Longzang

Chapter 1165: Relying on face to make a living
Several beautiful young women walked in the darkness, each appearing extremely nervous. They knew someone was following them, but they couldn't sense his presence at all. Surrounded by absolute darkness, they couldn't see anything and could only rely on instinct to move forward.

Finally, everyone's eyes lit up as they stepped into a hazy glow. The girls still couldn't see anything, so they all turned around and returned to the darkness. The unseen man, however, remained behind.

A beam of light, seemingly appearing out of nowhere, illuminated a small area. A man in gray appeared, looked up at the source of the light, and then continued walking forward, standing in front of a boy.

The young man was carving a stone figure and said without looking up, "You actually dared to step into the area with light this time. You've got some nerve."

The gray-clad man said calmly, "Even here, let alone the fact that you might not be able to kill me, even if you did succeed, would the Lord spare you?"

The young man laughed and finally put down the stone statue in his hand, saying, "Cangwu, you don't need to use the Venerable Lord to scare me. Lü Changhe is dead. If something happens to me, I'm afraid even the Venerable Lord in the Immortal Heaven will be restless, right? Besides, although we don't have any relationship, we also don't have any enmity. Why would I kill you for no reason? But whether you want to kill me or not, I don't know."

Cangwu remained expressionless, standing quietly.

The boy-looking Xu Wangu put down his carving knife and asked, "What are you doing here?"

"The Lord instructed me to come and see you."

"Look at me?" Xu Wangu pondered for a moment, then said, "Now that you've seen me, what are your own thoughts?"

Cangwu said, "I have never had my own ideas."

“That’s true.” Xu Wangu stood up, walked to Cangwu, turned around, and said, “What do you think?”

Cangwu remained expressionless, saying, "I don't know."

Xu Wangu smiled and said, "Now that you've seen it, please leave."

Cangwu slowly retreated, disappearing into the darkness.

Xu Wangu frowned slightly and muttered to himself, "There are such methods? Indeed, if I wanted to keep him here, it would be impossible."

The slightly hoarse voice of the woman with blue eyes sounded behind him: "With our conventional methods alone, it's naturally impossible. But with these added, he can't escape."

Xu Wangu turned around and saw the woman with blue eyes appear, holding a transparent glass bottle with a thin layer of pale white water at the bottom.

Seeing the pale white water, Xu Wangu's eyes showed a hint of excitement, and he asked, "A harvest?"

The woman with blue eyes nodded and said, "Yes. Originally, it was far too early, but now the number of children with Dao Foundations far exceeds what was expected back then, and everyone has begun to forge their bodies. So when I saw that the time was ripe, I made a move to harvest them, and it was indeed successful."

After saying that, she handed the glass bottle in her hand to Xu Wangu.

Xu Wangu took it, his hand trembling slightly, and said, "Give it all to me? Aren't you keeping any for yourself?"

The woman with blue eyes said, "I don't need it for now. Just remember what you promised."

Xu Wangu immediately replied, "Don't worry! In my life, there is only one thing I can be proud of, and that is keeping my promises."

The woman with blue eyes said, "This item cannot be stored for long. Since Cangwu has just left and the disturbances in the heavenly secrets of this place have not yet subsided, use it quickly so as not to reveal the cause and effect."

Xu Wangu pondered for a moment, his gaze sweeping back and forth between the unfinished stone carving, a broken small sword, and the small artificial hill. Finally, he came to the artificial hill in the center of the sky and poured the bottle of light-colored water onto it.

The woman with blue eyes finally showed a hint of expression and said, "The Water of Destiny is rare. I thought you would use it on the stone carving to avenge your great grudge, or to repair the immortal sword and leave a legacy for future generations. Both of these are feasible options. But you actually used it to enhance this world?"

Xu Wangu said, "This is my mental world. It has become stronger, and anything is possible."

The woman with blue eyes nodded: "I didn't expect you to have such ambitions."

The boyish-looking Xu Wangu laughed heartily and said, "This is ambition!"

The woman with blue eyes said, "Back then, you were able to accept my suggestion and dare to take such a risky move. You were indeed no ordinary person. Today, this bottle of water of destiny is what you deserve."

Xu Wangu said meaningfully, "A bottle of water of destiny is far from enough."

"That's beyond our control." With that, the woman with blue eyes retreated into the darkness, disappearing without a trace.

Xu Wangu looked up at the sky and could feel that the light was gradually increasing, and the area illuminated in the darkness was getting bigger and bigger.

He smiled slightly, looked away, then picked up the unfinished statue and casually tossed it into a corner.

The statue turned over, revealing its nascent face. At this point, the face had only been sculpted a few strokes, lacking detail, yet its exquisite beauty was already apparent. Furthermore, the top of its head was bald.

……

In the mountains near the Sword Palace, Bai Kaishui was examining calligraphy scrolls in a thatched hut built specifically for receiving guests. Some of the scrolls were hasty, some were passionate, and some seemed solemn, yet they still couldn't help but reveal their sharpness—sometimes an extra stroke here, sometimes a few wisps of sword-like energy flying out there. Suddenly, the room became somewhat chilly, and Cangwu, dressed in gray, quietly appeared, also looking at the calligraphy.

Bai Kaishui sighed, put away all the calligraphy scrolls, and said, "When I look at the calligraphy I wrote when I was young, I can't find peace."

"Please do as you please, I'll just take a look and leave."

Bai Kaishui glanced sideways at Cangwu and said, "No one in their right mind would believe that. You're supposed to be an immortal, so don't spout such useless nonsense. It only lowers your prestige. Are you really just here to take a look?"

Cangwu said, "The Lord instructed me to come and take a look, and I just came to take a look; I have no other intentions."

Plain Water said coldly, "The Venerable One treats you like a dog, and you actually become one? Think back to your days, how spirited you were, a Golden Roc that soared through the heavens and explored the nine earths, pursuing powerful enemies relentlessly! The Golden Roc that I admired back then is now just a butterfly. You, do you even deserve to see my writing from my youth?"

Cangwu remained expressionless and said, "Back then, Liu Miao was penniless, but he overcame all obstacles and hardships to become an immortal. Didn't he also perish silently? His strategy, temperament, and vision were all superior to mine. In the end, he only lacked a bit of luck and died without any dignity."

But is his only problem luck?

This last question seemed abrupt, yet it stumped Bai Kaishui. He pondered for a moment before saying, "That's right, even if we replenish Liu Miao's luck, he's still doomed."

Cangwu finally showed some expression and said, "That's right! Even if he were given luck, he would still die unless he could also have luck equivalent to 100 million people... But even the Venerable Lord wouldn't easily give up luck worth over 100 million people, so why would he use it on Liu Miao? He could never obtain such a level of luck on his own, and no one else would give it to him, nor would any family or elders vouch for him, so he died."

What he lacked wasn't luck, but family background—a family background strong enough to offset the misfortune of a hundred million people.

Plain water sighs.

Cangwu continued, "Liu Miao has always believed that wealth and honor are found in danger, braving perilous situations and risking his life. He has escaped danger countless times before finally making his way through the immortal realm. But he offended the wrong person. No matter how many times he had won in the gamble before, he lost everything he had won in this one game, including his path to immortality."

"Plain water. If it were you, would you gamble?"

This question came out of nowhere, and a dazzling light suddenly flashed in Cangwu's eyes, actually causing Bai Kaishui to look away. This wasn't just about immortal power; it had hit the nail on the head.

Plain Water sighed, "I will."

Cangwu's imposing aura subsided, and he said slowly, "You can gamble, and so can we. The difference is that you have the Sword Palace behind you, so if you lose, you can try again, and others won't go all out. But if we lose once, we have nothing left."

Bai Kaishui smiled bitterly: "Back then, I invited you all to join the Sword Palace, but none of you came."

"You'll be the Vice Palace Master's personal disciple once you enter, while we'll have to start as outer disciples. Back then, we were young and impetuous, and we all wanted to forge our own paths, so we went our separate ways. To be honest, I do regret it now, but it's too late. If Liu Miao were still alive, he would probably regret it too."

You and we are inherently different; you were born a cut above us, but we refused to acknowledge it back then. And for our youthful impetuosity, we have indeed paid a heavy price. For centuries, we have been struggling for meager sustenance, devoid of dignity.

Bai Kaishui hesitated for a moment, then finally asked, "Where's Feiyang?"

Cangwu paused for a moment before saying, "Because of the family's crisis, she married a core elder of a noble family, Yu Jing, at a young age, thinking she could live a peaceful life from then on. Unexpectedly, she was tortured and drained of her vitality. By the time I found out, her foundation had already been damaged. Later, I asked the Venerable Lord to take action and deal with that elder. Then the Venerable Lord refined her body into a secret puppet. If I perish, she will be the one to come looking for you next."

"Why...why are you doing this?" Plain Water asked helplessly.

Cangwu said calmly, "That person is the great-grandson of an immortal, and has the potential to ascend to immortality. To deal with him, Feiyang alone is not enough. I had to offer myself up to get the Venerable Lord to take action. If it weren't for the Venerable Lord, who else in the world could avenge her? Rely on your ancestor who is known as the 'Sword Without Edge'?"

Plain Water was speechless. He knew that his ancestor was most skilled in the art of balancing things out, commonly known as "muddling through mud," and would never fight to the death with a true immortal for the sake of a woman of ordinary birth who had been harmed.

That ancestor was able to become the deputy palace master entirely because of the word "sharpness," but it was precisely because he lacked that sharpness that he was stuck at the peak of the Imperial Realm for life and never ascended to the Immortal Gate.

Having said that, Cangwu released the resentment he had been holding back for who knows how long, and returned to his original cold indifference, saying, "I guess the Venerable One wants to ask you whether what you said back then still stands, and whether you still intend to repay the kindness?"

Plain Water immediately put on a smile and said, "I'm someone who always keeps my promises and repays kindness! But the kindness I received back then was just too great, and I never imagined that my promise would lead me to this bald monk. How about this, since the kindness is so great that I can't repay it all at once, I'll break it down into smaller parts and repay it little by little, how about that?"

Cangwu watched him quietly.

With a forced smile, Bai Kaishui said, "I know this is a bit embarrassing, but what else can we do? Besides, the Venerable One is a senior, and I am a junior among juniors. How could someone as important as him hold a grudge against a junior like me? Don't you think so?"

Cangwu was speechless, and could only manage to squeeze out, "You...you really are shameless!"

"Hahaha! You were absolutely right. Think about it, my Wufeng Ancestor is already incredibly high-ranking as a Vice Palace Master, so what makes me capable of surpassing Feng Hanzhou and becoming the Palace Master? Swordsmanship is only part of the reason, the real reason..."

Plain Water patted his face: "...It's still all thanks to this face!"

Cangwu remains silent, only retreating into the distance.

P.S.: At the beginning of 2026, I wish everyone a happy new year where all your wishes come true and you can make a living off your good looks!
(End of this chapter)