"Papa!"
"Xu Lan!"
Everyone was shouting Xu Lan's name.
"Pft…"
Xu Lan spat another mouthful of blood, dyeing his shirt, the chime-bells, and the wooden mallet red. Even then, he continued ringing the chime-bells according to the arrangement in the codex. All souls, with the exception of the ones whose body had fallen into the subsurface stream earlier, returned into their respective bodies. They walked onto the platform and looked at Xu Lan worriedly.
Bai Wu floated toward Xu Lan and screamed for him to stop. Even when Bai Wu's voice was hoarse from all the screaming, Xu Lan remained unmoved. Xu Lan's handsome face gradually lost its form and he looked weaker and thinner. He seemed to be shouldering an unbearable weight; his straight back arched under the weight, the scar on his brow lost its vigor and rested weakly like a caterpillar in fall.