by Feng Yue
Ye Qingxuan was curious as to what question had taken Mr. Hu’s teacher more than ten years to think through. “Then what?”
“Then?” Mr. Hu shrugged. “Then he died and I took his ashes back to the capital. He was enshrined in the Lingyan Pavilion. It’s been many years.”
Ye Qingxuan did not know what to say. He cleared his throat for a while and sighed, “The East is a strange place.”
“Yeah, it’s a nice place.” Mr. Hu pulled out a thin pipe and stuffed it with tobacco. Lighting it, he sucked in two breaths and let out a plume of smoke. He smoked while squatting on the ground like a farmer taking a break rather than a scholar with students. He smoked happily and lazily. “Hey, kid,” he suddenly said. “Have you thought about visiting the East?”
Caught by surprise, Ye Qingxuan shook his head.
“You should go.” Mr. Hu glanced at his white hair and said, “Otherwise, you’ll regret it.”
After a moment of silence, the youth could not help but scratch his head. “Sir, there’s nothing regretful. There’s only a few things people like me can do. Everything will be good if I can do it right. If not, nothing will happen. But right now, I can’t even handle the things that I need to do. I don’t have the effort to think about the East.”
“But have you ever thought that there’s something waiting for you there?”
After thinking a bit, Ye Qingxuan shook his head. “Never.”
Mr. Hu nodded. He suddenly chuckled. “Then that’s that.” He let out a breath and rose as if he was relieved. “It’s good this way.”
He nodded in farewell but Ye Qingxuan called out to him just as he turned to leave. “Mr. Hu, you’re an important figure in the Imperial College. You must have your view on music theory, right?”
Looking at him in confusion, Mr. Hu nodded. Thus, the youth smiled happily and moved closer to him, rubbing his palms in anticipation. “Can you help me with a question?”
Half an hour later, they were in a quiet corner of the inn’s hall.
“I see.” Mr. Hu nodded after listening to Ye Qingxuan’s current troubles. He had some ideas. Soon, he asked, “Ye Qingxuan, have you ever thought about what the source of the world is? How does life produced and evolved?”
“No.” Ye Qingxuan shook his head.
“The nature of time and space, the laws of the natural world, the existence of souls?”
“I don’t know.”
“The relationship between humanity and the world?”
“Never thought about it.”
Ye Qingxuan nodded crisply, but Mr. Hu looked at him with sharp eyes as if trying to see through his disguise. “You’ve never thought about it or you’re not willing to think about it?”
Ye Qingxuan froze, his expression stiffening. After a long while, he scratched his head awkwardly. “Sir, what do you mean?”
“The upper path of mind and thoughts is intangible, the lower path is tangible. This is the explanation of the musician paths by the ancient East. There is a separation between inside and outside. The seven schools can also be categorized as such. If I’m not wrong…” He reached out and grasped Ye Qingxuan’s wrist. His three fingers fell lightly onto the youth’s pulse. Sensing his sound of heart, understanding filled Mr. Hu. “Revelations, Mind, Illusion, and Abstinence? I see… Ye Qingxuan, how long has it been since you’ve dreamed?”
“Dreamed?” Ye Qingxuan was confused. “I dream every d-”
He stopped. He just realized that it had been a long time since he had dreamed. At some point, he had stopped dreaming and he no longer remembered any dreamscapes. Thinking back, he could only remember that person in the dream telling him to go to the end of the dream…
“This is where your problem is.” Mr. Hu toyed the thin pipe in his hands and asked lightly, “Ye Qingxuan, other than the way of abstinence that focuses on aether, you’ve learned practically all the ‘paths of self.’ However, there’s disparity between your sense of self and reality. You’ve felt this before, correct?”
Ye Qingxuan stayed silent because Mr. Hu was correct. He had long realized that there was something wrong with him but he could not pinpoint what it was.
“That’s why you feel you don’t fit with many musicians. You never saw yourself as part of the same world as them, and you lack the real sense of being a musician. So many people swarm by and you’re caught in the middle as a bystander, unable to integrate into them. It’s just like how a zebra can’t find their place between black horses and white horses.”
Mr. Hu studied him with pity and sympathy.
“Ye Qingxuan, what would you do if you realized the world is completely different from what you thought?”
Ye Qingxuan hung his head. He could not reply.
Mr. Hu rose to bid farewell. He patted Ye Qingxuan’s shoulder, saying, “This is your Barrier of Knowledge.”
-
In his room late at night, Ye Qingxuan finally snapped out of his deep thoughts. To be honest, he really had no other solutions. If this problem was his Barrier of Knowledge, then he truly had no idea how to solve it.
“So I have to rely on you?” He looked up at the weathered skull on his desk. The eye sockets were pure black as if it contained all the darkness in the universe with unknowable secrets.
It was the Skull of Truth.
355 Jiu Xiao Huan Pei
Ye Qingxuan lifted the skull and stared at the eye sockets. The skull was cold as tone and seemed to be made of metal. Its mouth was filled with solid gold, making it look like a menacing piece of art. However, waves rippled through constantly, resonating with the aether world in death.
This was the source that the saint left behind—a connecting point between the aether and material world. Through this point, Ye Qingxuan could experience the saint’s lifetime accumulation and absorb understanding of music theory. This way, he could see the truth through the fog. After he broke through the Barrier of Knowledge, he could enter the aether world, anchor his own point, and enter the Resonance level.
He did not need to sign with a spirit or demon so he did not need to be restricted or affected by the contract. This was the more stable solution but it was not entirely harmless. After all, the aether world was not a paradise. It was an illusory realm enveloped by the Originator. Unknown dangers were hidden in the shadows there. To them, rashly entering musicians were the best feast.
If he entered without enough accumulation and was not protected by a saint or natural catastrophe, he could attract the attention of something scary without realizing. Plus, Ye Qingxuan already had Hyakume’s eyes on him!
That natural catastrophe had established a bottomless abyss in the aether world and was not some nice guy. The aether world was his territory! If he was not gravely injured as expected or had recovered a bit, he would definitely ‘welcome’ Ye Qingxuan to visit and perform a bunch of ‘tricks’ for him…
“So should I gamble it?” Ye Qingxuan muttered to himself as he gripped his chin. He laughed involuntarily. Should he keep dragging it on until Hyakume recovered? It was just a matter of time. After all, the aether world was huge. He would not be so unlucky that he would fall into Hyakume’s territory, right?
As the saying went, you only live once. He would be like any other loser if he had such a good opportunity before him and he did not try.
Ping! Ping! Ping! Ping! The strings on Jiu Xiao Huan Pei quickly extended and crisscrossed through his room. They vibrated and established an aether blending music theory, constructing a small enchantment.
Moonlight creeped on the instrument strings and connected above the sub-originator. The sub-originator’s music theory came from Avalon’s enchantment and brought together the wisdom of several generations of musicians.
It was overqualified to be used here, but it was better safe than sorry in this situation. Ye Qingxuan did not want to get stabbed in the back while his consciousness was extending into the aether sea through the musician path.
When everything was ready, he cut open
his finger. A strand of silvery moonlight blood dripped from his finger. It fell onto the skull and disappeared. The skull absorbed his blood like a bottomless and insatiable hole.
Ye Qingxuan’s expression quickly changed. His blood was flowing faster and faster as if it was being sucked by an invisible vortex. A bout of dizziness besieged him. In his daze, he saw that flesh was growing on the skull.
The withered face grew plumper and a pair of eyes slowly opened in the empty sockets. It looked at him and sighed, singing a hoarse song. Ye Qingxuan was swallowed by the song. He sank into a daze and could not move.
The fog that constantly shrouded the world before him suddenly disappeared. Once again, he could observe the omnipresent aether sea. The sea was boundless. Waves surged to the rhythm of the world’s breathing. Light flowed from another world in the depths of the sea.
The four musician paths appeared before him again. Mind, Illusion, Revelations, and Abstinence. They were waiting for Ye Qingxuan’s choice.
However, before Ye Qingxuan could think, the moonlight inside him started burning. The sub-originator rose up and a gentle melody spread out. The sleeping Deva’s blood woke again under the melody. It radiated inside him. It felt as if his head split apart under the illumination of the moonlight. Sealed memories boiled in his mind, emerging one after another. They dragged him in, going deeper and deeper inside, deeper…
Finally, amidst the immense pain, he saw the seal made of moonlight inside his mind. Influenced by the Skull of Truth, some kind of power was awakening behind the seal. It was the power hidden in his blood, a melody that had accompanied his life since his birth. It was the talent within his Deva’s blood!
Ye Qingxuan could only feel that his blood had turned into some sort of medium. Countless complex sleeping music theories emerged in his blood. They connected with each other, transforming into a detailed but vast structure. Finally, it turned into a complicated music score. That was the nature of the Dragon bloodline, the source of the white-haired Deva’s strength!
The music score’s power continuously charged against the seal that Ye Lanzhou had set. The music notes inside the seal shook, pounding against Ye Qingxuan’s head, engulfing him in debilitating pain. However, the seal was undamaged.
Influenced by the music score, the Skull of Truth’s guidance suddenly changed. The talent within the Deva’s blood had chosen for Ye Qingxuan. Its power entered the Skull of Truth. It burned with the saint’s enlightenment and knowledge, quickly enacting one of Ye Qingxuan’s propositions.
Flames lit up inside the dark eye sockets of the skull. The inheritance was starting!
Countless music theories started emerging from the Skull of Truth. They wove with each other until the thousands of strands connected with the four paths made of music theory. Like tendrils and ivy, they grew quickly. They formed a complete entity where Ye Qingxuan had never thought of before and seeped into the four paths. They combined with the four entirely different music theories, starting an unexpected chain reaction.
The first to collapse was Revelations. Of the four, Ye Qingxuan’s study of Revelations was the shallowest. Therefore, the music theory in that path was the easiest to change. In his mind, the School of Revelations quickly evolved until it became a beam of light that flowed into the path of Abstinence.
There was a rumble. Countless music notes flowed on the path of Abstinence. They rose like flames and changed on the spiraling path. It wrapped around the Revelations music theory in an unimaginable way and became more solid. A dazzling star rose slowly at the end of the rode, illuminating the future path.
Next was Illusion. It evaporated and seeped into Abstinence. Countless music notes emerged and fused. The Abstinence path became both real and illusory as if it was between the real and nonexistent realms.
Finally, the path of Mind merged completely with Abstinence. Rays of light and shadows instantly appeared on either side of the path. They seemed to pass through hell and heaven, going to an unknown destination.
After the three changes, the path of Abstinence was nothing like before. It seemed to have turned from a bungalow to a tower that reached to the sky.
Countless music theories were combined by the saint’s enlightenment, enveloping Ye Qingxuan’s music theory within. This path transformed with the entirely new state, transforming into a structure that Ye Qingxuan could not understand. It was majestic and solemn. More moonlight spirit was merged into it. It had some signs of a symphony of predestination but was hard to grasp.
Ye Qingxuan was dumbfounded before this tower. He had no clue what was happening. The seven schools were different but it was possible to merge. However, one needed to be at least the Distortion level to merge to this extent. Before writing the symphony of predestination and entering the Scepter level, musicians must go through the ‘completion stage.’ They must merge his specialized path with the other six schools and complete the evolution.
Only a complete and stable system could support the vast symphony of predestination. Ye Qingxuan never expected that the Skull of Truth could cross all that at once and help him merge four paths before he even entered Resonance.
This change had solved one of Ye Qingxuan’s hardest problems though. All four paths were long and hard to choose but now they had become just one path. The downside was…the enlightenment within the Skull of Truth that could help him break through the Barrier of Knowledge had thinned. If it was a blazing fire before, now it was only a weak flame. All that power had been used up by the Deva’s blood!
Ye Qingxuan wanted to cry. What kind of musician was he now? Now, the sub-originator was the core within his body. His blood formed a system that merged four schools together… It looked like he had formed a special school but there was no sign of Ye Qingxuan’s Dreamweaver! It seemed that the world hated him.
However, he had no time to waste. His perception climbed the tower of music theory and charged into the depths of the aether sea. It felt like he was flying in the air. Breaking through layers of fog, he soared like an eagle. Riding the waves of aether, he flew higher, higher, and higher until he reached the end of the sky.
The scenery around him was bizarre. Figures appeared in the countless rays of light. Those were the silhouettes of musicians that had left in the aether sea when they entered Resonance. They spanned throughout history and were of all ages. Some wore noble clothing while others were in rags. Some may have died but their consciousness was carved within the aether and shone like stars.
The higher he went, the closer he was to the depth of the aether sea. He could sense more and more vast realms operating within the distant world.
He ‘stepped’ on the tower with stars of music theory guiding him overhead. Rather than being distracted by the absurd scenery, he walked steadily along the star’s guidance. Passing countless paths, he walked in his own direction and entered deep inside the aether sea.
As he walked, the figures around him lessened. The remaining aether waves were stronger. Finally, the figures turned into Eastern musicians in elegant robes. They were of different ages and genders but their marks in the aether sea rippled with familiar waves. The same family emblem was on their long robes.
The same…Jiu Xiao Huan Pei!
356 The Shadow of the Aether World
For thousands of years, the Eastern Deva’s blood, the Ye family of the nine dragon bloodlines, and all musicians who had reached the Resonance level had left their mark here. Whether near or far, they guided the road for Ye Qingxuan. However, there were very few people up ahead.
Ye Qingxuan began to feel weary and exhausted but the flames of the Skull of Truth still provided him with the power to fly to the depths of the sea. Finally, he saw the familiar figure.
The ethereal figure stood alone at the highest point, hanging high like the moon as if waiting for the successor with a smile.
“Father?” Ye Qingxuan was stunned. He had been walking down the musician path into the depths of the aether sea. His sense of the aether
world also reached an unprecedented clarity.
As if standing at the peak of the land, he gazed at the stars and saw countless sweeping nebulae in the starry sky. It was either the territory and lair of natural catastrophes or the scepters and temples of first generation kings and saints.
The most striking of all was the Sacred Temple, which was shrouded in divine light. Countless magnificent songs played in the temple. Saints stood like star, illuminating layers of darkness like the sun.
It was the Sacred City founded by the first three kings, around which countless saints and the scepters of the holy spirits revolved like satellites. Together, they created a galaxy.
In another distant place, Ye Qingxuan sensed a huge abyss, full of darkness. Endless cries emerged from it. There seemed to be countless huge figures hidden in the dark. Those shadows loomed in the dark with terrifying outlines.
As he gazed at the abyss, the abyss seemed to be watching him too. The horror emblem of the Eyes Within the Eye emerged from it. It was the territory of Hyakume, the original darkness of the world where all the evils gathered.
Ye Qingxuan felt distraught with a mere glance, growing breathless. He dared not to look again. Somewhere else, there were countless scepter territories operating.
One of the scepter fields was like a huge scorching sun, overbearing but lacking agility as if it was sleeping. It was the throne of the Burgundy Kingdom—the evidence of the Sun King. However, the position of the Sun King had been vacant for hundreds of years. No one had risen to it yet.
In the east, Ye Qingxuan could feel a huge wall extending tens of millions of miles. On that high barrier, countless beacons burned with eternal light. They were the physical incarnation of the holy spirits. The light interwove into an enchantment, resisting all the darkness and attacks, firmly shrouding the eastern land.