenly turned into a yin creature and lost his sanity. Left with no choice, he ignited the divine power of the sun and burned himself to ashes." "What?!" Zhang Yuanqing blurted out in shock. He had always assumed his father died from Ling Tuo's vengeance. Never in his wildest dreams had he imagined that Zhang Zizhen died by igniting the divine power of the sun. "Are you sure he turned into a yin creature? Did Uncle say that too?" Zhang Yuanqing found it hard to believe. How could a dignified Day Wanderer turn into a yin creature? It was utterly absurd!