The Young Lady Only Wants to Cultivate Immortality Chapter 23

White, all white.

A’Ling looked at everything around her; the sky was white, the ground was white, the trees were white, the birds were white…

Everything, absolutely everything, was white.

An ineffable ominous premonition instantly seized A’Ling’s heart.

Then, in the next second, A’Ling saw a figure in green fall from the white sky.

A’Ling’s face instantly turned ashen, as if all the blood had been drained from her body.

“The Seventh Level…” She heard her teeth clearly chattering, “The Seventh Level of the Heaven-Bearing Sorrowful Prison Cliff…”

A’Ling quickly ran towards the frail figure on the ground. The green dress was covered in mottled bloodstains. A’Ling, with trembling hands, tried to help the person up, but her transparent hands passed straight through the green figure.

It was a dream, A’Ling remembered. She had already left the Heaven-Bearing Sorrowful Prison Cliff a long time ago. Not only had she left, but she had also died and then come back to life.

Nearly a century had passed since her experience at the Heaven-Bearing Sorrowful Prison Cliff.

A’Ling’s entire body trembled at a visible rate. Even after so long, remembering it again still terrified her so greatly.

The immense fear pressed down on her heart, making it impossible to breathe normally. All she could hear was a roaring in her ears.

The world was silent, only the buzzing in her ears.

This was the ‘terror’ of the Heaven-Bearing Sorrowful Prison Cliff’s Seventh Level. Here, there was no color but white, and no sound. It was like a dead world.

When the world dies, and you are alive, every single moment is torment.

A’Ling saw the figure on the ground move; the ‘her’ on the ground woke up.

‘She’ stood up, and the joy on her face lasted only a moment before disappearing.

A’Ling watched ‘herself’ stumble to her feet, saw her frantically shouting but making no sound, and watched her stagger and run while desperately calling out for someone.

A’Ling knew what ‘she’ was afraid of.

Because, back then, she had narrowly survived the first six levels of the Heaven-Bearing Sorrowful Prison Cliff, fully believing that one more level would mean freedom, only to find herself in this silent, all-white world.

A’Ling felt she had been abandoned, abandoned by the living world.

A’Ling watched the dream-self run tirelessly for a very long time, finally giving up the struggle and slowly crouching down, unwilling to move. She curled up on the white ground, tightly hugging herself.

She had risked her life to pass the first six levels, yet in what seemed to be the safest place, she gave up struggling.

A’Ling couldn’t embrace herself. She could only shout loudly, ‘Don’t be afraid!’

“A’Ling, don’t be afraid—”

“A’Ling, you still have me—”

“I’m here, A’Ling—”

“Get up, don’t give up—”

“Just a little more, you’ll be out soon—”

But no matter how A’Ling called out, her dream-self couldn’t hear. She only curled up, and after an unknown amount of time, A’Ling felt that her dream-self was about to merge with this white world.

She was dying.

A’Ling couldn’t make a sound. Her face was ashen and she felt unsteady. This memory from her previous life was perhaps too painful; whenever she recalled it, it was always incomplete.

She didn’t know how she eventually got out of the Heaven-Bearing Sorrowful Prison Cliff. Why, in this dream, did it look nothing like she had escaped the Seventh Level? Could it all just be her dream?

Suddenly, a different color appeared in the pure white world: black.

A’Ling saw her dream-self, and vine-like black energy slowly grew within her body. They intertwined and writhed together, gradually forming a ‘cocoon’ that enveloped her body.

The black mist suddenly spoke.

“Child, don’t be afraid.”

A’Ling watched everything in the dream incredulously. The black mist caressed the ‘A’Ling’ who seemed to have lost all vitality.

“Child, wake up, quickly wake up.”

A’Ling’s eyes widened in shock as she watched the black mist coax the figure on the ground.

Slowly, she saw the jade-white spiritual core within the ‘her’ on the ground gradually seep into the black energy, dissolving little by little from within, as if it was being assimilated by the black energy.

No good.

A’Ling shouted at her dream-self, telling her not to: “A’Ling, wake up quickly! Don’t fall to the demonic path, wake up!”

“No, don’t—” A’Ling sharply opened her eyes. The white world instantly vanished, replaced by pale purplish-pink bed curtains embroidered with pink lotuses.

A’Ling sat bolt upright and looked around. Her body felt cold and clammy, and the surroundings were dark. For a moment, A’Ling couldn’t tell if she was awake or had entered another terrifying dream.

Only when she saw the three birds still diligently working at the foot of the bed did she let out a huge sigh of relief.

She closed her eyes tightly, and when she opened them again, her gaze was unfocused and scattered. The dream she had just experienced was bizarre yet real.

In her previous life, A’Ling had never remembered how she fell to the demonic path. She had only thought the process was too painful, and that she had acquired demonic energy and shattered her spiritual core after leaving the Heaven-Bearing Sorrowful Prison Cliff.

She had always believed that she had suffered cultivation deviation during that process, and her mind had gone astray, giving rise to evil thoughts.

Thinking about the scene in her dream, was it possible she hadn’t fallen to the demonic path by herself back then?

Did that demonic energy save her?

Who was that voice speaking?

And why did it want her to become a demonic cultivator?

A’Ling’s heart was filled with thousands upon thousands of questions, like the rapid-fire drumming of raindrops on the roof. She wanted to know if the events in her dream were real.

How did she get out of the Heaven-Bearing Sorrowful Prison Cliff later?

A’Ling lay back, pulling the quilt over her head. No, she had to finish that dream.

If she didn’t figure out where that demonic energy came from and why it saved her, she would suffer from insomnia.

An hour later, A’Ling confirmed she had insomnia.

The rain outside, which had been falling for most of the night, showed no signs of stopping; instead, it grew heavier, drumming loudly on the eaves. The air even carried an unpleasant salty, damp smell.

A’Ling found it even harder to sleep.

A faint light from the corridor outside shone through the window lattice onto the corner of the bed. A’Ling glanced at the three unusually busy birds in the corner, then put on an outer robe and got up.

She casually pulled out a few sheets of paper to see what Gu Jingyang was rambling about in the middle of the night. She saw that Gu Jingyang mentioned her mother had once captured a large, monstrous seagull that caused random rain. Later, it promised never to cause random rain again, and her mother released it after three years of imprisonment.

A’Ling already knew that Gu Jingyang’s mother was a demon subjugator, often commissioned to subjugate demons and monsters across the human realm.

Looking at these novel stories Gu Jingyang told, A’Ling pondered. Perhaps Gu Jingyang would know something, but how was she supposed to bring it up?

She hadn’t been to the Heaven-Bearing Sorrowful Prison Cliff yet, nor had she fallen to the demonic path. She couldn’t very well say she had a friend who did, could she? She didn’t even have friends.

A’Ling picked up Ling Ersan from the ground and stroked its ruffled feathers. “How do you think I should ask this question?”

Ling Ersan, who had repeated the same phrase thousands of times that night, immediately chirped, “That’s just too… you know.”

A’Ling’s mouth twitched. She had taught Ling Ersan phrases to string Gu Jingyang along, and now it was using them on her.

However, being amused by it, the oppressive discomfort in A’Ling’s heart lessened considerably.

She thought for a moment, then picked up the Phoenix Feather from the table and asked Gu Jingyang a question in a roundabout way.

Gu Jingyang had been listening to A’Ling repeat the same four phrases all night:

“Tell me more.”

“Continue.”

“That’s just too… you know.”

“You’re right.”

She instinctively felt something was off. Even if A’Ling wanted to string her along, she wouldn’t so regularly cycle through only these four phrases. That fellow must have used some spiritual art to deal with her.

She was about to send a message to question her. If the other party still replied with those same phrases, then there was no doubt.

Before she could send her message, the Phoenix Feather in her hand lit up first.

Gu Jingyang raised an eyebrow. Their messages had been going back and forth all night, so why was the sequence suddenly wrong? Very suspicious.

She tapped the communication feather, and A’Ling’s voice, which had repeated the four phrases all night, sounded again, but this time it wasn’t those four phrases.

Hearing A’Ling’s question, Gu Jingyang’s earlier irritation vanished. She wasn’t entirely clear on this particular question herself, but it didn’t matter; A’Ling finally had an interesting topic she wanted to discuss with her.

Gu Jingyang pulled out all the books about demonic cultivators in her room and replied to A’Ling while reading.

After A’Ling asked her question, she leaned against the bed and watched the rain falling in the courtyard, dense and continuous, as if it would never stop.

Soon, small puddles accumulated in the courtyard, glinting under the corridor’s lamplight.

A’Ling felt that even this annoying rainy day was much better than the pure white world in her dream.

That was truly hell, an endless nightmare.

In the darkness of the night, the light from the Phoenix Feather in A’Ling’s hand was conspicuously bright and dazzling. She hadn’t expected Gu Jingyang to reply so quickly; perhaps this indicated that she knew the answer to the question.

A’Ling had asked: ‘How do mortals cultivating immortals fall to the demonic path?’

She tapped Gu Jingyang’s message, and Gu Jingyang’s slightly excited voice came through in the night.

“A’Ling, why are you suddenly asking about this? Are you interested in it?”

A’Ling paused. How should she reply? Should she say it was just a sudden whim?

Before she could respond, another message came from Gu Jingyang’s side.

“A’Ling, the reasons for falling to the demonic path vary, and the methods of doing so also differ.”

A’Ling’s eyes lit up upon hearing this. It seemed Gu Jingyang really knew. Before she could ask for details, another message arrived.

“Specifically, it depends on the circumstances of the cultivator who falls to the demonic path and—”

A’Ling: ? And what?

She repeatedly confirmed that she hadn’t missed anything. Who talks by saying half a sentence like that?

Fortunately, another message quickly came.

“Sorry, A’Ling, I just turned a page. Let me see, and what—”

A’Ling slammed the Phoenix Feather down onto the table with a thud. She then grabbed Ling Ersan, who was dozing on the writing desk, and tossed it back into the corner.

She also threw Gu Jingyang’s Phoenix Feather in there for good measure.

She was afraid that if she kept listening, she’d stay up all night and go to the Gu family to give Gu Jingyang a good scolding.

Disrupted by this little interlude, A’Ling lay down and fell asleep.

Gradually, her breathing calmed, and her heartbeat finally returned to a normal rhythm.

This time, when she fell asleep, A’Ling didn’t dream again.

In the night, somewhere else, another person had fallen into a dream.

In the guest room of Tranquil Shade Herb Hut in Hongjian Academy’s back mountain, Shi Qingqian lay on the bed, her brows deeply furrowed, her chest heaving violently as if she had difficulty breathing.

Shi Qingqian rarely dreamt since she gained memory, but tonight, dreams came one after another.

In the dream, there was no sound, only silence, and a stubborn figure in green.

Shi Qingqian returned to the day A’Ling had her leg broken. She watched her stubbornly crawl outwards, leaving trails of bloodstains where she passed.

She saw herself kneeling on that expanse of crimson blood, her plain white robe stained red.

The bloodstains soaked into the robe, carrying intense pain that traveled from her knees all the way to her heart.

Shi Qingqian saw that her pale heart actually gained a hint of color.

In her dream, she clearly heard her heart stir.

Shi Qingqian sharply opened her eyes, looking at the straw hut’s roof covered in Lovesickness Vines, feeling a wave of bewilderment.

She gazed at the flowers on the Lovesickness Vines, blooming more passionately the higher they climbed, then abruptly got up, a hint of obsession in her eyes.

After a night of wind and rain, the first light of dawn broke the next day.

A’Ling woke from her stupor and glanced at the stack of letters at the foot of the bed, already piled high to the ceiling. Fortunately, she hadn’t kept listening yesterday.

Today, she definitely had to have a serious talk with Gu Jingyang about how to convey useful information concisely and efficiently, otherwise her three rotating birds would die of exhaustion.

No, one of them had already collapsed from exhaustion.

A’Ling looked at the listless Ling Ersan and chuckled. Look how tired the poor thing is, its silver-red eyes are now bloodshot from staying up.

She smiled and opened the window in the corner, hoping the cool air would refresh it.

The window lattice creaked open outwards, and a figure in plain white suddenly appeared before the window.

Startled, A’Ling took several steps back, accidentally knocking over the stack of letters piled high to the ceiling.

In an instant, papers rained down before A’Ling.

Some fluttered with the wind over the window lattice, landing on the red-eyed figure in plain white standing before the window.