[/expand]

BOOM!

w.a.n.g Tengfei’s eyes were crimson as he launched a full-force attack, which slammed into Meng Hao, causing blood to spray out of his mouth. Despite the fact that w.a.n.g Tengfei was likewise hit with a backlash attack, he didn’t seem to care. Roaring, he flew back to attack again.

“So you also know mountains have no worries, 'til struck by snowy flurries; waters feel no woe, 'til the winds gust and blow!!” The stabbing pain w.a.n.g Tengfei felt in his heart was not any less than Meng Hao's.

He had loved Chu Yuyan from the very beginning, and that had never changed. However... he had been too proud. Back in the early days, his pride had allowed him to turn a blind eye to her. He thought that if he could just defeat Meng Hao, if he could somehow get stronger and stronger, then it would be possible to sacrifice everything else... including Chu Yuyan!

But when he lost everything, he finally realized, to his bitterness, that he truly had nothing. From that moment on, he began to wish that Chu Yuyan could simply be happy, and live a life of laughter and smiles.

Many years went by, and he believed himself to have forgotten his love from the past. But then one day he emerged from secluded meditation to hear from his fellow clan members about what was happening with Chu Yuyan. He had then done everything in his power to come here. In the moment he arrived, he saw Meng Hao, then completely lost control and exploded with violence.

“If you didn't care about her then why did you have to steal her from me!?!? MENG HAO!!” Roaring, w.a.n.g Tengfei attacked again. Meng Hao didn’t respond. He stood there trembling, his heart in pieces. w.a.n.g Tengfei’s words slammed into him like bolts of lightning.

He didn’t raise a hand to fight back. w.a.n.g Tengfei battered him with one fist after another. In Meng Hao’s mind, this was all his fault. The debt he owed was too profound, and he felt deep regret.... He regretted everything from the past, and now knew the mistakes he had made. He had never realized how deeply, how severely he had affected others.

“I'm sorry....” he murmured bitterly. Although the words were spoken quietly, when w.a.n.g Tengfei heard them, he stopped in place. His fists dropped to his sides, and he began to weep.

Meng Hao walked back to the coffin and looked at the beautiful Chu Yuyan laying there as if slumbering. Tears streaming down his face, he reached up and gently touched her forehead with his right hand.

The tears rolled off his face, dropping down onto Chu Yuyan’s cheek....

A moment later, he looked up at Pill Demon and the ancient old man hovering next to him in midair.

“There's something off about Chu Yuyan's death. Tell me why, immediately!” He spoke slowly, one word at a time, and by the time he reached the final words, his voice boomed deafeningly, causing colors to flash in the sky and a sweeping wind to spring up. The entire Kunlun Society began to shake violently.

As he spoke, his cultivation base exploded with power, pus.h.i.+ng him to the point where he could slaughter Dao Realm cultivators. Right now, he could cut down 1-Essence Dao Realm experts, could cause 2-Essences cultivators to tremble, and could even take on... 3-Essences Dao Lords!

Pill Demon gaped in astonishment and turned to look at the ancient man next to him. That old man had not mentioned anything suspicious about Chu Yuyan’s death. Pill Demon had a.s.sumed that it was because after reaching Immortal Ascension, Chu Yuyan’s foundation was unstable, which led to the dispersal of her soul.

Pill Demon wasn’t the only one to stare in shock. w.a.n.g Tengfei’s eyes went wide, and the surrounding Kunlun Society disciples all looked up at the old man, astonished.

This old man was one of the Patriarchs of the Kunlun Society. He looked down at Meng Hao and sighed. He had long since heard about how powerful Meng Hao was, but now that he could see it for himself, he realized that Meng Hao was able to see the clues on Chu Yuyan’s corpse.

“Her spiritual soul is lost....

“When she returned last time, she seemed normal, but the truth of the matter was that she had already lost her spiritual soul. The only thing that remained behind was her physical soul. She could only last for so long in such a state. Without the support of her spiritual soul, in the end... her physical soul dispersed.

“That is why she died, and is also why I was unable to reverse the situation and resurrect her....”

The old man spoke in a low voice, and uttered no lies. He went on to explain the full process of how he had attempted to treat Chu Yuyan.

Meng Hao was trembling. Because of the level of his cultivation base, he was well aware of the ramifications of a person losing their spiritual soul. With only the physical soul remaining, one had no foundation, and at any time, that person could lose touch with reality and begin to disperse into death.

From the moment Chu Yuyan had returned, she had begun to weaken. With every day that pa.s.sed she struggled against death, but unfortunately, there was absolutely nothing she could do.

She could only wait until her physical soul dispersed, and the day of her death arrived....

She knew that she was dying, and therefore... had sent that final message to Meng Hao.

“Meng Hao.... I hope that you and Xu Qing can have a safe and peaceful life together....”

Meng Hao’s eyes were completely bloodshot, and he shook from the increasingly intense pain in his heart. Based on how high his cultivation base was, it was easy for him to inspect Chu Yuyan’s corpse and confirm that what the old man had said was no lie.

“Her spiritual soul is lost.... Well, where did it go...?” Meng Hao’s eyes were filled with madness; he knew that all of this was caused because Chu Yuyan had helped him in the Windswept Realm, leading to her serious injuries. However, although her soul had been in a fragile state that could split apart at any time, when she stepped into the vortex to return home it had been whole. Meng Hao had looked at her as she had left, and could confirm that that was the case.

The problem must have occurred... after Chu Yuyan entered the vortex leading from the area of the Windswept Realm back to the Ninth Mountain. Meng Hao had also made that trip, which had taken only a brief moment.

Clearly, though, that brief moment was all it took... for Chu Yuyan to lose her spiritual soul!

“The physical soul lives because of the spiritual soul. The spiritual soul nourishes the physical soul.... If I can find Chu Yuyan’s spiritual soul, then maybe... bringing her back to life wouldn’t be impossible!” Meng Hao looked back down at Chu Yuyan, his eyes flickering with a glint of obsession as he decided that he would definitely track down Chu Yuyan’s spiritual soul!

His right hand flashed with an incantation gesture as he unleashed Karmic Hexing. He gently pushed down onto Chu Yuyan’s forehead, and yet, no Karma appeared. His eyes flickered with madness as he suddenly began to walk around Chu Yuyan’s coffin. He moved faster and faster, until ghost images of himself appeared.

First it was one ghost image, and then two, three, four....

He moved so quickly that a wind sprang up, and even more ghost images appeared. Soon there were ten, fifteen... and even more.

Meng Hao didn't hesitate at all to use the strange walking technique, which would enable him to return... to the day before!

One day earlier, Chu Yuyan’s physical soul had not completely dispersed! [1. Interesting point. In the original Chinese, Er Gen actually typed Xu Qing instead of Chu Yuyan in this paragraph. It’s not the first time, either. I’ve always fixed the mistake, but this is a pretty intense scene where he yet again mixed up the names]

As Meng Hao walked, gradually, the power of time travel began to surge out. As soon as the aura appeared, it blurred the vision of the surrounding cultivators. Even Pill Demon’s eyes went blank.

It was only the Kunlun Society Patriarch whose eyes suddenly began to s.h.i.+ne with a bright light. Inwardly, ma.s.sive waves of shock battered his heart.

“The Dao... of time travel!!

“I can't believe that Meng Hao... can actually use the Dao of time travel!!”

He wasn’t the only one who was shaken. The other Dao Realm Patriarchs in the Kunlun Society were all shaken. As they watched the scene with divine sense, they were thoroughly flabbergasted by Meng Hao.

They all watched as gradually, more and more ghost images of Meng Hao appeared, until finally, they merged together into a ring.

In the middle of that ring was the coffin and the area around it, which apparently... was moving through time. The gra.s.s swayed, and ripples spread out. Numerous figures appeared, coming and going, going and coming.

None of the spectators noticed how incredibly pale Meng Hao’s face was. This walking technique was bizarre and enigmatic to be sure, but it was incredibly difficult for Meng Hao to use it to return Chu Yuyan to the previous day.

However, no thoughts of giving up entered his mind. He moved faster and faster. Regardless of how much blood oozed out of his mouth, regardless of how his body withered, regardless of how his cultivation base trembled, he persisted.

As he continued onward, more ripples flowed through the area around Chu Yuyan, moving faster and faster. More time pa.s.sed, and suddenly Chu Yuyan’s eyes opened.

It was in that moment that Meng Hao finally stopped in place. He coughed up nine mouthfuls of blood, and a patch of his hair turned white and then transformed into nothing but ash, and his entire body looked much older.

Chu Yuyan’s eyes were listless, which was how she had looked the previous day just before she died. She was not aware of the things around her, nor could she sense that Meng Hao had traveled back an entire day just to see her.

He didn't hesitate for a moment. Still coughing up blood, he performed an incantation gesture and unleashed a Demon Sealing Hexing magic, reaching out to push his finger down onto Chu Yuyan’s forehead.

In that moment, his mind trembled, and suddenly, faint Karma Threads appeared all around Chu Yuyan.

More than half of the threads were connected to Meng Hao himself, which caused the pain in his heart to intensify. However, he knew that time was of the essence. He focused all of his concentration and began to examine the other Karma Threads, hoping to use them to locate her spiritual soul!

He held nothing back, rotating his cultivation base to the full, causing azure light to s.h.i.+ne around him. Finally, he found one particular Karma Thread that led out into the void. He sent divine sense to follow it, going further and further until he was also in the void.

It was there that Meng Hao caught sight of a vortex, a familiar vortex that was none other than... the vortex which Paragon Sea Dream had summoned after the collapse of the Windswept Realm, allowing everyone to return to where they had come from.

It was there that the Karma Thread began to collapse. Seeing that the thread was about to vanish, Meng Hao roared, causing more Time magic to explode out. Coupled with his cultivation base and the Karmic Hexing, he once again began to walk, using the Dao of time travel.

He unleashed all of his power, until finally, he saw... two visions!

In the first vision, he saw Chu Yuyan stepping into a vortex, her face pale. That was the moment in which everyone returned through Paragon Sea Dream’s vortex.

By means of this particular divine ability, Meng Hao was able to follow Time back to its Essence to see what had happened here in the past.

What he saw was that, as Chu Yuyan traveled through the vortex, she pa.s.sed by the Nine Mountains of the Mountain and Sea Realm. When she was pa.s.sing by the Eighth Mountain and Sea, all of a sudden, a voice could be heard within the vortex.

“Soul, come to me!”