Fu Mingxia: “Tell me what you all found out.”
This was Li Weiyi’s time to shine. He pulled out his little notebook. “The first household runs a dye workshop in the city. Well-off family. The missing person is the workshop owner’s wife. She was very filial. After both her parents passed away from illness last year, one after another, the woman took it hard and has been bedridden at home ever since. The business was handed over to her husband, who married into the family. Once his wife disappeared, this huge family fortune, this sky-high wealth, fell right into his own hands. In my opinion, this might not be related to a Demon. Based on my experience watching hundreds of crime suspense dramas, it’s ninety-nine percent likely a case of the husband killing his wife!”
Rechen shut down Li Weiyi’s deduction with a single sentence. “Their house had the strongest Demonic Qi. Other houses were visited by someone tainted with Demonic Qi. Theirs? Probably cased by the Demon.”
Li Weiyi scratched his head. “Huh?”
He flipped another page. “Ahem, the second household… a scholarly family. Not much money, but they have their integrity. The missing person is the second son, a scholar. The two elders are still alive, and they’re frantic. This is quite similar to Zhang Youwen’s case. Nothing particularly special.”
“The third house is a wealthy merchant in the city. But we found out he frequented brothels and gambling dens, racking up a lot of debt. His wife is also missing. Only a few servants remain, being hounded by debt collectors daily. Since they aren’t the owners, they can’t sell the land or house. They had no choice but to report it to the authorities.”
“And this last house, a vendor in the north city. The wife sells pork at home. But the wife’s appearance… broad-backed and brawny, somewhat abstract. The neighbors all say maybe the husband was having an affair, got caught by his forceful wife, and was chopped up and dismembered. Because of these rumors, their business has plummeted. Closed the doors these past few days, no one there.”
Qin Jinghan’s investigation results were the same. The missing included men and women, young and old, rich and poor. The creature’s abductions had no pattern—no preference for target, no specific geographic distribution.
At first glance, these all seemed like ordinary missing-person cases, each with their own suspects. Without cultivators to investigate, the Demonic Qi probably wouldn’t have been discovered at all.
The case circled back to its original starting point—Mingwu’s list.
Qin Jinghan: “That old swindler. Believe him or not? I don’t believe a single word.”
Fu Mingxia flipped through the list. “Regardless, at least some of the contents match the case files. That much is true.”
Li Weiyi: “You think he’s a swindler? But I thought what he said sounded pretty genuine.”
Qin Jinghan glanced at him as if looking at a fool. “The Sect Leader hasn’t descended the mountain in centuries. If he truly were an old friend of the Sect Leader, he’d have to be a cultivator at least. But he has no Spiritual Power whatsoever. When I tested him, he had no reaction at all. What else could he be but a swindler?”
Rechen rarely agreed with Qin Jinghan. “If he really were a Buddhist Cultivator, having the list of missing and knowing it was a Demon Creature causing trouble, he’d never just stand by. He would’ve rooted out the mastermind long ago.”
Li Weiyi listened to their back-and-forth, then calculated the dates. “I get it now. Senior Sister is eighteen, but the Sect Leader went down the mountain a hundred years ago. So, this monk couldn’t possibly have seen the Sect Leader bringing Senior Sister along back then. Wait, the Sect Leader is a woman?”
Qin Jinghan: “What’s so strange about that.”
Fu Mingxia: “This Mingwu may not necessarily be a swindler. He has no Spiritual Power—maybe our cultivation levels aren’t high enough to detect it, or maybe his Spiritual Power is crippled, making him look like an ordinary person. Besides, by birth, I’m older than Qin Jinghan.”
Qin Jinghan turned his face away, unwilling to admit it. “Now I’m nineteen, you’re eighteen. I should be the older one.”
Li Weiyi was confused.
Fu Mingxia explained a few sentences before he understood.
This was the third thing Qin Jinghan most hated to face in his life—he was clearly a year older than Fu Mingxia, yet he never heard her call him “Brother”, and she was even considered his “older sister”.
Just how many children did the Fuxi Sect Leader have?
This question was likely a hot topic of gossip within the mountain sect.
In the past, the answer was simple: one, Fu Mingxia.
But everyone knew the Sect Leader’s Dao companion had died in the Demon and Monster chaos seven hundred years ago. Therefore, Fu Mingxia’s current age couldn’t match.
Whether it was the official word from Fuxi Mountain or what the Sect Leader had explained to her, the story was the same: Fu Mingxia had been plagued by illness and disaster since childhood. When she was young, Devil Qi invaded her body, leaving her at death’s door. Xie Liushang, who wasn’t yet the Fuxi Sect Leader then, could only disengage from battle and bring her back to Fuxi Mountain. Every possible method only barely kept her alive.
Song Ya went sleepless for months, using countless heavenly treasures and earthly rarities to build a Medicinal Nurturing Chamber. Then they sought an expert to act, freezing Fu Mingxia’s life, halting her growth. For her, time was stopped, and the Devil Qi inside her body naturally couldn’t continue corroding her Soul Spirit and body.
It wasn’t until the Sect Leader broke through from Nascent Soul to Minor Heavenly Tribulation that she had the ability to extract the Devil Qi and release her from the freeze.
Therefore, by birthdate, Fu Mingxia predated Qin Jinghan by several hundred years. But by biological age, she was a year younger.
Later, the question of exactly how many children the Sect Leader had—
The answer to this question became no longer singular.
Because Duan Nanyun emerged from the Ancestor Realm.
Not only did he emerge, but he also inherited the sword and withstood ten thousand strikes, shocking all cultivators. Sword and Saber Cultivators from Foot of Water Sect and Blade’s Edge Sect began to doubt whether they were even cultivating the same system of techniques.
The cultivators who got the answer were even more shocked. The answer was: indeed, it wasn’t the same.
Because at that time, Duan Nanyun hadn’t even started cultivating techniques yet. He was just a Mortal saddled with massive debt.
Later, the Sect Leader personally performed the Spiritual Light Unsealing for Duan Nanyun, protecting his spiritual sanctuary. She would occasionally visit to inquire about his cultivation progress. Even more outrageous—
She even gave him the Moon-Chasing Sword, the one she valued most.
You could find one or two reasons: for instance, Duan Nanyun had cleaned house for the sect, striking down scum and capturing Demons and Devils. He was also a once-in-a-millennium genius, the Sword Cultivator most likely to form a Golden Core in the future, possibly even reaching Nascent Soul.
But the matter of the Moon-Chasing Sword was simply too absurd.
The Moon-Chasing Sword was forged from the extremely rare billion-year Spirit Moon Iron by the most powerful Spirit Weapon Master. A thumb-sized chunk of Spirit Moon Iron was worth tens of thousands of low-grade Spirit Stones. The sword was three feet long, not to mention the amount lost during compression and refinement. Beyond that, it required various supreme treasures for nurturing and sharpening, and had to be scorched by Strange Fire for a full hundred years to be completed.
It was said that when this sword was born, ten thousand swords across the world cried out in unison. All common iron felt a tremor. The Spirit Swords with Spiritual Power and sword souls in the hands of cultivators quivered uncontrollably, unable to be suppressed.
—Everyone knew this was the paired sword of the Sect Leader’s deceased Dao companion.
Since that one died a hundred years after the Demon and Monster chaos, no one had been able to lay eyes on this sword.
This had already exceeded the reasonable scope of “cultivating Fuxi’s future talent” or “rewarding righteous courage.”
Thus, new gossip quietly spread, and was considered even more convincing—
Duan Nanyun was absolutely the Sect Leader’s secret son!
Fu Mingxia had already been frozen in age. Duan Nanyun couldn’t also be frozen. And being hunted to that extent, he was probably also a secret son with a story.
Fu Mingxia naturally heard these rumors too. She chose to ask her mother directly.
“Can’t blame them. Even I thought it was too much. That was Father’s most important paired sword.”
Fu Mingxia: “That Foundation Establishment gift was too extravagant.”
Sect Leader: “What else? He’s that poor—has money for sword maintenance but not for paying debts. If he had to forge a new sword, Song Ya would probably hunt him down.”
She glanced at Mingxia. “At that time, if you wanted to sneak into Song Ya’s place to steal Spirit Medicine for medicinal baths, it would’ve been difficult.”
Fu Mingxia immediately disassociated herself. “Qin Jinghan did it. He cared about a fellow disciple’s injuries and Uncle Song’s reputation. If outsiders knew Duan Nanyun still had old injuries flaring up often, it might affect other patients’ trust in Uncle Song.”
Sect Leader: “I doubt it’s old injuries.”
Fu Mingxia: “Could it be new injuries?”
The Sect Leader didn’t speak.
Fu Mingxia: “He couldn’t really be my brother, right? Not going to lie, whenever I see him, I get this feeling of familiarity and closeness, like we met in a past life. Could this be that damn bloodline intuition—”
Sect Leader: “Stop. It’s still unknown whether your past life was even human. Actually, telling you is fine. It’s no secret.”
The Sect Leader paused, her expression somewhat dazed. “That Spirit Sword following him was always a magnificent sight. When the sword was drawn, ten thousand swords cried out. Where its tip pointed was the peak. How unrestrained, how proud. The man was like this, and so was the sword. But now?”
She was silent for a moment, then continued: “The Moon-Chasing Sword lay in the Sword Tomb within the sect for a hundred years, never uttering a sword cry again. The divine iron of the past is now no different from scrap metal. The man dying is one thing, but his sword shouldn’t have to die too.”
The last sentence was spoken very softly.
Fu Mingxia was thoughtful. “You believe Duan Nanyun can restore the Moon-Chasing Sword to its former divine glory?”
Sect Leader: “The peak the Moon-Chasing Sword once had wasn’t its true peak. A famous sword should be known under heaven, make achievements, be passed down through the ages. Perhaps in Duan Nanyun’s hands, the sword can come alive again, can be a sword… Besides, it wasn’t that I chose Duan Nanyun, but the Moon-Chasing Sword chose him.”
Fu Mingxia: “Moon-Chasing chose him as master? How can that be?”
With the pride of a divine sword, if it could change masters so easily, it wouldn’t have lain there like scrap metal for a hundred years.
Xie Liushang was helpless. “If I could choose, I’d have you learn the sword, so you could inherit the Moon-Chasing Sword, stay by my side, and I could see it day and night. But a sword has a spirit, and Moon-Chasing is even more so.”
She paused, then said, “The Moon-Chasing Sword only emits a sword cry when it sees three types of people.”
Fu Mingxia: “Men, women, those in between.”
Sect Leader: “……”
Sect Leader: “Remember, you are a straight man, not a funny man. You should ask me what three types.”
Fu Mingxia played along with Sect Leader Xie very cooperatively, pretending the previous bit never happened, seamlessly asking the question. “Which three types?”
Sect Leader: “Its master. People it acknowledges. Its enemies.”
Fu Mingxia: “I understand. Father can’t return as a spirit, because he died very thoroughly. If he could reincarnate, you would’ve found him by any means, fair or foul, long ago. Someone the Moon-Chasing Sword missed for a hundred years and specifically cried out for must be no ordinary enemy. At minimum, a Devil Chief level, if not Nascent Soul, then at least Minor Heavenly Tribulation or higher. Duan Nanyun clearly doesn’t fit. So he can only be—”
Sect Leader: “Exactly. Someone acknowledged by the Moon-Chasing Sword.”
She frowned. “Wait, what do you mean ‘by any means, fair or foul’?”
Fu Mingxia dodged the issue of her phrasing. “But even someone acknowledged by Moon-Chasing might not be able to tame it. He’s only at Foundation Establishment, a starting disciple. If he gets counter-injured by the sword, then—”
Sect Leader: “So I thought, when you said he was unwell, it might not be old injuries. It really could be new ones.”
Saying this, the Sect Leader waved her hand dismissively. “Anyway, such a precious Spirit Sword, hard to come by. Now no need for nine million Spirit Stones, no need for ninety-eight thousand, no need for nine hundred and ninety-eight. Simply given for free. What’s he got to be dissatisfied about? As for the injuries… perhaps the Moon-Chasing Sword is tempering him. It might not necessarily kill him. Even when taming a horse, if the horse is too wild, bumps and bruises are inevitable, but it shouldn’t let the horse throw him to his death.”
Fu Mingxia: “If he really is thrown to death by the horse?”
Sect Leader: “Then with his ability, he wasn’t worthy of being Moon-Chasing’s master. After he dies, I’ll properly bury him, and take the sword back.”
Fu Mingxia: “……”
No wonder, among so many cultivators, it was you who ascended to the position of Sect Leader of the Number One Immortal Sect.
Fu Mingxia: “But speaking of this secret son rumor…”
Sect Leader interrupted. “I’ve said it many times, he is not my secret son, nor your elder brother.”
Fu Mingxia: “No, I have another question. Since we’re on the topic today, might as well ask it together.”
Sect Leader: “You’re curious about too many things. Can’t you be curious why the mnemonic for this new technique is Heaven, Earth—”
Fu Mingxia: “Stop, don’t change the subject. This question isn’t a secret either. You don’t need to be afraid, and you don’t need to feel guilty. I’m just asking casually.”
Sect Leader: “What question? When have I ever felt guilty?”
Fu Mingxia: “Since he said he had no name, and you gave him one, making you sort of half a mother to him—why the surname Duan and not Fu? Or Xie?”
Sect Leader: “…No reason. Just randomly picked a surname.”
Fu Mingxia said, “I get it now. You saw him covered in wounds, in a miserable state. Though you didn’t know his surname, you knew he was definitely broken and unhappy.”
Sect Leader: “……”
Fu Mingxia: “……”
After a brief silence, the Sect Leader spoke, her tone sincere and heartfelt. “Mingxia, promise me, don’t make these homophone puns anymore. Hearing them makes my whole body uncomfortable, easily affecting one’s Dao path, leading to Qi Deviation.”
Fu Mingxia: “So why couldn’t he be surnamed Xie?”
The Sect Leader shook her head and said, “I’m so smart, how did you not inherit half of it? I treat him this well, it was already easy to draw criticism. Giving him the surname Fu or Xie? What if others thought he was my secret son?”
Fu Mingxia: “……”
Fu Mingxia: “Mother, your brain has a kind of ‘trying to hide it but making it more obvious’ beauty that I just can’t inherit.”
Xie Liushang’s expression was serious and solemn. “I’ve said it many times, inside the sect, address me by my title.”
Fu Mingxia: “Sect Leader, your brain has a kind of ‘trying to hide it but making it more obvious’ beauty.”