Yin Long sat quietly on a chair that had been placed next to a simple bed within a dimly lit room, his eyes sweeping over a book he had borrowed from the martial library of Swan Queen Hall. He kept half an eye on the old hairless man sleeping in the bed, the practically unrecognizable Meiyu. Four days had passed since Yin Long's duel with De Yiu, so it had actually only been five days since Meiyu's age caught up with him.

Yet these five days had been enough to turn him into something that resembled a living corpse more than a man. His entire body had atrophied at a horrifying rate, right now he looked like no more than a skin-covered skeleton with deeply sunken in eyes. It was highly contrasting compared to the vigour he had shown earlier, the strength he had shown faint glimpses of while training Yin Long. Once he was powerful and revered, but now he was no more than a decaying body setting foot into the river leading to the Netherworld.

But compared to the contrast between his previous strength and his current state, there was another thing that caught far more of Yin Long's attention, how alone he was. Yin Long visited him once a day, but never once had he seen any other people here. In fact, he hadn't ever seen Meiyu interact with someone other than a handful of the dojo's disciples.

He had lived for thousands of years, cultivated to great heights and probably seen so many things that they completely eclipsed anything that Yin Long knew. Yet now, in his most vulnerable and weakest moment, he was practically all alone. It was a fate that Yin Long could only think of as sad, to be so alone in one's final moments. And as this thought passed through his mind, Meiyu woke up, coughing dryly.

"Ghk...hak... You're still here? Your time is better spent training than it is visiting a dying codger like me."

His cough sounded incredibly dry, but the blood he spat out was glaringly obvious even in the dimly lit room. Yin Long snapped shut the manual he was reading, pulling a tissue from his interspatial ring and wiping away the fresh blood, nonchalantly shrugging his shoulders.

"Who knows? Doesn't matter either way, you've gone out of your way to train me and hand me all your skills, the least I can do for you is accompany you while I still can."

The two really hadn't known each other for long, nor did they know a lot about each other. For example, Yin Long still didn't know Meiyu's entire name or if he had any other family in the world. But even so, Meiyu had spent his time helping Yin Long sharpen his sword, giving him a sea of information he could use as bricks to pave his own path forward.

No matter how little they knew of each other, that alone was enough for him to be worthy of at least a little of Yin Long's respect and care. Of course, him thinking that didn't mean that Meiyu necessarily shared his thoughts on the matter.

"Gehehe, you've got a soft heart and a straightforward personality, one is suited for the sword while the other isn't. There's no need to think so deeply about it, I only taught you so that my name and skills would be passed on, so that I would be remembered for countless years even after my passing. It was purely for me, just a selfish reason."

This was a fact that Meiyu had mentioned before, he hadn't been hiding it from the start. He was dying, this fact could no longer be changed by him or anyone he knew, so the best he could do to prevent his name from being erased by the passage of time was to pass on a small part of him. Yin Long wasn't bothered by Meiyu repeating his purposes, putting away the bloodied tissue while opening the cultivation manual again.

"And? It is inherent to most living beings to act selfishly, that's just how life is, so there's nothing wrong with acting selfishly at times. Heck, even I do it. I drag my companions along with my every whim, have them follow me whenever I decide to leave a place, potentially not giving them the chance to form any meaningful relationships of their own. I can say that I gave them the choice and don't restrict them, but I know that they won't reject me so I take advantage of it to stop myself from ending up alone again."

Yin Long spoke in a very casual manner as his gaze swept over the manual he was reading. He had known from the start that Lan Yun and Jin Wang wouldn't reject him, if he said that it was time to leave then they would follow him. And it didn't matter if he did it subconsciously or consciously, he took advantage of that fact to drag them around and keep them around him.

And as a result, he would never again feel that crushing loneliness he felt when his father's hand dropped from his shoulder and his mother's hand slid down his cheek. In that single instant, he had felt so utterly alone and terrified that he couldn't even describe it. And just like that one lightning bolt that struck close to him when he was a child, it left a small scar in his mind, searing him with the pain of loneliness.

So Yin Long knew, he knew that no matter how many deeds he had done for his sisters in the past, or how many deeds he did for Lan Yun, there would always be a sliver of selfishness within him and his actions. And that was fine, no living being could be perfectly selfless, it was one of the reasons he advocated for Lan Yun to be more selfish and act on her own desires.

Meiyu laughed somewhat weakly in response to Yin Long's straightforward statement. It was a statement that didn't leave any face for himself and didn't take into account the feelings of his companions. After all, what did it matter if they couldn't form any other meaningful relationships if the relationship with him was the only one they wanted to form? But he didn't say anything like that to Yin Long, some things had to be learned on your own to be truly understood. Instead, he just dismissed Yin Long.

"You should leave, that stage you've occupied can't be left empty for too long, otherwise you'll miss valuable time to further show off and deepen your skills."

Meiyu closed his eyes again while dismissing him, but Yin Long didn't budge and simply continued to read the manual. Meiyu's breathing quickly turned low and deep as he fell asleep again, Yin Long remaining in the chair by the bedside for another few hours before snapping shut the manual once more. He got up from the chair and put away the book, giving the sleeping Meiyu a simple bow before leaving the room.

He returned to the martial library and placed the borrowed manual back in its place, picking out another one and leaving the library. He read through the manual as he made his way through the dojo and returned to the stage he had occupied with his sign. It was a bit rude of him to leave his sign there, common courtesy preventing others from removing it and taking over the stage. But he didn't really bother too much with it since there were so many other stone stages scattered throughout the area.

He put away the book he was reading and ascended the stage once more, sitting down with crossed legs as he awaited his first challenger. And now that he had spent a bit more time here and engaged in a few duels on the stage, his name had already started to spread among those who frequented this area.

As a result, it didn't take too long for a small crowd of people to form around the stage, most of them just there to take this chance to observe the coming battles to see if they could pick up a trick or two. Yin Long was already used to these small crowds, he had even been part of one for a short hour two days ago as he observed a duel.

But today he received a spectator he hadn't been expecting, a large golden lion sauntering over and drawing a good deal of attention. Lan Yun followed at Jin Wang's side, her amber hair was slightly damp so it looked as if he had just been taking a shower before she decided to rush over. Her arm looked to be completely healed so she had probably charged over the moment she got wind of that Yin Long had appeared here.

The appearance of Jin Wang and the beautiful Lan Yun only served to draw even more attention to this particular stone stage, resulting in an even larger crowd gathering. Of course, those that could be lured over by Lan Yun or Jin Wang were more occupied with trying to interact with them rather than observing the man on the stone stage.

There wasn't a challenger straight away, some people looked like they were considering stepping onto the stage, but eventually decided against it for the moment. But after a little over an hour, a graceful woman with flowing brown hair and deep brown eyes stepped onto the stone stage. The woman was wielding two sickles that were strangely rounded, her arms stretching out to the side as she bowed and introduced herself.

"Cui Mu Lan, Heron Lord Hall. Please accept this challenge, Yin Long of Swan Queen Hall."

Yin Long's curiosity at her weapons only grew after she introduced herself. As a member of Heron Lord Hall she definitely specialized in ranged weapons, so could it be that those two sickles were actually supposed to be used as ranged weapons? He returned the formality and gave a polite bow, the straightening of his back signalling the start of the battle.

And Cui Mu Lan didn't waste a single second, her wrist flicking the moment Yin Long finished his bow. One of her silver sickles cut through the air like a faint blur, the woman revealing herself to have reached the 3rd Immortal Door the moment she launched her attack. It was just a sparring match to test their skills so the difference in cultivation wasn't very important, at best it would just be somewhat frowned upon if the stronger cultivator used their abundant Qi to overwhelm their enemy.

Yin Long took a quick step to the side so that the sickle passed by him, but a strange scene entered his senses just as he was going to step forward. Cui Mu Lan appeared where the sickle was, as if she had teleported to it. She grasped its handle and slashed it sideways at Yin Long, forcing him to throw his sword over to his left hand and slash upwards to deflect her attack. And as he deflected the attack, Cui Mu Lan looked at him with narrowed eyes.

"Don't bother taking it easy on me, I want to see your law of space and your law of blood, otherwise this won't be considered sparring."

Cui Mu Lan didn't lower her voice in the slightest, she actually spoke out as loudly as she could, as if she was offended by him holding back. And as the crowd looked at Yin Long with wide eyes, wondering if Cui Mu Lan had just spoken the truth, Yin Long also realized the truth.

"Cui Mu Lan... You're related to Cui Senju aren't you? Or at the very least, you belong to Xue Shuiye's faction, no?"

There were very few people here who had seen Yin Long's law of space, there were actually only two people, Lan Yun and Cui Senju. Not even Xue Qiuling had managed to see it, so the number of people that could have informed Cui Mu Lan about his laws was preciously few.

Cui Mu Lan didn't respond, but Yin Long managed to just barely spot Xue Shuiye in the distance when he swept the surroundings with a quick gaze. She was standing quite far away, even outside the range of his senses, but he could tell that she was looking straight at him, probably trying to discern if Cui Senju had been right in his assessment. But while he spotted Xue Shuiye, he failed to spot Xue Qiuling, who entered the area after he finished his sweeping glance.

Cui Mu Lan didn't give Yin Long the chance to check the area any longer, attacking him again by throwing her sickle at him once more. He dodged it once more, but the same strange scene repeated itself, she teleported to the position of her sickle without warning and grabbed its handle so that she could swing it at Yin Long.

Her words had drawn the full attention of all the onlookers, who were now eager to see if Yin Long truly had the exalted law of space. And looking at all these spectators observing Yin Long with such intent gazes, the corners of Lan Yun's lips curved up charmingly.

No matter how much a sun tried to hide, it would inevitably shine so brightly that it would catch the attention of all beings in the area. After all, it was in the destiny of any sun to blind and captivate all who looked at it.