Chen Changsheng stayed one night at Yuan Mountain and planned to head back to Flowing Cloud Temple early the next morning.
Su Junhan never explained what he said last night.
Chen Changsheng thought about it for a long ti. He had a guess but felt it was too absurd. So he didn’t dwell on it further, treating those words as just random and leaving it at that.
Early that morning, Su Junhan invited Chen Changsheng for so light tea.
“Drinking tea first thing in the morning isn’t great, I think,” Chen Changsheng remarked.
Su Junhan smiled. “Afraid Mr. Chen still had a hangover?”
“Sober, I’m sober.”
Chen Changsheng chuckled but then recalled sothing ntioned during his talk with Hu Yu yesterday.
“Right, there’s one thing I want to ask you.”
“Please ask, Mr. Chen.”
“There’s the phrase ‘thirty-three years old’. It doesn’t an simply being thirty. Your Honorable Fox knows much more. I wonder if this character ‘year’ holds so other aning?”
“‘Year’…”
After hearing this, Su Junhan set down his teacup and lowered his head in thought.
“‘Year’ links to ‘ripening grain’. A full harvest each cycle gives us ‘ripening grain,’ hence one cycle equals one year. Besides that…”
“In the Daoist Arts concerning lifespan, there’s a concept called ‘small circuitry’. Typically, sixty years form one Jiazi cycle. Likewise, sixty days constitute one minor circuit. Thus, one minor circuit is one ‘year’.”
Chen Changsheng did a quick calculation. In that case, thirty-three ‘years’ ca to about two thousand days, aning roughly five and a half years.
This explanation didn’t seem to fit.
Chen Changsheng looked up and asked further, “Any others?”
Su Junhan pondered once more, this ti with considerably more effort.
After about a quarter of an hour.
Su Junhan smoothed his brow and looked at Chen Changsheng. “There is indeed another interpretation.”
“As far back as the Ancient Tis, there existed the system of heavenly stems and earthly branches. Jia, Yi, Bing, Ding, Wu, Ji, Geng, Xin, Ren, and Gui are called the Ten Heavenly Stems. Zi, Chou, Yin, Mao, Chen, Si, Wu, Wei, Shen, You, Xu, and Hai are called the Twelve Earthly Branches.”
“The heavenly stems pair with earthly branches. Every sixty years completes one cycle, also called one ‘year’.”
Chen Changsheng frowned upon hearing this. Doing the math this way…
Thirty-three years.
Chen Changsheng stated, “That would put thirty-three years at exactly two thousand years.”
“Precisely.”
Su Junhan nodded. “But, Mr. Chen, why ask about this?”
Chen Changsheng paused. “Just wondering.”
He lowered his head and took a sip of tea.
His mind fixed on this character ‘year’.
Exactly two thousand years.
Perhaps this interpretation of sixty years as one ‘year’ was the correct answer.
Chen Changsheng recalled the sentence he’d seen in the Fate Stone again.
[The mayfly seeks immortality, lives at dawn and dies by dusk. Perishes at thirty-three ‘years’, washes away the past’s dust. Reincarnation never ceases; enduring vision remains through longevity.]
This showed that at thirty-three ‘years’, aning two thousand years, the mayfly would et its end, after which it would wash away the dust of past lives, reborn anew in an endless cycle…
Chen Changsheng froze still, his arm trembling slightly.
Seeing him spaced out, Su Junhan looked puzzled.
In Chen Changsheng’s mind, Hu Yu’s words echoed:
‘I know what you’re asking. But let tell you, the reason you rember nothing now definitely isn’t because you practiced the Sutra of Rebirth.’
Chen Changsheng snapped back to reality.
“If that’s the truth…”
“Then everything makes perfect sense.”
Su Junhan watched Mr. Chen, confused about what he ant.
But anything that could leave Mr. Chen this stunned…
Might be truly extraordinary.
…
After finishing the tea, Chen Changsheng bid Su Junhan farewell and returned to Flowing Cloud Temple.
Su Junhan didn’t accompany Mr. Chen but remained at Yuan Mountain, seeming to have matters to attend to.
As the Fox Sovereign, idle days were few. Away for months, many disturbances had erupted among the Hundred Monster Peaks. It all still required this Fox Sovereign’s diation.
Chen Changsheng flew back on his sword. This trip certainly solved many of his doubts.
But…
This conclusion worried him even more.
When Hu Yu ntioned that he once forgot mories after practicing the Sutra of Rebirth, Chen Changsheng thought that scripture caused him to lose his past.
But the line on the Fate Stone told him it was the Mayfly Curse.
“If that’s really the case, then it’s dreadful…”
Chen Changsheng’s expression turned grim. Now he had no way to verify it.
‘Reaches the end at thirty-three years’ signaled the end of one cycle.
‘Washes away past dust’—that dust must be mories… and perhaps not just mories, but also magical power, cultivation base, divine sense…
Everything reset to the beginning.
aning, he might have existed in this world for a very, very long ti…
Counting from eight thousand years ago, perhaps mory loss like this happened three tis.
‘Sir isn’t forgetting for the first ti.’
Chen Changsheng murmured, “No wonder Nezha said that back at the Lotus Pond…”
Therefore, that Divine Decree of the Gods might be sothing left by his forr self, designed to aid this ‘washed clean’ version.
Thinking further…
Maybe the magical power within the strand of hair ca the sa way.
Chen Changsheng felt shaken inside. Such an outco was hard to accept imdiately.
Distracted, he flew straight into a patch of thunderclouds.
BOOM!!
Thunder exploded right beside him. Chen Changsheng jolted back to his senses and swiftly burst out of the clouds.
He glanced back behind him and then forward ahead.
His mind felt chaotic.
“Am I still ?”
He asked himself, plunged into confusion once more.
…
Although Chenghuang stayed at Flowing Cloud Temple, he wasn’t Moyuan’s match. After several attempts to discuss matters, Chenghuang could only admit defeat. But he couldn’t endure Moyuan’s endless nagging.
So, Chenghuang transford into a guardian beast statue perched atop the Flowing Cloud Temple’s roof ridge. He didn’t co down afterward.
Chenghuang absorbed the spiritual energy flowing from the mountain stream, sustaining himself. An opportunity for peaceful cultivation felt like a luxury to him.
“Sigh.”
A heavy sigh sounded in the courtyard. Without Su Junhan, Moyuan was bored all day, sighing from morning till nightfall.
“Why isn’t Sir back yet…”
Moyuan was just thinking this when he suddenly felt sothing and frowned.
“Hm?”
At the sa mont, Chenghuang, the beast statue on the rooftop ridge jolted awake.
Chenghuang landed upright in the courtyard, expression tense. He told Moyuan, “They’ve probably co… for …”
Moyuan turned his head. “For you?”
Moyuan extended his divine sense outward. Countless auras, nearly a hundred, encircled the entire mountain!
Cultivators stood at the base of the mountain, surrounding the place completely.
Further up the mountain path, leading the group stood a man in black robes. His piercing gaze fixed on the temple atop the mountain.
A jet-black jade pendant hung at his waist. The character ‘Cloud’ was carved upon it.
Moyuan withdrew his divine sense, voice icy cold. “Quite the grand show.”
Chenghuang looked gravely serious. He opened his mouth, hesitated, then said, “They’re tough opponents… maybe I should just…”
“Just stay put.”
Moyuan’s eyes flashed cold anger. “Flowing Cloud Temple is Mr. Chen’s sacred ground. Even if the Heavenly King himself ca, he’d have to light incense properly.”
“What bunch of nobodies? Dare cause trouble here?!”
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