Tang Manqing moved with extreme speed, teleporting away to catch the falling figure before flashing back to the Water-Cloud Grand Carriage.
Only then did Shui’er realize that what had fallen from the sky wasn’t a thing, but a person.
A young man who looked to be in his early twenties.
The man wore a simple, plain white cloth robe, his long black hair loosely scattered. His face was rather handsome, his eyes closed as if he were asleep. When Shui’er extended her divine sense to investigate, she found something amiss. This man wasn’t asleep; he was dead. There was no trace of vitality in his entire body.
“Is he dead?”
“He’s still alive, but very weak. Devoid of vitality, he’s not far from death.”
Tang Manqing set the man down, then retrieved a white jade vial from her storage pouch. She poured out a spirit pill and placed it into the man’s mouth. This was a Life-Giving Pill, also known as a Resurrection Pill, used to replenish primordial energy and restore vitality. If even a Life-Giving Pill couldn’t revive this man, she would be powerless.
Life-Giving Pills were priceless treasures, even in this prosperous era of universal revival following the Heavenly Mandate’s descent.
Few people would use a Life-Giving Pill to save a complete stranger.
However, that only meant few, not none.
At the very least, Tang Manqing would do so.
First, she wasn’t short on money.
Second, she was charitable and benevolent.
Third, and most importantly, she had always held a deep respect for life.
“Princess Royal, why would this fellow suddenly fall from the sky out of nowhere? And he doesn’t seem to be a cultivator at all; there’s no spiritual aura on him.”
Shui’er couldn’t understand. How could someone who wasn’t even a cultivator fall from the sky? He bore no injuries, his clothes were neat and tidy, and there were no signs of a struggle. It felt to her as if this person had been sleeping in the sky and just happened to fall.
“He must have been a cultivator before.”
“Princess Royal, how do you know?”
“Look at his acupoints and meridians.”
Acupoints and meridians?
Shui’er examined carefully and found this fellow’s acupoints to be very strange—pitted and uneven, some blurred, some twisted, as if they had been damaged.
The acupoints of an ordinary person were completely sealed.
Only a cultivator’s acupoints were open.
As for these pitted, uneven acupoints, they clearly indicated a cultivation mishap—perhaps a Golden Core explosion or a Nascent Soul dispersal.
Looking further at his internal meridians,
they were even more chaotic and disordered. All the acupoints were twisted together, a complete mess. Shui’er had never seen meridians in such terrible condition.
She became even more certain inwardly: this person must have suffered a cultivation mishap, his physical body severely damaged.
Shui’er couldn’t detect a Violet Palace on this person, likely having dispersed as well. If even the Violet Palace had dispersed, forget about a Nascent Soul Dharma Form.
“How pitiful…” Shui’er frowned, asking, “Could this fellow be like me? When the Heavenly Mandate descended, he desperately cultivated using the rainbow spiritual aura and gestated an unstable Nascent Soul, which is why he…”
“Probably so.”
Tang Manqing thought the same.
The descent of the Heavenly Mandate, the upheaval of the Great Nature, the sky filled with vibrant, life-giving rainbow spiritual energy—it had caused too many to lose their way, to be impatient for success, to force breakthroughs, to chase after cultivation realms. Over these years, Tang Manqing had seen far too many people who lost their lives due to unstable Nascent Soul Dharma Forms.
The dispersal of a Nascent Soul Dharma Form was an extremely terrifying event.
Most people’s physical bodies couldn’t withstand it, leading to explosions.
Even if the body didn’t explode, the Violet Palace Dantian, meridians and bones, foundational acupoints—all would be damaged. From then on, even if one recovered, whether they could cultivate again or even live independently was an unknown.
“How terrifying…
I swear, once I return, I’ll never…
never cultivate again…
I’ll definitely carefully nurture my Nascent Soul with utmost caution. I…
I don’t want to become a cripple!”
Looking at this fellow before her, devoid of any vitality, Shui’er was utterly terrified.
Tang Manqing comforted her a few words, then looked at this young man who had fallen from the sky, sighing softly. Suddenly, she noticed something odd about the man’s left hand. On his left hand were some clearly visible patterns, like the patterns of blood vessels, but they weren’t blood-red. Instead, they were a reddish-gray color.
She rolled up the man’s sleeve and found it wasn’t just his left hand; his entire left arm was like this, covered in many irregular reddish-gray patterns, as if the blood vessels in his arm had mutated.
What was going on?
Tang Manqing examined carefully but found nothing suspicious. She thought inwardly that perhaps his left arm had suffered severe damage after his Nascent Soul Dharma Form dispersed.
“Princess Royal, are you going to take this person back with you?”
“What else? Should we just leave him here?”
With a wave of her hand, Tang Manqing sent the man into the grand carriage, saying, “Let’s take him back for Elder Feng to examine. Whether he can come back to life will depend on his own fortune.”
Who was this man?
None other than Gu Qingfeng, reborn from nirvana.
However, after his nirvanic rebirth, Gu Qingfeng was extremely weak, so weak that both his soul and physical body were in a state of chaotic slumber.
Only his consciousness remained relatively clear.
At this moment,
he was carefully sensing his own soul.
The soul was a person’s origin, their foundation.
This was no exception for Gu Qingfeng.
Even though his soul was the Avici Uninterrupted Evil Asura soul, a thing of the Hell Realms, a thing of darkness and evil.
Regardless, in the end, it was still his own soul.
As the saying goes, a child does not dislike their mother for being ugly.
No matter how dark, how evil his soul was, it was still his origin and foundation.
He couldn’t afford to be careless.
At this moment,
he could sense that his Avici Uninterrupted Evil Asura soul was also extremely weak, forced into a state of chaotic slumber. However, fortunately, the thing still existed. As long as it existed, Gu Qingfeng wasn’t worried. Not only was he not worried, he was even thankful for the judgment of the heavens.
Why?
No particular reason.
Because he had absolutely no control over his Avici Uninterrupted Evil Asura soul. Once this thing awakened, it held not a shred of benefit for him. Not only were there no benefits, there was even the danger of his self-consciousness being devoured.
This was no exaggeration.
Back when he went mad in the Great Desolate Celestial Realm, it was precisely because his physical body had been taken over by the Avici Uninterrupted Evil Asura. If not for his relatively tenacious self-consciousness, the Gu Qingfeng of today would likely have long been a mindless puppet belonging to the Avici Uninterrupted Evil Asura.
Gu Qingfeng had experienced that feeling—the feeling of his self-consciousness being devoured. It was terrifying beyond description. Precisely because he had experienced it, he had no desire to go through it again.
If possible, he hoped the Avici Uninterrupted Evil Asura soul would sleep forever, never to awaken, saving him from constant fear and worry.
He even considered that from now on, he should have the heavens judge him every so often to prevent the Avici Uninterrupted Evil Asura from awakening.