Eternal Life Begins with Learning

Chapter 331: Chapter 303: Trauma and The Old Place

「One month later.」

In Nanshan, amid endless mountain ranges, a small, simple yet exquisite Flying Boat soared slowly across the sky.

Atop the Flying Boat, Wangcai lay in a corner. Before it were several mangled bodies sprawled on the deck, dripping with blood and bearing clear signs of having been gnawed upon.

Inside the cabin, Chu Mu sat cross-legged, his face pale and his lips dry. A faint, unnatural flush was visible on his cheeks.

Several Fire Attribute Spirit Stones were placed around him, and an Energy Gathering Array Prohibition broke them down, transforming them into pure Spiritual Qi that swirled within the Flying Boat.

With each breath, his Divine Sense circulated. The dense Fire Spiritual Energy followed the flow of his Magical Power, seeping into his body bit by bit.

After about an hour, Chu Mu slowly opened his eyes.

Sensing the lingering injuries within his body, a self-deprecating smile touched the corners of his lips.

By leveraging his fame as an Artifact Refining Master and his skills as an Artifact Refiner, he had amassed a great fortune.

Before, he had always operated within a stable order. Coupled with his own Cultivation and the many Righteous Alliance Cultivators he had befriended, the process had been exceedingly smooth and uneventful.

But this time, during the battle of Jingmen, a Righteous Alliance Nascent Soul had self-detonated. The order established by the Righteous Alliance forces gathered at Jingmen instantly crumbled.

Naturally, he was just one of the rats fleeing a sinking ship.

After luckily surviving the tidal wave of Spiritual Qi, he had decisively fled.

Originally, his biggest worry had been being hunted by the Longevity Sect.

He had made a rather deep enemy of the Longevity Sect.

But as it turned out, he had easily evaded their pursuit.

After all, the Righteous Alliance’s main forces at Jingmen had suffered almost no major losses.

The two Nascent Soul Great Powers had fled at the very beginning, luring away the Longevity Sect’s Nascent Soul Great Powers as well.

Furthermore, not a single one of the Righteous Alliance’s Golden Core True Masters stationed at Jingmen had been harmed.

With such High Tier powers still in play, the Longevity Sect’s Golden Core True Masters naturally had their hands full.

The same was true for the Foundation Establishment Realm Cultivators.

Although order had collapsed, it was clear a relative balance of "king against king, general against general" was maintained.

Since he wasn’t targeted by any High Tier Cultivators, he managed to escape without any real incident, though it took some effort.

After escaping, he happened to run into a retreating squad from the Righteous Alliance.

The squad was obviously thrown together at the last minute, and its members were clearly not important people.

There were only six Foundation Establishment Cultivators—some were Foundation Establishment Loose Cultivators, others were Cultivators from various Clans—along with several dozen Qi Cultivation Realm Cultivators from the Righteous Alliance.

He even knew the six Foundation Establishment Cultivators. After meeting them, he only lingered for a moment to exchange pleasantries before leaving on his own to avoid any trouble.

And then...

The most absurd and ridiculous thing happened!

He hadn’t been hunted by the Longevity Sect, but ambushed by these few Foundation Establishment Cultivators from the Righteous Alliance...

It happened so suddenly. On top of that, most of his assets—like the Cyan Wolf Puppet, the Guard Puppet, his Magic Robe, Shield, and so on—had all been destroyed in that terrifying tidal wave of Spiritual Qi.

The ensuing battle was naturally extremely difficult.

After a bitter fight, he had initially wanted to flee, but the indignation in his heart was impossible to quell!

Therefore, at the cost of his Divine Soul and body suffering heavy damage, he fought back and killed every single one of those Foundation Establishment Cultivators!

The cost was immense.

His Divine Soul was damaged, his Meridians were injured, and his body was covered in several deep gashes. He was gravely wounded.

After more than half a month of recuperation, he had only recovered slightly. His body and Divine Soul were still a complete mess.

This had also disrupted his original plan to go to Changzhou.

According to the news he had recently gathered, after the battle of Jingmen, just like with the Vast Sea upheaval back then, the Righteous Alliance was in full retreat and had suffered disastrous losses.

It was said that several Nascent Soul Great Powers had fallen!

The so-called East Lake Xie Family, just like the Sun Family back then, had lost all of its territory!

Now, after the battle of Jingmen and the disastrous defeat of the East Lake Xie Family, the Righteous Alliance had been forcefully split in two.

This split was not in name, but a geographical division.

After all, the Righteous Alliance was originally formed around the five great Cultivation Immortal Clans.

Originally, it occupied more than half of Great Chu, with the Longevity Sect cornered in the Northern Border, struggling to withstand the Righteous Alliance’s siege.

But after the Vast Sea upheaval, the roles of offense and defense were instantly reversed.

With the Longevity Sect in the north and the Vast Sea Chen Family in the south, they were now fighting a war on two fronts.

The East Lake Xie Family was located in the core region of central Great Chu, with East Lake at its heart, a veritable battleground in the Central Plains.

Now, with the Xie Family in full retreat, the Longevity Sect had driven straight in, seized all of East Lake, and was pressing toward the Chu River. Geographically speaking, the Righteous Alliance had been split down the middle into western and eastern factions.

The Longevity Sect was also about to join forces with the Vast Sea Chen Family at the Chu River.

The Righteous Alliance...

Its future was clearly not optimistic.

Given the situation, he naturally didn’t dare get involved in this war again. For the past few days, his Flying Boat had concealed its tracks, drifting lazily through the Nanshan Mountain Range.

Firstly, to heal his wounds, and secondly, to wait and see how things developed.

If the Longevity Sect’s momentum continued to build like this, it probably wouldn’t be long before the Great Chu Cultivation Immortal World returned completely to Longevity Sect rule.

’When that time comes, I’ll really have to think hard about how I’m going to survive in the Great Chu Cultivation Immortal World.’

’As for the deal with that Residual Soul, there’s still a lot of time left. Unless it’s a last resort, I’m not willing to run off to such a distant and unknown place.’

As his thoughts churned, he slowly rose, walked out of the cabin, and stood at the bow. What greeted him was the sight of endless mountain ranges rolling through a sea of clouds.

The landscape of mountains and rivers was right before him, but it seemed to trigger a memory, and scenes from the great battle at Jingmen that day began to surface uncontrollably.

The magnificent spectacle of the war, that world-shaking sword strike, the self-detonation of a Nascent Soul Great Power, the terrifying tidal wave of Spiritual Qi...

All of it had completely redefined his understanding of the world.

Such mighty power was truly beyond human imagination.

The word "terrifying" was hardly enough to describe it.

And as for that sword-bearing Nascent Soul from the Longevity Sect, his perception of him was very clear.

That was, without a doubt, a Sword Dao Nascent Soul!

His attack was unrivaled!

He had almost single-handedly forced that reinforcing Righteous Alliance Nascent Soul Great Power to self-detonate!

Moreover, it was said that two Nascent Soul Great Powers had come to reinforce Jingmen for the Righteous Alliance, but the Longevity Sect had ambushed the reinforcements while besieging the city.

One of them was slain by that Sword Dao Nascent Soul at the very beginning. The one he had seen later, the Nascent Soul Great Power who was forced to self-detonate, had actually managed to escape the initial trap.

But in the end, he still couldn’t escape the fate of falling.

It was obvious that the two Nascent Soul Great Powers inside Jingmen City back then had also been deathly afraid of that Sword Dao Nascent Soul.

Otherwise, they wouldn’t have just stood by and watched a Nascent Soul self-detonate, let alone flee at the first possible moment after the explosion...

"Xu Lingtian..."

Chu Mu silently recited the name. Then, he suddenly recalled the Longevity True Inheritor he had met before.

’His name... Xu Changqing?’

’If I remember correctly, the Longevity Sect’s Sect Leader is named Li Changqing!’

’And this Sword Dao Nascent Soul from the Longevity Sect has the surname Xu and the given name Lingtian.’

’The Sect Leader’s name is Changqing. So how could Xu Changqing, who started as a mere Outer Disciple, have been allowed to keep the name Changqing?’

’And the Sword Dao Nascent Soul is also surnamed Xu...’

He pursed his lips, burying this speculation deep in his heart.

’Whether it’s true or not doesn’t really matter to me.’

"Perhaps..."

A flash of inspiration struck him. He took out the Sound Transmission Order he had gotten from Xu Changqing, looking thoughtful.

’This might... be a possible way out.’

As his thoughts turned, he seemed to notice something. His gaze flickered and then suddenly locked onto a specific mountain range among the endless peaks.

He focused his gaze, and his previously placid expression was suddenly filled with emotion.

"I’m back here..."

He murmured softly. With a thought, the Flying Boat slowly moved forward and descended. Finally, the boat concealed itself within the clouds, and the scene on the ground below came into sharp focus.

The mines bustled with activity, the laborers toiling under Forced Labor.

Black smoke billowed from the Iron Refinery. The town was peaceful, yet bustling.

His eyes roamed, and he seemed to be in a bit of a daze.

A moment later, he leaped down, landing lightly on the ground.

Fields and mountain forests, waves of wheat rippling in the wind. Chu Mu walked slowly along a path between the paddies. He remembered this was the very path he had taken up the mountain back then, to learn the system of identifying people and herbs taught by Elder Li.

Not far away, the town’s memorial archway stood tall. He could still faintly make out the chafe marks left by ropes on the archway.

The town was bustling with people. The wars in the Cultivation Immortal Realm clearly hadn’t had much of an impact on this secular corner of the world.

The trade in Ore Materials continued to bring prosperity to the town. A steady stream of carriages and horses passed in and out beneath the archway.

Following the merchants on the street, he slowly walked into this long-unseen homeland.

’For me, this place... should count as my hometown, right?’

Chu Mu hesitated. He recalled his past life; many of those memories, though not exactly blurry, had grown distant and unfamiliar with the passage of time.

But the little details of his life in this town were still refreshingly familiar.

Several decades didn’t seem to have changed the town much.

The shops and houses along the street were mostly as he remembered them; only a small portion seemed to have been rebuilt or renovated.

The town was the same as before, but he couldn’t find a single familiar face among the people living there.

Following the path from his memory, he arrived at his "front door." The small courtyard that once stood there was gone.

Along with several neighboring residences, it had been replaced by a sprawling mansion.

"Li Mansion..."

Chu Mu glanced at the mansion’s plaque, an inexplicable emptiness filling his heart.

After standing there for a moment, he slowly turned and began to wander aimlessly through the town.

Under the effects of a Concealment technique, his presence was nonexistent to this secular town and its ordinary people.

Walking down the street, no one saw him, and no one could see him.

Of course, even if they could see him, no one would recognize him.

In the secular world, several decades is enough time for generations to pass; for many, it’s a whole lifetime.

The only person he had a bond with here, the Squad Leader from back then, was nowhere to be found in Nanshan Town.

It seemed he, too, had fled like Chu Mu after the great upheaval at Nanshan.

From the town, to the Iron Refinery, to the mines...

Memory and reality intertwined, finally dissolving into a soft sigh...

...

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