.

While the Zhu family was sinking into despair, Zhu Rong took a moment to visit the tomb of his parents and pay his respects.

Although he had lived several lives, and these parents were only two people from one of them, the fact remained that in this life he was their son, and the least he felt he could do for them was to keep their memory alive in his mind.

The death of his parents happened when he was too young; there were really few things he could remember, but from those little fragments, he could tell they had been good people who loved him.

That said, what he went to visit wasn't the gravestones that had been erected for them by the family after it was known they had perished, but rather their true tomb.

His uncle had tried to make them disappear after killing them, so that it would be difficult to determine when and how they had died. Even though he knew the family would surely suspect him, he also knew they would turn a blind eye, so he left their bodies to rot in some forgotten corner of the forest.

The only reason he had succeeded in finding them was thanks to his blood connection.

He couldn't directly sense their blood in any way, as it had long since vanished after so much time, but just like blood could retain a person's genetic information, it could also hold their spiritual imprint.

Formed through blood, that imprint carried a unique identity that could be found in any remaining part of the body,

skin, hair, even a single piece of bone. As long as it was there, he would be able to sense it, and to his surprise, he really had managed to perceive something.

Now he was deep inside the forest near Qiyan city, in an area where beasts of the third and fourth stage roamed most often, making it extremely deadly for normal people and average cultivators.

But at that moment, none of those beasts dared even breathe in that area; all of them had hidden in their dens or stayed as far as possible from that place. All because of a single being, one that had appeared out of nowhere and scared them off instantly.

Zhu Rong stood in the middle of a patch of forest ground, gazing downward.

Beneath him there was nothing but dirt and grass, but through his spiritual sense, he could feel there was something deeper.

His spiritual sense extended down, first one meter, then five, then ten, and finally he sensed what seemed to be the remains of two figures, one male and one female.

When he felt them, his brow furrowed slightly in surprise.

From what he knew, his uncle had left their corpses to rot in the forest, so he hadn't expected to find them in good condition, and yet there they were, buried beneath the earth, completely intact.

Or rather, their bodies were largely decomposed, but all the rest was preserved: limbs, bones, no signs of mauling or anything else. He could, however, perceive a certain wound in the abdomen of both bodies, most likely the one that had taken their lives.

He wasn't sure why they were in such a preserved state. It was as if someone had buried them properly instead of leaving them at the mercy of the forest's monsters.

Thanks to this, he could see their faces and fill in, in his mind, the gaps left by natural decomposition.

He could finally see, for the first time, the faces of his parents.

While he stood there examining the ground, behind him stood another figure, Yuan Lan.

Just like him, she could sense the two figures beneath the soil, but she said nothing, remaining silent on the side.

There was a certain strange gleam in her eyes as she looked at the back of that imposing figure who, since the ancient days of this continent, had been like a pillar for humanity and for many other races, standing there, his back still straight as ever, never showing the slightest sign of bending.

It was a sight she had grown used to seeing, yet she felt that perhaps his current state, at least outwardly, was something she had only witnessed twice before.

Time passed quietly, and after a while, Zhu Rong and Yuan Lan left that place.

Zhu Rong did not take his parents' remains with him. He thought they were better off here, away from the eyes of others, in a place that, though chaotic on the surface, remained peaceful beneath the ground.

But before leaving, he did one thing.

He surrounded the area within a ten meter radius with an invisible spiritual formation that would keep any spiritual beast away, no matter if it was of the first or the fifth stage, none of them would dare step foot there.

Then, at the center of that formation, he placed a seed of a plant.

A very rare one, a species now completely extinct, one that would make anyone drool if they knew what it was.

It was a sign of life itself, here, where they had died, a new life would be born.

It would make the surrounding land a more pleasant place in the future and allow them to rest below in peace and harmony.

***

In another corner of Qiyan city stood another majestic and ancient manor.

Just like the Zhu family's, it had maintained its original splendor, and although the signs of time had inevitably appeared here and there, overall it was still well preserved.

Its mighty walls still stood tall and solid, enough to make any wrongdoer think twice before daring to cross them, but perhaps they weren't even necessary, for the family's name alone was more than enough to keep troublemakers away.

It was, in fact, the manor of the Lin family, one of the four main and most important families of the Lushan province's capital.

The atmosphere inside was calm, as daily life went on as usual.

The events of the past month had caused chaos here as well, but the family's elders had managed to calm everyone down, and although another chaotic incident had started that very morning, the manor as a whole was still much calmer than many other parts of the city.

The younger members were training or cultivating, the older ones were teaching or attending to other duties. Everything went as usual, everything except one certain part of the manor.

In one of the rooms of the main building, the air was the exact opposite of what it was outside.

It was gloomy, silent, and desolate.

No sounds, no chatter echoed there, no presence of people, none except one, that of a sleeping figure who rested as if the rest of the world didn't exist.

The room was large and finely decorated, a clear sign of the person's status within the family.

But despite that, everything seemed drained of color, devoid of life.

The only trace of life was the soft and slow breathing of the sleeping figure on the bed, who otherwise showed no other sign of life.

It was a woman with long, silver white hair and a delicate face that spoke much of her beauty, but it was motionless and void of any emotion.

Just like her face, the rest of her body was still, lying there, with only her chest rising faintly, a sign that she was still alive.

It was, of course, Liang Yuexin, who since the day of the incident had fallen into a coma, showing no sign of waking up ever since.

She had been brought back by the rest of her family, who as a whole had safely escaped the secret realm, and although she had been examined by the best experts in the capital and beyond, none had ever discovered what had happened to her.

They all said that her vital signs were stable and that, technically, she should have woken up at any moment, but it was clear she hadn't.

The only strange thing they had noticed in all this was her cultivation base.

It was nonexistent, completely gone, as if she had never cultivated in her life, and yet her dantian was still there.

That alone confused everyone even more, and in the end, all the healers who had been summoned gave up, saying that only time would tell whether she would recover or not.

That, however, caused quite a stir in the family, especially her older brother,

Liang Zhan, who had nearly laid hands on the healers more than once for their uselessness in the matter.

He, more than anyone, had tried to find a solution to her condition, but just like the healers, he had reached a dead end, not knowing what exactly to look for or what kind of condition to search for, since there were no signs of illness or any internal or external cause.

The only thing they knew was that she had had a small outburst after leaving the secret realm, and then fainted.

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