Ning Xiu was choked by the smoke and coughed several times, but still widened his eyes in amazement to look at the towering fire.

“Mother~” He was held in Chu Jun’s embrace, hugging Chu Jun’s neck tightly, calling him softly.

“Hmm?” Chu Jun turned his head to look at him.

Ning Xiu pointed at the fire, speaking in his childish voice, “So many~ white white~ crying~”

“Mm.” Chu Jun held him and turned in another direction. “If you don’t like it, don’t look.”

Ning Xiu looked around. “Where~ Father~ go?”

“He went to find someone.” Chu Jun’s tone was indifferent.

“Uncle~ Fang?” Ning Xiu tilted his head.

“Mm.” Chu Jun carried him further away from the fire. “Do you remember everything I just taught you?”

Ning Xiu nodded happily, a large ball of brilliant golden spiritual power appearing in his palm. He waved his little hand, wrapping it around a cluster of green leaves, then sent it into Chu Jun’s sleeve. “Da!”

Like this!

Chu Jun said, “Be careful yourself. Don’t leave even a bit in your hands, understand?”

Ning Xiu spread his little hands to show him. “Mother~ none~”

Chu Jun pinched his little hands. “Not bad.”

Then he stuffed a candy into his mouth.

“Ah~” Ning Xiu’s eyes lit up, and he obediently kissed Chu Jun’s face, whispering, “Can’t~ tell Father~ he’ll~ get angry~”

“Mm.” Chu Jun nodded.

Ning Xiu ate the candy with complete satisfaction. When the candy in his mouth was almost completely dissolved, he finally saw his father.

Ning Buwei had a dark expression on his face, still dragging someone in his hand. That person’s clothes were burned to tatters, his face was streaked with black and gray. Whether from being smoked or from grief, his eyes were completely red.

Ning Buwei released him and patted the ash off his clothes.

Fang Wanchen stared blankly at the fire for a while, then vigorously wiped his face and turned to bow to Ning Buwei, his voice hoarse, “Thank you, Brother Chengfeng, for saving my life. I’ve caused trouble for you and Brother Chu.”

Ning Buwei stared at him coldly. “What you’re doing is meaningless.”

Fang Wanchen lowered his head in silence.

They already knew the truth about the fire in Yuquan Village all those years ago, but the illusion hadn’t ended. The illusion was gradually collapsing. If they couldn’t find a way out before the fire was extinguished, their only fate would be to turn to ash along with the illusion.

Ning Buwei drew the Suzaku knife. “At this point, making those vengeful souls disappear is the only way.”

Just as he was about to act, Fang Wanchen suddenly said, “Brother Chengfeng, wait!”

Ning Buwei looked at him with unfriendly eyes. “You—”

“I found this in Pei Wu’s tomb!” Fang Wanchen opened his palm. It was a jade pendant identical to the one hanging at his waist.

Only one was an illusion object, and the other existed in reality.

“Perhaps… this jade pendant is exactly the same as the one I’m wearing.” Fang Wanchen tried to combine the jade pendant in his hand with the one at his waist.

As the two jade pendants drew closer and closer, the surrounding illusion began to gradually distort. This time Ning Buwei didn’t stop him. Just as the two jade pendants were about to completely merge, a sudden gust of wind swept through.

The jade pendant in Fang Wanchen’s hand fell into a pale hand.

Fang Wanchen’s eyes were blinded by the wind. He raised his sleeve to block it, and when he lowered it, he found that a stranger had suddenly appeared before him.

“Who are you?” He instinctively stepped back.

Pei Heguang glanced at the jade pendant at his waist, looked toward Ning Buwei and Chu Jun on the opposite side, and smiled. “Chengfeng, Venerable Jinghe, it’s been a while.”

“Pei Heguang.” Ning Buwei’s gaze toward him was particularly complex.

This time Pei Heguang didn’t give him the ambiguous illusion that he was Ning Xingyuan. He just smiled with some regret. “You never wanted to call me and Xingyuan ‘brother.’ Xingyuan always mentioned it.”

Ning Buwei stared at him coldly. “In the end—”

“In the end, which one is Xingyuan and which one is me?” Pei Heguang finished the words he hadn’t completed, smiling. “Sometimes we ourselves can’t tell the difference, let alone you. However, Xingyuan and his companion vine were inseparable most of the time.”

But as Pei Heguang said, they themselves couldn’t tell the difference. Those memories that were too distant for Ning Buwei—he couldn’t distinguish when the vine was present and when it wasn’t.

“How exactly did Ning Xingyuan die?” Ning Buwei gripped the Suzaku knife in his hand tighter. “Did you do something to him?”

Pei Heguang sighed softly, helplessly. “Chengfeng, why ask when you already know the answer.”

The Suzaku narrow knife in Ning Buwei’s hand trembled slightly, then was forcibly suppressed by his great effort.

“You can kill me.” Pei Heguang smiled very calmly. “But how do you know… whether the one you’re killing is really the Ning Xingyuan you think he is?”

The suppressed anger in Ning Buwei’s eyes almost erupted. He gritted his teeth. “What did Ning Xingyuan do to make you hate him so much? The matter of your adoptive parents and younger brother wasn’t his fault!”

“Of course it wasn’t his fault. Xingyuan was also my brother, my blood brother from the same mother. He treated me extremely well. How could I hate him.” Pei Heguang sighed. “You know this—Xingyuan as a person… no one could bring themselves to hate him. He was too good.”

“Some things in this world can’t be explained simply by love and hate. There are always many times when we have no choice.” Pei Heguang looked toward Chu Jun standing to the side, smiling with deep meaning. “For example, some people seem to have deep, unwavering feelings for you, but actually they’ve been using you from beginning to end…

Am I right, Venerable Jinghe?”

Chu Jun’s gaze grew slightly cold.

“Speak clearly if you have something to say!” Ning Buwei looked at Pei Heguang somewhat irritably.

This kind of ambiguous instigation might be fine coming from others, but from Pei Heguang, especially since he had once assumed Ning Xingyuan’s identity, Ning Buwei found it particularly disgusting and repulsive.

Pei Heguang smoothed his sleeves. “Venerable Jinghe calculated early on that he had a death tribulation in his fate, and began making preparations for himself six hundred years ago… So Chengfeng, do you think he gave you the sea-expanding bone-reshaping treatment and then you bore his fate tribulation, or because he had already calculated that he would have a fate tribulation, he simply went with the flow, gave you the sea-expanding bone-reshaping treatment, and let the fate tribulation fall on you?”

The sea-expanding bone-reshaping did share life force with him, and there would indeed be a corresponding fate tribulation. But what if Chu Jun had known from the beginning that he would have a fate tribulation? Rather than letting the fate tribulation fall on some uncontrollable person at an unknown time, it would be better to have the person who would bear his fate tribulation within his control from the start.

Chu Jun was meticulous in his thinking and rarely let things exceed his expectations.

Pei Heguang shook his head. “Xingyuan said you were soft-hearted, but I think you’re gullible. If you don’t believe me, ask him directly now. Ask him whether he gave you the sea-expanding bone-reshaping because Ning Gu saved him, or because he wanted to use you to break his fate tribulation from the very beginning.”

“Flowery words.” Ning Buwei glanced at him coldly, then turned to look at Chu Jun. “Surnamed Chu, speak for yourself.”

Ning Xiu was held in Chu Jun’s embrace, looking curiously at Pei Heguang.

Pei Heguang smiled gently at him. Ning Xiu blinked and buried his little head in Chu Jun’s embrace.

Chu Jun, under Ning Buwei’s certain gaze, remained silent without answering.

Ning Buwei was quite stunned, frowning. “Chu Jun?”

Chu Jun’s tone was very calm, as if he were talking about something unimportant. “Before helping you with the sea-expanding bone-reshaping, I was indeed always looking for a suitable person to bear the fate tribulation….Sharing a strand of life force with you meant the fate tribulation would inevitably fall on you.”

Ning Buwei looked at him in astonishment, while Chu Jun still maintained his indifferent expression.

“The most reliable way to break a fate tribulation is to break it through death. He might now be looking for other methods because he still has time, but if the time for the fate tribulation arrives, do you think he would willingly go to his death, or—” Pei Heguang smiled slightly. “Choose to use your life to break the tribulation?”

“Shut up!” Ning Buwei shouted coldly.

“Ning Chengfeng, you’ve been played by him from beginning to end!” Pei Heguang looked at Ning Buwei with disappointment, shouting sternly. “He shared life force with you, he gave you the sea-expanding bone-reshaping, he repaired your damaged dantian and meridians, he even coaxed you into forming a dao contract with him. Your sea of consciousness is now accessible to him at will. He can easily crush your dantian and destroy your divine consciousness to take your life at any time! But what about the reverse?”

“Feelings between people are the most unreliable thing in this world. Brothers turn against each other, spouses become enemies—haven’t you seen enough of this!?”

“Your dao heart still won’t establish itself, and you’re going to continue letting yourself wallow in these false lies he’s given you?”

The Suzaku narrow knife in Ning Buwei’s hand hummed and vibrated. He lifted his eyelids to look at Chu Jun. “Is everything he said true?”

“Mm.” Chu Jun responded.

Ning Buwei raised the Suzaku narrow knife and pointed it at Chu Jun. Ning Xiu in Chu Jun’s embrace seemed to sense something and poked out his little head, but Chu Jun gently pressed it back with his hand.

“Ah~” Ning Xiu hummed in dissatisfaction.

Ning Buwei’s face was covered with frost. His entire person suddenly erupted, the Suzaku narrow knife wrapped in black mist slashing toward Chu Jun. Fang Wanchen beside them cried out in alarm, “Brother Chengfeng, don’t!”

Pei Heguang behind him smiled slightly.

Who would have known that before Ning Buwei’s Suzaku narrow knife could touch Chu Jun, it suddenly changed direction and slashed fiercely toward Pei Heguang, who stood with sleeves folded.

Xie Jiu hastily drew his sword, but was ultimately a step too late. The Suzaku narrow knife, brushing past his sleeve, slashed toward Pei Heguang, but was blocked by an invisible barrier in mid-air. The blade collided with the barrier, creating a string of dazzling sparks and producing a teeth-grinding collision sound.

Pei Heguang stood behind the barrier, looking at Ning Buwei with disappointment.

Ning Buwei’s black eyes showed threads of crimson, staring at him with an unfriendly expression.

Pei Heguang casually waved his sleeve, and an invisible but tremendous force suddenly threw him, person and knife together, backwards.

Ning Buwei retreated more than ten zhang before barely stabilizing his form.

“Stubborn to the end.” Pei Heguang put away his smile. “He really has you completely befuddled.”

Ning Buwei flicked his wrist, and the black mist in the Suzaku narrow knife suddenly churned and rolled. The sharp wailing sounds from within the blade echoed with the lamentations of the vengeful souls beneath Yuquan Village. He exerted force with his feet, his entire body flying up, carrying the force of a thousand jun as he once again slashed toward Pei Heguang.

“My person is not for you to criticize!”