Chapter 537: Chapter 537: The Chosen One (4)

"Haha... to be honest, out of all the futures I have seen... this is probably the closest to death that I will ever experience."

After a few more steps, he glanced back slightly over his shoulder as a faint smile lingered on his lips.

"And also..."

His voice softened just a little.

"The only chance you people will ever have of killing me today."

The moment those words left his lips—

CRACK!

The surroundings suddenly brightened.

A vast formation erupted into existence, covering the entire mountain peak and the land around it.

Intricate runes of light flared one after another, spreading outward like a living net of power.

The air itself seemed to tremble under the weight of the array.

Peng Jianwei looked up at the glowing patterns and gave a small nod of appreciation.

"...So this is the famous Pseudo Rank 6 Forbidden Spiritual Array."

As he spoke, dark walls of condensed spiritual energy began rising from both the earth and the sky, rapidly closing in from all directions.

The space around them was being slowly sealed off, isolating the area from the outside world.

Even while this was happening, Peng Jianwei turned his calm gaze toward Leng Qianxue and Fen Ling.

"And the reason I followed your Sect Leader’s will..."

His voice remained mild, almost gentle.

"...is because I can’t have the two of you die yet."

Fen Ling’s eyes narrowed sharply behind the Dragon Lord Armor.

"...What do you mean by that?"

Peng Jianwei smiled.

He slowly raised one hand and pointed toward the distant capital city, where the raging flames continued to devour everything under the night sky through the yet unsealed crack.

"Because originally, the two of you would have had to... sacrifice your lives to stop the coming Calamity, and erase the hidden threat from these lands forever. But..."

He said quietly as his smile deepened just a little.

"...But I cannot allow you to do that now."

BANG!

With that, the view to the outside world was completely sealed off by the rising black barriers.

The mountain peak fell into an eerie isolation.

Peng Jianwei casually raised one hand and looked at it.

A faint, almost curious expression crossed his face.

All of his spiritual energy had been completely sealed.

He then lifted his gaze toward the two women standing opposite him.

Both Leng Qianxue and Fen Ling were in a similar state... their spiritual power locked down by the Forbidden Spiritual Array.

Under normal circumstances, this would have placed them on equal footing.

But the advantage still clearly belonged to the other side.

The Dragon Lord Armor covering Fen Ling’s body radiated a dense, oppressive presence.

Combined with the extreme body tempering brought by her True Dragon bloodline and special physique, her raw physical strength had already reached the Divine Body Stage.

Even without spiritual energy, she remained an extremely dangerous opponent.

Fen Ling, however, still paused at his earlier words.

After a moment of silence, she asked one last question, her voice low and heavy within the armor.

"...Were you the one who killed Concubine Zhao?"

At the question, Peng Jianwei blinked once, then casually waved his hand.

"Ah. I did kill Prime Minister Mu... but I didn’t kill Concubine Zhao."

Fen Ling’s eyes widened slightly.

"Eh? What do you mean—"

Before she could finish, Leng Qianxue cut them off.

Shing—

Her pure white sword left its sheath in a clean, elegant motion.

The blade pointed straight at Peng Jianwei as a cold light flashed in her white eyes.

"Enough."

Her voice was calm, yet absolute.

"We will take care of whatever plot he has left... after we kill him."

Peng Jianwei’s smile did not fade.

Standing there with his spiritual energy completely sealed, surrounded by the sealed formation and facing two powerful opponents, he simply closed his eyes for a brief moment.

Inwardly, a quiet thought drifted through his mind.

’Brother Li... as I promise, I leave the main stage entirely to you.’

’Ahh... too bad I couldn’t personally witness it.’

’I really wonder... what choice you will make.’

But he didn’t mind whichever choice Li Feng made, as... all of it, in the end, was something he had never known before.

Peng Jianwei slowly opened his eyes.

Across from him, both Leng Qianxue and Fen Ling were already releasing a terrifying pressure.

Even with their spiritual energy sealed by the Forbidden Spiritual Array, the pure physical might and killing intent radiating from the two women made the air itself feel heavy and oppressive.

Peng Jianwei looked at them for a moment, then let out a soft sigh.

"Before we begin this life-and-death battle..."

His voice remained calm and clear, carrying easily across the sealed mountain peak.

"I want to tell the two of you a simple story."

Without waiting for either of them to respond, Peng Jianwei continued speaking in a quiet, almost nostalgic tone.

"There was once a little girl."

He looked up at the sealed black sky above the formation, as if gazing at something far away.

"She was born into a small, ordinary family in a remote border town of the Fen Dynasty. Her parents were simple people... her father a carpenter, her mother a seamstress. They were not wealthy, but they were kind."

"The girl grew up surrounded by warmth, laughter, and the smell of wood shavings and freshly sewn cloth."

His voice remained steady, yet there was a faint, almost imperceptible heaviness beneath it.

"But when she was seven years old, a plague swept through the border regions. It had, in truth, been quietly spreading throughout the dynasty for a long time before anyone realized its existence."

"And as a result, her parents both fell ill. The girl stayed by their side day and night, wiping their sweat, feeding them medicine bought with the last of their savings... but it was useless."

Peng Jianwei’s gaze lowered slightly.

"Tragically... she watched them die one after another."

"First her mother."

"Then her father."

"In the end, she was left completely alone in a small wooden house filled with the smell of death and medicine."

"After that, the local officials came. They ordered the house to be burned down, claiming it was necessary to stop the plague from spreading. They believed it was merely a normal plague, unaware of the true nature behind it."

"The little girl was then driven out with nothing but the clothes on her back as she watched her only warmth burning away to ash."

"Then she wandered the streets for months... hungry, cold, and ignored by everyone. Some people spat at her, calling her a plague bringer. Others simply looked away."

His smile from earlier had completely faded.

"One winter night, she collapsed in an alley, her body weakened by starvation and the biting cold... and that was when I found her. Perhaps it was merely coincidence, or perhaps it was fate itself, but..."

Peng Jianwei’s dark eyes drifted into the distance, as if he were once again witnessing that scene from years ago.

"She was so light... so small. And yet... when I looked upon her fate, I saw something truly fascinating."

He paused for a moment, then continued in a softer voice.

"A future so tragic that even I found it... wasteful."

A brief silence followed as Peng Jianwei’s gaze grew distant.

Then, as if the sealed mountain peak itself had faded away, a fragment of the past quietly unfolded.

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During an unknown winter.

At a narrow, forgotten alley buried beneath heavy snow.

The world was silent except for the soft howling of the cold wind.

Thick layers of white covered the ground, the rooftops, and the frozen corpses of those who had already succumbed to the plague.

In the middle of that desolate alley, a small figure lay half-buried in the snow.

It was a little girl.

Her lips had turned blue from the cold.

Her thin clothes were torn and filthy, and her breathing was so weak it was almost nonexistent.

Frost clung to her eyelashes, and her small body trembled faintly with every shallow breath.

A strange black spot had already appeared on her pale cheek... an ominous mark that slowly spread beneath her skin like living ink.

But then... footsteps approached through the snow.

A tall and broad cloaked man stopped in front of her.

He stood there for a long moment, looking down at the dying child in silence.

The deep hood concealed most of his face, yet one could tell he was a handsome man as his gaze remained fixed on the small, fragile life before him... especially on the ominous mark etched upon her.

’So this is Venerable Dreamless’s creation...’

Slowly, he crouched down.

His large hand reached out and gently took hold of her small, ice-cold fingers.

The contrast was almost cruel... his hand steady and warm, hers weak and nearly lifeless.

The little girl’s eyelids fluttered weakly, but she no longer had the strength to open them fully.

The tall cloaked man spoke in a quiet, almost gentle voice that drifted through the frozen air.

"...Oh, child. I can see it in your eyes... What is it that you seek?"

For a moment, there was only the sound of the winter wind sweeping through the snow-filled alley.

The little girl’s eyelids trembled weakly.

Her lips, already turning blue from the cold, parted ever so slightly.

Then a faint, almost broken voice escaped her throat... so soft that it nearly vanished into the snow.

"...I want... to see..."

Her small fingers weakly curled around the man’s hand, as if clinging to the last thread of life.

"The plague..."

"The pain..."

"The sorrow..."

"...Everything... everything."

"...burn."

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[Here an illustration of Leng Qianxue pointing her sword straight at Peng Jianwei:]

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