“What?!”

     Mo Ran was taken aback and took half a step back. If he hadn’t been an incorporeal person in this memory scroll, he would have knocked over the fishing basket and net rope beside him—

     The Flame Emperor’s Divine Wood could create a living person?

     “Flame Emperor’s Divine Wood, Nuwa’s Earth, and Fuxi’s Zither were originally the three emperor’s divine artifacts. They have extremely pure spiritual power. It is said that the first batch of unparalleled immortals were created from these artifacts. I obtained a piece of the Flame Emperor’s Divine Wood; even if I didn’t have the divine emperor’s power to reach heaven and earth, it wouldn’t be difficult to shape a human. Just like after Master Tongtian died, his mother used lotus roots to reshape his body. I finally made up my mind and decided to use this piece of Divine Wood to carve little Chu-gongzi’s appearance.”

     Mo Ran only felt that the world was spinning around him, and his vision was blurry.

     Carved into… little Chu-gongzi… Chu Lan?

     Huaizui said, “I wanted to return my benefactor his son.”

     Mo Ran’s throat was very dry, as if something had blocked it. After a long time, he murmured, “Impossible…”

     In the memory scroll, the evening bell of Wubei Temple tolled as dusk fell.

     The tired birds returned to their nests, and the monk’s flowing robes and wide sleeves fluttered as they passed under the veranda.

     Master Huaizui sat in the meditation room with the doors and windows tightly shut. Accompanied by an ancient Buddha statue and the green light of an oil lantern, he carefully carved little by little. Before using the Flame Emperor’s Divine Wood to reconstruct a living person, he had carved hundreds of puppets until they were exactly the same as the Chu Lan in his memories.

     That night, he finally took out the Flame Emperor’s Divine Wood. After looking at it for a long time, he carefully made the first cut.

     Wood shavings fluttered in the air and scattered into golden powder when they hit the ground.

     With every stroke, he put in all his effort. With every stroke, he saw the figures of his two lost ghosts. A hundred years went by under the carving knife. The old monk buried his head very low, as if his neck had been crushed by sin.

     “I went into seclusion and spent five years in the temple before I finally finished carving ‘Chu Lan’.”

     Mo Ran walked stiffly towards Huaizui. He watched the monk slowly put down the carving knife. It was the last stroke, and Huaizui brushed off the last of the wood shavings.

     Huaizui trembled as he caressed the face and clothes of the carved boy. He knelt on the ground and cried, kowtowing to the wooden statue.

     Mo Ran stared blankly at the small statue placed on the table…

     The Divine Wood as the body, and guilt as the blade.

     The tiny figure was the same as what Chu Wanning looked when he was a child.

     At this time, it was dusk, and the bell tolled. Only the last bit of blood-red color of the setting sun was left between heaven and earth. It spilled in through the window and shone on the table.

     The evening bell tolled throughout the temple. Outside the temple, monks were burning cypress wood and pine leaves. The fragrant aroma was also tinged with a bit of bitterness and coldness.

     Night was approaching, and the courtyard was at peace.

     “I’ll just call you Chu Wanning.”

     Huaizui whispered softly to the wooden statue as the last toll of the bell sounded.

     He bit the tip of his finger and dripped a drop of blood full of metal spiritual energy onto the statue. In an instant, the room was filled with brilliant light.

     Mo Ran’s eyelashes couldn’t stop trembling in this light, and he closed his eyes. His eyelids trembled as he tried to see everything through the light, but because of his tears, the light was blinding. He couldn’t see anything clearly.

     When he was pierced until his eyes closed completely, the first thought that came to Mo Ran’s mind was—

     Chu Wanning already knew everything. How much pain must his heart be in?

     Not a living person.

     No father or mother.

     Just a piece of dead wood and a drop of blood.

     He had lived in ignorance for more than thirty years without knowing anything.

     “The sacred tree has a spirit. After I dripped my blood, and it became human, it really became the appearance of Chu Lan, just as I wished. I raised him in the temple and took him in a disciple. Slowly, he grew up and began to ask me about his origins and where he came from.”

     Mo Ran saw the young Chu Wanning sitting beside Master Huaizui. He ate candied fruits and asked, “Shizun, you always said that you carried me back from the snow. Then, where exactly did you carry me back from?”

     Huaizui’s gaze was cast towards the distant mountain. He was lost in thought for a while, then sighed and said two words.

     “Lin’an.”

     “So I’m from Lin’an?”

     “Yes.”

     “But I’ve never left the temple. I don’t know what Lin’an is like.” Chu Wanning looked a little dejected. “Shizun, I want to go down the mountain and take a look outside. I… want to see Lin’an.”

     The illusion gradually faded away. Wubei Temple became distant, and what followed was the brilliant summer scenery of Jiangnan.

     It was June. The lotus flowers in the lotus pond were delicate and upright, their fragrance brilliant. Chu Wanning, who was a lot smaller than Xia Sini, walked on the bluestone path, with Huaizui following behind him.

     “Wanning, walk slowly. Be careful not to fall.”

     Chu Wanning looked back with a smile.

     It was a young and carefree smile that Mo Ran had never seen before.

     “Alright, I’ll wait for Shizun.”

     At that time, Chu Wanning was wearing a small green and gray monk’s robe. His hair was tied into a small bun, and there was a lotus leaf on his head. The lotus leaf was covered in crystal-clear dew, making Chu Wanning’s face look even more pure and bright.

     Huaizui walked next to him and held his hand. “Okay, now that you’ve seen Xizi Lake, where do you want to go next?”

     “Can we get something to eat?”

     “Then…” Huaizui paused. “Let’s go to the city.”

     They walked into the city hand in hand, and Mo Ran walked beside them. He looked at Chu Wanning with the lotus leaf on his head. He didn’t even reach his knees. He felt both pity and sadness in his heart.

     He stretched out his hand. Although he knew he couldn’t touch the person in the illusion, he still reached out and touched Chu Wanning’s head.

     “Hm?”

     Unexpectedly, Chu Wanning suddenly stopped in his tracks when he touched him.

     Huaizui asked warmly, “What’s wrong?”

     Chu Wanning raised his head and looked up. Under the sunlight, his eyes were as clear as two pools of spring water. They fell on Mo Ran.

     Mo Ran was stunned. He could only hear his heart pounding and his blood flowing rapidly.

     He felt that this was unbelievable, but he was also secretly looking forward to it…

     “What is that?”

     Chu Wanning let go of Huaizui’s hand and walked towards Mo Ran. The more Mo Ran looked, the more uncomfortable he felt. He had never seen Chu Wanning so carefree. He couldn’t help but bend down and open his arms, wanting to hug him.

     However, Chu Wanning went straight through his illusory figure.

     Mo Ran was stunned for a moment. He turned around and saw that the child had walked to a dessert stand behind him. He had raised his head to look up at the stall owner as he opened the bamboo cage. Smoke rose in spirals, revealing a light pink flower pastry inside.

     Mo Ran’s heart relaxed, but he also felt a tinge of disappointment.

     It really was just a coincidence.

     He walked over with Huaizui. Seeing that Huaizui was coming, Chu Wanning smiled and said, “Shizun, this pastry looks delicious.”

     “Do you want to try it?”

     “Can I?”

     With a somewhat absent-minded expression, Huaizui said, “You both really like it…”

     Chu Wanning heard it, and his eyes widened slightly. He asked innocently, “Who likes it?”

     Huaizui pursed his lips and said, “...Nothing. Shizun just thought of an old friend.”

     He paid for three pastries and looked thoughtfully at Chu Wanning as he took a bite. The steam rose, blurring the child’s face.

     The past was like a river rolling by.

     Huaizui sighed softly and closed his eyes.

     Suddenly, his sleeve was gently tugged. He lowered his head and saw the pastry broken in half. The red bean paste inside was delicate and soft, exuding heat and fragrance of the dessert.

     “Shizun, half for you and half for me. The big one is for Shizun.”

     “Why would the big one be given to me?”

     “If you’re tall, you can eat more.”

     “...” Mo Ran watched as Huaizui took the pastry and stood by the stall with Chu Wanning, eating and chatting. He was silent for a moment, standing under the bright sunshine of Lin’an, and smiled slightly.

     It hurt.

     But there was also spring water flowing in his heart. He felt that in face of such a Chu Wanning, no one would not be soft-hearted and dislike him.

     He was the most obedient and best child in the world.

     The flourishing sunshine in front of him faded again.

     This time, the new picture from the memory scroll did not appear immediately. Mo Ran stood in the darkness, and beside his ears was Huaizui’s ghostly voice.

     “I spent my days with him, teaching him to read and explaining scriptures to him. But what I cared most about was his magic—I still hadn’t forgotten that I created such a child in order to eventually return him to my benefactor. I planned from the beginning that when Chu Wanning grew up, and his spiritual power and body could bear it, I would take him to the ghost realm.”

     Huaizui paused, and his voice became even deeper.

     “Bring him there and melt little Chu Lan-gongzi’s remaining broken soul into his body.”

     Mo Ran: “!”

     Huaizui said hoarsely, “I thought it was not wrong to do so at the time. What is Chu Wanning? He’s not a real living person; he’s just a piece of wood, a wooden sculpture. I gave him life and taught him how to conduct himself in this world. But in the end, what flows in his body is not real blood, and what covers his muscles and bones is not real flesh.”

     Mo Ran had already been upset from the start. When he heard Huaizui say this, he couldn’t help but shout, “No!”

     But what was the use?

     Huaizui couldn’t hear his indignant retort, and the old monk’s voice was still like a whirlpool, dragging Mo Ran into a deeper and more painful vortex.

     “Chu Wanning is unnecessary. He has no life and no soul.”

     “No! Doesn’t the sacred tree have a soul? He has life; he has a soul! He’s not like anyone… He’s not like anyone else!” Mo Ran howled like a trapped beast in the illusion. “Huaizui, it’s you who raised him. You looked after him every day… Isn’t he alive? How is he different from you and I?"

     But Huaizui was still mumbling to himself, as numbly as if he was chanting sutras in front of Buddha—as if the words had been repeated thousands of times. It was unknown whether he was truly dedicated to worshipping Buddha, or if he just wanted to numb the intense pain in his heart.

     “He is a physical body that I carved for Chu Lan. Only when Chu Lan’s soul lives in it can Chu Wanning be considered completely human."

     Mo Ran felt a chill run down his spine. He didn’t know what happened next, but he felt like he was going crazy. He was running in the darkness, but everywhere was an abyss with no escape. He kept muttering, and then the muttering turned into shouting, “No! You can’t destroy him, Huaizui. He has a soul in his body. He is a living person…”

     He knelt down.

     He was suddenly so scared, even more than he had been when the truth of his previous life was revealed.

     He was suddenly afraid that he would see Huaizui take Chu Wanning to the ghost realm, cut open his chest, and merge his spiritual core with Chu Lan’s soul.

     What about the original Chu Wanning?

     Chu Wanning’s sacred tree spirit would leave. Where could a broken piece of wood go in the six paths of reincarnation?

     Heaven, earth, between the clouds, and the underworld.

     He wouldn’t be wanted anywhere.

     “No… Huaizui… you can’t…” Mo Ran stammered, his lips turning blue and white. “You can’t…”

     How could he not have a soul?

     How could he not be a living person?

     The child who laughed, running and jumping on the path with a lotus leaf on his head.

     The child who carefully broke apart the flower pastry to give the big one to his Shizun and eat the small one himself.

     He was still so young, but he was more affectionate and righteous than many people.

     He was not inferior to any life formed from flesh and blood.

     How could this be? Not a living person…

     However, Mo Ran’s desperate pleas and cries could not awaken Huaizui.

     The knot in Huaizui’s heart was there for hundreds of years. He felt that he owed Chu Xun’s family. He had gone through countless hardships to create such a prosthetic body. How could he let it slip by?

     “As the days passed, Chu Wanning slowly grew up. He was Chu Lan’s reincarnated body. I worried about his life a hundred times more than I worried about my own. So over the years, I only brought him to Lin’an to stay for a few months when he was five or six years old. After that, he never left the boundaries of Wubei Temple.”

     Huaizui sighed and continued, “Sometimes I wonder if I had shown him too little of the beauty of the mortal world. He lived to be fourteen years old, and apart from Lin’an, he’d never been anywhere else. From beginning to end, all he had was the world in Wubei Temple, the size of spring and autumn.”

     His eyes finally lit up again.

     It was a moonlit night. Mo Ran saw Huaizui standing at the door of the meditation room, looking out into the courtyard.

     Mo Ran also walked over. Under the frosty moonlight, he saw the fourteen-year-old Chu Wanning practicing his sword as haitang flowers fluttered in the air. The white-clothed youth looked like an immortal under the reflection of the petals and the cold moon.

     Huaizui’s voice still lingered in his ears, along with the sharp sound of the sword cutting through the air.

     “But I also feel that seeing less was not necessarily a bad thing. There are too many sufferings in the human world. If the spirit of this sacred tree was destined to only have a short life of around ten years, then be replaced by Chu Lan, wouldn’t giving him an easy, honest, and magnanimous life be more merciful?”

     The sword dance ended.

     The remaining flowers fell.

     Chu Wanning put the longsword behind his arm and raised two fingers of his other hand as he concentrated on calming his breathing.

     After he calmed his slightly rapid breathing, he raised his head. When he saw Huaizui looking at him, he smiled.

     The evening breeze brushed the hair on his forehead, causing it to itch. He blew at it lightly, trying to blow away the strands of hair that kept tickling his cheeks, but it was obviously useless. So in the end, he could only use his hand to brush it away. He looked back at Huaizui, his dark phoenix eyes smiling.

     That was also the direction Mo Ran was standing.

     “Shizun.”

     “Mm. Not bad.” Huaizui nodded. “Come here, I’ll test the progress of your spiritual core now.”

     Chu Wanning walked over without any hesitation. He moved his snow-white sleeves and gave his hand to Huaizui.

     After the test, Huaizui said, “It’s very strong, but still a little unstable. Practice more. Before winter, you should be able to achieve great success.”

     Chu Wanning smiled. “Thank you, Shizun.”

     When he said this, perhaps it was an illusion, but Mo Ran seemed to see Huaizui’s shoulders tremble slightly.

     But in the end, he still did not say anything, did not express anything, and did not change anything.

     He turned around and entered the room.

     Mo Ran stood in place. He no longer looked at Huaizui in the room. He was urgently longing to look at the young Chu Wanning, who would disappear in front of him at any moment.

     He was still clean, pure, and even gentle.

     How could such a person not have a soul?

     His gaze fell, and he inadvertently caught a glimpse of Chu Wanning’s chest rising and falling under his pure white robes.

     Mo Ran suddenly thought of something and felt as if he had been struck by lightning, or if a huge rock had been dropped on his chest, stirring up a thousand layers of shockwaves.

     “No… no…”

     He took a step back.

     But what could he do?

     His memories had already extended their ferocious claws and pierced into his internal organs.

     He remembered that Chu Wanning had a scar on his chest.

     …His heart had been cut open! He… He…

     Mo Ran trembled. The Chu Wanning in front of him danced with the sword under the moonlight, stepping on the flying flowers.

     So handsome.

     But he felt as if a bucket of ice had been dropped into his stomach. He couldn’t help but shudder.

     He had… his chest cut open before…

     So did Huaizui really do it in the end?

     He really brought Chu Wanning to the ghost realm and merged the fragments of Chu Lan’s soul into Chu Wanning’s heart. So the original Chu Wanning was long gone. So—

     He put his head in his hands and curled up on the floor.

     He trembled and didn’t dare to think about it anymore.

     It hurt.

     His heart hurt so much.

     He would rather the person whose heart was dug out be him. He would rather the person whose spirit soul was stripped away be him.

     Chu Wanning.

     He was so good.

     Why should he have to suffer so much and end up with the verdict of “not a living person,” treated as a lifeless body by the creator to carry another life?

     Then, who exactly was the Shizun he recognized?

     Was it Chu Lan, or Chu Wanning?

     Mo Ran felt like he was going crazy. His head was aching, and he even felt dizzy and nauseous. He didn’t know how long he had been sitting there.

     Later, they sky darkened, and the meditation room and flowering trees disappeared.

     Chu Wanning also faded away.

     Huaizui’s voice slowly flowed through the darkness.

     He said, “When Chu Wanning was fourteen years old, the time was ripe. I intended to bring him to the ghost realm in another year to merge his soul with Chu Lan.”