Nether Path spirit masters divided spirits of the underworld into seven ranks. The ones commonly seen were the lower four ranks; the upper three ranks were few in number, but whenever one appeared, it was a calamity.
The so-called “crimson evil” was the seventh rank, the highest among spirits of the underworld.
Although the fifth and sixth ranks in the upper ranks were rare, a few would appear every few years to wreak havoc on the human world. They would then be besieged and eliminated by the prominent families among the current Nether Path spirit masters. The cases left behind were available for young practitioners like them to study and learn from.
But the seventh-rank crimson evil was something that only existed in legends.
The conditions for a spirit to step into the crimson evil rank were extremely demanding. It must have suffered extremely miserable, inhuman torment in life, died at the moment its emotions are most intense, and turned into a ghost carrying extremely pure resentment and killing intent. In addition, the right timing, place, and circumstances are required and only then could a crimson evil be achieved.
Moreover, once a crimson evil manifested, it could not be guided, only slain. But crimson evils bore such deep resentment that very few spirit masters in the world could match them. As a second best option, they can only be sealed away.
The Seven Watch Blood-Crying Prison was a sealing formation created by the founding ancestor of his own sect. Because the formation was fierce and its setup required great sacrifice, this formation would not be easily activated.
The family’s secret records stated that the birth of the Seven Watch Blood-Crying Prison, as well as its only activation in history, were both for the purpose of suppressing the only crimson evil in the entire history of the Nether Path.
Fu Sang couldn’t see spirits of the underworld, so over the years, he could only work hard on theoretical knowledge.
The formation before his eyes was divided into seven paths: wind, thunder, fire, heaven, earth, life, and death. Each path used seven threads stringing seven coins, plus countless suppression talismans. Even the purifying ghost fire and the Cease-Delusion Command, which were never lightly used, were hung here. He had never seen such a scene except on the page about the Seven Watch Blood-Crying Prison.
Was the dense yin energy at the bottom of Languozi Cliff not just because of a fu, but also because the Seven Watch Blood-Crying Prison and the crimson evil sealed beneath it were hidden here?
Then why had he been drawn in here?
The chanting of the Cease-Delusion Command rose and fell in waves, and the cyan-green flames burned ever more fiercely. Everything in the cave trembled incessantly, and the wailing sound of the weeping soul coins reporting death was so loud it hurt the ears.
…This seal was about to break.
Realizing this, Fu Sang let out a silent sigh.
He knelt down on one knee to feel for his phone, which had fallen to the ground earlier.
It had landed behind him. He picked it up, lit up the screen, and directly opened Huo Wei’s chat window, typing rapidly.
[I’m about to die. I’m leaving my inheritance to you. Good night. Don’t miss me.]
“Whoosh…”
A strange gust of wind eerily surged from deep within the cave.
The wind was extremely cold and ominous. It brushed against the back of Fu Sang’s neck, giving him goosebumps all over. His hand trembled, and his phone fell to the ground once more.
The firelight in the cave blazed brightly, casting Fu Sang’s shadow onto the ground.
He clearly saw himself kneeling there, and then another dark shadow slowly spread from behind him, engulfing his own bit by bit.
Anyone in their line of work knew that ghosts did not have shadows.
Unless, what loomed over him was the purifying ghost fire.
“One step closer…”
The phone on the ground suddenly rang with a ringtone, accompanied by another sound of metal colliding, different from the sound of the weeping soul coins.
It sounded like… chains.
Fu Sang stared at the dark shadow that had now completely covered him, watching the long hair of the shadow whipping wildly in the wind, and was somewhat lost in thought.
So lost in thought that he forgot to pick up his phone, letting the melody and lyrics slowly flow out.
“I have died everyday waiting for you, Darling, don’t be afraid…”
“I have loved you for a thousand years…”
Having been a spirit master for so many years, this was the first time in his life that Fu Sang had ever seen a spirit of the underworld, even if it was just a shadow.
This made him completely unable to look away.
At the same time, he was clearly aware that if the formation in this cave really was the Seven Watch Blood-Crying Prison, then behind him was the only seventh-rank crimson evil in thousands of years.
This meant he was definitely going to die tonight.
But Fu Sang’s mood was extraordinarily calm.
Seeing the shadow already drawing near, he slowly turned his head as well.
“I’ll love you for a thousand more, And all along I believed I would find you…”
Perhaps it was because Fu Sang’s blood had connected with the Seven Watch Blood-Crying Prison, or perhaps it was because the crimson evil was inherently different from other spirits, but at this moment, the ghost behind him appeared extraordinarily clear in Fu Sang’s eyes, which originally couldn’t see spirits of the underworld.
The crimson evil took the form of a young man.
His complexion was as pale as paper. He should have been quite handsome, but a pair of grayish-white eyes gave him an eerie, ghostly air.
On the right side of his face was a blood-red rune. It began at his forehead, crossed over his brow and eye, and ended at his jaw. Further down, a terrifying dark red vertical line appeared at his neck, right over his Adam’s apple.
That indicated the fatal wound this ghost had suffered in life.
— He had died by a sharp weapon piercing his throat.
“Clank!”
The crimson evil stepped forward, slowly walking toward him.
As he moved, the shackles around his ankles dragged across the ground, producing a grating, teeth-clenching sound.
“I have loved you for a thousand years…”
The crimson evil’s red robe was tattered and torn, as if it had been pierced by swords and blades countless times and then burned by fire. Dust and scorch marks had dimmed the original crimson to an extremely dull shade. Through the gaps, an equally ragged white inner garment could be seen.
The fabric, nearly shredded into a curtain, overlapped with the man’s loose jet-black hair, dancing wildly together with the wind and fire light.
“I’ll love you for a thousand more.”
The weeping soul coins at Fu Sang’s waist, along with the song, were nearly crying themselves hoarse.
He and his weeping soul coins had never encountered this level of yin energy before, it was extremely cold, and extremely dangerous.
This was a crimson evil.
“You… who are you…?”
While Fu Sang was slightly dazed, he heard the crimson evil speak.
So this was how ghosts talked.
Unlike what others said, with sharp, hoarse voices and slurred speech, only capable of wailing.
Actually, it wasn’t much different from a normal living person.
The voice was actually very clear and cold, bringing to mind an underground spring flowing at the foot of a mountain.
Fu Sang was twenty-four years old this year. He had been exposed to matters of spirits since childhood, dealing with the dark side of the human world day in and day out, yet he had never truly been able to see or touch that world.
Everyone around him could, but he alone could not.
It was as if everyone else described such vivid scenes, yet he alone stood outside the panels of the comic book.
This was the first ghost he had seen in twenty-four years.
He had seen it with his own eyes.
How novel.
Then, Fu Sang’s gaze slowly descended, and he saw the bronze plaque at the waist of the fierce ghost before him.
Sealed evil ghosts would have their names carved on bronze plaques; the name was the first seal placed upon their souls.
Now, the crimson evil was already near, and the bronze plaque dangled right before Fu Sang’s eyes.
Too many years had passed, so the plaque was already corroded and its inscriptions were illegible.
So Fu Sang simply reached out his hand, without fear or timidity in his heart, and without regard for any consequences or outcomes.
He gently grasped the name plaque at the crimson evil’s waist, using his fingertip to trace the uneven characters, forming them stroke by stroke in his mind.
Qi…
Realizing which characters he was touching, Fu Sang’s eyes widened slightly, and he looked up into the crimson evil’s grayish-white eyes.
Qi, Chang, Ying.
How could it be Qi Changying?
So, the unofficial history he had read was true…Qi Changying had indeed died at Buzhou Cliff.
The secret history passed down through generations of spirit masters was also true; a seventh-rank crimson evil had indeed appeared, the Seven Watch Blood-Crying Prison, which was recorded but had never been successfully replicated by anyone since, was not a fictional legendary creation either.
The renowned general Qi Changying, who had achieved fame at a young age with high spirits, praised by generations and lamented for a thousand years, was the greatest calamity in Nether Path history, the legendary crimson evil that had nearly destroyed the entire Nether Path and forced spirit masters to create an entirely new seventh rank beyond the original six ranks of spirits of the underworld.
What a great discovery. This completely unremarkable Languozi Cliff actually hid the Seven Watch Blood-Crying Prison and a crimson evil, which was also Qi Changying’s burial ground.
What a pity, it was about to be his as well.
“Who are you?”
Qi Changying spoke again, repeating the question from before.
Fu Sang met his gaze.
He stared into Qi Changying’s grayish-white eyes.
‘How beautiful.’
The irises were a pale, snow-like grayish-white, but the pupils were blood-red, which was extremely eerie. Paired with that ten-thousand-deaths-without-reincarnation rune on the right side of his face, this overwhelming sense of inhumanity was terrifying, yet also breathtakingly beautiful.
For the sake of those eyes, Fu Sang answered his question:
“Fu Sang.”
“Fu… Sang…”
Perhaps it had been too long since he had spoken, Qi Changying enunciated slowly and haltingly:
“Too lazy to watch the fleeting light, too idle to tend the mulberry trees…”
**It’s a line from the poem “Hard Is the Way of the World” (Xínglù Nán) by He Zhù (贺铸), a poet from the Northern Song dynasty. (“Fu Sang” means “mulberry tree” in Chinese,so when Qi Changying hears the name, it makes him think of that line and he quotes it).
Qi Changying gently grasped Fu Sang’s wrist through his sleeve, then gradually moved from his wrist to his hand.
The trail of blood flowing on the back of Fu Sang’s hand was smeared.
Qi Changying drew Fu Sang’s hand away from the bronze plaque at his waist, and the plaque bearing his name fell back among the folds of his clothing.
“…Yet helplessly, sorrow comes and a single day feels as long as a year.”
**Another line from the poem
Qi Changying held Fu Sang’s fingers very lightly, like the courtesy of a Western gentleman about to kiss the back of a hand.
A ghost’s touch was different from a human’s. It had no human warmth, only the deathly stillness of cold.
It was not quite real, somewhat illusory, yet it made one know with absolute clarity that they were being touched.
“A good name.”
As Qi Changying’s words fell, Fu Sang’s body suddenly jolted violently.
His left eye, naturally different in color, suddenly burned with a searing pain, as if even his soul was being scorched.
Fu Sang broke free from Qi Changying’s hand, but the pain in his left eye only grew more intense, as if fire was burning and needles were prickling his eye. He couldn’t help but cover his eyes with both hands, bending over and kneeling to the ground.
His eyes and temples throbbed with pain, the pain more fierce and piercing than falling from a great height. Even Fu Sang, who had grown accustomed to pain over the years, could barely endure it.
Fu Sang collapsed to the ground, curling up, his face as pale as paper, his fingertips trembling. Yet a faint, subtle upward curve lingered at the corners of his mouth.
Before losing consciousness, he heard his phone’s ringtone finally reach its last line, the voices overlapping and unclear, sounding both far away and very near…
“I’ll love you for a thousand more.”
Song is “A Thousand Years” by Christina Perri!
