Chapter 52 of translation
Outside, just as Fu Xuan finished closing the entrance to the cavern realm, a violent shockwave overturned her and the Cloud Knights behind her.
Amid March 7th and Stelle's startled cries, the entrance was forcibly blasted open. The Astral Express crew and Jing Yuan fell out like dumplings being dumped from a pot.
"Ugh—ow, ow, ow!"
March 7th clutched her backside, unable to get up for a long while.
"General! Are you all alright?!"
Seeing everyone lying flat on the ground, Fu Xuan rushed over in a panic.
"We're fine."
"Everyone—our mission was successful."
Jing Yuan slowly stood up, smiling as he spoke to Fu Xuan and the Cloud Knights behind her.
At his words, the Cloud Knights erupted into loud cheers.
"...Hey! Look over here… I've got a problem…"
"I… can't… die…"
(ambulance siren implied)
After saying this, Xun Yu, lying beside March 7th's feet, promptly collapsed and "fell asleep."
"Quick! Save him!"
As Fu Xuan hurried over in alarm, Jing Yuan's lips curved into a knowing, almost motherly smile.
What they didn't know was that Xun Yu's figure had appeared somewhere else entirely.
Earlier — Around the Time Xun Yu Encountered Phantylia
At the residence of the Vidyadhara Dragon Masters, two uninvited guests arrived.
Both wore bamboo hats. Their swordsmanship was exquisite.
Before long, the guards protecting the Dragon Masters all fell into a sleep as peaceful as infants.
"Y-you—who are you?!"
"You dare make a move on Vidyadhara territory—aren't you afraid of the Hunt's retribution?!"
"Leave now, and I'll pretend none of this ever happened."
Facing the Dragon Master's threat, the intruders said nothing.
The one who was clearly male stabbed eighteen times in a single second.
Each strike deliberately avoided vital points. The Dragon Master screamed in agony.
Soon, all the Dragon Masters lay on the ground—covered in wounds, yet none of them fatal.
Thanks to draconic regeneration, they were grievously injured, but still alive.
The Dragon Masters stared at the two blood-soaked nightmares before them, trembling in terror.
They could feel the killing intent radiating from the pair—yet for some reason, the attackers had deliberately avoided killing them.
The two intruders stood silently, looking at the Dragon Masters who were barely clinging to life.
Not long after, sensing an overwhelming force approaching, the pair withdrew without hesitation.
Moments later, a massive crater appeared where the Dragon Masters' residence once stood.
A few of the weaker Dragon Masters died on the spot. The rest were barely breathing, on the verge of death.
At that moment, a man dressed in white appeared.
With a wave of his hand, he stabilized the lives of those still alive.
Then he bound them to crosses.
"Lord, please forgive them their sins."
Under the Dragon Masters' grateful gazes, the man in white sent them to the Alchemy Commission.
Though his methods were… strange, at least they wouldn't be reincarnating anytime soon.
"Look—they're even thanking us."
The man in white revealed his face—it was Xun Yu.
"Darling~ you're so bad~ I love it~"
Aha clutched their stomach, laughing uncontrollably. The comment immediately darkened Xun Yu's expression.
"Alright. The traces Jingliu and Blade left behind have been cleaned up. Time to go."
Watching the healers inside the Alchemy Commission desperately treat the "fake corpse" while completely ignoring the Dragon Masters who brought him in, Xun Yu couldn't help but laugh again.
"…You're not going to kill me?"
Blade looked at Jingliu, his expression complicated.
"Heh… hahaha… For her sake, I'll spare you—this once."
There was a hint of madness in Jingliu's voice.
But when the image of that ever-smiling foxian woman surfaced in her mind, she calmed down slightly.
The next instant, the scene of Baiheng's death replayed itself. Jingliu clutched her head in agony.
Seeing her like this, Blade felt he was about to die again.
No—maybe several times.
Yet unexpectedly, Jingliu eventually steadied herself.
She shot Blade a cold glance and left without a word.
"..."
"There were five people. The price was three."
"You're one of them."
"I… am one of them too…"
Listening to the sound of the waves, Blade sat alone.
Kafka's Words of Binding could suppress his Mara-struck state for a while longer. During that time, he wanted to be alone.
Elsewhere, Jingliu covered her eyes once more.
She recalled the first time she met Xun Yu.
Back then, she had been slaughtering aberrations of unknown origin and was on the verge of a Mara outbreak—when Xun Yu suddenly appeared.
He hugged her leg and shouted:
"Big sister, cut me!"
After that… her memories became fuzzy.
But she seemed to remember cutting him down for a long, long time—yet he never died.
Later, he told her that the little one was having a very hard life on the Luofu…
Dan Feng and Yingxing had tampered with Abundance, attempting to resurrect the deceased Baiheng.
Instead, they created a calamity dragon.
After it was slain, what remained was Bailu—a failed product of the Dragon Transmutation Art.
Baiheng had indeed returned, in a sense.
But Bailu was not Baiheng.
Still, the young Bailu carried many of Baiheng's shadows.
Jingliu and the others treated her as if she were Baiheng's daughter.
Unfortunately, after the Imbibitor Lunae incident, Jingliu herself fell to Mara, and among the High-Cloud Quintet, only Jing Yuan remained.
Had Jing Yuan not found excuses over the years to visit Bailu from time to time, that little girl—bearing half the power of a Dragon Sovereign—might have already fallen victim to the Dragon Masters.
Jingliu continued recalling how, upon learning Bailu's situation, she had wanted to immediately butcher those Dragon Masters into pieces.
But Xun Yu told her she could act—just don't kill them all.
He even found her a partner.
She wouldn't have listened, but his next words stopped her in her tracks:
"Technically, the Dragon Transmutation Art failed—but Baiheng's soul attached itself to Bailu."
"The world allows consciousness to match a new vessel, but does not allow vessels to gather scattered consciousness."
"That makes this… a miracle."
"Perhaps she really does have a chance to be resurrected."
Upon hearing the word "resurrection", Jingliu slashed her sword.
Resurrection… resurrection…
The scene of the calamity dragon created by Dan Feng and Yingxing still haunted her mind.
Baiheng… is already gone.
Under such stimulation, Jingliu's Mara erupted, and she hacked at Xun Yu wildly for quite some time.
Xun Yu enjoyed a bit of "sword-energy massage," then suppressed her Mara state.