Cultivating with Bragging System-Chapter 636 - 291: Things Change, People Change, The Inversion of the Sky Gangsters - 1
Hearing that voice, Xiao Qingyu's body trembled. She spun around, her eyes wide with a mixture of disbelief and overwhelming joy.
By the cliff's edge, the drifting clouds parted. The wind high above swept through the ancient trees flanking the pavilion, making their branches sway. Sunlight filtered through the shifting leaves, casting a lattice of light and shadow upon the young man's face. He stood there, hazy and indistinct, just like the figure from her countless dreams.
Xiao Qingyu opened her mouth, but the words wouldn't come.
Wang Xiu smiled gently. "Senior Sister Xiao, I'm back." 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞
The sound of his voice shattered her stupor. Realizing this was no dream or illusion, she rushed forward and threw her arms around him.
"You finally decided to come back?" she murmured, lightly patting his back in mock reproach. "Where have you been all these years?"
Wang Xiu gently hugged her back. He didn't need to see her face to know her eyes were red. Stroking her back soothingly, he said softly, "I'm sorry for making you worry, Senior Sister."
Xiao Qingyu didn't say anything more. She simply leaned into his embrace for a long moment before finally pulling away. She smiled through her tears, her eyes still shimmering. "It's alright. All that matters is that you're back... you're back."
***
The cliffside was quiet.
In soft voices, Wang Xiu and Xiao Qingyu calmly recounted the events of the past years.
"My master and the Sect Leader... they went to the Nine Heavens?"
"Yes. Martial Aunt Luo speculated that you had fallen into an extremely ancient void Secret Realm and were unable to escape. She exhausted every option trying to find you, but nothing worked. In the end, she decided to go to the Nine Heavens to look for other solutions. Master and Martial Uncle Dugu were worried about her going alone, so they went with her."
Wang Xiu was taken aback. So that was why he couldn't find them; they had left the Cangyuan Realm long ago. He fell silent for a moment. "It's my fault," he said quietly. "I made them worry."
Xiao Qingyu's gaze softened. "You can't say that," she whispered. "Their leaving wasn't entirely because of you. Their cultivation levels had hit a bottleneck here in the Cangyuan Realm. The Nine Heavens is a much vaster world with far more opportunities. With the threat of the Demon Race gone, it was only a matter of time before they set out to explore it. Just like the Snow Ancestor."
"About thirty years after Master and the others left, she sensed her Heavenly Tribulation was approaching. She also left the Cangyuan Realm, hoping to find an opportunity to safely undergo her Tribulation Transcendence."
Wang Xiu knew his gentle and considerate senior sister was trying to comfort him, and he offered a faint smile.
Xiao Qingyu looked at him, her beautiful eyes full of tenderness. "If Martial Aunt Luo and the others knew you had returned safely, they would be overjoyed."
"Is there no way to contact them?" Wang Xiu asked.
Xiao Qingyu's brow furrowed. "There was. I used to contact Master and the others every five years, but for some reason... it's been a full ten years since we last received a message."
Hearing this, a flicker of worry appeared in Wang Xiu's eyes.
Reading his expression, Xiao Qingyu quickly added, "But don't worry too much, Junior Brother. With their strength, they are far from weak, even in the Nine Heavens. They won't get into trouble easily. I imagine they're in a situation similar to yours—temporarily unable to contact the outside world."
Wang Xiu tucked his worries deep into his heart and nodded with a faint smile.
Then, another thought occurred to him. "What about Senior Brother Li and the others? I haven't seen them either."
At the mention of Li Zuoyue and the others, a helpless, bittersweet smile touched Xiao Qingyu's beautiful face. At Wang Xiu's prompting, she finally revealed the truth.
It turned out that twenty years ago, Li Zuoyue, Xiang Tiange, and the others had broken through to the Out-of-Body Realm. They kept it a secret from everyone, sneaking away from the Sanqing Immortal Sect to go to the Nine Heavens as well.
Wang Xiu's expression shifted. "They went too?"
Xiao Qingyu sighed. "Every day you were gone was another day they spent worried and helpless. For a long time, their cultivation levels stagnated. A few of them even nearly suffered from cultivation deviation. Eventually, they managed to resolve their inner turmoil and dedicated themselves to training, working countless times harder than ever before. They wanted to gain enough strength to protect themselves so they could venture into the Nine Heavens to temper their skills."
Wang Xiu hesitated. "What about Junior Sister Ji? And Ling'er? Surely they didn't go to the Nine Heavens as well?"
Xiao Qingyu gave Wang Xiu a playful roll of her eyes. "You were gone for sixty years. Did you really think they'd still be the same little girls?"
Xiao Qingyu explained that after Wang Xiu disappeared, those two were the most heartbroken. They lost their appetite and had no will to cultivate, nearly withering away from grief. They grew more gaunt by the day, causing their elders, like Ji Yan and Jiang Yourong, immense heartache.
Then, the Saintess of Mount Shu, Li Xuanqi, heard what had happened and made a special trip to speak with them. After her visit, it was as if the two girls had transformed. They became absolute cultivation fanatics.
They cared for nothing else, cycling endlessly between secluded cultivation and venturing out for real-world experience. In just a few short decades, they built a formidable reputation throughout the Southern Domain, earning the title of the "Twin Beauties of Sanqing."
"One of them possesses the Innate Thunder Saint Body, while the other carries the ten-thousand-year destiny of the Jiuli Cave Heaven—she could find treasures just by walking down the road. Teaming up, they were practically invincible. They even surpassed Li Zuoyue and the others, breaking through to the Out-of-Body Realm before them. Their rapid rise became a celebrated tale at the time."
"In the end, they left the Cangyuan Realm with Li Xuanqi and the others."
"At first, Elder Ji refused to allow it," Xiao Qingyu said. "But he couldn't win against Junior Sister Ji. He was so worried she would fall into despair again that he finally had to give in."
