Past Events

The two traveled day and night without rest. Zhao Fengnian spread his dragon wings and flew low, while Liu Jin rode the wind and followed closely beside him.

The three thousand miles were compressed into a day and a night of rapid travel. The villages and towns along the way became increasingly desolate. First, the fields cracked, then the riverbeds dried up, and finally even the roadside weeds withered and curled up.

The impact of the drought demon was even wider than estimated in the City God's official letter.

The meeting point agreed upon with Mingxin was in front of an abandoned local temple.

When Liu Jin landed, Ming Xin was sitting on the stone steps at the temple entrance, a crescent-shaped fan resting on his lap. The waxing and waning of the moon on the fan surface was still slowly changing, but he himself had no leisure to fan himself.

His eyes were slightly red, his lips were tightly pursed, and his hands were clasped together on his knees, his knuckles turning slightly white from the force.

"I found my senior brother." Mingxin's voice was hoarse. There were no pleasantries, no preamble, as if these words had been bottled up inside him for a long time, just waiting for someone to listen. "The corpse he used to train the drought demon belonged to Mingzhi."

Liu Jin and Zhao Fengnian both fell silent. Mingzhi, the first of the three disciples of Laoshan, the one with extraordinary memory, who went mad from his opportunistic ways.

After his meridians were severed, he disappeared down the mountain. Everyone thought he was dead or had found a place to eke out a living.

No one expected that he would be turned into a drought demon by his own senior brother. Even less did anyone expect that Mingde did this not just to create a drought demon, but also because he wanted Mingzhi's cheat: the memory palace.

With two cheat codes combined, plus the inherent malevolent energy of the drought demon, he was powerful enough to dominate a region in this world of obscure secrets.

"He knows I'm here." Mingxin looked down at the crescent moon fan on her lap, the waxing and waning of the moon on the fan surface spinning faster than usual.

"He messaged me, saying that since I was able to get out of the illusion, it meant I had some skills, so why don't we work together? He said two cheat codes weren't enough, three would be more reliable."

He said, "Haven't you always wanted to bring me back? Now your chance has come. Come to my side, and with the combined strengths of the three of us brothers, the world will be ours."

Zhao Fengnian's expression gradually shifted from serious to icy. That coldness wasn't anger, but something deeper, something that surged up from the depths of his memory.

He leaned against the half-collapsed wall of the earth god temple and remained silent for a long time, until Mingxin looked up at him, at which point he finally spoke.

"I have a childhood friend." His voice was calm, so calm it didn't sound like him.

"We grew up together, like brothers. On the day we time-traveled, we both clicked on the screen. He wasn't a good student and didn't trust his own brain, so he chose the Voice of the Great Dao."

As a result, he had an epiphany on his first attempt at learning basic runes, using up the initial opportunity for enlightenment. Later, he couldn't get into meditation, and even after paying a great price to get started, his progress was extremely slow.

At the time, I wanted to distinguish myself and become a formal monk as soon as possible so I could help him find a solution.

"He doesn't think so." Zhao Fengnian looked at the cracked wasteland in front of the land temple, his gaze seemingly looking far into the distance through the withered yellow grass.

"He felt that I was giving him charity, looking down on him, and humiliating him. Later, he came into contact with a cult, and I found out immediately. I saw him secretly practicing the cult's meditation runes in the dormitory. The runes were dark red, and I could smell the rotten egg smell even through the crack in the door."

But I didn't interfere. I thought to myself, with the voice of the Great Dao by his side, he shouldn't be in any serious trouble. Maybe he was just testing it out, maybe he'd come back once he realized something was wrong.

He paused, "Then he conspired with the aristocratic children in the academy who were jealous of me, poisoned my drink, dragged me into the basement, and pressed that black crystal onto my chest."

He doesn't just want my cheat codes; he wants to feed me and turn me into his demonic servant. The Mark of Gluttony was tailor-made for me from the very beginning.

A deathly silence fell before the earth god's temple. Mingxin's fingers gripped the handle of the crescent-shaped fan tightly, her fingertips turning white. Liu Jin stood there, the cold, silvery light of his moon-like robe casting faint shadows on the parched earth.

"That's why I had to come." Zhao Fengnian turned to look at Liu Jin, his eyes slightly red.

"Brother, I have a question that's been bothering me for a long time. When I discovered he was involved with a cult, I didn't do anything about it. I thought we were both time travelers with cheat codes, so he should know his limits and wouldn't really go astray."

I was wrong. But where exactly did I go wrong? Should I have intervened the moment I noticed, or even earlier, or should I have been in no way at all so eager to show off and make him feel inferior to me? What should I do if something like this happens again?

Liu Jin sighed. The sigh was very soft, but it was heard very clearly in the silent wilderness. "You should have stopped him sternly the first time you found out he was going the wrong way."

Even if he had been killed back then, he would have simply returned to Earth to live an ordinary life. It wasn't a good thing, but at least it wasn't the worst outcome.

He's now colluding with the devil, harming countless innocent people, including his fellow Earthlings. Even if he returns to Earth, the blood on his hands won't be wiped away. The damage is done; there's no turning back.

He paused, looking into Zhao Fengnian's eyes: "You will encounter many more people who have gone astray in the future. Some can be brought back, some cannot."

Those who can't be brought back will only harm more people if left behind. Therefore...

Eliminate evil completely

This decision, learned from your lesson, will become your own principle from now on.

......

"Zhao Fengnian is usually so cheerful, but it turns out he's been carrying this heavy burden in his heart all along. Being pushed into the abyss by his childhood brother must feel even more painful than the Mark of Gluttony gnawing at his soul."

"His voice was trembling when he said, 'I saw him practicing cult runes in the dorm, but I did nothing.' It's not about shirking responsibility; it's that for so many years he's been repeatedly asking himself, 'What if I had stopped him then?'"

"That's why he's so concerned about Mingxin's senior brother. It's not because he's just joining in the fun; seeing Mingxin reminds him of himself."

"Liu Jin's statement, 'Even if you kill him, he'll just go back to Earth and live an ordinary life,' is absolutely right. For transmigrators, death isn't the worst outcome; the worst outcome is becoming Azu."

"Zhao Fengnian usually cooks for everyone with a smile, washes vegetables, takes care of his junior brothers and sisters, and runs errands to buy talismans, making Sanyi Temple feel like home. It turns out that he himself was once pushed out of his home."

"But after he said it, his eyes became more determined. Some wounds need to be exposed to the sun to heal; keeping them bottled up inside will only cause them to fester."

......

Zhao Fengnian remained silent for a long time. The dragon scales on the back of his hand slowly emerged, and the firelight changed from dark to bright, flowing back and forth between dark blue and orange-red, burning the surrounding air slightly distorted.

He raised his head, the last trace of warmth in his eyes slowly cooling, transforming into a calm yet resolute killing intent unlike anything he had ever felt before.

Mingxin also stood up from the stone steps. He closed the crescent-shaped fan, and the moonlight flashed one last time across the fan's surface, reflecting the cycle of waxing and waning, before settling back into the fan's ribs. He raised his head; his eyes were still red, but the mist in them had dissipated.

He nodded to Zhao Fengnian, his usually gentle eyes reflecting the same determination as Zhao Fengnian's.

That was the determination to pull oneself out of the mire of suffering, to never look back, and to never waver.