Chapter 10: The Sword Offering

Xue Huailing’s face flushed with an unusual shade of red, fueled by anger. Her delicate brows arched sharply, and her furious eyes fixed intently on Lu Wenshu, who held Lu Chanji—whose eyes were tightly shut—in his arms.

Dressed in a thin, pale blue robe, Lu Chanji’s closed eyes still revealed her delicate features: faint red beneath her eyelids, lips slightly pale, and a somewhat ashen face pressed closely against Lu Wenshu’s chest. Her breathing was shallow, rendering her pitifully fragile.

A surge of fury erupted in Xue Huailing’s heart. She shouted, “Lu Wenshu, you claim to be the young master of the Sword Inheritance Sect, responsible for the entire sect’s future. Is this how you bear that responsibility?! You grow close and affectionate with this mortal woman—what am I to you then?”

“No matter the rumors, I always dismissed them as baseless gossip, twisting facts,” she continued, her voice sharp. “But seeing this today, it seems I’ve been the fool, kept in the dark all along.” Born a favored daughter of the prestigious Fengxi Valley, the brightest jewel of her clan, Xue Huailing had never tasted such humiliation. Her anger flared so fiercely that she summoned her soul-bound sword, gripping it tightly.

“Our families share a bond deeper than others can fathom. Do you truly intend to trample the honor of both our houses for the sake of this mortal? Lu Wenshu, if you dare take her away today, I will never forgive either of you!” With that, she drew her sword and decisively blocked his path.

Lu Wenshu did not even lift his eyelids, his gaze fixed solely on Lu Chanji’s sleeping face. “You misunderstand,” he said coolly to Xue Huailing.

“Step aside. She will soon no longer be in your sight.” Without giving her a chance to respond, he transformed into a streak of white light and vanished.

Left staring helplessly at his retreating figure, Xue Huailing was furious. Turning back, she saw the Lingchun Pavilion behind her and swung her sword to shatter the enchantments sealing it.

Stepping inside, she found the pavilion lush and fragrant, which only intensified her rage. The carefully tended plants within were rare species brought from the mortal realm, some even unknown to Fengxi Valley. Lu Wenshu cared for Lu Chanji with such meticulous attention, yet he told her she was mistaken? The fire inside Xue Huailing burned hotter.

In the courtyard stood several crooked puppets, each bearing a face resembling Lu Chanji’s. Filled with fury, Xue Huailing raised her sword and shattered the remaining puppet bodies into pieces.

—

When Lu Chanji awakened again, her surroundings had changed. She was no longer in the familiar Lingchun Pavilion.

She looked around in confusion. Jagged rocks and sheer cliffs surrounded her. On the steep, ochre-colored cliffs, only a few hardy pines clung stubbornly to crevices, their fan-shaped needles struggling to stretch toward the sky.

No one was in sight. Only the howling wind filled the air.

“Brother Wenshu? Is anyone there? Can anyone hear me?” she called out, but no response came.

Trying to leave the cliff, she took a few steps before an invisible barrier blocked her path, preventing any further movement. Trapped atop the cliff, she could go nowhere.

Had Lu Wenshu imprisoned her?

Her brows furrowed, a wave of helplessness spreading through her limbs and body.

For a moment, she was utterly at a loss.

She had never imagined that one day Lu Wenshu would confine her, restrict her freedom.

Thrown back by the barrier, she stubbornly tried several times to break through, only to be repelled each time.

There was no escaping the enchantments Lu Wenshu had set.

What was his intention?

Did he plan to keep her locked here forever?

Terrifying thoughts flooded her mind, weakening her limbs.

Alone on the cliff, with no birds or beasts in sight, she spent seven or eight days quietly waiting for the moon to rise and fall, until Lu Wenshu finally arrived.

During those days, Lu Chanji had grown much thinner.

Though she consumed the Zhuyu Grass, which kept her from hunger, the heavy worries weighed on her heart. After days without seeing anyone, her once radiant face became gaunt and pale.

Her eyes remained bright, but they no longer smiled.

Huddled under a pine tree with sharp needles piercing her thin clothes and pricking her skin, she seemed oblivious to the pain. When Lu Wenshu appeared on the ground, she barely lifted her eyelids to glance at him, remaining motionless.

As always, Lu Wenshu called her by name: “Achan.”

He approached, gently stroking her hair. “I’ve been busy these past days and couldn’t come to you. I’ve sent Ling’er back to Fengxi Valley. Don’t be unhappy.”

Lu Chanji no longer cared about Xue Huailing.

None of this concerned her anymore.

After days alone on the Sword Forging Cliff, some things became clear to Lu Chanji, though others remained elusive.

—

There were many things she could not understand, but one truth was undeniable: Lu Wenshu did not want her to leave.

This was a barrier she had never anticipated when planning to leave the Sword Inheritance Sect.

If he refused to let her go, freedom was impossible.

“What is this place? How long will you keep me locked up?” Lu Chanji shook off his hand and asked coldly, her tone impatient and guarded.

She dodged his attempt to touch her hair again, suspicion flickering in her eyes.

Lu Wenshu lowered his gaze and placed his hands behind his back.

“This is the Sword Forging Cliff, where I usually retreat to practice swordsmanship,” he said, turning his back to her and gazing down at the howling mountain winds. “No one will come here. Stay put; no one will disturb us.”

The Sword Forging Cliff was the sect’s forbidden ground; Lu Chanji had heard of it before.

No one was allowed to enter or leave. In other words, aside from Lu Wenshu, no one else would see her or take her away.

Her last shred of hope was strangled.

Her face drained of color as she trembled, asking softly, “...How long do you intend to keep me here?”

“Soon. It will be over soon.”

“When is ‘soon’?”

“On your eighteenth birthday.”

Eighteen? But that meant... today?

In disbelief, Lu Chanji hesitated. “My birthday is today... You’re going to let me leave today?”

“No,” Lu Wenshu said. “We will be together forever.”

“No!” Her chest heaved with emotion. “We could never be together forever. I don’t want to stay by your side like some pet. I’d rather die. Even if I turn to dust, I refuse to be a pet.”

“How could you be a pet?” Lu Wenshu crouched before her, brushing the pine needles from her clothes. His eyes shone with rare sincerity as he smiled. “You are the edge and blade of my sword. You will stand with me. As long as we are together, we will be invincible.”

Lu Chanji’s face paled by degrees. Unable to bear it any longer, she shouted, “Stop speaking these foolish, stubborn lies!”

“They are not lies, Achan. You will give me the finest sword. You are the partner I have dreamed of since childhood. We will be together forever, in the closest way imaginable.”

Before she could reply, a sudden thought struck her.

When she lit the lamp on the Moon Wall to pray for her parents, she asked Lu Wenshu what gift he wanted for his birthday. He said she would give him the most precious gift.

The finest sword, the most precious gift...

If those words were not meant to comfort her, then for a sword-obsessed Lu Wenshu, the most precious gift must be the rarest treasured sword in the world.

She seemed to grasp something but shivered inexplicably.

Looking up sharply at Lu Wenshu, she asked, “Lu Wenshu, what is it you want from me?”

Her voice had never been so cold. In her eyes, there was no trace of trust left.

Lu Wenshu was momentarily stunned, then smiled as if the clouds had parted after rain.

He laughed heartily, a laughter freer, more refreshing, and happier than ever before.

He did not answer but asked instead, “Achan, do you know the Yinghuo Sword?”

Lu Chanji remained silent.

“The Yinghuo Sword was wielded by the sect’s founding ancestor,” Lu Wenshu continued. “Back then, during a chaotic era, a demon lord from the Asura Realm emerged. Monsters ravaged the mortal world. Cultivators from the Ten Continents of the Great Sea sacrificed themselves in vain. No one could stop the demons.”

“The ancestor’s beloved offered herself as a sword sacrifice, awakening the sword’s killing aura, and only then were the demons vanquished. But since then, the Yinghuo Sword has never been drawn. Like the ‘Seven Slaughters,’ it became a cursed blade.”

“Now it lies locked beneath the cliff, covered in rust and dust. This place is its grave. It sleeps here, never seeing daylight.”

Lu Wenshu murmured, “Weisheng Ming has the ‘Seven Slaughters,’ so I should have the ‘Yinghuo’ too, to be worthy of battling him. Don’t you agree, Achan?”

At that moment, her body turned cold as if she’d returned to the snowy night at five years old, facing the terrifying snow demon, powerless to resist.

“You want me to be the sword sacrifice?” Though it was a question, Lu Chanji’s heart was resolute.

Lu Wenshu said nothing.

A chill ran from her chest through her entire body. Her throat tightened. “When did you decide this?”

Lu Wenshu looked at her for a long time before answering, “The moment I saw you.”

The first moment... the night he saved her from the snow demon?

She always remembered that night—snow blanketed the world, moonlight brightened the earth, and when the cold-eyed youth looked at her, his serene gaze seemed to brighten. So that was why!

She thought his eyes glowed because he had rescued her.

But in truth, they shone because he had found the perfect sword sacrifice.

“So it’s like that...” Lu Chanji laughed weakly, almost as if crying.

“I don’t understand... why me... why?” She could say no more, feeling she was less than a pet.

“You have a special constitution, a fragile fate. Over the years, all your thoughts, loves, and hates have arisen because of me alone. You will be the perfect sword sacrifice. The ‘Yinghuo’ will favor you.”

“No!”

She had lived all these years, trained puppets tirelessly, practiced swordsmanship with all her might—just to become a sword sacrifice?

No! She was not born for this fate. She would not die here.

Her words rang out firmly in defiance.

Stepping back, her dark eyes locked onto Lu Wenshu. His expression remained as gentle as ever, but through that facade, she saw his stubbornness and madness.

Thirteen years. In all those years, she had never felt so estranged from him as she did now.

She had known him for thirteen years, but only today did she truly see who he was.

How could she calmly accept her fate?

“Aren’t you afraid that if others find out, it would tarnish the Sword Inheritance Sect’s reputation, damage your cultivation and standing?” Lu Chanji tried to awaken him. “If Lu Qi and the others knew, could you still be the man they believe you to be—?”

Lu Wenshu merely raised his sleeve again.

Once more, Lu Chanji found herself unable to utter a word.

He cast a spell upon her; her body stiffened as if she were a puppet doll, controlled by him.

Lu Wenshu lifted the enchantment, and instantly, fierce winds swept across the cliff’s summit, nearly uprooting the pines.

The trees clung firmly to their roots, unmoving, but Lu Chanji walked forward against the gale.

Her dark hair and thin robe were tossed wildly, but she continued step by step—forward, forward, relentlessly forward—toward the cliff’s edge.

Watching her pale figure approach the precipice, Lu Wenshu sighed one last time, “Achan.”

His sigh seemed to mock her earlier defiance: “Mortal life is but a hundred years. When you die, no one in the cultivation world will remember you—except me.”

“I will always remember you,” he said. “Achan, for me, jump.”

Her footing gave way; a sense of weightlessness rushed over her as she closed her eyes and shed her first tear.

A fierce sword aura slashed toward her.

Then a second, a third...

Her robes tore, her hair was cut, flesh shredded, and her consciousness blurred.

The long-slumbering rage of the “Yinghuo” sword had not abated; a single sword aura was enough to bring disaster.

In the haze, Lu Chanji glimpsed the sword’s blade standing at the cliff’s base and heard its excited, metallic hum before losing consciousness.

—

Since that day,

The Lingchun Pavilion no longer stood atop the Green Peak.

Within the Sword Inheritance Sect, Lu Chanji was gone forever.