Be Gentle, Immortal Master

The crowd hushed. No more gossips, and certainly no more sneers. Everyone was probably shocked by the demonstration and started paying meticulous attention for the rest of the lesson. But I only felt so lost and confused that I could barely follow what the master said afterward. It was his earlier words that kept echoing in my ears:

"Take demonic swords, for example. Everyone who used them knew that it was only time before they would lose control of their artifacts."

"It would only lead to chaos and deaths in the end."

Did he mean that it was inevitable for demonic swords to go berserk eventually? I searched my memory for those legends from that book I read in Bai Ye's library. The stories were all told in random order, and I hadn't paid much attention back then to which swords were mentioned and which weren't. Was it possible that each one of the swords listed in that book came with one of these tragedies?

Was it possible that the same fate had been waiting for Twin Stars all along?

I shuddered despite the warm room. If that was the case, and if Bai Ye had always known that would be the case …

"Yun Qing-er?"

A voice startled me, and I jolted. I looked up, not realizing that the lesson had ended while my thoughts were wandering, and Xie Lun was somehow standing next to me with a curious smile on his face.

"Are you musing about your current life or past life?" he asked. "Preparing yourself for the meditation?"

His weird question, combined with the shock of his sudden appearance and my own puzzlement over the mystery of Twin Stars, made me stare at him blankly for much longer than I intended. At last, when he figured that I wasn't going to answer his question, he cleared his throat a bit awkwardly and asked, "Are you not here for the lessons from Azure Dragon Palace?"

"Azure Dragon Palace?" I asked cluelessly. Oh, right. The next lesson was about to begin in this room. "I … suppose I came to the wrong room." I came up with a terrible excuse. "What is this lesson about?"

Xie Lun chuckled, clearly seeing that I was telling a bad lie, though he didn't pry. "About how to read one's previous cycles of life and interpret how they affect the current one." He sat down next to me. "Sounds almost like what a fortune-telling trickster does, I know. But Azure Dragon Palace is well-known for this art, so I thought I'd give it a try."

I smiled, shoving the thought about Twin Stars to the back of my mind temporarily—this wasn't the time to find an answer, and I wouldn't find one by thinking about it now anyway. "You are interested in your past life?" I asked. "What do you want to find out?"

Xie Lun shrugged. "Maybe how many wives I ended up with?" He pointed to himself. "In the commoner's world, a face like this probably attracts even more trouble than it does at Mount Hua. I'm a bit curious."

I stared at him for a moment. Then we both broke into laughter. He was right. Appearances wouldn't change throughout cycles of rebirth, and I had to admit that if I had never met Bai Ye, I might've thought Xie Lun was the most handsome man in the world. "You're getting me interested now," I said. "I'll stay and take a peek at mine too."

—And see if someone as dull-looking as me ever managed to get married off.

The master from Azure Dragon Palace entered the room soon afterward. Just like the previous master, he wasted no time getting to the point, by … handing out an illustrated sheet to everyone in the room. "Get into whichever meditation pose you're comfortable with," he said brusquely. "Follow the instructions and focus."

Well, that was certainly terse and straightforward. Effective, though. The illustration was simple and clear, and within five minutes, I was deep in meditation. As I concentrated, I started feeling a faint pull at the edge of my consciousness, somewhat similar to the sensation before each time Twin Stars showed me those visions.

"Breathe deeply." I heard the master say. "Open your mind's eye, and call upon those lost memories."

I breathed, reaching out to that faint existence drifting in front of me. It felt a bit out of reach. I tried again, focusing on pushing my consciousness forward. But something still seemed missing.

"Don't strain yourself." The master's voice drifted into my ears. He sounded close, probably standing right next to me and noticing my struggle. "Open up yourself and let it leap into your embrace."

I tried once more, heeding his advice and letting my mind relax, beckoning for that sensation to come towards me. Yet something still felt off. The calling was there, but the short distance between us seemed uncrossable, as if something was denying my access to it, blocking me from reaching that memory.

"Some people's past might be harder than others to retrieve." The master spoke again. "It is natural. As long as you've caught a glimpse of it, you can keep practicing by repeating the process. With time, the full memory will come."

I kept my eyes closed, still struggling with that insubstantial feeling. "I … don't think I've caught a glimpse yet," I said. "Only a vague sensation that seems too far away to reach. Am I doing something wrong?"

A hand rested on the top of my head. "It happens sometimes," the master said. "I can feel your spiritual power's flow. You're doing everything right. Just keep—"

He paused. I waited for him to instruct me on how to correct my meditation, but he was silent. I could only feel a slight pulse of his spiritual power spreading from his palm, as if he was trying to probe something about me.

"Is there … something off?" I ventured, uncertain what was going on.

"Hmm," the master let out a muffled sound and removed his hand.. "Aren't you an interesting one? You don't have a past cycle of life."