First Immortal of the Sword

Chapter 2148 – A Feather, a Past Life, a Fusion

Tu Youfang still hadn’t forgotten the three people they’d encountered riding along on a little flat boat.

The seemingly unassuming navigator had slain Pei Zhang, a Mid-Rank God of Red Pine Sword Mountain, with a snap of his fingers. It seemed no more difficult than crushing an ant!

This was far too astonishing. Tu Youfang couldn’t help but suspect that the three of them were really Master Gods!

The thought that he’d just invited three suspected Master Gods to join the Opening Origins Daoist Sect left his cheeks hot and stinging. He felt incomparably embarrassed.

At the same time, a tender-faced young woman stood in the corner of a warship. In her heart, she murmured, Father, I’ve already been chosen by a senior of the Opening Origins Daoist Sect. I’m on my way to continue my cultivation in the God Domain. If you’re watching from up there, I’m sure you’re happy for me.

Her name was Wen Ruoxue, and she was a Great Profound Stage cultivator. She’d spent an enormous amount of time exploring the River of Epochs in search of a chance to achieve divinity.

Now, she’d been fortunate enough to earn Tu Youfang’s recognition, and she was on her way to continue her cultivation in the Opening Origins Daoist Sect!!

This was the kind of good fortune she used to long for even in her dreams!

“Hm?” Wen Ruoxue was stunned.

She wasn’t sure when, but a feather floated onto the deck and landed not far from her.

It was damaged and burnt black.

Wen Ruoxue walked up to it and picked it up.

The moment she touched it, she felt a wondrous sensation, and the image of a black divine phoenix bathed in flame arose unbidden in her sea of consciousness!

……

The atmosphere in a dimly lit ancestral hall was stifled and oppressive.

Yi Daoxuan was just seven years old. He’d been placed atop an altar, his hands and feet thoroughly bound.

His father and a group of clan elders stood beside him.

“Father, taking my Nine Apertures Sword Meridian will help my big brother, right?” asked Yi Daoxuan.

“That’s right,” said his father, a thin, dignified man.

“If your brother gains the Nine Apertures Sword Meridian, he’ll be able to use them to make rapid progress in his pursuit of the Grand Dao and become a prominent expert!” said Yi Daoxuan’s father, his eyes bright with longing. “That will in turn benefit the entire family!”

But the seven-year-old Yi Daoxuan shook his head. “But Father, all I want is for Mother to return to my side.”

His father smiled. “I promised you, didn’t I? I naturally won’t go back on my word. Little Xuan, once we’ve extracted your Nine Apertures Sword Meridian, I’ll naturally let you reunite with your mother.”

“Mm!” Yi Daoxuan nodded and smiled wholeheartedly.

His father and the clan higher-ups smiled too.

“Be brave, Little Xuan.” A cold-faced old man walked up with a sharp, glinting knife and plunged it into Yi Daoxuan’s chest.

Blood splattered, and agony coursed through his entire body.

Yi Daoxuan quickly fell unconscious.

On that day, Yi Daoxuan’s father extracted his innate talent, the Nine Apertures Sword Meridian, and placed it into his older son, Yi Daoxuan’s brother.

When Yi Daoxuan woke, he found himself alone in a dark, damp, underground cell.

He was only seven years old. He in no way understood what had happened to him.

There was no sign of his mother, either.

All he knew was that his father hadn’t kept his promise. He was upset about this for a long time.

During his third month of confinement, Yi Daoxuan fell gravely ill. The disease attacked his vitals, and he was on the brink of death.

It was then that he finally saw his father once more.

However, his father’s expression was overcast and full of hatred. As soon as he saw Yi Daoxuan, he cursed him out. He called Yi Daoxuan a bastard, and accused him of hurting his older brother!

Yi Daoxuan was already sick and on the brink of death. He couldn’t for the life of him understand why his father was acting like this.

All he knew was that he was sad, that he was about to die, and he would never see his mother again.

In the end, his father slapped him across the face in a fit of rage, and all traces of life fled Yi Daoxuan’s little body.

His father thought him dead, so he arranged for a servant to bring his corpse to the wilderness, dig a hole, and bury him.

But Yi Daoxuan wasn’t dead.

A graverobber called Ol’ Blade just happened to be passing through. He opened the grave, hoping to pilfer riches from Yi Daoxuan’s corpse.

Against all expectations, the “corpse” woke up.

Ol’ Blade took it for a miracle and said, “Alright, it seems we’re connected by fate. I’ll raise you up, and you can look after me in your old age!”

From that day forth, Yi Daoxuan followed Ol’ Blade.

Unfortunately, Ol’ Blade was just a second-rate petty crook. When Yi Daoxuan was just ten years old, he bumbled into a grave laden with traps and died a brutal death.

Yi Daoxuan was left alone once more.

In the years that followed, Yi Daoxuan wandered the world alone. Sometimes he fought wild dogs over food, or competed for territory with beggars. At a tender young age, he experienced all the cruelty and suffering the world of men had to offer.

Eventually, a human trafficker kidnapped him and sold him to a mine.

Yi Daoxuan, then fourteen years old, was determined and skillful. One of the mine’s bosses took notice of him, made him his subordinate, and trained him up.

His name was “Old Yang.” It was from Old Yang that Yi Daoxuan first received an opportunity to cultivate and began his pursuit of the Grand Dao.

When Yi Daoxuan was seventeen years old, Old Yang died in a territorial dispute. After his death, his killer hacked his corpse into countless pieces.

Yi Daoxuan was overcome with grief.

During the two years that followed, he tempered himself to the extreme, braving grave peril in the name of growing stronger. His cultivation advanced rapidly, until finally, he managed to avenge Old Yang and kill every last one of his enemies!

Having achieved revenge, Yi Daoxuan returned to his hometown.

He couldn’t forget the brutality he’d endured at just seven years of age.

Nor could he forget how his father had “beaten him to death” and hastily buried him in an unmarked grave.

At nineteen years of age, when he looked back on everything he’d experienced back then, he discovered numerous details that didn’t add up, so he went home to uncover the truth!

But the truth was often the cruelest of all.

When Yi Daoxuan returned to the clan, he bided his time to avoid alerting his clansmen. Finally, he seized an opportunity to capture the elder who’d personally cut out his Nine Apertures Sword Meridian.

It was from the elder that Yi Daoxuan learned the full story.

Yi Daoxuan’s mother had been a songstress at a brothel. As beautiful as she was, her status was lowly.

Yi Daoxuan’s father had been amorous in his youth, and he made her his own by force. Yi Daoxuan was the unintended result.

For the sake of her unborn child, his mother endured the bitter humiliation and moved into the Yi Family estate.

However, due to her lowly status, others frequently insulted and humiliated her. Even the ordinary servants dared to order her about. Her plight was incomparably bitter.

Yi Daoxuan’s father wasn’t the least bit concerned. A whore, that’s all. If she hadn’t been pregnant with his child, he’d have kicked her out a long time ago.

It was only when Yi Daoxuan was born that his father bothered to visit.

But that was the end of it. Even Yi Daoxuan’s name was chosen for him by his mother.

Mother and son were like outsiders living beneath another’s roof.

However, Yi Daoxuan’s mother did her utmost to protect him. She taught him to read and write, and how to behave. Prior to Yi Daoxuan’s seventh year, although he and his mother lived in poverty, they were happy.

But all of that changed when Yi Daoxuan turned seven.

Every scion of the Yi Family had their bones and talent tested at seven years old. Yi Daoxuan, as the illegitimate son of the family head, was qualified to participate.

The test results revealed that Yi Daoxuan had an innate Nine Apertures Sword Meridian!

This discovery shook the entire clan.

At the time, Yi Daoxuan was happy. He thought that his talent might change his and his mother’s situation.

He would never have guessed that his talent would hurt him and his mother instead.

That very night, his father sent someone to take Yi Daoxuan’s mother away and kill her.

Yi Daoxuan’s father, meanwhile, lied to him and said that so long as he cooperated and let them extract his Nine Apertures Sword Meridian, he and his mother would soon be reunited.

Yi Daoxuan naturally agreed.

But it was all a trick. Yi Daoxuan’s father just wanted to extract his illegitimate son’s Nine Apertures Sword Meridian and transplant it into his eldest son, Yi Leng, instead!

Unfortunately, the transplant failed. Yi Leng’s physique was extraordinary, but he wasn’t strong enough to withstand the power of the Nine Apertures Sword Meridian. The resulting backlash reduced him to a muddle-headed fool…

That was what led to Yi Daoxuan’s father slapping him to “death” in a fit of rage.

After learning the truth…

Yi Daoxuan was left with a chest full of grief and hatred.

His mother had been treated so cruelly all on account of her lowly status, and his father killed her without hesitation, all for the sake of extracting his Nine Apertures Sword Meridian!

Why would he do that? Why couldn’t he leave Yi Daoxuan and his mother a path to life?

That very day, the enraged Yi Daoxuan fought his way into the Yi Family estate and killed everyone involved in his mother’s death, as well as everyone who’d participated in the extraction of his Nine Apertures Sword Meridian.

He killed his father, too.

Patricide!!

Killing one’s own father went against human decency. Such a grave breach of filial piety enraged both men and gods.

But Yi Daoxuan in no way considered that man his father!

This was the man who’d killed his mother and come dangerously close to killing him, too. How could someone who hastily buried his own son in an unmarked grave be worthy of the title “father?”

It was also on that day that he finally retrieved his original Nine Apertures Sword Meridian!

……

Boom!

Fleeting visions from Yi Daoxuan’s memories flashed through Su Yi’s head like fireworks.

It was as if he’d become Yi Daoxuan and were reliving his life.

All of Yi Daoxuan’s joys, sorrows, reunions, and separations flooded endlessly into Su Yi’s mind.

Yi Daoxuan really had lived a bitter life full of misfortune. His family’s abuse was only the beginning. He was later tricked and harmed by his sect, betrayed by friends and family, and stabbed in the back by his allies.

It seemed as if he’d experienced every obstacle and misfortune the world had to offer. He endured so many heavy, cruel setbacks that he lost track.

As these memories and experiences flooded into Su Yi’s mind, even he almost dared not believe that someone so unfortunate could exist in this world!

But as the memories flowed into him, he found that he couldn’t afford to give the matter any further thought. Yi Daoxuan’s memories, experiences, and Dao Imprint were flooding into him and becoming his.

The two of them were ultimately the same person.

It was just that now, two starkly different lives were fusing into one!