Chapter 118 — Deep Scar
The Sword Questions the Heavens · Page 1 of 4
All was quiet around them.
The night was deep, and it was a desolate hour.
The long street lay silent; the bright moon hung at the edge of the sky, and its clear radiance spilled down, drawing out the long shadows of the two figures standing in that barren street.
What feeling was this, ten thousand words tangling at the heart, yet faced with one another, they could not speak.
The lonely wind of the deep night stirred their garments gently.
The Tianxuan in Lu Xueling's hand glimmered with a faint blue light, then slowly dipped, and was drawn back.
Ming Li was silent.
Lu Xueling gazed at the man before her. Beneath the moonlight, Ming Li suddenly felt as though he could not breathe.
No blows were struck, no slaughter, no wounds, no blood—and yet somehow, every time he faced this beautiful woman, under the watch of her eyes, there was always this nameless feeling.
That peerless face, cold and pure as snow, seemed faintly to be the same aloof, exquisite woman he had first met that year.
He only did not know when it was that his own shadow had come to dwell in her eyes.
"That woman just now—was she Jin Pingyue of the Enchantment Sect?" Lu Xueling asked suddenly, quietly.
Ming Li started, then nodded silently. "She was."
Lu Xueling looked at him, something flickering deep in her eyes, and said mildly, "Have you been with her all this time?"
Almost instinctively, Ming Li shook his head at once. "No, there is nothing at all between her and me—"
"—Ge." His voice suddenly dropped, and he sensed something strange in his own feelings, as though he were trying to explain himself.
But the strange light in Lu Xueling's eyes had already faded, as if some weight had suddenly lifted from her shoulders; even her expression seemed to have softened a little.
Only, between the two of them there still stretched a great distance, like a deep chasm.
Moonlight like water lingered along that barren street.
Far off, the figures of Jin Pingyue and Li Xun in their pursuit had long since vanished, and in the vast stronghold it seemed only the two of them remained.
They stood for orthodoxy and heresy, sworn enemies who could never coexist, yet neither of them, at this moment, had any thought of raising a hand. In the cold, clear radiance, Lu Xueling said suddenly, "You... would you walk with me a while?"
Ming Li lifted his head, a flicker of surprise in his eyes.
They walked slowly along that ruined street, the night deep, the moonlight like water.
On either side of the street lay only broken walls and crumbling ruins. Yet as the night wind blew, on this alien hill a thousand miles from home, there seemed, in the stillness, a faint tenderness.
The two walked shoulder to shoulder, yet still three feet apart; deliberately or not, they seemed to be quietly keeping some taboo.
Only, in such desolate night, how could the heart not be tangled?
A faint, delicate fragrance drifted on the wind, at their side, now hidden, now revealed.
"Do you still remember the first match between us, at the Seven Veins Tournament on Mount Canglan?"
Lu Xueling suddenly broke the silence, speaking quietly.
Ming Li paused, somewhat surprised. In his memory, Lu Xueling was anything but a talkative person. Yet somehow, tonight she seemed a little strange.
Even so, he nodded. "I remember. You could already use the Divine Sword Thunder Command Art even then—that was truly remarkable."
Lu Xueling glanced at him and said mildly, "But that match—I actually lost."
Ming Li was silent, then said in a low voice, "At that time your cultivation in the Dao arts was far above mine. In truth, I..."
"I lost," Lu Xueling said. A trace of sorrow crossed her face, and she said softly, "I knew even then that at the very last moment, you deliberately held back. And yet I do not know why—I could not master my own competitiveness. That time, no matter what, I could not bring myself to tell the truth to my master and my uncles, jubilant as they were."