He Qingfu was proud to be human.
Because of this pride, she disdained using despicable means. Even if humanity’s power was insufficient, what she wanted to do was seek cooperation, striving to offer terms the other party could not refuse—a fair exchange of interests, not coercion or exploitation.
Because of this character, that one step she took back was the moment she parted ways with her grandmaster.
The two would walk different paths.
The second screen faded, and the third began to play. As light and shadow surged, He Qingfu and her grandmaster each chose the road they believed in.
The grandmaster had Bai Ze fulfill his promise, repaying the Supernatural Administration Bureau by offering his power. Bai Ze agreed, then gave up his physical body, became human, and retired to the mountains with his wife to await the end of their days.
Afterward, the grandmaster spread the word, welcoming yao who wished to become human, obtaining the runes their bodies became, and waiting for the day he could get a control-type talisman to subdue the wedding robe yao unearthed thirty years later.
Meanwhile, He Qingfu kept empathizing with history, finally finding in ancient texts a way to briefly isolate the Heavenly Dao.
She exhausted her spiritual power several times, constantly absorbing recovery-type runes. After half a year, she drew nine runes and handed them to her most trusted junior disciple:
“Forty years from now, please go to the National Museum and release the wedding robe yao inside. Help her take human form.”
He Qingyuan had been raised by He Qingfu. He respected and adored his senior sister and agreed at once, but he still knew nothing of the future, so he looked a bit confused:
“Senior sister, are you going somewhere?”
He Qingfu replied, “I’m going somewhere very far away.”
When she said this, He Qingfu herself was still unsure what the ultimate future would be. From the moment she told her grandmaster about the wedding robe yao and he demanded Bai Ze’s power, the future had already changed.
In the future she had seen, after the wedding robe yao emerged, it was besieged by hundreds of talismans—all runes transformed from yao. Some could slow it, some could trap it, and there was even a control-type rune that could restrain it for three seconds.
But the wedding robe yao did not sit and wait for death. It broke free by force, self-destructed its soul, and in its final moments, drew all the turbid qi floating in the sky down to the human world, accelerating the horror resurgence.
The grandmaster’s talk of survival of the fittest, of the strong preying on the weak, ultimately backfired on humanity itself.
But He Qingfu did not plan to tell her grandmaster about this future. If she did, he would only start looking for ways to prevent the yao’s self-destruction, and she did not want that.
She had already thought of a solution.
He Qingfu instructed her junior, “I saw that on that day, an amplification-type rune will appear. After you use it, you’ll be able to use these nine runes for a short time. My health isn’t good lately, so I can’t reveal too many secrets of heaven.”
“I can’t explain the details, but you’ll understand when the time comes.”
“Although the wedding robe yao doesn’t like human bodies, once she has one, her yao energy will be completely restrained and undetectable by yao detectors. It was my fault her existence was discovered, so helping her hide is also my responsibility.”
“And one more thing,” He Qingfu looked at He Qingyuan, her expression gentle and serious, “In the future, a control-type rune for yao will appear. Hide it for me. Never use it, understand?”
At that time, He Qingyuan was only sixteen, still a bit immature, but he nodded firmly: “I will, senior sister!”
He Qingfu nodded with relief, patting his head.
Jiang Yan watched this scene, her feelings complicated.
He Qingyuan had indeed fulfilled all of He Qingfu’s instructions.
He helped her take human form, hid the control-type rune, but for the sake of humanity’s survival, he walked the grandmaster’s old path. He didn’t let Jiang Yan go, but instead brought her into the Bureau.
His methods weren’t as radical as the grandmaster’s, more like emotional brainwashing—a slow-boiling frog.
Cangnan Funeral Home was also part of He Qingyuan’s plan.
He wanted Jiang Yan to realize the importance of her teammates, to sincerely save them, to truly understand human frailty—if she couldn’t protect them for a lifetime, she might as well sacrifice herself to give them a future without bloodshed.
But He Qingyuan never truly understood what He Qingfu had done.
His precognition was extremely limited. He couldn’t foresee the far future, nor see the fate of those stronger than himself, so he walked in a fog, many of his predictions half-guesses and deductions.
He couldn’t see Jiang Yan’s future.
Nor could he see through the trap He Qingfu had set.
Now the third screen faded, and the fourth and final one began.
Golden light, like fireflies, fell onto the transparent screen, as if dancing for the future.
On this screen, He Qingfu spent half a year empathizing with Jiang Chixi and many figures of Jiang, using her photographic memory to build a web of causality across dynasties in her mind.
When she was ready, she sought out a friend living on Penglai.
At the time, the Penglai energy field had already claimed two groups of psychics. The psychics on Penglai Island were at their wits’ end. When He Qingfu found her friend, she said directly:
“Come into the field with me. I’ll die in there. When that happens, I’ll need you to take my body out.”
Her friend refused in panic: “No, why do you have to die in there?!”
“Don’t go in. We’ll handle Penglai ourselves. You don’t have to go.”
He Qingfu smiled and shook her head. “I want to go.”
“Because I’ve used my power to see the future too many times these past two years, my lifespan is less than five years. I can’t use it again. Until my last vision, that girl’s ending was never good—I heard her voice. She’s a girl, about our age judging by her voice.”
“My junior listens to me, but he also listens to the grandmaster.”
“After helping the girl take human form, he wants her to join the Bureau. But the girl herself doesn’t care about taking human form and naturally has no thought of repaying anyone, so she refuses.”
“Some higher-ups close to the grandmaster know the girl’s power and later forcibly seize the control rune. No one ends well.”
Her friend couldn’t understand. From her perspective, He Qingfu’s words were a mess.
Who was the girl? What was the control-type rune? Why did she have less than five years to live? None of it made sense.
But He Qingfu kept talking: “Bai Ze helped me contact Torch Dragon.”
“My decision won’t be approved by the sect—they might even confine me. So I can only fake my death… or rather, truly die.”
“You don’t have to understand all this.”
“Just… if you ever meet a crimson wedding robe, don’t attack it. Help it.”
He Qingfu said, “Killing an innocent yao won’t bring happiness to humanity. It will only make us murderers.”
*
The four screens finished playing, dissolving into light. The tomb chamber brightened a little.
Jiang Yan stood in thought for a long time. Now she had a clear idea.
She could more or less guess what He Qingfu had done.
With that, Jiang Yan walked deeper into the tomb.
The place was small enough to see the end at a glance. At the very back was something like a stone pedestal, and behind it a wall. From behind the wall, dragon qi faintly seeped out, so it wasn’t solid.
It was hiding a ley line.
Jiang Yan walked up to the pedestal and stopped.
On it was a notebook. Jiang Yan picked it up and opened the first page.
He Qingfu’s neat handwriting filled the page.
[It worked.]
She wrote:
[After making arrangements with Torch Dragon, I died on Penglai Island. My soul separated from my consciousness—my soul entered reincarnation, and Torch Dragon brought my consciousness and a small box of runes to Jiang a thousand years ago.]
[As for why I didn’t bring my soul—of course, because Jiang Chixi’s soul and mine are the same. Two identical souls can’t exist in the same spacetime.]
[Consciousness is easily dispersed, so I needed a body. I could only use Jiang Chixi’s, so I floated to her bedside at night to negotiate, asking if I could stay for a few years, promising not to disturb her.]
[Jiang Chixi, worthy of being an emperor, wasn’t scared at all. She got up and went to find an exorcist. That was frightening. No one but her could know of my existence, so I stopped her quickly and told her many things—things only she would know.]
[She half believed I was her reincarnation, but still didn’t want to deal with me.]
[Oh, right, she did make some conditions—like asking me to tell her secrets of other countries, or when neighboring states would attack. But I couldn’t say.]
[I couldn’t change any past events, because the world’s timeline didn’t actually rewind—only my consciousness traveled a thousand years. If I changed history, the butterfly effect could be catastrophic. Even the He Qingfu a thousand years later might cease to exist, and this world would become a parallel one, not the original.]
[So I couldn’t change anything. I could only act outside everyone’s causality, doing the one thing I wanted to do.]
He Qingfu’s tone was troubled: [But Jiang Chixi was so stubborn, and I really couldn’t offer her anything she wanted. From her perspective, I must have seemed strange, even frightening, wanting to share her body.]
[It was a huge gamble. Now, without a soul, I’d lost my empathy ability and knew nothing of the future.]
[The gamble seemed about to fail. On the night before I was to fade away, I felt a bit lost. I told Jiang Chixi why I’d come, described the misery of the world a thousand years later. She said nothing, just pulled up her covers and went to sleep.]
[When she woke up the next morning, she agreed.]
[She was a good emperor, loving not only the people of Jiang, but also future generations.]
At this point, He Qingfu’s handwriting pressed a little harder: [I won’t let the timeline change because of me. I’ve memorized every action Jiang Chixi took in her life. If she ever deviates from history because of my presence, I’ll instantly take over and correct it.]
[I explained all this to Jiang Chixi. She laughed at me, saying she would never be swayed by my presence. Her character was unwavering; her decisions always her own.]
[She’s amazing.]
[As I write this diary, it’s been many years since I came to Jiang.]
[At this moment, I suddenly thought of something interesting—why was Jiang Chixi my past life? What did I do to deserve such an honor? But as soon as the question arose, I understood.]
[First there was Jiang Chixi, then there was me. Because my past life was this Empress, I have such powerful psychic talent. This is causality. The wedding robe began with Jiang Chixi and continues with me—this too is causality.]
As she flipped through the diary, Jiang Yan felt strange.
It was like reading the life of someone familiar, and yet a complete stranger.
Yet she was also an inseparable protagonist in this story.
But as the protagonist, she’d had no idea what she meant to the story. She only knew she’d been raised in the underground palace by Jiang Chixi, and had lived well.
Suppressing these feelings, Jiang Yan flipped further. The later pages were brief, the writing simple.
[Found the first ley line outside causality. Luckily, I brought enough runes. Moving it was troublesome.]
The next page was similar:
[Found the second ley line outside causality. Already moved it into Xing Mountain.]
Jiang Yan quickly understood these lines.
A ley line “outside causality” meant one that, for a thousand years to come, would never be unearthed—hidden deep and remote, not involved in the causality of any species. Even if moved, it would have no effect, no butterfly effect on the future.
And Xing Mountain…
It must be the barren mountain of Jin Chuan.
Which meant, behind that wall, there were at least two ley lines—possibly three, if Xing Mountain itself had a deeply hidden one. After gathering all three, He Qingfu used the runes she’d brought to confine the dragon qi to a certain area, preventing it from leaking, and stopping future psychics from detecting it.
Thinking of this, Jiang Yan walked straight to the gray wall behind the pedestal.
She knocked on the wall.
“Dong dong”—the sound echoed in the tomb, deep and resonant, as if history itself were answering.
She didn’t wait any longer. Behind the wall was likely the path He Qingfu had found for humanity, the thing left for her, the thing she could trade with.
Jiang Yan was too curious.
Without hesitation, she pressed her palm to the wall. Invisible yao power spread from her hand, spiderwebbing out.
A few seconds later, the wall collapsed with a roar, and pure, noble dragon qi filled the tomb.
Jiang Yan finally saw what was hidden behind the wall.
She stood quietly, looking at it for a long, long time.
Finally, she couldn’t help but turn away, sighing softly, her gaze complicated and full of emotion.
He Qingfu had done it.
She had made the deal—a deal Jiang Yan could not refuse.
Behind the wall was a crimson wedding robe.
Three ley lines had taken the form of three golden dragons, each a meter long, circling the robe. A several-meter-long war halberd pierced the robe’s chest. The hem was embroidered with dragon and phoenix patterns, the gold thread made from Zhu Yan’s fur, the auspicious clouds on the chest from silk left by Leizu, fine brocade and satin, every stitch and detail exactly like Jiang Yan’s own body.
But this was a wedding robe even stronger than Jiang Yan’s true form.
With the unheard-of power of three ley lines, this robe’s age had reached ten thousand years, enough to rival the greatest yao of the Classic of Mountains and Seas. By rights, such a robe should have long since gained consciousness, a soul, and become one of the strongest beings alive.
But because of the fatal wound from the war halberd, its body was severely damaged. It would never develop a soul—just an empty, dead thing.
Just like Jiang Yan’s true form, which had passed through the chaos of warring states.
Jiang Yan finally understood what He Qingfu had done.
She had traveled back a thousand years to Jiang, searching for the original materials, and outside the causality of all living things, personally crafted a body even stronger than Jiang Yan’s own.
Because this wedding robe was identical to Jiang Yan’s true form, it could bear her soul.
When Jiang Yan abandoned her current body, turning it into a rune, her soul would not have to enter a human body, but could inhabit this stronger form—transforming from a six-thousand-year-old yao into a ten-thousand-year-old great yao.
This was a fair trade.
If she was to give up her current power, she deserved something even greater—she would still be a yao, still be immortal, still have endless time to do as she wished.
This was humanity’s way of participating in salvation.
Jiang Yan stepped forward and pulled the war halberd from the robe’s chest.
The Bureau would surely find a way to repair the damage. Even if they couldn’t now, they could rally all their resources to figure it out.
So…
Jiang Yan carefully folded the wedding robe and put it in her backpack.
If there was a remedy in the human world, it should not be Jiang Yan herself, but He Qingfu.