Eighteen-year-old Teng Hua was about to leave for the distant capital to attend university. Before leaving her hometown, she still had one unfulfilled wish.
As she grew older and gained more life experience, Teng Hua finally understood what that childhood game had truly meant. Not long ago, she had also heard an ancient legend about a mountain deity from the adults.
She returned to that small cave, now empty of everything. She lit incense sticks, placed offerings, and called out that name from the depths of her heart.
The mountain deity came.
She still looked the same as before. Her translucent body grew solid and real because of Teng Hua’s continuous calling. After eleven years apart, human and spirit met again.
Teng Hua was overjoyed. She could finally confirm that the beautiful, haunting dream that had stayed with her all these years was real. For the remaining month and a half before leaving for university, she spent almost every moment with the mountain deity, single-handedly sustaining her and greatly restoring her spiritual power.
But for the mountain deity to regain her true status as a mountain god, one believer was certainly not enough.
Yet in that short month, the mountain deity seemed to have lost some of her former desire for that.
The mountain deity had lived for a very, very long time and had encountered all kinds of humans. But after losing her last believer, she had never met another human like Teng Hua.
Her feelings toward Teng Hua began to change. Beyond mere utility, something else had emerged—emotions a mountain deity shouldn’t have.
Human lifespans were short. She could stay with this little believer until the end of her life, and only then think about returning to her rightful place. Perhaps that wouldn’t be so bad?
Teng Hua went far away to school. The mountain deity couldn’t travel that far; they could only reunite on certain holidays.
Things might have continued that way. But then Teng Hua’s family suddenly decided to marry her off.
Teng Hua was shocked when she heard the news—her father had already accepted the bride price from the other family. She didn’t know the man at all, and he was an old bachelor in his fifties.
She couldn’t accept it. The very next day, she flew back home.
She told her parents about her sexual orientation and confessed that she already had someone she loved.
During the ensuing argument, her father accidentally pushed her into a well. Teng Hua couldn’t swim. Her parents, panicking, accidentally broke the well rope. Within minutes, she was gone.
The mountain deity had been by Teng Hua’s side since she returned home, but Teng Hua didn’t want her to show herself. So all the mountain deity could do was watch.
The moment Teng Hua fell into the water, the mountain deity reached out her hand. But with her meager spiritual power, she could do nothing.
Teng Hua’s presence faded completely, yet her soul—unconscious and unaware—remained trapped in her body. The mountain deity finally realized that all of this was because of her.
Never had she hated her own weakness and helplessness more than at that moment.
She couldn’t even avenge Teng Hua.
After several days of silence, the mountain deity suddenly came to a realization. She had always been obsessed with reclaiming her rightful position, so she had disdained using any underhanded methods to gather power. But now, she no longer wanted that. She only wanted to free Teng Hua’s trapped soul so she could reincarnate normally. This was what she owed Teng Hua.
She began absorbing energy from the land and the living beings upon it. Her power recovered quickly, but her sanity gradually slipped away.
Eventually, she couldn’t even remember what she had set out to do. She simply absorbed power, growing stronger and stronger, and more and more distorted.
Even at this stage, she had no intention of harming anyone.
That was until Ye Yang arrived. The hostility emanating from Ye Yang, combined with the power she sensed within him, made the mountain deity feel threatened. In a stress response, the power she had accumulated finally erupted.
“So that soul outside the barrier—that was Teng Hua!” Ye Yang rubbed his face, his emotions in turmoil.
“Correct.”
“And what happened to her?”
“She has already been sent to the underworld.”
“And the mountain deity?”
“She was beaten down to a single wisp of her spirit. She’s now being held in a YCG detention facility. Perhaps one day she may regain her consciousness.” But the chances were very, very slim.
So that was the truth. Ye Yang didn’t know what to feel. The complex emotions between the mountain deity and Teng Hua were beyond the understanding of a young demon who had only just entered human society and hadn’t yet formed any deep bonds with humans.
Ling She twisted himself into a knot, writhing in contemplation, before finally offering a comment: “For them, this outcome is actually not bad.”
Teng Hua’s family had treated her poorly. Even if she had survived, it was hard to say what kind of life she would have had. Now that YCG had sent her to the underworld, with the merit she had accumulated in this life, she was sure to be reborn into a good home.
As for the mountain deity—without Teng Hua, she would have long since become a mindless wandering spirit, either casually destroyed by righteous cultivators, refined by ghost cultivators, or simply drifted for a few hundred more years before naturally dissipating. After all the chaos she caused, it was extremely fortunate that she could still preserve a wisp of her spirit.
It was also because Shen Ming had held back. Otherwise, a true god’s strike would have annihilated her on the spot.
·
The weekend was short. After two days at home, it was time to return to school.
Monday at noon, Ye Yang came back from the park to find Shen Xiuyun, who had been waiting for him, immediately hand him a registration form from the dorm supervisor. “Off to see your little crow again?” Shen Xiuyun asked.
Qin Zhi happened to walk in from outside and casually said, “It’s been so long without a trace. Maybe it flew south for the winter?”
Shen Xiuyun disagreed. “But it doesn’t even get that cold here in winter. Besides, crows don’t really migrate, do they?”
“Then if it’s been missing this long, maybe it died.” No sooner had Qin Zhi said this than he got a punch from Shen Xiuyun, having no idea what he’d said wrong. The two nearly came to blows again.
Ye Yang sighed.
A little while later, after Qin Zhi and Shen Xiuyun finished arguing, Qin Zhi suddenly came over to Ye Yang. “Since your little crow is nowhere to be found, why don’t you come to my place this weekend? I’ve adopted a little dog—he’s really amusing.”
Ye Yang thought it over. He didn’t have anything planned for the weekend anyway, so he agreed.
Qin Zhi suddenly grew excited, pulling out his phone to text Zhuang Li, who wasn’t in the dorm, inviting him to come as well.
Shen Xiuyun was annoyed. “What’s that supposed to mean? Leaving me out?”
Qin Zhi looked genuinely confused. “Huh? Aren’t you coming?”
Ye Yang clearly saw the vein bulge on Shen Xiuyun’s forehead again.
…
The weekend arrived quickly. Autumn was deepening, and the morning temperatures were quite low. The moment Ye Yang stepped outside, cold air hit his face, and the scent of osmanthus flowers filled his nostrils, instantly waking him up.
Qin Zhi’s home was in the mountains on the outskirts of the city, quite a distance away. Ye Yang had gotten up at five in the morning and followed Qin Zhi’s instructions, transferring between two subway lines. When he got off, he still had three kilometers to go.
He tried to hail a taxi, but no driver picked up his request for several minutes. He thought about using a wind-speed spell to run there, but there were security cameras everywhere. With no other choice, he grudgingly scanned the only available shared bicycle—its handlebars were crooked and it creaked with every pedal.
He finally made it to the foot of the mountain and saw Qin Zhi, but he still hadn’t reached the destination.
Qin Zhi waved from afar and, once Ye Yang got closer, happily took his bag and put an arm around his shoulder, steering him onto a very hidden path.
It was a mountain trail paved with stone, quite steep in many places. Ye Yang struggled just to walk it, but Qin Zhi moved as if on flat ground—clearly used to it.
After climbing over a hundred meters, they finally reached the mountainside. It was a good thing one of them was a demon and the other a sword cultivator—an ordinary person climbing such a steep dirt path would have taken at least half an hour.
But that wasn’t the strangest part.
The strangest part was the small platform halfway up the mountain, on which stood a tiny thatched hut and a courtyard of about two hundred square meters.
The courtyard was overgrown with weeds, and the thatched hut looked like it could collapse at any moment.
When Qin Zhi headed straight for the hut, Ye Yang was dumbfounded. “This is your home?”
“Not exactly home, but I live here until I make a breakthrough in my cultivation.”
As he spoke, a small gray-black dog leaped out of the weeds, tail wagging furiously as it pounced on Qin Zhi.
The dog was small but surprisingly strong. Qin Zhi instinctively dropped into a horse stance and managed to catch it steadily.
Ye Yang looked closer. The dog was lean and long-bodied, with bright eyes and unique black-gray fur. Its expression was cool and aloof, but its tail—spinning like a propeller—gave it away.
And the bright red outfit it was wearing seriously ruined its cool-guy aesthetic. Wait a minute, that outfit looked familiar… wasn’t that made from one of Qin Zhi’s old shirts?
The dog was quite aggressive with strangers. Seeing Ye Yang behind Qin Zhi, it immediately bared its teeth.
Once inside the thatched hut, Ye Yang discovered it was surprisingly nice. Though covered in thatch and looking shabby outside, the interior had tiled floors, thick walls, and solid rosewood furniture. It had an antique, substantial feel to it.
Shen Xiuyun and Zhuang Li, who had arrived earlier, were already brewing tea. The room was filled with the delicate aroma of tea, creating an elegant atmosphere.
“Ye Ye’s here. Come, sit, have some tea.” Zhuang Li held a small teacup with three fingers, sitting in the host’s seat with a warm smile, as if he were the one who lived there.
Qin Zhi didn’t mind. He sat down across from Zhuang Li with his dog and patted the spot next to him, signaling Ye Yang to sit too.
Ye Yang carefully avoided the dog, which was still growling at him, and sat close to the wall, as far away as possible.
Once seated, he realized the hut had a perfect location. Looking out the small window by the tea table, he could see the scenery below the mountain. Late autumn was when the mountain views were most unique and colorful.
“This tea is really good. Beautiful view, beautiful tea,” Shen Xiuyun remarked, then looked around disdainfully. “This environment is probably better than even the sect’s. What kind of ascetic cultivation is this? Isn’t this just self-deception?”
Qin Zhi stroked the dog’s head on his lap and replied confidently, “We sword cultivators cultivate the sword heart. The external form doesn’t matter. If you can be comfortable, why make things hard on yourself? It’s a new era now—we cultivators have to keep up with the times.”
“Oh, I almost forgot to introduce you. This is the stray dog I adopted. I named him Xuan Lu.”
Whenever he talked about the dog, Qin Zhi couldn’t help but beam with pride. “Pretty cool, right? Very classical.”
Zhuang Li nodded. “A black hunting dog? Very nice, very nice. You’re quite good at literary allusions.”
Shen Xiuyun pursed his lips and reluctantly admitted, “It is pretty cool.”
Looking at that majestic, proud canine head, he simply couldn’t say anything insincere.
The sleek, shiny fur swayed before Ye Yang’s eyes. He couldn’t resist anymore. He subtly moved closer and stealthily reached out his hand.
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