My mother is the white moonlight of the cultivation world.

"Sister, take me with you."

He carefully gripped Hua Yue's clothes, his knuckles turning white from the force. His still-childish face revealed a composure beyond his years, even a kind of stubborn determination.

Hua Yue lowered her gaze, looking at the little boy who resembled Yun You so much. Logically, she should immediately cast a sleeping spell to send him back to the anxious couple at the city gate. After all, they would soon be facing that unfathomable black-robed god.

It was a monster that could annihilate living beings at will and even manipulate the threads of fate.

"If you come with me, you won't be able to save your brother, and you might even lose your life." Hua Yue squatted down, looked him straight in the eyes, and tried to see even the slightest hint of hesitation in those clear eyes.

but no.

Carefully, she shook her head, her voice soft yet remarkably firm: "Where Xiaomi is, I have to be too. I run fast, I won't hold my sister back. Besides, I know where that person took him."

He pointed to the rolling mountains behind the city, which were shrouded in dark clouds all year round. "I can feel Xiao Mi's presence. He's there, feeling cold and uncomfortable."

Hua Yue's heart skipped a beat. Ordinary people could never sense this level of energy fluctuation, unless this child was born with fully developed spiritual senses, or…

She didn't refuse again, and reached out to embrace Xiaoxin's waist. The Phoenix Eye Sword emitted a clear and melodious sword cry, and a green light instantly enveloped the two of them.

"Hurry up."

With a low shout, sword light shot into the sky. Xiao Xin, soaring into the air for the first time, instinctively clung tightly to Hua Yue's arm, his body tense, but he didn't utter a scream. His eyes were wide, fixed on the mountains rushing past below.

Hua Yue flew on her sword, following the careful directions, and soon discovered a natural cave deep in the dense forest.

The cave entrance was filled with a nauseating odor, not just the aura of death, but a kind of divine power fluctuation that had been forcibly crushed and then roughly stitched back together.

"It's inside," he said quietly, his voice trembling slightly.

Hua Yue landed at the cave entrance and sheathed her Phoenix Eye Sword. She patted the boy's shoulder with her backhand, and a soft emerald light disappeared into his skin: "Stay behind me, don't move."

Upon entering the cave, the air became thick and heavy.

Deep within the cave, the man in black robes stood with his back to them, cradling a child named Xiaomi in his arms. Xiaomi's eyes were tightly closed, and dark purple lines appeared on his skin, like some kind of living parasite residing within him.

"Let him go." Hua Yue said coldly, her Phoenix Eye Sword emitting a gray light of the law of death.

The man in the black robe turned around, his large hood obscuring his face, with only two points of blood-red light shimmering in the shadows.

"It's you again." His voice was hoarse, like sandpaper scraping the ground. "You persistent ghost."

Before he finished speaking, he suddenly flicked his sleeve, and a wave of pitch-black energy surged forth like a tidal wave.

Hua Yue remained calm, her fingertips lightly tapping the air, and a shield woven from laws steadily appeared before her. At the same time, her figure blurred into afterimages, and her Phoenix Eye Sword pierced straight for her opponent's heart.

However, a strange scene happened.

Just as the tip of her sword was about to touch the other's chest, space itself mysteriously distorted at that moment. Hua Yue felt as if her movements were a beat too slow, while the man in black robes suddenly appeared three meters away.

"Time?" Hua Yue frowned slightly.

The other party was able to interfere with the flow of time in a small area.

"You've gotten weaker." Hua Yue wasn't flustered by her earlier mistake; instead, she curled her lips in a mocking smile.

Compared to his arrogance when he killed Ling Yue, the black-robed god now resembled a porcelain vase that was strong on the outside but weak on the inside. His divine power fluctuations were chaotic and weak, like a river whose source had been cut off.

"Killing you is enough." The black-robed god roared, and time around him suddenly stopped.

But the instant he made his move, Hua Yue flipped her hand, and countless golden threads of divine power shot out from her fingertips. These threads were unaffected by the time stagnation; instead, they nimbly pierced through the distorted space, instantly binding the black-robed god tightly.

"How could you use this!" the black-robed god cried out in disbelief, his voice filled with panic. "The power of a god... how could you possibly..."

"Is it strange?" Hua Yue approached step by step, her fingertips slightly tightening the silk threads—a sensation from divine blood. "I share similar blood with you. It seems the collapse of the divine realm has affected you quite a bit; you've even lost this basic sense of perception."

The golden threads tightened continuously, and the black smoke on the black-robed god's body was compressed, making a hissing sound.

"Why do you do this?" Hua Yue looked at the withered corpses lying on the ground, her voice utterly cold. "What good does it do you to experiment on these innocent children?"

The black-robed god let out a nervous chuckle: "Because they disagree... those self-righteous gods, they disagree with my destruction of the human realm. Once the human realm is gone, the demons will lose their source of desire, and the demon realm will collapse as well. That way, the world will be clean, what a perfect plan..."

"madman."

Hua Yue stopped talking nonsense and brought down her Phoenix Eye Sword with a deathly gray arc of light.

"Bang!"

The black-robed god's body exploded, turning into a thick plume of black smoke that swept away the dust from the bottom of the cave. Before leaving, he let out a mournful curse, but had no choice but to abandon the millet in his hand.

Hua Yue removed the silk threads and reached out to catch the falling child.

At this moment, Xiao Mi was in extremely bad condition. His whole body was burning hot, like a branding iron, and fine beads of sweat kept seeping out. A series of muffled rumbling sounds came from inside his body, as if a torrent that did not belong to him was raging wildly.

"Sister, save him!" She stumbled and rushed over, kneeling beside her younger brother.

Hua Yue placed her hand on Xiao Mi's forehead, her expression slightly grim: "He is undergoing demigodification."

The black-robed god attempted to forcibly infuse divine power into the mortal's body, trying to create a vessel capable of containing that power. The mortal's meridians were simply unable to withstand such energy; if left unchecked, Xiao Mi would soon become a flesh-and-blood bomb ready to explode at any moment.

Hua Yue quickly set up several suppression formations, but the effect was minimal. Divine power and spiritual power are completely different dimensions.

"I'm sorry, I can only suppress it for now." Hua Yue gritted her teeth as she tried to use the formation to suppress the power.

Just then, Xiaoxin suddenly grasped her younger brother's burning little hand.

"Xiaomi, wake up, it's your older brother."

His voice was trembling with fear, and he closed his eyes, his whole body shaking.

Hua Yue was about to dissuade her when she suddenly froze.

A pure white, gentle power, brimming with vitality, flowed slowly into Xiao Mi's body through Xiao Xin's fingertips. Wherever that power passed, the originally violent purple patterns melted away like ice and snow, and the frenzied divine power was smoothed and reorganized inch by inch, finally transforming into a gentle trickle.

This aura...

"Yun You?" Hua Yue couldn't help but call out softly.

That was Yun You's most fundamental divine power—restoration. Even after his reincarnation, that deep-seated instinct to protect still awakened at crucial moments.

After about the time it takes for an incense stick to burn, the high temperature on Xiao Mi's body subsided, the dark purple patterns disappeared, and her breathing became even.

He slowly opened his eyes, looking around in a daze.

"Xiao Mi, that's great!" Xiao Xin hugged her younger brother tightly, tears streaming down her face. "It was this older sister who saved you."

Xiaomi turned to look at Hua Yue, her eyes innocent.

Hua Yue dispelled the formation, patted Xiao Xin's head, and said gently, "No, you saved him yourself, little hero."

It was already past midnight when the two children were sent back to the city.

The woman held her two children, whom she had lost and then found again, and cried so hard she almost stopped.

"My lord, your kindness is immeasurable; we could never repay you, even if we worked like oxen and horses," the man said, his voice choked with emotion. "Why don't you give these two children names? They don't have proper names yet."

Looking at the two children, Hua Yue recalled the cold, calculating image of the Yun family from the past.

She shook her head, a faint smile playing on her lips: "No need. My name carries my parents' expectations and love; I can't take away that blessing."

The man wiped away his tears and smiled憨厚ly: "Actually, we had already thought about it, but we were afraid that the names would be too common and spoil the children's spirit. We originally wanted to name the eldest Yunyou, hoping that he would live a carefree life like a cloud; and the younger one Yunmi, hoping that his life would be as sweet as honey."

Yun You, Yun You.

Yunmi, Yunmi.

Hua Yue stood in the darkness, her mind slightly dazed. Fate is such a thing; sometimes it's so ironic that it makes you want to laugh, yet sometimes it's so tender that it makes you want to cry.

Because of his pain, Yun You killed the Yun family and Yun Mi. In order to destroy the human world, he transformed into a demon god. In order to avoid reincarnation, he wanted to be killed by the power of death.

But now, he has been reincarnated again.

He has loving parents, a younger brother he would risk his life to protect, and the "leisure" he once longed for but could never have.

"elder sister."

Yunyou (carefully) let go of his parents' hands and ran over to grab Huayue's clothes. His eyes sparkled in the torchlight.

"Sister, aren't you amazing?"

Hua Yue smiled and said, "It's alright."

"I also want to cultivate immortality, to be as powerful as my older sister, and then protect everyone." The child's voice was full of longing.

In this war-torn world, power means survival, and no longer being bullied by monsters like the man in black robes.

Hua Yue squatted down, looking at the young, innocent face. If it were before, she might have accepted him.

But now, looking at the innocence in his eyes, she simply shook her head gently.

"What you need right now isn't to become stronger, nor is it to protect anyone." Hua Yue looked at him earnestly. "What you should do most right now is go home, eat a warm dinner your mother has prepared, and then get a good night's sleep, to enjoy this hard-won warmth. Understand?"

Yun You looked somewhat bewildered. He tilted his head and thought for a moment, seemingly understanding yet not quite.

"Come find me again when you've truly made up your mind, when you're sure you're not cultivating immortality for hatred or to follow in someone else's footsteps."

Hua Yue stood up, her figure gradually fading, turning into a wisp of breeze and disappearing into the night.

On her way back to the Wuji Sect, Hua Yue flew through the thick sea of ​​clouds on her sword.

She recalled Yun You's expression when he disappeared. What would that man, whose entire life had been pushed along by fate, look like if he knew he had been reincarnated as a human again?

They probably think it's a good idea.

The winds of the cultivation world remained cold, but Hua Yue felt that many of the old grudges in her heart had been quietly erased by those two ordinary names.