Chapter 32: Jia Ling

Four years later, 

"Please, forgive me, please." Chen Ki shouted, he was slumped on the ground. His hands were behind his back on the ground, holding him. He was fully covered in injuries, and his clothes were tattered. He was begging for mercy right now.

"Why should I?" Yang Zhai asked—holding a sword in his hands—looking at Chen Ki indifferently. He had already reached Rank5.

"You spared me before and if you spare me this time, I promise I will leave your life forever. I can even give you everything I have." Chen Ki kept on begging, his face covered with fear.

"I regret sparing you before. I regret the kindness I showed you. And if I spare you once more, I might lose someone again. Please forgive me." There was no regret on his face for seeing Chen Ki like this at all. Even his 'please forgive me' was filled with indifference. He took out a Ka.

"The Will Of Malice Ka…"

When Chen Ki saw the Ka, his expression changed dramatically. His eyes started to bleed. His hands and body trembled violently. Tears started to fall from his eyes. It could be seen just how scared he was right now. He was just like a child and started to cry and shout.

"Please, please, please kill me. Please, just don't use this Ka. I can give you everything. You can even kill me after taking everything."

"Please, please." His voice was sometimes so loud that it echoed through the forest, sometimes it was so low that only Yang Zhai could hear it. He was so scared that he even forgot that he could kill himself. 

Yang Zhai released the Ka. This Ka could torture a person until its master wanted it to. It just needed to drink a little blood every seven to eight days. Its torture was not only limited to a person's physical body, but also the soul. Because it would pollute a person's aperture first—rendering it useless—that person wouldn't even be able to do anything after the Ka entered the person's body. The weaker the Rank of the cultivator, the stronger the Ka's control over a person was. This was a living hell. This was also the reason why Chen Ki wanted Yang Zhai to kill him.

After the Ka entered Chen Ki's body, his torture began. His screams —that could make one's soul tremble— echoed in the forest. Yang Zhai wanted the torture to go on for a year. After Chen Ki's blood was lowered in quantity, Yang Zhai would heal him and raise his blood quantity again.

…..

Three years passed in the blink of an eye.

Yang Zhai came out of the cave, his eyes had turned more distant. There was a sense of indifference in his eyes now. His hair extended to his feet, fully black. There was an air of nothingness around him now. It seemed as if there was nothing left in him. His eyes were fully black. His expression itself displayed sadness, it was as if for the past years, he had been in extreme sadness. His tears were already lost, not because he was not worried about anything, but because he had already emptied them. For the past seven years, he hadn't been able to forget about Cho Byeol and what he did to her. 

He had already decided that he needed to leave now. He went to Cho Byeol's grave before he left. There he saw the grave he had dug himself. It was covered with green and lush grass, and flowers were growing on it. 

Yang Zhai left the forest and began his journey.

…..

Thirty years passed, and he was already one hundred and fifty-two years old. He had already recovered his left arm.

His eyes were becoming more and more distant. Because he had changed his point of view, he began to change, his personality began to develop into something completely unknown. His mind would go chaotic sometimes. He couldn't even think straight many times. Like just a few days ago, he killed a whole den of Rank 3 beasts, just because one of the beasts had hurt him a little. He killed all of them, not because he was angry, but because he was making sure that they wouldn't do something like this to someone else again. But he regretted it later. Just today, he had been sneak attacked by a Rank 3 beast, but he didn't do anything to its companions, even though it was killed by Yang Zhai without any pain.

….. 

Another two years passed,

Yang Zhai was resting on a tree when he heard a voice, 

"Save me, someone save me." 

This voice belonged to a child, at least thirteen or fourteen years. 

Yang Zhai looked over and saw a girl with green hair and tattered clothes. She was running with all her might. Behind her were two men and a woman that were chasing her.

"Why are you wasting your time running? Come back with us. Just accept your fate already." One of the two men spoke.

"Yes, Jia Ling. This is for your own good. Just listen to us and come back." The woman spoke.

"Hey little girl, why would you do this? You are enjoying your life and you still run. Just come back with us." The other man spoke, who was around thirty years old.

The little girl didn't utter a word about anything and kept on running. Her face was covered in dust, and she was panting. It seemed like she was being chased for a while now. 

The people behind the girl were all adults. It seemed like, this situation was not a joke or a small issue of a family.

The three people were still shouting when they saw the girl disappear in front of their eyes. They came to a sudden stop.

"What, what just happened?" The woman fell to the ground and shouted.

"I, I think, it was a cultivator." The man around thirty years old spoke with an anxious expression

"We should return instead of waiting here to death," the other man spoke and ran without waiting for a reply.

Yang Zhai was standing behind the trees, looking at the girl, who was standing in front of him. It was Yang Zhai, who took the girl and disappeared. Because the people chasing after the girl were mortals, they couldn't see Yang Zhai.

"You, you are a cultivator. Thanks for saving me, thanks so much, thank you." The girl was excited about being saved and started to cry midway through her sentence.

"Why were they chasing you?" Yang Zhai didn't care about pleasantries or other things and directly got to the point. Even though he had started to kill, and his personality was changing, he would not kill people on a whim, or start a massacre for nothing. He knew that it would not benefit him. So, he let the mortals go.

"They, they want to take me back to the village." The girl replied with a grievance in her voice.

"Isn't it good? And also, is your name Jia Ling?" Yang Zhai asked.

"How did you know my name?" The girl was surprised and asked. 

"The woman before said it. I heard it when she called you by your name. So, tell me, why were they chasing you?"

"It's like this, my parents sent me to another village to earn essence stones. There, the young master of the house— I worked in— always tried to get free with me, but I always avoided him. One such night, after I was returning from a festival, he took advantage of me in the forest. I left the village after that and went to my own village." She stopped before continuing. She was crying whilst revealing her story.

"But, after seeing the poor condition, my family was living in, I went to another village to work. I encountered that man again. He again tried to be with me. But I avoided him. He went to my village after I refused his proposal. There, my father and my aunt sold me to that scoundrel, without letting my mom know. I was forced to marry that man forcefully, or you could say that I was given something by them, that made me faint, after which I was married without even knowing."

"Not just that, but he even wanted me to… meet his friends; therefore I ran away. The people chasing me were my father, my aunt, and one of that man's friends. And the whole village of that young master is like him as well. They do this to every woman or girl that comes to their village. And they don't give work to any boy." Jia Ling kept on crying, like a child. After all, she was a child.

"So, you were betrayed by your aunt and even your father." Yang Zhai said this and remembered his previous life, where he was betrayed by his friends as well.

"And also, the whole village is involved in this, huh? Then, can you take me to the village of that young master?" Yang Zhai asked, his eyes turning cold. A beast had been awakened again.

"Why? Why do you want to go to that village?" Jia Ling was surprised by Yang Zhai's sudden demand. She could see that the man had changed from earlier just now. 

"Don't you want revenge? I can help you. Just take me there." Yang Zhai looked at the girl and asked.

"Really!! Thank you!! I do want to take revenge. Let me take you there. But what are you going to do? How will you take my revenge?" Jia Ling was extremely happy after hearing Yang Zhai. But she didn't know how Yang Zhai was going to take revenge.

"You just need to see. Don't ask and wait." Yang Zhai said this line and followed the girl.

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