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

The snow started falling again.

The ancient celestial fox stood in the center of the black stone array, with 372 chains running through its shoulder bones and the base of its nine tails, and crimson and moon-white array patterns slowly flowing along the chains.

Young Li Changgeng stood guard at the heart of the formation.

The extremely evil black markings on his chest had subsided, and the blood-stained iron sword lay across his knees, his palm still pressing on the hilt, never letting go.

Su Chang'an inspected the Nine-Tailed Dividing Tribulation Formation one by one.

The earth's veins bear the death energy, the lunar phase freezes the extreme evil, and the future array eye receives the cause and effect spanning three thousand years. The three branching streams are connected end to end, with no further signs of collapse.

After confirming that everything was correct, she re-pressed the vital points all over her body, sealing the Taiyin Moon Amber and the Nine-Tailed Ancestral Source into her body.

The rejection from Heaven then receded.

Su Chang'an stood up, supporting himself with the array diagram, and looked up at the edge of spacetime.

There is still a gap there.

The primordial purple energy had already mended most of the cracks, leaving only a thin, elongated gap between the past and the future. Chaotic forces of time seeped out from it, constantly tugging at the moon-white array patterns on the snow.

Li Changgeng, the skeleton, stood before the breach.

He was left with only half a body, several ribs broken, and a section of his spine missing. Each sweep of time would grind a layer of bone dust from his body.

"It's not over yet."

Su Chang'an stared at the gap.

"It connects the past and the future. If we keep it, the Nine-Tailed Dividing Tribulation Array will always be dragged down by the karma of future generations."

"This formation has only just been established; it cannot withstand three thousand years of repeated strain."

Li Changgeng, the skeleton, lowered his head.

Within the cracked bone palm, a few faint traces of Quasi-Emperor Laws still remained.

"I know."

He glanced at the ancient celestial fox in the Black Stone Formation, then looked at his younger self.

"Chen Xuan's sword bone, Bai Yin's calamity aura, her Heavenly Fox origin, and the Chen family's Heaven-Suppressing Bell."

"I used these things that don't belong to me to forcibly tear open the river of time."

"This crack is my debt."

Li Changgeng, the White Bone, raised his hand and deliberately dispersed the last layer of Quasi-Emperor Law protecting his Soul Flame.

"What I tore open, I will mend."

The moment the laws vanished, the turbulent currents of time rushed towards us.

Click!

Li Changgeng, the skeleton, had several ribs broken simultaneously and swept into the depths of time and space. Large sections of his shoulder bones weathered away, and the pale soul fire in his eye sockets dimmed.

Gu Tianhu instinctively raised one of his fox tails.

The tip of the tail had already touched the edge of the turbulence, but it stopped in mid-air.

She taught Li Changgeng to respect others and not to decide their paths for them.

Now, we can no longer bear the consequences that he should have borne out of pity.

The fox tail slowly descended back into the black stone formation.

Young Li Changgeng gripped his iron sword tightly, watching his future self crumble away bit by bit over the years.

For the first time, he realized what he would become three thousand years later if he turned love into a grave he refused to leave.

However, Li Changgeng, the White Bone, did not immediately enter the rift.

He raised his remaining bone hand, reached deep into his sternum, and retrieved a gray-white jade slip from the dim soul fire.

The jade slip was covered with cracks.

The moment it appeared, a phantom image of a sect spanning three thousand years emerged above the Cold Abyss.

It started as just a few wooden huts on the snowfield.

Gu Tianhu stood in front of the stone tablet and wrote "Education should be provided to all without discrimination".

Young Li Changgeng stood guard behind her with his sword, carefully writing down, "The one whose heart is truly devoted is the one we are."

The screen continued to scroll.

The wooden huts transformed into palaces, and the stone tablets became mountain gates. The number of disciples grew, and the rules became increasingly strict.

Sever all emotional ties.

Extinguish desires.

Sever kinship ties.

Using all sentient beings as medicine and true heart as tribulation, one regards sentient beings as the impure foundation of the path.

One after another, cold precepts squeezed into the jade slip, covering the original words left by the ancient celestial fox.

Gu Tianhu gazed at the unfamiliar sect, his hands hanging at his sides slowly tightening.

Young Li Changgeng also lowered his head.

He couldn't reconcile the corrupt sect in the illusory world that took pride in severing emotions and used all living beings as medicine with the Supreme Forgetfulness that his master spoke of.

Li Changgeng, the skeleton, held up the jade slip and handed it to Su Chang'an.

Su Chang'an did not answer.

"What's wrong?"

She glanced at the layers of gray mist in the jade slip.

"Are you planning to dump this mess on me and have me collect the corpses for your sect?"

The bony palm stopped in mid-air.

Li Changgeng, the skeleton, remained silent for a long time.

"The reason why the Supreme Forgetfulness Sect has come to this point is inseparable from me."

His voice was lost in the wind and snow; he offered no further explanation for himself.

"After my master left, I thought that by suppressing my feelings, I could suppress the pain of losing her."

"I dared not face the cold abyss, so I taught my disciples to sever their attachments to love. I refused to admit my fear, so I wrote escapism into the precepts."

"Later generations only saw the quasi-emperor lineage, but they did not know that at the beginning of the sect's founding, she never let anyone forget love."

The gray-white jade slip vibrated violently.

Cracks appeared in one of the precepts against severing emotions.

That is the rule that the Supreme Forgetfulness Sect has upheld as the principle of Heaven for three thousand years.

However, it has now been denied by the founder of the sect himself.

White Bone Li Changgeng retrieved the jade slip, raised a finger bone, and pierced it into his own soul fire.

laugh!

He pulled a wisp of dark Dao trace from the depths of the soul fire.

Within the traces of the Dao lies a possession that has lingered for three thousand years.

He pressed it into the jade slip.

Click!

The gray shell on the surface of the jade slip crumbled.

The second trace of the Dao was peeled away.

That was an escape from the cold abyss, where one remained outside but never dared to step into its depths.

The third thread is the severing of emotions.

The fourth thread is the obsession with deciding the fate of the ancient fox spirit in the name of saving people.

With each layer peeled away, the soul fire in Li Changgeng's eyes dimmed a little. The gray-white jade slip, however, gradually shed its grime, revealing the warm, lustrous base color buried for three thousand years.

Su Chang'an raised his hand.

The Nine-Tailed Ancestral Source transformed into a layer of crimson light, protecting the jade slip from shattering along with the erroneous Dao traces.

As for the backlash Li Changgeng suffered, she did not shield him from it.

"Clean up your own mistakes."

"I won't accept it if you skip one step."

Li Changgeng, the skeleton, did not respond.

Bone fingers pierced the soul fire time and time again.

The dark traces of the Dao were torn out strand by strand and burned out in the wind and snow. The quasi-emperor soul fire that was once enough to suppress the Nine Provinces was stripped away by his own hands, leaving only a faint glimmer.

The last layer of gray coating finally peeled off.

The jade slip changed from grayish-white to a warm, moonlit color.

Three lines of ancient characters emerged from the jade, illuminating the cold abyss.

"The one who truly loves is us."

"Deep affection dares not be expressed, yet fear cannot sever affection."

"To forget is not to love, but to cling."

Zheng—

The blood-stained iron sword before young Li Changgeng's knees emitted a soft ringing.

The three hundred and seventy-two Heavenly Dao chains also trembled, and crimson and moon-white array patterns lit up along the chains, as if responding to the Dao lineage that had been lost for three thousand years.

Gu Tianhu looked at the three lines of ancient characters.

This was the original intention she and the young Li Changgeng jointly decided when she founded the sect.

The highest level of transcendence is never about being heartless.

It is because my feelings are too deep that I dare not make a promise lightly.

"I dare not" does not mean "to cut off".

White Bone Li Changgeng handed out the jade slip again.

"What I returned was not that corrupt sect."

"It's the original aspiration that I lost."

This time, Su Chang'an reached out and took it.

As the Jade Slip of Oblivion touched her palm, she immediately sensed the Nine-Tailed Ancestral Source and the blood and bones that shared the same origin as the Ancient Celestial Fox.

It did not identify Su Chang'an as the Ancient Celestial Fox.

It simply hung quietly in her palm, bathed in the warm moonlight, neither vying nor fighting.

Su Chang'an glanced at the jade slip and put it into his sleeve.

Li Changgeng, the skeleton, raised his hands.

The primordial Daoist tradition of the Supreme Forgetfulness, which remained in the soul fire, was completely stripped away, transforming into a stream of moon-white light and returning to the jade slip.

The remaining Quasi-Emperor Laws did not fly towards Su Chang'an.

They condensed into dozens of pale light nails in mid-air, changed direction, and nailed towards the time gap that had not yet closed.

boom!

The first light nail fell, and the crack stopped expanding.

The second one fell, and the leaking turbulent currents of time were pushed back into the river of time.

Dozens of light nails pierced through the space-time barrier one after another, merging with the primordial purple energy left behind.

Li Changgeng, the White Bone Demon, no longer bestows his power upon anyone else.

He no longer uses the pretext of saving his master to arrange the rest of others' lives.

After doing all this, he looked at Su Chang'an.

"If you ever see Luo Qingxue again, please pass on a message for me."

"The highest form of detachment from emotions does not mean forgetting love."

"If she still wishes to wield the sword, let her establish new rules according to her own heart."

"If she is unwilling, she does not need to atone for the sect's sins."

Su Chang'an nodded.

"I will convey this message."

Li Changgeng, the White Bone Demon, turned to Gu Tianhu.

He straightened his long-gone clothes, knelt in the wind and snow, and gave his final bow to the woman in red at the center of the chains.

Gu Tianhu did not stop it.

Li Changgeng, the white-boned warrior, looked towards the center of the formation again.

As a teenager, I held an iron sword and gazed at him across three thousand years.

"Don't turn your master's love into a grave."

Young Li Changgeng remained silent.

He simply gripped the iron sword tightly and nodded solemnly.

Li Changgeng, the skeleton, turned around.

He stepped into the time rift.

The remaining bones, soul fire, and quasi-emperor laws burned simultaneously, and the pale flames pierced through the past and future, transforming into a spine that supported the crack.

His bones and body crumbled inch by inch.

The ribs turned to light.

The spine burned out.

That spark of soul fire, guarded for three thousand years, finally merged into the deepest part of the crack.

Pale bone light spread across both ends of spacetime, merging one by one with dozens of Primordial Purple Qi light nails. The power of chaotic years was completely suppressed back into the river of time, and the slender gap began to slowly close.

The tremors in the Cold Abyss have ceased.

The crimson and moon-white patterns on the 372 chains returned to normal.

Gu Tianhu did not give chase.

She simply spread her fox tail, hugged the young Li Changgeng tightly, and watched as the last wisp of pale soul fire disappeared into the rift.

"Go."

Su Chang'an put away the Jade Slip of Oblivion, stood in the wind and snow, and watched as the light from the white bones completely filled the cracks.

Li Changgeng did not take his master with him.

He also stopped letting his master take the blame for him.

He finally used his crippled body to repay the three thousand years of karma he had torn apart with his own hands.