"It was that father and son who destroyed your family and stole your life!"
Sun Jin's voice echoed relentlessly in Jiang Qingyi's ears.
"Impossible... Impossible..." Jiang Qingyi kept backing away, her face deathly pale.
"You must be lying to me! You have to be lying to me! You must be!" Jiang Qingyi's mind was in utter chaos; she couldn't believe what she was hearing.
She refused to believe her master was the son of her enemy.
And in that very moment, Sun Jin found an opening. A hidden weapon in his hand shot toward Jiang Qingyi!
But Jiang Qingyi simply tilted her head, and the hidden weapon grazed her hair.
Almost simultaneously, Jiang Qingyi brought her fingers together, forming a blade, and swiped at his neck.
"Ugh..."
Sun Jin clutched his neck as blood spurted from between his fingers.
"Help... help..." Sun Jin reached out a hand toward Jiang Qingyi, his pupils gradually dilating.
Jiang Qingyi stared at him, her eyes as still as stagnant water, showing no emotion.
A few breaths later, Sun Jin's hand fell limp to the ground. His eyes were wide open, staring ahead, as his blood stained the earth red.
"Qingyi! Are you all right?"
Xiao Mo had finally arrived.
When he saw his disciple's unharmed back and the corpses of the Blood Butterfly Pavilion Cultivators lying around her, Xiao Mo finally breathed a sigh of relief.
But upon hearing her master's voice, Jiang Qingyi's body trembled, and she slowly turned around.
The moment Xiao Mo saw her eyes, he stopped in his tracks.
Xiao Mo had never seen such a look in his disciple's eyes.
Qingyi's eyes were utterly devoid of light, as if her entire being had died, her very soul shattered.
"Qingyi, what happened?"
Xiao Mo took a step forward, but Jiang Qingyi unleashed a wave of Sword Qi that slashed the ground in front of him.
"Master... do you know?"
Jiang Qingyi spoke slowly, her voice seeming to rise from an abyss, filled with despair.
"I've actually been able to remember things since I was very young. I think it started when I was one year old.
I remember I had a very happy family.
My father was a fairly wealthy merchant. My mother was an ordinary woman, but she was gentle and loved me and my father very much.
When I was two, my mother gave birth to a little brother.
My little brother was adorable.
When he was one and a half, the first name he could say clearly was 'Big Sister'...
From the day I was born, I never knew what sorrow was.
But everything changed the year I turned four.
Several people burst into our home, and the moment they were inside, they began to slaughter everyone indiscriminately.
The guards, the servants, even the maid who took care of me—they were all killed.
The stone path flowed with blood, and the pond in the courtyard turned crimson.
My parents shoved me and my two-year-old brother into a cabinet.
They told us not to make a sound, not to come out no matter what happened outside.
Inside the cabinet, I held my little brother tightly, covering his eyes and ears.
Before long, we heard a commotion outside.
Through a crack in the cabinet, I watched with my own eyes as those people killed my parents!
Then, they found my brother and me.
Right in front of me!
They killed my little brother!
Master, do you know what it feels like to watch your family die one by one in front of you, knowing that no amount of begging will help?
They wouldn't even spare a two-year-old...
Master, do you know that kind of despair?"
Xiao Mo: "..."
As Jiang Qingyi recounted these events, Xiao Mo knew. She knew everything.
"My entire family was dead. Not a single person was left alive. I was taken to a courtyard.
In that courtyard, I saw so many people.
They tied me to a bed, took a knife, cut open my back, and removed one of my bones.
It hurt so much. It really, really hurt.
I was in so much pain that I passed out.
When I woke up, I was surrounded by corpses.
Later, I learned that the place where I had woken up was called the Chaotic Burial Mound...
I don't know how my wound healed, or how I even survived.
Perhaps the heavens took pity on me and had some passing Immortal heal me.
But I knew one thing: I had survived!
At that moment, I swore to the heavens that I would live, no matter what, and that I would avenge my parents and my little brother!
They killed my entire family, so I will kill their entire family!
I don't care if my enemy's family members are innocent—I won't spare a single one!
I will kill his son and his daughter right in front of him, and then I will slice him into a thousand pieces!
Every single one of them must die!"
Jiang Qingyi raised her head, her eyes filled with endless hatred.
"All these years, I have been secretly investigating who was responsible for my family's murder, but I never found any leads.
The house from back then was reduced to ashes.
But Master...
Just now, when I killed that man...
He said...
...that your father, Master, is the enemy who murdered my family.
He did it to transplant one of my bones into you, Master.
Master, is that true?
Is everything he said true?"
Xiao Mo: "..."
"Master! Was he lying?! Was he trying to deceive me?!"
Xiao Mo: "..."
Tears blurred Jiang Qingyi's vision. She gripped the Profound Frost Longsword tightly in her right hand and screamed, almost hysterically:
"Master! Answer me!"
"Master! Say something!"
Xiao Mo sighed, raised his head, and met Jiang Qingyi's gaze directly. "The man you killed was Sun Jin, one of the retainers of Prince Xiao's Mansion. Everything he said is true.
Prince Xiao's Mansion murdered your family, and I am the son of Prince Jing Xiao.
Your Sword Bone is inside my body."
Hearing her master's words, Jiang Qingyi shook her head. "No, none of this is real... None of it is real... Master, you're lying to me. You're lying to me too, aren't you..."
"Qingyi, it is the truth."
"Liar!" In an instant, the young woman raised her longsword and pointed it at Xiao Mo's face. "Then why did you save me back then?! Why did you bring me back to the mountain?! Why did you teach me your Sword Technique?! Why did you treat me like a brother or a father would?! Why?! WHY?!"
"Because I owed you," Xiao Mo said calmly. "I reached the Nascent Soul Realm at eighteen. I thought it was because of my own extraordinary talent, but it turned out to be because a young girl's Sword Bone had been transplanted into me. One day, a woman told me that girl hadn't died. So I left the Xiao Country Mansion to find you and compensate you."
"Compensate...? The son of the man who murdered my family saved me! Taught me his Sword Technique! Raised me! You should have just killed me instead!" Jiang Qingyi roared.
Xiao Mo slowly closed his eyes. "Then kill me. Fulfill your oath. It's what I owe you."
Staring at the man before her, Jiang Qingyi's longsword trembled in her hand as tears rolled down her cheeks and fell to the ground.
In the end, Xiao Mo only felt a gust of wind from a sword slash pass by him.
Xiao Mo slowly opened his eyes. A piece of fabric the young woman had cut from her skirt slowly drifted up into the air before him.
She held her longsword, turned, and walked away. Her voice drifted back from behind her:
"From this day forward, there is nothing between us..."