Transforming into a stunningly beautiful fox spirit, leaving a scar on the heart of a prodigy.

It was very quiet inside the Guiyuan Hall.

It was so quiet that you could hear Chen Xuan's blood dripping onto the broken bricks.

Li Changgeng withdrew his foot.

He didn't step on it again. He stood on the edge of the abyss, his back to Chen Xuan, looking down into the darkness.

Chen Xuan lay on the ground.

Two vertebrae of the spine were broken.

His fingernails were torn up, and all ten fingers were a bloody mess. His face was pressed against the cold, broken bricks, his right eye was covered in blood, and only his left eye could still see.

He saw Li Changgeng's back.

He wore a gray Taoist robe and had white hair that reached his shoulders.

Standing there, it's like a mountain.

A hissing sound came from Chen Xuan's throat.

He is moving.

He braced himself on his elbows and moved forward half an inch. Broken bricks scraped across his chest; his clothes were already torn, and his skin was rubbing directly against the stone surface.

Li Changgeng did not turn around.

"Don't move."

His voice was very soft.

"Two vertebrae of your spine are broken, your meridians are disordered, and your foundation is 30% fractured. If you move again, you will die."

Chen Xuan did not stop.

He moved forward another half an inch.

Li Changgeng turned around.

He looked down at Chen Xuan on the ground. His gaze swept over the blood-stained face and settled on his eyes.

The left eye that wasn't covered in blood.

His eyes were red. Not the red of bloodshot eyes, but the red of burning murderous intent.

Li Changgeng looked at it for a long time.

Then he sighed.

"You're just like her."

Chen Xuan's elbow paused for a moment.

"They're all the same." Li Changgeng squatted down. His movements were slow, and as his knees bent, the hem of his Taoist robe swept across the broken bricks. "Knowing they can't win, they still charge in."

Chen Xuan opened his mouth.

Blood gushed from the corner of his mouth. He swallowed.

"Give her back to me."

The sound was intermittent. Every word was laced with blood and foam.

Li Changgeng did not answer that question.

He sat down, just three feet in front of Chen Xuan, cross-legged, with his hands on his knees.

It's like having a conversation with someone who is about to die.

Do you know what's buried beneath this Guiyuan Hall?

Chen Xuan didn't speak. His elbow was still pushing forward.

"A nine-tailed celestial fox," Li Changgeng said. "I made the nine-tailed celestial fox based on her appearance."

Chen Xuan paused for a moment.

Li Changgeng's voice was very flat, as if he were talking about someone else's affairs.

"I was fifteen years old then. A complete waste. My spiritual root was the worst kind, a mixed spiritual root, and my cultivation speed was three times slower than that of my peers. I was kicked out of the sect and walked in the snow for seven days, almost freezing to death."

He paused for a moment.

"She was passing by."

Chen Xuan scratched at the broken bricks with his fingers. His nail broke, but he didn't feel it.

"She is a celestial fox. A nine-tailed celestial fox. At that time in the cultivation world, humans and demons were sworn enemies. She had absolutely no reason to save a human waste."

Li Changgeng lowered his head and looked at his hands.

But she stopped.

The lights in Guiyuan Hall flickered on the walls. The golden light of the formation had dimmed considerably, with only a few runes still slowly circulating.

"She wrapped me up with her tail," Li Changgeng said.

Chen Xuan's body stiffened.

"She taught me meditation, how to gather spiritual energy, and how to identify herbs. The first time I gathered spiritual energy, the wind was too strong, and the energy dissipated. She patted my head with her paw."

Li Changgeng's voice remained unchanged.

But the knuckles of his hand, which was resting on his knee, were white.

"Then she left. Without saying goodbye. When I woke up, there was only a paw print left on the snow."

A low sound came from Chen Xuan's throat. It wasn't an attempt to speak. It was the displacement of his broken spine, bone grinding against bone. He bit his tongue.

Li Changgeng glanced at him and continued.

"I've been looking for her for sixty years."

Li Changgeng raised his head.

"Sixty years. From the Northern Regions to the Central Continent, and from the Central Continent to the Eastern Sea. I have been to every mountain, every forest, and every place with a legend of the Celestial Fox."

His lips twitched slightly.

"I found it later."

Chen Xuan's breathing became heavier.

"In a place called Luoyan Town, she changed her face, disguised herself as a rogue cultivator, and mingled in the crowd."

Li Changgeng's gaze fell on the direction of the abyss.

"She stood outside the crowd watching my fight. I could smell her scent."

He paused for a long time.

"I didn't expose her."

Chen Xuan pushed forward with his elbow again. This time, he used too much force, and a sharp pain shot through his broken spine. His body convulsed, and his forehead hit the broken bricks.

Li Changgeng glanced at him. He didn't move.

"She didn't want to be recognized. So I pretended not to know her. She said she wanted to become her apprentice, so I taught her the simplest sword techniques. She deliberately made mistakes, so I corrected her."

"She was secretly clearing my meridians. Using her own essence."

Li Changgeng's voice finally cracked slightly.

"I know. I knew from the third day. But I didn't dare say anything. I was afraid that if I did, she would leave again."

The air in Guiyuan Hall was very cold.

Chen Xuan lay on the ground, blood spreading beneath him. His consciousness teetered on the brink of fading.

But he heard it very clearly.

Every single word.

"She fed me with her own life to cultivate. Little by little each day. I watched as her complexion worsened day by day, and she could do nothing."

Li Changgeng closed his eyes.

"Later, she wanted to establish a sect. She said that regardless of whether one was human or demon, anyone who wanted to learn could join. I said okay. She asked me what my name was, and I said Supreme Forgetfulness."

He opened his eyes.

"The name she gave me."

Chen Xuan squeezed out a syllable from his throat.

"Why...?"

Li Changgeng looked at him.

"Why didn't you save her?" Chen Xuan's voice was forced out through clenched teeth. "You are a Quasi-Emperor. That seal... a Quasi-Emperor can break it."

These words struck the Guiyuan Hall like a thunderbolt.

Li Changgeng did not answer immediately.

He looked into Chen Xuan's eyes. In that bloodshot left eye, besides the killing intent, there was something else.

Puzzled.

A deep-seated confusion.

If you love her.

If you waited three thousand years.

If you have that ability.

Why not go?

Li Changgeng stood up.

He walked to the edge of the abyss. He looked down.

In the darkness, the body pierced by chains still emitted a faint red glow.

"The fox you keep is named Su Chang'an," Li Changgeng said.

Chen Xuan remained silent.

"The one underground is also a nine-tailed celestial fox."

"Their spiritual aura is almost identical."

Li Changgeng turned around.

His lips moved slightly, as if something was stuck in his throat and he couldn't swallow it.

After a long pause, he finally spoke. "But no two flowers in the world are the same."

Chen Xuan's pupils contracted.

"Your Su Chang'an is Tianhu," Li Changgeng said, emphasizing each word. "But she is not my master."

The Guiyuan Hall was deathly silent.

Chen Xuan lay in a pool of blood, his mind buzzing.

"There are traces of my master in her soul. The underlying essence, fragments of memory, even her temperament are similar." Li Changgeng's voice was very low. "But she is not."

"She is someone else. She carries the shadow of my master, yet lives as someone else."

Chen Xuan's fingers slowly clenched on the broken bricks.

"I've waited three thousand years, not because I didn't want to break the formation," Li Changgeng said. His voice finally lost its composure. "It's because I dared not."

"I'm afraid that after I break it open, she'll look at me and not see me in her eyes."

"I'm afraid that if she comes back to life, she won't call out my name."

"Finding out who she really is is harder than letting her die down there..."

Chen Xuan's lips were moving.

He wanted to speak. He wanted to say so much. He wanted to say that Su Chang'an was not anyone's shadow, not anyone's substitute, she was herself.

But he could only manage a muffled, breathy sound.

Li Changgeng squatted down.

He looked at Chen Xuan's face.

"You're luckier than me," he said. "At least you know her name."

Chen Xuan stared intently at him with his left eye.

Li Changgeng opened his mouth, as if to say something else.

He didn't say it.

Because the ground of Guiyuan Hall was shaking.

It wasn't the kind of tremor caused by spiritual vein fluctuations like before. This one was coming from outside. From the direction of the palace gate. From the other side sealed off by the seven arrays.

Li Changgeng suddenly stood up.

Chen Xuan also sensed it.

That aura.

What flowed up from the depths of the spiritual vein was not his power. It was something else entirely.

A feeling that's ingrained in your very bones.

The Origin of the Celestial Fox.

But not the body that's underground.

It is alive. It is scalding hot. It carries the temperature of the phoenix's true fire, and is wrapped in all the rage and irrationality of a woman.

The iron gates of Guiyuan Hall shook violently.

The array runes flickered wildly.

Outside the door, something was forcefully tearing apart the blockade.

Chen Xuan lay in a pool of blood. His lips were split open. Not from pain. He was smiling.

He wanted to say something, but his throat was full of blood.

That sentence was very short.

"They're here."