Chapter 562: Departure

Chapter 564: Departure

“One Derivation, One Deception?”

Real Person Situ thought he must have seen wrong. He blinked and looked again—Mo Hua’s expression was completely normal, still that obedient, adorable look with a hint of confusion, no trace of anything unusual.

“What… what in the world is going on?”

Real Person Situ murmured, baffled.

On the other side, Bai Qingcheng also found it unbelievable.

The Dao-Heart Seed Demon dissipated…

Did her senior brother spare Mo Hua?

Impossible…

She asked, “Mo Hua… you’re all right now?”

Mo Hua nodded. “Shishu, I’m fine.”

Everyone exchanged looks. Then one Nascent Soul Real Person cautiously asked, “Little brother, did you happen to see a Daoist with a strange aura?”

“I did,” Mo Hua answered truthfully.

A chill ran through everyone’s hearts. Another person asked, “Where is that Daoist?”

“He left,” Mo Hua said.

“He… left?”

“Mhm.” Mo Hua nodded. “Master taught me a Meditation Technique. If evil thoughts seep into the body, staying calm and meditating allows one to restrain oneself and suppress the evil thoughts…”

“I meditated for a while, and Mas—”

Mo Hua almost blurted out “Shibo,” but held it back and changed his words, “—and that Daoist… saw my Dao-heart was firm and flawless, so he left…”

The Nascent Soul cultivators listened as if hearing scripture from another world.

Dao-Heart Seed Demon… works like that?

Yet the boy before them had clear eyes, steady thoughts, obviously no longer under any demonic influence.

“The Meditation Technique…”

Curiosity flickered in the Nascent Soul experts’ hearts. Could this also be Mister Zhuang’s method?

They wanted to ask, but such things weren’t appropriate.

Only Real Person Situ frowned.

And Bai Qingcheng was even more stunned.

Others might not know, but she came from the same lineage as Mister Zhuang—how could she not know what the Meditation Technique is for?

It calms the heart, clears stray thoughts.

It can also restore one’s Divine-Sense.

But saying it can guard the heart against the Dao-Heart Seed Demon… that was blatant nonsense.

She looked at Mo Hua.

His small face was serious, his “honest” eyes even held some innocence—he truly didn’t look like he was lying.

This made her doubt herself a bit.

Could it be she didn’t learn it properly?

Or learned it wrong?

Does Meditation actually have deeper mysteries?

She couldn’t figure it out.

But no matter what, Mo Hua was safe. That alone was a relief.

Everyone let out a breath.

If not absolutely necessary, they really didn’t want to kill a child barely over ten.

Especially one with such a peculiar background.

Still, they worried the demonic seed hadn’t truly dispersed. What if it lurked, waiting to devour his mind later? So they locked him in a room and observed him for a while.

A few days later, everything remained normal. No demonic aura.

Only then did they release him.

Only Real Person Situ would sometimes glance at Mo Hua, thoughtful, a bit worried.

He couldn’t forget that fleeting moment—Mo Hua’s eyes.

Half clear… half eerie.

And somehow perfectly fused together.

Far too strange.

The clarity was fine…

But that eerie aura… the more he thought about it, the more it resembled the Strange Daoist…

He feared Mo Hua might one day suddenly lose control, his pupils turning pitch-black, becoming a miniature “Strange Daoist.”

Thankfully, nothing odd happened afterward.

Only then did Real Person Situ relax.

Thus, the incident with the Strange Daoist was considered resolved.

The Heaven-Obscuring Formation was undone, and Mo Hua’s Heavenly Evolution Art bottleneck was broken—he could consider formally entering Foundation Establishment.

But before that, he needed preparation.

Nourish his meridians and qi sea, buy some pills, ready spirit stones—and most importantly, completely refine the remaining strange will within him, leaving no flaw in his mind or heart.

Meanwhile, the other cultivators would be leaving.

The Nascent Soul experts, Dao Court families and sects, and Bai Qingcheng.

For Mo Hua, Foundation Establishment was a major event.

For them—especially the Nascent Soul Realmen—it was utterly insignificant.

Their schedule wouldn’t change.

No one cared whether a small Qi-Refining cultivator like Mo Hua would or wouldn’t form his foundation.

In the days that followed, the Nascent Soul Realmen left one after another.

Three days later, Mister Zhuang would be taken to the Bai Clan.

Mo Hua put aside his Foundation Establishment plans.

He feared that he might never see his master again, so he stayed by his side daily.

The master who had once been as warm as spring rain now lay cold and still.

Mo Hua felt bitter sorrow.

He wished his master would open his eyes just once more, speak to him again—but it was nothing more than a fantasy.

Sometimes when Mo Hua grew tired, he would fall asleep beside him.

The dim perpetual lamp cast warm light over him, as if embracing him in comfort—but Mo Hua knew nothing.

One day, while half-asleep, he faintly heard voices.

Real Person Situ and Shishu Bai.

Perhaps thinking Mo Hua was asleep, they didn’t avoid speaking near him.

“…Can he be saved?”

“Difficult…”

The old voice instantly told Mo Hua it was Real Person Situ.

“Besides the severed Heavenly Mechanism, even the flesh body… sigh. His qi sea is shattered, Sea of Consciousness withered, Dao Bone removed, heart’s blood burned away by sword qi… no way to restore it…”

“Even if someday, there’s some heaven-defying treasure to repair this body—that’s only the first step…”

“Divine-Sense is the real trouble…”

“This involves Heavenly Secrets… and karma…”

Bai Qingcheng’s face turned pale. “There’s truly not even a sliver of hope…?”

Real Person Situ shook his head. “This sort of thing is like becoming an immortal.”

“Is becoming an immortal possible? Sure. But in this vast land, among countless beings, for tens of thousands of years—not a single person has succeeded.”

“There’s a chance, but it’s so microscopic it’s practically nonexistent.”

Bai Qingcheng sighed.

Real Person Situ hesitated, then said, “What I’m about to say… Bai Zhenren, you might not like it.”

She paused. “Senior, go ahead.”

Real Person Situ spoke carefully, “Right now, Mister Zhuang has just ‘died’…”

He stopped, feeling the wording was off.

Saying ‘died’ wasn’t accurate—there was still the faintest shred of life. But calling him ‘not dead’ was practically a lie.

“Mister Zhuang’s life hangs by a thread…”

He rephrased, then continued, “You’ve lost your senior brother, so you are grieving. But grief… is temporary.”

“You want to save him, but that resolve… is also temporary. With time, your heart will fade.”

He sighed like someone who’d lived long enough to see everything.

“Cultivators have long lifespans. The years grind away all regrets and pain. Live long enough, and nothing feels unbearable anymore…”

“So,” he sighed, “focus on your cultivation. Care for your own path. Don’t force things beyond your control.”

Bai Qingcheng fell silent.

She knew he wasn’t wrong.

She too had felt regret and pain before—felt life was meaningless. But after enough years, enough hurdles…

With time, sorrow fades, like a healed scar—ugly, but painless.

Just like her senior brother…

It hurt now, but someday, she might grow numb, might forget.

She pressed her lips together. “But what if I insist on saving him?”

Real Person Situ frowned. “Then the road ahead will be hard…”

“Mister Zhuang has immense karmic entanglements, enemies everywhere, interests all tangled together…”

“How many people want him dead? Whether Dao Court or Demonic Sect—none wish to save him.”

“If you insist on saving him, obstacles will meet you at every turn.”

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She hurt now, but with time… maybe she’d go numb, maybe she’d forget.

Biting down lightly on her lip, Bai Qingcheng asked, “And if I insist on saving him?”

Real Person Situ frowned. “Then you’ll be in for a hard time…”

“Master Zhuang’s karmic ties are massive—too many enemies, too many tangled interests…”

“In this world, how many people want Zhuang-sir dead? Whether the Dao Court or the Demonic Sect, I doubt anyone wishes to save him.”

“If you insist on saving him, you’ll face obstacles at every step.”

“Raising the ‘dead’ back to life… that’s extremely difficult. Besides enormous amounts of spirit stones and spiritual materials, it requires perseverance—unyielding persistence. Pain, torment, and a cycle of hope and despair… very few can endure that.”

“You need an incredibly tenacious Dao-heart to hold your resolve…”

“And even then… it’s not enough.”

“You can revive the flesh, but if his Heavenly Fate is utterly extinguished, he still cannot survive…”

“You’ll need a heavenly-fate formation that contains the Great Dao of Life and Death—only then is there a chance of mending the shattered fate and buying Master Zhuang even a thread of life…”

“Stealing Yin and Yang, seizing Creation itself, reversing Life and Death…”

“Such formations are unfathomably deep, impossibly powerful, unimaginably ancient. Most have been lost in primordial Dao-grounds or extinct cultivators’ forbidden lands. Where will you even find a formation diagram?”

“And even if you find one—who could possibly learn it?”

“No one can…”

“And even if they learned it—who could actually construct it in reality?”

Real Person Situ’s brows knotted tight. He sighed from the depths of his heart:

“People say formation arts are vast and profound. But only those of us who study them to their depths know just how vast and how profound they really are!”

“There is always a higher mountain, always a greater sky.”

“But beyond the sky… there are heavens one can never reach…”

“There exist formations in this world so intricate, so esoteric, that they were never meant for ‘humans’ to learn…”

A faint shadow of despair crossed his aged features.

…

Bai Qingcheng’s expression trembled with fear, yet after a moment of silence, she gritted her teeth and stubbornly declared:

“I won’t give up!”

Real Person Situ sighed and nodded.

Whether she truly wouldn’t give up or not, he had said all he should, and added no more.

Beside them, Mo Hua—lying on his side—heard every word.

“Stealing Yin and Yang, seizing Creation, reversing Life and Death…”

He carved these words into his heart.

As dawn arrived, Real Person Situ discussed matters with the uncle-master and departed.

Mo Hua opened his eyes and slowly sat up.

He looked once more at Mister Zhuang, committing his master’s appearance to memory, and made a silent vow.

“If no one else can save Master, I will!”

“If no one else can learn the formation, I will!”

“Even if the entire world wants my master dead—I will make sure he lives, and lives well!”

Mo Hua’s small face grew solemn, his gaze firm. He etched this oath deep into his Dao-heart.

The rising sun cast its warm light over master and disciple.

Mo Hua murmured softly:

“Master… sleep for now.”

“When the time comes, I’ll wake you…”

…

Three days later, Bai Qingcheng was preparing to leave.

She would take away the karmically bound, life-hanging-by-a-thread Mister Zhuang, and she would bring Bai Zisheng and Bai Zixi back to the Bai Clan.

Bai Zixi sought Bai Qingcheng out, determination in her gaze.

“Mother, I want to take Little Junior Brother back to the Bai Clan…”

Bai Zisheng nodded beside her. “Mother, take Mo Hua with you as well…”

Bai Qingcheng’s expression grew slightly distant. “Why?”

A complicated emotion flickered in Bai Zixi’s eyes. “I promised Master I would look after Junior Brother…”

“Mhm.” Bai Zisheng nodded vigorously.

They invoked their master, thinking their mother would surely give face.

But Bai Qingcheng shook her head. “Look after him? How will you look after him?”

The two children froze.

Bai Qingcheng continued, “Once he reaches the Bai Clan, if he faces danger, who will protect him?”

“You two?”

“You’re only in Qi-Refining. What can you do? Even if you reach Foundation Establishment, then what?”

“In a second-grade cultivation realm, Foundation cultivators can call wind and rain. But in the Bai Clan, mere Foundation Establishment—what can it protect?”

She looked at her children, pained but honest:

“Besides… you two are Bai Clan disciples. You rely on the Bai Clan—not yourselves. You want to protect him, but one day…”

“What if the Bai Clan wants him dead?”

“What then? What can you do?”

“With your cultivation, can you defy a ten-thousand-year-old great clan?”

“If you can’t… will you watch helplessly as your Little Junior Brother dies?”

Her words were cold, ruthless… and true.

The siblings turned pale, heads lowered, hands clenched tight—yet speechless.

They could protect nothing…

Not their master.

Not Little Junior Brother.

Bai Qingcheng’s gaze softened a little. “A cultivator must ultimately rely on their own strength.”

“I know you share deep bonds, but bringing Mo Hua back to the Bai Clan would not help him—it would harm him.”

“The Bai Clan is too vast, too tangled, too burdened with karma…”

Bai Zixi’s voice trembled. “Mother, then…”

After a brief hesitation, Bai Qingcheng reached out, gently patting her daughter’s head.

“Go.”

“Forget this Little Junior Brother of yours—that is the greatest protection you can give him…”

…

Little Senior Brother and Little Senior Sister were leaving.

They’d head to Liyuan City, take the flying Cloud-Ferry, and depart the Great Li Mountain Prefecture.

Mo Hua came to see them off.

It was his first time in Liyuan City—and his first time seeing a cloud-ferry.

The cloud-ferry was huge, splendidly crafted, docked like a winged celestial kun. They said that once airborne, it sailed the sea of clouds like a skyborne ship, swift enough to cross entire prefectures.

Its principle involved drawing on streams of spiritual qi and riding the clouds.

Mo Hua found it fascinating, but with farewells looming, his mood was too heavy to study it…

Bai Zisheng, worried Mo Hua might be sad, chirped endlessly—

stories of Qian Prefecture’s famous sights: towering cultivation edifices, ancient temples, hanging sword-qi waterfalls, the Bai Clan’s old pavilions, the Three-Purities Spirit Mountain…

Mo Hua listened with interest.

Bai Zisheng even told him to visit the Bai Clan someday—

—but only after his cultivation was higher.

The Bai Clan had plenty of bad eggs… who might very well harm him.

Mo Hua gave Bai Zisheng a gift: a dragon controlled by a Spirit-Pivot formation. This one wasn’t a crawling reptile anymore—

Mo Hua had installed two wings. It could flap and lift off the ground.

Not very high, sure… and adding wings made it a bit ugly.

But hey—progress!

Mo Hua promised, “When I get better at formations, I’ll make you a dragon that can fly without wings!”

Bai Zisheng lit up.

Then he asked, “Did you practice that move I taught you?”

Mo Hua blinked. “What move?”

Bai Zisheng scowled. “Flying! Dragon! In! The! Heavens!”

Mo Hua remembered that self-invented move—jump into the air, strike a pose, spear pointing downward, then dive dramatically…

He winced. “Uh… can I not learn it…?”

Pure posturing. Zero practicality.

“No!” Bai Zisheng insisted. “I created that move myself! I taught only you! Only the two of us in the whole world know it! You must learn it!”

Mo Hua sighed. “Fine…”

Satisfied, Bai Zisheng nodded—but then his mood dimmed.

“I wanted to return to Tōngxiān City to see Uncle Mo and Auntie Liu… but we can’t. Qian Prefecture’s too far. Who knows if I’ll ever get the chance again…”

Auntie Liu’s cooking had been amazing.

Bai Zisheng dearly missed that carefree, well-fed period in Tōngxiān City.

Mo Hua comforted him. “There’ll be a chance.”

Bai Zisheng perked up a little.

Mo Hua thought for a moment. “What about Little Senior Sister…?”

He hadn’t seen her this whole trip.

Bai Zisheng paused, sighing. “She originally wanted to bring you to the Bai Clan too. But now that you can’t go… maybe she’s a bit embarrassed to see you.”

Embarrassed… why?

Mo Hua murmured, “Is Little Senior Sister sulking?”

Bai Zisheng thought it over and nodded. “Probably…”

Though he knew… that wasn’t the real reason.

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All this way, he hadn’t seen Little Senior Sister even once…

Bai Zisheng paused, sighed, and said, “She originally wanted to take you back to the Bai Clan too, but now… you can’t go. So maybe she feels a bit embarrassed to see you…”

Embarrassed… about that?

Mo Hua murmured softly, “Is Little Senior Sister throwing a tantrum?”

Bai Zisheng thought for a moment, then nodded. “Probably…”

But he knew that wasn’t the real reason.

Ever since hearing her mother’s words, Zixi had locked herself in her room, refusing to see anyone. It seemed she was afraid that seeing Mo Hua again would hurt too much.

Bai Zisheng didn’t quite understand and shook his head.

Parting hurts—of course it does.

Which is exactly why you should see each other more…

Bai Zisheng then reluctantly chatted with Mo Hua for a long time. Only when someone urged him—saying the Cloud Ferry was about to depart—did he finally say goodbye, glancing back every few steps as he boarded the vessel.

“We’re really… parting, huh…”

Just before stepping onto the Cloud Ferry, Bai Zisheng suddenly felt his eyes sting.

All the days and nights the three of them spent together—their laughter, their squabbles—flooded his heart at once.

He forced back his tears, looked at Mo Hua one last time, imprinting his junior brother’s figure in his heart. Only then did he step into the vast Cloud Ferry.

Mo Hua stood at the dock, reluctant but silent, watching Little Senior Brother—and the unseen Little Senior Sister—depart.

Inside the Cloud Ferry…

Bai Zisheng knocked on Bai Zixi’s door. “Aren’t you going to see your junior brother?”

Silence.

“If you don’t go now… you might never see him again…”

Still no answer from behind the door.

Bai Zisheng shook his head helplessly, hugged the big dragon doll his junior brother had given him, and turned away.

Inside the room, Bai Zixi sat quietly. Her long black lashes trembled, and her beautiful eyes held a trace of loneliness.

Clear sunlight streamed in, brushing her slightly pale cheeks. Her originally cool and flawless face now carried a faint, melancholic beauty.

She sat there silently, lost in thought, her emotions tangled and frail.

Moments later, the Cloud Ferry emitted a deep, resonant hum.

Bai Zixi’s heart jolted. Bai Zisheng’s voice echoed in her mind:

“You might never see him again…”

Her heart trembled. She abruptly stood up, left her room, and rushed onto the deck.

But by then—the Cloud Ferry had already launched.

Under a flawless sky, the magnificent vessel rose into the heavens, parting waves of rolling cloud-sea.

When she looked again, the world below was an endless white ocean.

Mo Hua’s tiny silhouette was already swallowed by the vast clouds—gone from her sight completely.

Never… to be seen again…

A sharp pain stabbed through Bai Zixi’s chest, as if carved by a blade. A single tear, clear as snowmelt, slid down her pale, perfect cheek.

White clouds surged like great tides, cloud currents flowing like an ocean, lifting the Cloud Ferry as it rode the wind—drifting farther and farther into the endless sea of clouds…

The Dao is long, and the cloud sea lies between them.

With this parting—who knows in what year they will meet again.