Chương 97: A Mortal Path
Yaan walked along the roads through the forest in the opposite direction of Heavenly Path Mountain, through the less dangerous region of the forest. He didn't become impatient. He even ignored his hunger, tiredness and thirst, as if these sensations did not matter to him.
Whenever there was a fork in the road, a turn or a bend, he just chose at random. Well, sometimes he chose, occasionally he asked others to choose for him, and other times, he simply flipped a silver coin.
When Yaan first ran into a group of mortals, they had immediately assisted him, nursing this child who was emaciated and barely living, until he thankfully returned back to full health. They treated the wound on his hand, they fed him and provided him with water, and they even allowed him to rest within a carriage until he recovered properly.
Yaan had clasped his hands, smiling and thanking the kind people, yet they felt as if this sort of 'normal' response was actually very peculiar for a child in such a terrible situation.
The people came and went. Sometimes he travelled with others, other times he ignored them and walked by. Sometimes he hung around for weeks, other times he departed after a short few hours. Whether or not he bade farewell to his temporary travel companions was also random, with no real rationale behind his choice.
Time flew by…
How long had it been since he set out alone? Where exactly was he going at this point? Yaan neither knew nor care. He didn't really look after himself beyond keeping his body alive with mortal food and water, and he absolutely didn't cultivate.
Actually, he found some enjoyment in joining random mortal caravans. He travelled with merchants, travellers, and one time, even bandits!
He helped out with the various tasks and chores in exchange for food, water and shelter. He didn't seem to move with any particular motivation or end goal, he only went along with the flow - until he didn't, abruptly and suddenly leaving everything behind him.
Yaan never thought about these decisions, he never dwelled on what he was doing here…he just lived out this life of a mortal traveller.
The only real abnormality in Yaan's behaviour, was that when the thought of leaving everything behind entered his mind, he did so. Sometimes he would leave after a few days, or sometimes, he walked off immediately without saying a word to anyone.
"Hey kid, what exactly are you doing out in these parts anyway?" A chatty merchant jumped out from his crate, landing roughly beside Yaan before straightening up and smiling at him curiously.
This child had been the talk of their caravan for the past five days, ever since he joined their group.
As soon as he joined them, they realised that he was a bit strange. When they first encountered this boy and offered their accompaniment, he merely politely clasped his hands, then joined the group without a word.
Whenever he saw others struggling with their work, he would casually assist them until they recovered their bearings. Towards their words of thanks, he merely nodded.
Yaan wasn't usually so silent when travelling with others, but one month ago, he had encountered something that shook awake his peaceful dream.
Yaan remained silent as he thought back on that day, making the merchant wait for his answer.
One month earlier, he was travelling with a different group of people when a stray demonic beast swept down from the sky, slaughtering the six guards and the four young ladies in the front carriage. The remaining guards raised their spears with trembling gazes, watching the beast in terror as they found that they were unable to even move.
Its aura, its size, its pure majesty…its presence overpowered them. As the people dropped to their knees and trembled in fear, Yaan looked around the group with a startled gaze, before turning towards the beast.
When he made eye contact with the eagle, he understood that the beast had paused its rampage, because Yaan gave it a very uneasy feeling. Yaan was clearly a mortal, yet he emitted a sense of calmness which could only be interpreted as strength.
Yaan remembered his actions from that time one month ago, yet he still felt dazed by the choice he had made.
Perhaps it was due to his way of living for this past year, but he simply ignored the beast. With a calm expression, Yaan walked past the beast, leaving the mortals to die without looking back.
Ever since leaving Lightstone Village, he had lived by forgetting about his purpose or any sort of mission, and instead…simply living.
He lived a mortal life, but his life could not be considered ordinary. He lived contrary to the direction that this world tried to direct him. This was the reason that Yaan often abruptly left without a word.
He simply ignored everything, and due to his actions, even his mind and heart gradually became indifferent to it all.
When confronted with the demonic eagle, he hesitated for a brief moment, feeling uncertain about whether he should help those people, or if he should leave them to die…but that was merely a single instant, an instant that acted as a sort of confirmation regarding his choice.
Yaan experienced an epiphany.
During his time spent travelling as a mortal child, he moved forwards according to his whims. He made strange decisions that seemed random on the surface, but were truthfully a method that he had devised to evade his so called 'fate'.
Yaan was not really their companion, nor was he a mortal. He was not responsible for the lives of others, because in this cruel world, every living being was responsible for its own survival.
Battling the demonic eagle had felt like the natural choice, but it was for that exact reason that Yaan decided to walk past it. An illusory truth appeared in his gaze as he realised that engaging the demonic beast in battle, would cause him to return to his preordained path…
When Yaan stepped away from his former self, choosing not to return to Heavenly Path Mountain, he forgot his memories of his life as a cultivator. Every now and then, certain memories would return, but he refused to hang onto them. He rejected this memories and lived an entirely new life, a life away from the cultivation world.
Yaan recalled all of this as the curious merchant waited for an answer hopefully. The man didn't mind that he was taking some time to respond, because Yaan had always acted this way ever since their group picked him up.
"I'm just walking the path towards that which I want, and away from that which I don't…" Yaan finally answered. His words would leave many followers of the dao in deep contemplation, but the merchant scratched his head in confusion.
"Haha, you really are a strange one, aren't you?" The merchant chuckled.
Yaan looked at the merchant and smiled for a moment, but the smile suddenly vanished from his face as an intense premonition of danger suddenly assaulted his senses.
Nobody else could feel it, because this danger was unrelated to them. In the same way that Yaan had been ignored by the demonic beast by simply stepping away from that unrelated encounter, nobody here would be dragged into whatever was about to befall him.
"GAHHH! GAHHHH!" Suddenly, a crazed teenage boy rushed out from the bushes.
This boy was not a human, but a fiend that had lost its mind due to insanity, completely and utterly.
His eyes were bloodshot and rolled back, whilst his body was covered in blood which belonged both to himself and to others. As his eyes darted about, he suddenly ignored everything else and rushed towards Yaan with a crazed look of malice and hatred.
"Jash…?" Yaan's eyes widened. As his memories flooded back to him for a brief moment, he stared at the boy from Lightstone Village with a look of shock and disbelief.
However, even as the completely blood-crazed Jash rushed towards him, Yaan did not react. Those around him stared in horror. Even the guards were so shocked by this eery 'person' that they did not know what to do!
As the blood soaked Jash ran towards Yaan, a stream of memories seemed to enter Yaan's mind. He became aware of various events, like how he had once killed Jash by mistake, and how he lost his mind back in Zong Village due to the Slaughter Aura that he was forced to refine thanks to the Fiend Transformation Technique.
"Jash…" Yaan muttered again, his gaze narrowing as his calmness returned. He spoke slowly and unhurriedly, even as Jash was almost upon him.
"You are not able to pull me towards that fate…I will not allow you to alter my path!"
As Yaan spoke these words with a cold voice, a bright light shot over from the sky in the distance. Suddenly and without warning, Jash's body was incinerated! He exploded into a bloody mist and ash rained down all around.
Yaan knew this attack came from a cultivator, but as for their identity, he had no clue. However, as this thought appeared in his mind, he stuck to his resolve and remained still. He even looked away from the second incoming attack, because he had noticed something else!
A stone object was thrust out from the fiery explosion of light caused by the detonation of Jash's body - clearly, it was something that Jash had been carrying on his person. Yaan was startled to notice that the trajectory of this item seemed to be on a collision course with his head!
Until now, nothing had been able to affect him, so long as he chose to turn the other way. However, if he remained still, he had no doubt that this object would hit him…
This was a change!
His eyes lit up and he quickly grabbed the stone ring, before placing it onto his finger. However despite this change, he still did not fear the unknown cultivator's second attack.
Yaan turned around and casually continued walking along the road. Only a few people stared at him in confusion, but most were focussed on that incoming white light!
The unknown cultivator never made an appearance. After Jash was destroyed, his remains were dragged into a net of white light, before the net shot away into the distance. It was a long time before the stunned mortals were able to get over their disbelief and fear, and by this time, Yaan was long gone.
He was alone again, yet also not. A smile crept onto Yaan's lips, not just because he had encountered a change, but because this change showed him the 'true path' that he had been seeking blindly until now.
Back when he arrived in Lightstone Village, Yaan realised almost immediately that this world was not real, and that in reality, he was stranded, trapped within an illusion. He couldn't remember all the specifics, but he knew that logically, he should give his utmost to break out in order to regain his freedom!
However, he realised that the thought of regaining this freedom only filled him with a sense of loss and regret. As he nostalgically recalled simple things like the village trees, the wooden fence and then finally his family, Yaan rejected his reality, and chose to live truthfully within the illusion. This desire drove so deep that for some time, he even forgot entirely that this was an illusion, believing in the history that was repeating itself.
But indeed, this was a repetition…whenever Yaan recognised something signifiant, his true memories and life threatened to storm back into him, to take over…and to end this illusion.
Yaan battled down these thoughts and feelings each and every time. In his heart, even without his memory, he knew that something was amiss…he just deliberately overlooked this, so that he could enjoy the feeling of having a family once again.
Even if there was a continual pain, an emptiness lingering within him as he spent time with his parents and newborn sister, Yaan had been willing to overlook this pain.
But then, they were killed before his very eyes once again. It was a repeat of the past, a mistake that Yaan could not fix, even after everything he had been through, despite the growth of his cultivation.
At that point, he grew cold, detached. With a final glance at Elia that stung her heart for an unknown reason, he had left…and yet, he also had not, but Yaan was not yet aware of this fact.
In his obsession to take control over his own fate, in his fury at his own inability to make a single change to the tragedy of his past, even in a false reality, Yaan became completely single minded. He now cared only for one objective, as arbitrary as it may be.
To change the fate of this world…to change his own fate…
He realised that by playing along with the natural order of his past in Lightstone Village, he had unknowingly assured that nothing could be changed, nothing significant at least. And so, he decided to walk the opposite way. He walked away from the Heavenly Path Sect. He refused to get involved with cultivators in any way.
Even when he was stared down by a ravenous demonic beat, Yaan refused to step back onto the path of bloodshed and battle.
But now, everything had changed, all because of one little ring. The obsession that had taken grip over him for the past year or so partially dissipated, but this left him unsure about what was real and what was a fabrication. He didn't try to break out from the illusion, but he also no longer embraced a life within this illusion as his true path.
For the first time, Yaan did not reject the past memories that returned to him, and for the first time, he did not feel that clinging onto these memories would cause the illusion to end.
And all of this, from a ring…no, that wasn't quite right. Yaan smiled. All of this was not because of a ring, but thanks to a woman.
Rui…
"Rui, I know you're in there. Since Jash died so miserably, I doubt that you used up your powers to assist him, so I know you can hear me right now." Yaan spoke at his hand with a smile. He waited patiently for a minute, but nothing happened.
"Rui Bloodstar, I know that you taught Jash the Fiend Transformation Technique and manipulated him into following the demonic path…I know you, Rui, though I suppose that you might not yet know me…"
Another minute passed by, but there was still no response. Yaan was unfazed, as he had one more line that he was certain would rouse her attention.
"Rui…have you noticed that this world is an illusion?"
Whoosh!
Nine blood-red symbols lit up on the ring. As the symbols reached a chill-inducing intensity, a woman appeared. She wore a blood coloured robe which matched her crimson eyes, and her black hair draped down her back without being held in place by any needless accessories.
This woman was so gorgeous that even now, she left Yaan feeling breathless. However, that cold, emotionless gaze of hers scared off any potential suitors…or really, any living creatures in general.
Yaan studied her expression, but he couldn't read a trace of her thoughts or feelings. She could be shocked to the point of near death, or enraged enough to initiate a war, but her gaze would forever hold that cold, detached look.
"It's been a while, Rui…"
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