Chapter 44: “Brother Wen, This Isn’t Right, Is It?”

When Xie Tongchen first entered the secret realm, he had tried to use Qingshuang Sword to split apart the fog. He struck too fiercely and nearly damaged the secret realm’s lifespan along with heaven and earth. Qingshuang Sword was immediately expelled from the secret realm.

At first, Meng Fuguang had only become pregnant in order to escape the secret realm.

But by the time the fetus had been carried for ten full months, he had developed feelings for the child.

The secret realm was utterly empty. The only things the two of them could use were what they had inside their qiankun pouches. Magical treasures and talismans were completely useless. A luminous pearl worth a hundred thousand spirit stones was not as useful as two cornmeal buns for filling the stomach.

Both of them had practiced bigu before. Meng Fuguang had always considered dry rations a burden, so he could not produce even half a steamed bun from his qiankun pouch.

Xie Tongchen, however, believed that “food is the people’s greatest necessity” and had plenty stored away.

“I may not need to eat it myself, but someone will always go hungry. Keeping some prepared is never wrong.”

Golden Core cultivators were everywhere in Hengxue Sect, but across the cultivation world as a whole, ordinary cultivators at Qi Refining and Foundation Establishment still formed the majority.

As Xie Tongchen traveled through the cultivation world, he frequently encountered rogue cultivators who could not even fill their stomachs. He generously gave them both fish and the means to fish.

“So these are specifically meant as charity for others? I’m not eating your disaster-relief provisions. Don’t bring them over. Mm—”

After confirming his pregnancy on the tenth day, Meng Fuguang stopped pretending. If he did not mock the righteous path several times a day, he felt uncomfortable.

That hateful Xie Tongchen was actually forcing him to eat.

After going without food and drink for a long time, he did occasionally crave something.

Xie Tongchen had unilaterally concluded that pregnancy required additional nutrition and became anxious over it.

Meng Fuguang pulled over his qiankun pouch and looked inside. The food was piled up like a small mountain, and there was an astonishing variety.

Once, Xie Tongchen accidentally let slip that these were banquet foods no one touched whenever the righteous path held conferences or the Xie family gathered.

Cultivators took pride in practicing bigu. Whenever they attended a conference, they always pretended to be detached, calm, and free of worldly desires. They would not touch a single chopstick to the delicacies before them, often causing food to be wasted.

Ever since his youth, while traveling with Wen Tingshu and Jia Liance to uphold justice, Xie Tongchen had possessed the habit of packing food away.

Brother Wen and Brother Jia never criticized him. They would even quietly grow accustomed to dividing the dishes in advance. The portions they could not finish remained untouched, leaving behind only complete pieces.

So it was all leftovers from the righteous path!

And Xie Tongchen did not even eat them himself!

Meng Fuguang never saw Xie Tongchen take a single bite. The way he acted made one suspect the buns were poisoned.

“You’re not eating?”

Xie Tongchen looked at him for a long while before saying, “Beauty itself is a feast.”

Meng Fuguang: Hypocrite!

The great demon preferred meat. After eating all the meat and leaving behind a pile of vegetables, he deliberately supported his nine-month belly and looked for trouble.

“You’re from the Xie family, the foremost cultivation clan in the world, yet following you means I can’t even get meat to eat.”

Without another word, Xie Tongchen cut open his arm and offered it for Meng Fuguang to dip his steamed bun in.

It nearly frightened the great demon to death.

Meng Fuguang had once killed without blinking, but he had not seen blood for an entire ten months. Every day had been nothing but endless white. When he suddenly saw the vivid red blood, he almost had the illusion that he had already reformed.

“You’re the one who eats raw flesh and drinks blood! Stop the bleeding. Looking at it makes me dizzy.”

Inside the secret realm, nothing truly touched the ground. Each drop of blood floated in midair. Xie Tongchen said that leaving it uneaten would be wasteful.

Waste, waste—every day, all he knew was waste!

When Meng Fuguang went to sleep that night, the blood quietly floated into his mouth.

Had Xie Tongchen gone mad from being imprisoned?

Originally, Meng Fuguang had intended to simply close and open his eyes repeatedly until the pregnancy passed. But pregnancy itself consumed nutrients, and at three months, the little demon inside his abdomen began absorbing his spiritual power as well. If he ate absolutely nothing, he would become extremely weak after giving birth.

It was all because Xie Tongchen cared for him too attentively. Meng Fuguang became intensely aware of his own pregnancy as he watched his stomach grow day by day.

Xie Tongchen even asked whether he could sense if the child was a boy or a girl. Since they had nothing else to do, perhaps they could think of a name.

Meng Fuguang said, “Once the child leaves, who will even know the name you chose?”

Xie Tongchen said, “That is true.”

Using spare clothing from his qiankun pouch, Xie Tongchen sewed a swaddling cloth for the child. It was crooked and uneven, with one arm sticking out.

It was all Xie Tongchen’s fault. After Meng Fuguang gave birth and sent the child away, he shed two tears befitting a demon.

Xie Tongchen held his son in one arm, standing tall and upright. He examined the child he shared with Meng Fuguang one final time.

“Our child will certainly accomplish great things in the future.”

Meng Fuguang curled his lips.

Xie Tongchen continued, “Aid your father in supporting the world, restore order to heaven and earth, and uphold righteousness.”

“…”

Meng Fuguang immediately stopped crying. After the Silver Kite carried the child away, he fought Xie Tongchen.

That damned, cunning Xie Tongchen had actually seized the opportunity to leave the child a final instruction.

Meng Fuguang inwardly thought this was disastrous. The last thing his son heard before leaving had been so righteous. What if it made him forget all the prenatal teachings Meng Fuguang had given him earlier?

Fortunately, the Silver Kite would bring the little fellow to Guiye City.

His subordinates—He Shangxian, Shi Wumi, Liu Xishi, and Yu Qingfeng—were not to be underestimated. They would certainly raise the little fellow in the proper demonic way.

So what if human nature was inherently good?

Had this sect leader never been kind before?

Had he not still become a great demon who did whatever he pleased?

Their son’s birth caused both Meng Fuguang and Xie Tongchen to lose a great deal of cultivation. Meng Fuguang began cultivating in seclusion.

For cultivators, several years could pass between closing and opening their eyes.

That bastard Xie Tongchen woke him every year under the pretext of celebrating their son’s birthday.

Meng Fuguang thought he merely wanted to tumble around with him.

They had nothing else to do anyway.

Sixteen years had now passed. Their child should have grown into a graceful young man. That tiny, obedient-looking infant should have transformed into a great demon capable of summoning wind and rain.

Meng Fuguang looked at the young man before him. He was elegant and beautiful, spirited, eloquent, and clearly had not suffered much hardship.

The Demon Sect had raised him well.

The next moment, Meng Fuguang’s gaze lowered to the hand wrapped around Wen Tingshu’s arm.

Ha. Hahaha.

So this was the good brother to whom Xie Tongchen had been willing to entrust his back!

How did he have the nerve to be an old cow eating tender grass?!

That foolish Xie Tongchen!

He had not even recognized his own son and was still trying to exchange pleasantries with Wen Tingshu!

“Dad!” Meng Baixu called.

The person emerging from the small house had a waist slender as if bound, straight shoulders, crimson lips, upturned eyes, and black robes covering his body.

The moment he came out, he first cursed Xie Tongchen as “foolish,” then glared furiously at Wen Tingshu.

His father truly was a proper great demon, filled with hatred toward these two righteous cultivators.

Meng Baixu thought it was normal for his father to dislike Wen Tingshu. After all, Shizun had once beaten his father.

That single call of “Dad” froze the smile on Xie Tongchen’s face.

He stared at Meng Baixu in disbelief. Earlier, he had thought the young man looked older than sixteen and had therefore never considered anything else.

Most importantly, Wen Tingshu was upright, even somewhat stubborn. Xie Tongchen respected and trusted Brother Wen, so he had subconsciously assumed that his Dao companion would be much older.

“Brother Wen?”

For the first time, suspicion toward his brother appeared on Xie Tongchen’s heroic face.

“This… this isn’t right, is it?”

Wen Tingshu removed Meng Baixu’s hand from around his arm and instead held it in his own. His eyes lowered slightly before he calmly looked at Xie Tongchen.

“Brother Xie, Hengxue Sect has already reconciled with Fuguang Sect. However, because of the rumor that you and Meng Fuguang perished together, the Xie family has resolved to remain enemies with them. Once you return, you must take control of the situation.”

Xie Tongchen said, “No, let us not discuss that yet—”

Meng Baixu interrupted. “Oh? Your Xie family still intends to oppose this sect leader?”

At the same time, Xie Tongchen pointed at Meng Baixu and cried in collapse, “Brother Wen, he is my son! He is only sixteen years old!”

Hm?

Meng Baixu raised his brows.

What was he saying? Why did it sound a little difficult to understand?

Why was he pointing at this sect leader?

This sect leader was already twenty-two.

Xie Tongchen said, “Didn’t you see the jade cicada I left him? Your Wen family’s totem! The jade cicada your mother gave me! There is only one in the world!”

Wen Tingshu fell silent.

In the end, this could not be concealed.

When Jia Liance mentioned the jade cicada, Wowo and Nangnang had both been present. The truth would eventually come out. He could not possibly ask Brother Jia and his one-year-old sons to help hide his crime together.

Had Brother Jia arrived one day earlier, before Wen Tingshu and Meng Baixu agreed to form a bond, perhaps there might still have been room to reconsider after he learned about the jade cicada…

Would there?

With Wowo and Nangnang, there had long been no room to turn back.

In a flash, Meng Baixu suddenly understood that the “son” Xie Tongchen was pointing at was himself.

He immediately turned to Meng Fuguang for confirmation.

“Dad???”

Meng Fuguang was too angry to speak. He turned his head aside and nodded.

Meng Baixu was shocked.

So all this time, he had been speaking badly about his biological father in front of Shizun?

The jade cicada?

Did that mean the jade cicada in his swaddling clothes had been left by Xie Tongchen? Would Wen Tingshu have known his identity as soon as he saw it?

Without even thinking, Meng Baixu said, “Shizun never saw it!”

Fortunately, before departing for Hengxue Sect to go undercover, this sect leader had instinctively felt that a fierce battle might occur.

To prevent the only keepsake his father had left him from being lost amid chaos, he had deliberately removed the jade cicada from his neck and left it in Guiye City.

Good thing he had not brought it.

Otherwise, after eating and living together for three months—and even sleeping together once—Wen Tingshu definitely would have seen the jade cicada.

With this old thing’s towering wall of morality, that would have made matters even more difficult.

Meng Fuguang froze as though struck by lightning.

“You call him Shizun? Weren’t you raised in Guiye City?”

Had no one told him?

Those useless fools did not know how to raise a child and had sent his son to Hengxue Sect to be fostered!

Once he returned, he would discipline them one by one.

Meng Baixu proudly said, “Dad! After I grew up, I went undercover in Hengxue Sect and threw the entire place into chaos!”

Oh? Undercover?

Well done.

No, whether it had truly been well done remained debatable.

Meng Fuguang nearly praised him out loud.

“Brother Wen, you two are still master and disciple?”

Xie Tongchen’s vision went dark.

Had Meng Baixu and Wen Tingshu not been Dao companions, he would have been delighted that his son had taken Wen Tingshu as his Shizun.

But now…

Ice seemed to form beneath Xie Tongchen’s feet, and his blood ran cold. On one hand, his brother suddenly felt extremely unfamiliar. On the other, he panicked over the assurances he had once given Meng Fuguang.

It was over.

Brother Wen’s crime was going to implicate him too.

Meng Baixu keenly noticed that every question Xie Tongchen asked was directed at Wen Tingshu, not at him.

This father did not understand his own son at all. At a glance, he assumed this sect leader had been coerced.

Wen Tingshu’s complexion turned pale, but he did not release Meng Baixu’s hand. He only defended what he could.

“When Lanshe was twenty years old, he came to Hengxue Mountain and asked me to accept him as a disciple. He was very intelligent. I accepted only him as my disciple.”

Lanshe truly was intelligent. Even without knowing anything, he had immediately denied that Wen Tingshu had ever seen the jade cicada.

Logically, Xie Tongchen should have been pleased that his son’s Shizun praised his son’s intelligence.

But Xie Tongchen could not feel pleased.

“Twenty years old?”

Wen Tingshu said, “Time passes differently inside the mountain. Twenty-two years have passed outside.”

Xie Tongchen murmured, “Twenty years old…”

Twenty was still unacceptable!

Xie Tongchen looked at Meng Baixu and Wen Tingshu, each carrying a sword, and only felt that his own hands were missing a suitable weapon.

He had held his infant son for only one day.

In the blink of an eye, that child had become his good brother’s Dao companion.

Earlier, Meng Baixu had said Jia Liance even called him sister-in-law.

Brother Jia was muddleheaded too!

Had his eyesight not always been good? How could he not see that the boy resembled Xie Tongchen?