Bao Gu couldn’t get through to Yu Mi. On top of that, she noticed that the Demon Saint and Zi Yunshu hadn’t immediately informed Yu Mi that she’d returned. When she asked about Yu Mi, they hid it, only saying they’d explain later. Her heart tightened. She grabbed Zi Yunshu, who was about to follow the Demon Saint into the pill room, and asked:
“Little Martial Aunt, is Senior Sister alright?”
So much had happened after Bao Gu left that Zi Yunshu didn’t even know where to start. She thought for a moment, then nodded.
“She’s not doing badly. All these years she’s been wandering outside cultivating. She’s just half a step away from entering the Tribulation Stage and is looking for a chance to break through.”
Hearing that Yu Mi was fine, Bao Gu let out a long breath of relief.
“After I left, did Senior Sister… was she very upset?”
She had imagined Yu Mi’s life after her departure countless times, and the more she imagined it, the less she dared to think about it. She knew Yu Mi would not have had it easy.
Zi Yunshu gave Bao Gu a quick sideways glance and said nothing. Instead, she turned her head toward Zi Tianjun, who had hurried over after hearing the news, and called out:
“Dad.”
Zi Tianjun wore a purple robe and carried an extraordinary aura. His face looked as young as twenty-seven or twenty-eight, his eyes deep and vast like an unfathomable abyss. Just by standing there, he exuded the pressure of someone who had been in a high position for a very long time. At the moment, he was staring fixedly at Bao Gu. Then he burst into a hearty laugh.
“Good!”
He strode up to Bao Gu, smiling.
“It’s good that you’re back.”
If Bao Gu hadn’t recognized his features, and if Zi Yunshu hadn’t just called him “Dad,” she would almost not have dared to believe this was Zi Tianjun. After more than five hundred years, his appearance in her memory had grown a little blurry. Her deepest impression of him was of her Grandmaster fussing over every last detail of Xuantian Sect like a housekeeper. In the cultivation world, aside from the title “Sect Master of Xuantian Sect,” the name “Zi Tianjun” had very little presence. Yet now, just standing there casually, he gave off a mountain-like pressure that was impossible to ignore.
She suddenly realized just how many things five hundred years could change. She called out respectfully:
“Grandmaster.”
Then she bowed.
Zi Tianjun’s face was full of joy.
“It’s good that you’re back, it’s good that you’re back. No need for so much ceremony. I heard you brought someone back with you. Who is it?”
“It’s a Ba,” Bao Gu said.
Zi Tianjun’s smile froze.
“A real Ba?”
Bao Gu sharply sensed that her Grandmaster seemed to have his hackles raised in horror.
“Mm,” she replied. “In a bit I’ll have her serve you tea. By seniority, she should call you Great-Grandmaster Taixuan. She likes eating spirit pills and precious medicines, so don’t forget to give this junior of your junior a meeting gift.”
Zi Tianjun stood there, completely stunned, unable to process what Bao Gu had just revealed.
Seeing him standing like a wooden post, Bao Gu called softly:
“Grandmaster…”
“You’re saying,” Zi Tianjun asked incredulously, “that you brought a Ba into Xuantian Sect, and she formally acknowledged you as her master?”
“Put ‘nominal’ in front of ‘master,’” Bao Gu said. “She picked up a cheap master, and I picked up a cheap disciple. We met by beating each other up.”
Zi Tianjun stared at Bao Gu deeply. Her face and expressions were the same as ever; even her aura and bearing felt just like in the past. And yet he could vaguely sense a depth he couldn’t see through. He knew better than anyone what terrifying explosive power hid beneath Bao Gu’s weak-looking exterior. Back when she was still at the Golden Core Stage, plenty of people had underestimated her because of her realm and ended up paying dearly for it.
Now Bao Gu had returned from the Void itself and even subjugated a Ba. Her strength and combat power were probably so high it would make people’s scalps go numb.
“What realm are you at now?” he asked. “And how strong is your battle power?”
Bao Gu naturally wouldn’t hide her strength in front of her own Grandmaster and Little Martial Aunt. She answered honestly:
“I just finished getting hit by two great tribulations of the Tribulation Stage. The first time, the Xuantian Sword took the lightning for me. Probably because the Xuantian Sword’s grade is too high, it directly drew down a Violet Cloud Thunder Tribulation, but the sword took all the thunder and absorbed it. I didn’t actually experience the tempering of Heaven’s lightning for the first Tribulation Stage.
“The second time was when I stepped onto a boundary-breaking gate that could lead to the upper realm. Because that gate is the place closest to the Heavenly Dao’s laws, the Heavenly Dao sensed something was off with me and sent down a make-up tribulation. I’ve killed too many, so I drew eighty-one strikes of Blood Calamity Heavenly Thunder.”
Zi Yunshu’s face instantly went green.
“Tribulation Stage—first level is Violet Cloud Thunder Tribulation, second level is Blood Calamity Heavenly Thunder. For the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth levels, what kind of lightning is there left to fall?”
The entire Tribulation Stage was essentially a process of getting repeatedly struck by lightning. Bao Gu was just at her first tribulation, and she’d already drawn down some of the heaviest, most terrifying bolts. The higher you climbed, the stronger the lightning became. With Violet Cloud and Blood Calamity already used, what more could possibly come? One more step up and it would be Heaven’s Wrath, the kind where you either die or die trying.
Cultivation, from mortal to immortal, was a rebellion against Heaven. The moment you stepped into the Tribulation Stage, you started transforming into an immortal. That was something the heavens did not permit, so every advancement would inevitably draw the Heavenly Dao’s strike.
Bao Gu didn’t take Zi Yunshu’s worry to heart.
“I don’t think I’ve done anything so enraging to Heaven and man that I deserve Heaven’s Wrath,” she said. “I’ve already taken Violet Cloud and Blood Calamity lightning. Whatever comes next should be about the same.”
As they spoke, more people arrived. It was Feng Yi and a young man in a dark robe. Their strength felt about the same—one sharp and handsome, the other steady and deep as an abyss.
Bao Gu bowed to Feng Yi, then looked at the young man. He seemed very familiar. She thought for a moment, then her face lit up and she bowed again.
“Greetings, Martial Uncle Chen Yu.”
Of her master’s generation, after that great calamity of Xuantian Sect, only “one and a half” had survived. The “one” was Feng Yi. The “half” was her Martial Uncle Chen Jue—acting sect master when she entered Xuantian Sect and the personal disciple of the traitor Nan Yi. During the calamity, Chen Jue had perished together with the enemy, and his soul had been fused into a flood dragon’s bones and refined into a weapon spirit, saving Xuantian Sect from disaster. Later, he had taken a Nascent Soul Fruit from her; she didn’t know whether he’d become a ghost cultivator or entered the sword path through weapon fusion.
Judging from his current bearing and sword intent, he’d clearly taken the sword path, and had already reached a considerable level.
Bao Gu had only exchanged a couple of words with Feng Yi and Chen Yu when another man hurried over. He first bowed respectfully to Zi Tianjun, Chen Yu, Feng Yi, and Zi Yunshu, then turned to Bao Gu and, unable to hide his excitement, bowed again.
“Yu Jianming pays respect to Martial Aunt.”
“Where’s your master?” Bao Gu asked.
“My master has been roaming outside for many years,” Yu Jianming answered. “She comes back every year in the first month, leaves for Shadowveil City in the second, and the rest of the time her whereabouts are unpredictable.”
“Is she well?” Bao Gu asked.
“Both well… and not so well,” Yu Jianming said.
“Where is she now?” Bao Gu asked.
“When this disciple came, I already contacted Master. She’s in Forget-Worry City, chasing down a demonic cultivator,” Yu Jianming replied.
Bao Gu frowned in puzzlement. Yu Jianming could contact Yu Mi, yet she couldn’t? She took out her own transmission jade and tried again, but still got no response. Her brows tightened.
Yu Jianming then pulled out his transmission jades—one after another, piling up in his hand. Feng Menglong, Hua Sheng, and a whole bunch of people Bao Gu knew and didn’t know were all asking him if Bao Gu had really returned, and they were all gathered in Lingyun Hall.
There were so many people contacting him that Yu Jianming simply couldn’t keep up. He explained the situation to Bao Gu.
“Martial Aunt, many of our fellow disciples have rushed to Lingyun Hall to ask about you. How should this disciple reply to them?”
“I’ll pay them a visit another day,” Bao Gu said. “I want to see your master first.”
She turned to glance at Zi Tianjun and the others.
Seeing that Bao Gu was still the same after more than five hundred years, none of them found it strange. Zi Tianjun said:
“Go, then.”
The moment his words fell, he suddenly felt a presence appear beside Bao Gu, as if out of nowhere. That figure had given him such a fright he almost jumped. He looked more closely and saw it was a cute girl of about fifteen or sixteen, with a soft, innocent face. She was currently clinging to Bao Gu’s arm, looking up at her with hopeful eyes.
“Um… you’re going alone?” she asked. “I’ll go with you! Mm, I’ll go with you. Don’t worry, I won’t hit her. I promise I won’t hit her.”
The Demon Saint had just stepped out of her own courtyard when she saw that the Ba, who’d been in her pill room a moment ago, was now suddenly standing at Bao Gu’s side. She froze mid-step and stopped dead at the gate. Her yard only had one path in or out. When had the Ba who’d been behind her gotten ahead of her? She hadn’t sensed a thing.
Bao Gu patted the Ba’s hand and gently pulled her arm free.
“This is your Great-Grandmaster Taixuan, the sect master of Xuantian Sect,” she said. “This is your Grand Martial Uncle, elder of the Punishment Hall. This is your Grand Martial Uncle Chen Yu. And this is your… senior brother, Yu Jianming.”
The Ba swept her gaze over everyone, then frowned.
“How come you have so many relatives?” she asked. “And they’re all higher seniority than me. Do you have any who are lower?”
Yu Jianming coughed lightly.
“Uh… junior sister, I have seven disciples and more than thirty grand-disciples. They’re all lower in seniority than you.”
The Ba nodded in satisfaction, straightened her back, and stared seriously at Yu Jianming.
“Then have them line up in a row later,” she said. “Each one holding a Revival Pill—wait, no, five Revival Pills—to pay respects to me, their… Martial Aunt, right?”
She wasn’t entirely sure if that was the right title, so she turned her head to ask Bao Gu.
Zi Tianjun, Feng Yi, and Chen Yu were all staring at the Ba with inscrutable expressions. They had personally lived through that catastrophe caused by the Ba. Now the culprit herself was standing right in front of them in this form. The impact on their worldview was so overwhelming that they were all a bit dazed.
Yu Jianming was completely speechless toward this junior sister who’d suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
“Junior Sister, as Martial Aunt’s disciple, you can’t possibly be short on spirit treasures and precious medicines. I—”
He hadn’t finished before this brand-new junior sister of his cut him off righteously.
“Maybe I’m not short,” she said, “but I’m hungry every single day with no spirit treasures or precious medicines to eat!”
Bao Gu didn’t even want to respond to her. Did the Ba not feel the slightest twinge of guilt saying that?
Yu Jianming choked, then suddenly remembered—wasn’t the disciple his Martial Aunt had brought back supposed to be that legendary Ba? Was she? Looking like this?
He stared at the Ba, full of doubt, then turned to Bao Gu, silently asking for confirmation with his eyes.
Right now, what Bao Gu wanted most was to stuff the Ba into her oversized storage bag.
But she knew that was impossible.
