Chapter 189 – The Unspoken Hurt (VII)

Chapter 189

The Unspoken Hurt (VII)

Okay, I need my brain to work at about four thousand miles an hour because I do not have that much time before shit hits the fan here.

The system, for all its frustrations, has been… consistent. I don’t know why it’s giving me a ‘hint’ in the form of a riddle all of a sudden instead of just explaining what it is, but I can kind of venture a guess; as it outright said, the woman in front of me is desecrating Heavenly Ordinances–and even if the system isn’t of them, it’s somehow, in some way, certainly connected to them.

I imagine, however, that even if I kept all the points I ever earned somehow, I would not have had enough to catch even a fading glimpse of her status window–but the system still wants me to ‘resolve’ this, and, since it’s providing a hint, I do have a way to resolve it without detonating my nuke: Long Tao.

So, what precisely is the hint about? Shorn of the fancy riddling red herrings, there’s really just one clear clue: illusion.

Whatever it has to do with, it’s in some way connected to an ‘illusion’ of sorts. What kind? Hell if I know.

Honestly, I don’t even need to figure out the full truth of the hint, just exactly what the system wants me to do–or, rather, what it’s saying I can do. When it comes to illusions, there’s the Art of Survival–ability to discern through them. But seeing as Long Tao isn’t reacting and none of my alarms are being triggered, I don’t think we are subject to any illusion directly.

… which means that the illusion is about her and likely the desecrated ordinance.

Long Tao implied that there are no arts that ‘alter the appearance’, at least not in the capacity that we are altering it right now.

And yet, there she was. Not only did he change his appearance, but he also changed his sex, somehow. Was that the illusion? I don’t actually… know. Maybe? If I take Long Tao’s words as truth, then yes, it has to be an illusion since there are no means to alter the body beyond the basics.

Which would make that one of the Ordinances being desecrated.

What’s the other one, then?

Maybe splaying a young man and using him as a vessel to resurrect a dead person? Yeah.

Okay, stray thoughts, come back. Luckily, Long Tao was still distracting her with inane chatter.

“You do realize you will never succeed, right?” he said, breaking the silence. “Even if you kill us all, and your ritual proceeds as you want it to… whatever ends up possessing that boy up there… well, you’ll be the first to die to it.”

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“Hm,” the woman nodded, oddly enough. “Indeed. The dead cannot be brought back to life–that’s what all you cultivators believe. The laws of life and death are sacred to you and are to be unchallenged. I am… different. I don’t believe in a higher order, or in the gods, or in some unspoken rules and laws about what we can and cannot pursue.

“Life and death are parts of our lives as fire and wind are–the notion that we are disallowed from tampering with them… it’s merely dogmatic beating of those who’d want us spiritually enslaved.”

“No, you’re not quite listening,” Long Tao said. “I’m not saying that you cannot challenge the laws of life or death–or even that you can’t resurrect the dead. I am saying that you will be failed, regardless of if you succeed or not.”

“Oh? You think some higher power will intervene to prevent it?”