Chapter 127: Hidden Array

The spiritual energy in the surrounding air surged violently. Ye Su had no time to ponder the mystery of You Fushi’s true form; at this rate, even though they were tens of thousands of miles away, some grand master would likely sense the anomaly.

Ye Su desperately racked her brain, recalling every talisman array and formation she had ever seen, searching for a way to conceal his aura.

Nothing. Still nothing.

She had never come across a single array or talisman capable of completely masking a demon’s aura.

---

Inside the Qianji Sect’s Library Repository, the one-armed man suddenly looked up. He faintly sensed a powerful fluctuation of spiritual energy coming from Jiuxuan Peak. It wasn't Zhang Fengfeng’s aura.

Yu Fenghai set down the book in his hand and instantly teleported up toward Jiuxuan Peak.

At the same time, Zhang Fengfeng noticed the anomaly as well. He walked quickly down the mountain, muttering to himself, "I'm barely over two hundred years old, and I'm already starting to hallucinate."

Just as Ye Su found herself completely out of options, a brilliant golden light suddenly erupted within the room. Rotating arrays rose from the floor, the roof beams, and the walls, and every trace of You Fushi’s aura instantly vanished.

It was as if someone had set up this formation here long ago, specifically to block his aura.

……

"Gatekeeper Yu, what brings you here?" Zhang Fengfeng asked as he strolled down and ran into Yu Fenghai.

"There was a strange fluctuation of spiritual energy here just now. I came to see what happened." Yu Fenghai looked Zhang Fengfeng up and down. "You... you look much better like this."

Back then, a man barely in his two hundreds had looked decrepit, shriveled, and wretched, playing the part of a dying sect to perfection.

"Master," Ye Su said as she walked out of the courtyard. She looked slightly surprised to see the two of them. "Gatekeeper Yu."

"My eldest disciple!" Zhang Fengfeng looked at Ye Su in pleasant surprise. "Why are you back?!"

Just a moment ago, he had assumed he was losing his mind to imagine a spiritual energy fluctuation.

"We came back to pick something up," Ye Su said without batting an eye.

"Who else is back?" Zhang Fengfeng rubbed his hands together. "Yi Xuan hasn't been back in ages."

"It's You Fushi," Ye Su said. "Junior Brother Yi is still competing. The two of us just finished our match, so we made a quick trip back."

Yu Fenghai swept his gaze across the courtyard. Finding nothing out of the ordinary, he could only deduce, "Did you use a teleportation scroll to get here?"

Ye Su nodded. "Yes, we used a rather unique scroll."

"Congratulations on making it to the top three," Yu Fenghai said, withdrawing his gaze and speaking earnestly to Ye Su. "You are both very formidable."

He occasionally kept an eye on the Grand Sect Tournament and knew that Ye Su had already defeated Guliang Tian.

"We actually took the top two spots, and Lu Chenhan lost as well," Ye Su said with a smile. In front of her own sect members, she made sure to say things that would make them proud.

Sure enough, a rare softness appeared on Yu Fenghai’s usually stern face, though he didn't stay long. "I still have books left to organize. I'll head back to the Library Repository first."

As for Zhang Fengfeng, he poked his head into the courtyard and asked, entirely unfazed, "Is Little You sleeping in the room again?"

"He just finished a match against Lu Chenhan, and his spiritual energy is completely drained," Ye Su explained.

Zhang Fengfeng shook his head. "Then why did you two come back now? There's no spiritual energy here at the Qianji Sect. It would have been much better to stay in Kunlun."

Even as he said this, he immediately pulled out some spirit stones from his spatial pouch. "I still have a few spirit stones left here."

"Master, you haven't used them up yet?" Ye Su pushed them back. "If you don't start cultivating properly, your disciples are going to surpass you."

"Aiya, Huang Erqian sends spirit stones and materials over every now and then, and we've started taking orders for artifact refining. We have more than enough," Zhang Fengfeng said guiltily.

"Keep them for yourself, Master. We still have plenty of spirit stones; we earned quite a bit in Kunlun." Ye Su glanced inside. "Would you like to come in?"

Zhang Fengfeng waved his hand. "Get some rest while you have the time, and head back to Kunlun early. What if they can't find you when the Grand Sect Tournament ends?"

"Understood. We'll head back as soon as we grab our things," Ye Su replied.

"Alright, I'll head back first then. I still have a dharma weapon left to finish refining."

Before Zhang Fengfeng could leave, Ye Su called out to him again, "Master, have the five rooms here always been occupied by past generations of disciples?"

"Yes, only the five most outstanding disciples are permitted to live in this courtyard on Jiuxuan Peak, though later on, we couldn't even fill all five," Zhang Fengfeng nodded, sounding a bit proud. "It wasn't until I took you all in that the rooms were finally filled, and as it turns out, you're all quite incredible."

"Among the ancestors who used to live in my room, did any of them know array formations?" Ye Su asked tentatively.

"Array formations?" Zhang Fengfeng thought hard. "Quite a few, actually. The Qianji Sect's peak era is divided into before the Era of the Fallen Gods and after the Era of the Fallen Gods. I'm not too clear about the early days, but the peak era after the fallen gods was over five hundred years ago. My master said they knew a bit of everything back then, and some people dedicated themselves entirely to studying arrays."

Over five hundred years ago...

Ye Su ran through the grand masters who had fallen during that period in her mind, but none of the few options seemed to fit You Fushi.

"Alright, you just get back and all you do is ask questions. Go get some rest early." Zhang Fengfeng turned and walked away with his hands behind his back. He wanted to talk more with his eldest disciple, but since the tournament wasn't over yet, he wanted her to rest as much as possible while she was back.

Only after Yu Fenghai and Zhang Fengfeng had both left did Ye Su turn around and head back into the room.

The moment she stepped inside, she was utterly stunned.

The room was no longer an ordinary room; instead, a silver waterfall cascaded down into a deep, dark pool below, accompanied by the faint chirping of birds around them. No matter how she looked at it, it was a hidden paradise.

Ye Su took a step back and slammed the door shut.

Where exactly had things gone wrong? She had lived in this room for over a decade and had never noticed a single thing out of place.

How could an array suddenly appear to conceal an aura, and even open up a pocket dimension?

Standing at the doorway, Ye Su stared at the weathered door. Could You Fushi have been some grand master of the Qianji Sect before his reincarnation? Is this room originally his?

This hypothesis was the most logical. Otherwise, it couldn't explain why the array and the sudden dimension appeared, or why You Fushi himself had wanted to return to the Qianji Sect so badly. It was likely a subconscious urge from before his reincarnation.

Ye Su stood at the door for a long time before finally opening it and stepping back inside.

It was still that pocket dimension that looked like a hidden paradise.

However, the moment she stepped onto a boulder by the edge of the pool, a stunning, brilliant black tail sliced through the water. It drenched Ye Su completely before diving back under.

Soaked from head to toe, Ye Su tilted her head and wiped the water from her shoulder. Realizing it was a spiritual spring, she fell silent.

The water was far from calm; something seemed to be thrashing violently beneath the surface.

Ye Su recalled the long black tail she had just seen. At any rate, it wasn't a mermaid’s tail—it was much slenderer and lacked fins.

Most importantly... it looked inexplicably familiar.

This was a highly unusual experience for Ye Su. Her memory was exceptionally good, and she rarely forgot anything.

If it felt familiar, she must have seen it somewhere before. But the fact that she couldn't pinpoint it suggested she hadn't actually seen it.

Once again, the long black tail broke the surface. It seemed to intentionally splash the spiritual spring water onto Ye Su. She instinctively reached out to touch the tip of the tail. The tip trembled instantly, swiftly retreating beneath the water.

—It was a snake's tail.

The eldest senior sister, having touched the tip of the tail, finally had a delayed realization. She suddenly remembered the beautiful little black snake she had seen by a mountain spring outside Dinghai City.

Aside from the size, they were practically identical.

Ye Su froze in place, recalling her junior brother's inexplicable fondness for the Mistflower Fang. So... she had actually crafted a replica of his true form.

For once, the eldest senior sister's brain completely short-circuited. Standing on the boulder, she failed to notice that the pool had stopped churning violently, leaving only expanding ripples on the surface.

After an unknown amount of time, Ye Su snapped out of it. The dimension had grown completely still, save for the sound of the cascading waterfall. The pool held an eerie silence.

"Junior Brother?"

Ye Su dropped to one knee, attempting to extend her divine sense into the water to investigate. She encountered none of the resistance she expected, only to find You Fushi drifting at the bottom of the pool, seemingly unconscious.

She dove into the water immediately, sinking to the bottom to grab him.

Perhaps because they were underwater, Ye Su felt her junior brother looked even paler than usual. Just as she was about to pull him up, You Fushi suddenly opened his eyes.

—They were a pair of purple eyes.

Ye Su stared into his eyes, realizing that her previous fleeting impressions had not been illusions after all. Her junior brother’s irises really were purple.

Beneath the water, You Fushi gazed at Ye Su as if confirming something. Then, holding her hand, he swam further down toward the bottom of the pool. He pointed to a shed tail lying there and said, "Keep it."

The shed black tail lay quietly on the pool floor. As stray beams of light filtered down, it resembled gilded black armor, every single scale gleaming brilliantly.

This was a shed snake skin. As an artifact refiner, Ye Su was intimately familiar with such materials; in the compendium of beast materials, many shed snake skins were considered top-tier resources. Yet she had never seen snake scales this dazzling, even after being shed.

When she looked back, You Fushi had already closed his eyes against her, looking thoroughly exhausted.

Ye Su brought him back to the surface, catching sight of a few scattered scales remaining at the bottom of the pool out of the corner of her eye.

You Fushi wore a loose, illusory black robe that clung to his body. The moment they left the water, the spiritual spring water on them vanished completely.

Ye Su laid him down on the boulder, then dove back to the bottom of the pool to gather every last one of the fallen scales.

Emerging from the pool, Ye Su cleaned herself up. She felt her spiritual mansion beginning to expand once more; the spiritual energy concentration here was so high it had practically materialized.

Ye Su helped You Fushi sit up. She realized she could no longer see through his cultivation realm at all. Has he recovered his power from before his reincarnation?

When You Fushi opened his eyes again, they were still purple.

He tilted his head to look at Ye Su, then suddenly leaned closer, resting his chin on her shoulder.

"Junior Brother?" Ye Su asked, slightly surprised.

"Ye Su, they are coming," You Fushi uttered inexplicably, before completely losing consciousness and falling into a deep sleep.

"They?" Ye Su was baffled.

Right then, the array began to lose its effect, and the entire dimension dissolved. Ye Su and You Fushi found themselves back on the bed, as if nothing had happened.

Ye Su watched with her own eyes as You Fushi's cultivation realm plummeted continuously, until it stabilized at the exact same level as hers—the early stage of Soul Transformation.

Perhaps because of You Fushi’s warning, or perhaps for some other reason, Ye Su had never felt such an urgent need to raise her cultivation level. It felt as though an invisible, unknown pressure was bearing down on her.

"Eldest Senior Sister, why aren't you back yet? The Grand Sect Tournament is over!" Xia Er’s voice echoed through the communication jade talisman. "The top ten have to gather at the Kunlun Grand Hall tomorrow morning."

Huang Erqian’s voice followed immediately after: "Boss Ye, do you need me to use the Myriad Realms Scroll?"

Ye Su looked back at You Fushi, who was still fast asleep, and replied to Huang Erqian, "Come over tomorrow morning."

You Fushi’s face rested against her hand, his long lashes slightly closed, looking as though he were merely having a peaceful slumber.

Fortunately, when Huang Erqian arrived early the next morning, You Fushi woke up. It was as though nothing out of the ordinary had occurred; his eye color had returned to black, and he didn't even remember what he had said.