Chapter 124: Shizun Awakens

The barrier around Red Lotus Pavilion glowed and shimmered, day and night, through the seasons. Those inside remained inside, and those outside were kept out.

Five years passed in a blink, the world turning like a carousel lantern[9], changing every day, changing every moon. In teahouses, in history books… those years became pieces of stories told,

lines written.

Looking back on the past——

The first year of Chu Wanning's seclusion, his disciple Mo Ran went down the mountain, while Xue Meng and Shi Mei stayed at Sisheng Peak, each cultivating on their own.

That year, Mo Ran's handwriting got a little better, Xue Meng broke through to the ninth level of Quiescence Blade, and Shi Mei went to study at the medicine sect Guyue'ye at the end of the year, learning much.

During that time, Mo Ran paid a visit to the salt merchant Chang family at Yizhou, asking to see Chang-gongzi for personal matters, only to find out that Chang-gongzi had suddenly passed away only a few days ago. After finding out in the Underworld that Chang-gongzi had been in cahoots with the fake Gouchen, Mo Ran had hoped to pry some information out of him, but his quarry was ahead of him and had already done away with the witness—even the body had been burnt into ashes.

A dead end.

The second year of Chu Wanning's seclusion, the cultivation world held the Spiritual Mountain Competition, in which Xue Meng won first place, Mei Hanxue second place, and Nangong Si third. Shi Mei tended to the sick and injured across the lower cultivation realm, while Mo Ran traveled the land, killing evil fiends and doing good deeds everywhere he went, before retreating into the mountains to cultivate, disappearing without a trace.

The third year of Chu Wanning's seclusion fell on a ghost year, teeming with Yin energy. The barrier where that bloody battle at Butterfly Town had taken place in the past weakened, ghosts and fiends encroaching into the living world,

terrorizing the people. The disciples of Sisheng Peak, led by Xue Meng, fought to suppress the menace. Although the situation was not as dire as it had been that time when evil ghosts had swarmed the skies, it was still a disastrous year of misery and destitution.

The upper cultivation realm, being large and populous, opted for selfprotection. Each of its nine major sects dispatched hundreds of disciples to guard the border between the upper and lower cultivation realms, and built an evil-repelling wall, preventing both fiends and refugees from moving toward the east.

All of the impoverished fugitives from the lower cultivation realms were refused entry at the wall and left with nowhere to go, the border defense keeping out ghosts and people alike. And so there was peace and calm within the walls, while corpses littered the ground just outside. Xue Zhengyong tried many times to negotiate with the upper cultivation realm, but to no avail. All of the blood spilt by the disciples of Sisheng Peak at Butterfly Town that year flowed eastward.

At the end of the year, Mo Ran, who had been cultivating in seclusion in the mountains, received a letter from his uncle. Learning that there was trouble in the Shu region, he went back into the world.

The fourth year of Chu Wanning's seclusion.

Mo Ran and Xue Meng fought side by side, the two young masters of Sisheng Peak leading the battle in the lower cultivation realm, driving the demonic fiends from the land. During the final battle, once again at Butterfly Town, Xue Ziming annihilated ghosts and demons by the hundreds and thousands, while Mo Weiyu repaired the Heavenly Rift, single-handedly sealing the evil.

Afterwards, the upper cultivation realm removed the border defense and allowed the people of the lower cultivation realm to enter.

Xue Meng and Mo Ran became famous the world over, the former being the Son of the Phoenix whose prestige was matched by none, the latter becoming known as "Mo-zongshi" for repairing the Heavenly Rift with barrier techniques that were just like Chu Wanning's.

And so time flowed, all things ever-changing.

Though Xue Meng had made a name for himself at the Spiritual Mountain Competition, he did not let it get to his head and neither did he grow complacent like he would have had in his youth. Instead, he diligently went to the bamboo forest to cultivate and train every chance he could, be it winter or summer, or even when sick.

He remembered Shizun's words, that even without a holy weapon, the darling of the heavens was still the darling of the heavens. It was just that his inborn advantages were no longer sufficient to place him ahead of the curve, and he now had to work harder to make up for a disadvantage instead.

Sometimes, after completing a set of blade techniques, when he landed lithely on the ground and turned his head, he almost seemed to catch a glimpse of a small figure, sitting on the rock in the sunlight streaming through the bamboo, whistling with a leaf.

And then he couldn't help thinking back to that day, when the Chu Wanning who had turned tiny had watched him practice his blade in the forest and guided his rhythm with a whistled tune.

Xue Meng could almost hear the melody as he reminisced with his head still turned.

So he closed his eyes, stilling his breath and concentrating, before opening them again just as a piece of withered bamboo leaf came drifting down. Longcheng thrummed as a flash of the blade reflected in his eyes, the shadow of the blade extending and retracting with intent, swift in the strike like the surging of tide and the flashing of lightning, deliberate in the withdrawal like the flurrying of snow in the endless sky.

By the time Longcheng was withdrawn and he stood straight once more, that piece of withered leaf had already been sliced into a million little pieces, drifting down to land silently by his feet.

With his head lowered, he almost seemed to still be that foolhardy young boy.

But when he looked up, those straight brows and clear, steady eyes were like the meeting of river and sea, the rapid stream surging into the vast openness, melding into unbound tranquility.

It had been five years.

Xue Meng raised his blade and wiped the frosty edge off with a piece of white cloth. He was just about to return the blade to its scabbard when he was interrupted by hurried footsteps from the distance, followed by a disciple rushing in, hollering non-stop, "Young Master! Young Master!"

"What is it?" Xue Meng frowned. "Where's your composure? Pull yourself together. What happened?"

"The Red Lotus Pavilion——" The disciple was all red in the face and could hardly even catch his breath from how fast he'd run. "Ma, Master Huaizui left! Yu, Yuheng Elder——wo, woke up!!!!"  

With a clang, Longcheng, the veteran of a hundred battles, fell to the ground from its owner's hand.

Xue Meng's handsome, fair-skinned face blanched of all color then turned bright red in quick succession, his mouth opening and closing mutely before he dashed off toward the southern summit of Sisheng Peak at a breakneck speed, leaving even his own weapon behind, forgotten on the ground. He nearly tripped over a rock on the way, stumbling and staggering.

"SHIZUN!!! SHIZUN!!!!!!"

Despite having just lectured someone else about composure, Xue Ziming sure wasted no time in flinging his own to the ground.

He got to the Red Lotus Pavilion just as Xue Zhengyong strode out. Grinning broadly, Xue Zhengyong stopped his son from charging in like his life depended on it, before he even got to set a foot inside.

Xue Meng was beside himself. "Dad!"

"Alrighty alrighty, I know you want to see Yuheng," Xue Zhengyong said with a smile. "But he's tired from having just recovered, and only talked with me a little before going back to sleep. Surely you wouldn't wanna interrupt your shizun's rest?"  

Xue Meng faltered. "I mean, yeah, but…" But it had really been so hard waiting out the five years, and there was so much he wanted to tell Shizun; he wanted so badly to run over right now to tell Shizun about how he had won first place at the Spiritual Mountain Competition, about all the ghosts and demons he had put down, about his...

"Be sensible now."

"..." The phrase "be sensible" was Xue Meng's weak point, always effective in making him listen. He let out a long sigh and stopped trying to shuffle past,

though he stuck his neck out like that would let him peek past his bulky father and the slightly-ajar door to see the person on the bed.

Xue Meng pressed his lips together, still not quite giving up. "Can I just, just go in and take a quick look at Shizun, I won't say anything."  

"With the way that you are, making a ruckus and a half whenever you're happy?" Xue Zhengyong shot him a glare. "Don't think I forgot how you won at the Spiritual Mountain Competition and acted all cool in front of outsiders, but hollered about it for four, five days straight as soon as you got back home, wouldn't stop telling anyone and everyone about how you kicked Nangong Si off his wolf, told it so much that even Auntie Li at Mengpo Hall can recite your story,

word for word. You? Not say a thing? Hah!"

"...Fine."

Xue Meng drooped.

"Father is right."

"Well of course, when has your dad ever been wrong before."

Xue Meng made a sour face, but he still couldn't help but want to know. "Dad, how's Shizun doing?"

"Pretty good, Master Huaizui even got rid of the remaining poison from the Heartpluck Willow."

"Ah, so Shizun won't turn into little shidi anymore?" "Haha, nope." Xue Meng scratched his head, a little disappointed that he wouldn't get to see Xia Sini anymore.

"Then, then what about everything else? Is he feeling okay?" "Don't worry, he's fine. The only thing not fine was the look on his face when he found out that he'd been asleep for five years." Xue Zhengyong couldn't help chuckling as he recalled Chu Wanning's expression. "Good thing he's still tired,

else he'd be grilling me right now. Oh yeah, speaking of——" Suddenly thinking of something, he said to Xue Meng, "Meng-er, do me a favor. Your shizun missed quite a bit, being gone from the world for so long; it'll be too much talking for us to try to catch him up on things ourselves, and tiring for him to listen to it all too. How about this, go ask your mom for some money then go take a trip down the mountain to buy some books from Wuchang Town.

Don't they have those chronicle-type books, the ones where they write down everything big and small? Get him a couple to read." Xue Meng could practically smell the ulterior motive—his old fox of a dad just thought he was being noisy, and was trying to kick him off the mountain to run errands.

But then again, the errands were for Shizun, so it was… not unacceptable.

Shizun was asleep right now anyway, and it was true that he wasn't too sure if he'd be able to keep his emotions under control if he were to go in the room right now, so there was a chance he'd end up running over and waking him up.

So he sighed and mumbled reluctantly, "Fine, I'll go get the stinkin' books."   "Get a couple different ones, for both the upper and lower cultivation realms,

Yuheng likes to read anyway." "Okay, alright." And so Xue Meng lumbered dejectedly down the mountain by himself.

Xue Meng wasn't much of a reader; he made it to the book-selling stand at Wuchang Town and looked this way and that, but couldn't really tell much of anything from just the titles, so he squatted down to ask the vendor, "Uncle[10],

do you have any books about the recent happenings of the cultivation world in the last few years? Can you get me a couple?" The vendor, who was quite excited to see someone from Sisheng Peak,

even if he didn't recognize that it was the Son of the Phoenix Xue Ziming himself, said with great enthusiasm, "Books about recent happenings? Of course of course. I've got both historical chronicles and fictional adaptations, all kinds of biographies and annals, regional chronicles, demon suppression records, even manuscripts from ten of the most famous storytellers out there. Which would xianjun like?" All the babbling gave Xue Meng a headache, so he waved his hand and said, "Just, just gimme all of it, money's no issue." A businessman's favorite phrases to hear are not "I love you", "I care about you", or "I want you", but "buy", "money's no issue", and "one of each".

The vendor immediately grinned from ear to ear, rubbing his hands together as he answered to Xue Meng's order and turned to gather the books from the rack. Having nothing better to do, Xue Meng went to flip casually through the books on the stand, and happened across a thin little booklet that seemed rather interesting—the page he'd flipped open read:

Cultivation World Wealth Ranking First Place: Jiang Xi.                 Position: Rainbell Isle Guyue'ye Sect Leader Second Place: Nangong Liu.         Position: Linyi Rufeng Sect Leader Third Place: Ma Yun                Position: Westlake Taobao[11] Estate Master ...

So on and so forth, the entire page covered in tiny writing.

Xue Meng got fired up immediately, eager to find out his own rank, so he looked up and down the page four, five times, until his eyes started to cross, but he still couldn't find the name "Xue Meng".

Crestfallen at first and then a little mad, but all in all unresigned, he flipped the page to keep looking, but saw only a couple more names and the following line:

"Due to time and resource constraints, rankings only go to one hundred, and those after one hundred will not be listed."   Xue Meng slammed the booklet to the ground in a fit of rage. "Am I that fucking broke????"   The vendor jumped, startled, and then, seeing the book he had been reading, hurriedly comforted him while picking it up, saying, "Ease your anger,

xianjun, these ranking booklets are just willy-nilly made up by folks, and on top of that, each region has its own version circulating. For example, if you buy one from Linyi, number one on the gentleman ranking is definitely gonna be Nangong-zhangmen. It's just something people flip through to pass the time,

don't be mad, don't be mad."   His words seemed reasonable enough, and Xue Meng was pretty curious about the remainder of the booklet's contents, so he hmph'd, took it back from the vendor's hands, and offhandedly flipped two more pages.

This time, he saw an even more peculiar ranking.

"Young Master Ego Ranking"    

Author's Notes:

Ma Yun, who's on the Wealth Ranking, as well as Taobao Estate are Easter eggs, hahaha~ Since Shizun is awake, we'll resume the daily mini-theatres as well~ The reopened mini-theatre~ A hawker's favourite phrase to hear is "Buy buy buy", so what's the phrase each character wishes to hear the most~ Chu Wan Ning wishes to hear: Elder Yuheng is a good shizun.

Mo Ran 2.0 wishes to hear: You are different from your past life.

Mo Ran 1.0 wishes to hear: Everyone likes you.

Mo Ran 0.5 wishes to hear: Stop dreaming and wake up, dog, your saliva's dripping onto the desk!

Xue Meng wishes to hear: Young Master is No.1, Young Master is the most handsome, Shizun finds Young Master the most lovable!

Shi Mei wishes to hear: Shi Mei is so gentle and cute, how can he be the BOSS?

Ye Wangxi wishes to hear: Nangong-gongzi will not be short-lived.

Nangong Si wishes to hear: Your dad has stepped down and let you take his place, gongzi, you can make your own decisions on matters.

Song Qiutong wishes to hear: This is a heterosexual romance novel.

Mei Hanxue wishes to hear: Mei Hanxue, get ready to make your appearance.

[9] 走马灯 carousel lantern, popular at Lantern Festival

[10] Again, not literally his uncle. It's common in Chinese to politely refer to older people as uncle/aunt

[11] 桃宝 Taobao here uses different characters from the taobao website [淘宝], but sure does sound the same...