When Earth Awakened, I Became a Sword Saintess

Chapter 197 : Tears Exhausted, Sky Clear

197: Tears Exhausted, Sky Clear

Upon reading the inscription, Yuyin understood. The right passage held only the inheritance, accessible only after passing the Rain Concubine's test. The door at the left passage's end, however, could only be opened by one who had received the inheritance. Those the Rain Concubine deemed unworthy could never enter, even if they fought through all the guardians and traps to reach this place.

"Perhaps I can open this stone door." Yuyin's chest heaved; she had been running at full speed, and her breath came in ragged gasps.

Behind them, Bai Ruowei's powerful aura was drawing closer. Those mechanical statues couldn't stop her, only delay her slightly.

"You can?" Green Ghost Pang Shan looked down at Yuyin. For a moment, he seemed to feel some regret about his life. He set down Princess Gui Ji.

"Pang Shan?" Gui Ji was badly wounded and utterly drained. She leaned gently against Pang Shan's thick, pillar-like leg.

Pang Shan turned, his fierce, resolute gaze fixed on the depths of the cavern. "Xia Yuyin, I entrust Princess Gui Ji to you."

Boom! Pang Shan's savage Ghost Clan Primordial Energy erupted as he strode resolutely toward where Bai Ruowei pursued them.

"Xia Yuyin, if I ever become Ghost King one day, I will surely take a wife like you. Unfortunately, I fear I won't get the chance."

Yuyin didn't hear Pang Shan's self-mocking thoughts. Seeing him go to block Bai Ruowei, she immediately focused on the stone door. An instinctive feeling guided her to place her hand upon it. The rain-suffused Primordial Energy within her circulated, and a spirit current flowed from her hand into the door. The carved raindrops on the stone door actually began to glow, falling like real rain onto the lotus flowers. The stone lotus petals shimmered with watery mist and swayed. The carved snakes coiled across the door started to move. The heavy stone door slowly opened.

Behind them, fierce battle fluctuations erupted. Beautiful purple lightning flashed in the dark cavern.

The door opened. Yuyin immediately pulled Gui Ji inside. After they entered, the door slowly closed on its own.

Only moments later, three white lightning sword beams struck the stone door.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Electric sparks flew.

Yet the door only bore a few hair-thin scratches.

Bai Ruowei leaped to the door. Her slender hand caressed the rough stone, tracing the carved, hard serpents. She activated her spirit water fully and pushed with all her might.

Peng! Ripples of air surged across the door, but it was useless.

"This stone door... perhaps no living expert of this age could destroy it." Bai Ruowei panted. She stepped back and bowed to the door. "Senior Rain Concubine, Bai Ruowei means no offense. But my homeland is about to fall. The lives of billions of Li Su hang in the balance. I only wish to borrow your power and do all I can to turn this tide."

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · · · · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

Yuyin and Gui Ji entered the darkness. Gradually, cold, mournful spirit flames lit up, barely illuminating the tomb chamber.

It was a vast octagonal tomb.

Yuyin looked around. Every wall was carved with faded murals of unknown age.

"This... this is the Rain Concubine Goddess's tomb chamber, isn't it?" Gui Ji said in a daze. The tomb's solemn, icy atmosphere had completely subdued even her spirited nature.

"Gui Ji, let us first pay our respects to Senior Rain Concubine." Though Yuyin had received part of the Rain Concubine's inheritance, without explicit permission, she dared not call her master.

On the wall directly ahead hung an ancient painting. Beneath the painting stood an altar, holding a longsword in a jade-white scabbard. Under the sword lay a small black wooden box.

Before the altar, Yuyin looked up at the painting. It depicted two women. One was enchanting and seductive, dressed in revealing feathers and splendid robes, golden serpents coiled around her arms and anklets of gold around her bare feet. Waves lapped at her feet, yet she hid behind an ancient pine tree, stealing a glance with what seemed like infatuation at the back of another woman not far away.

That other woman had waterfall-like hair and wore a simple, plain black gown. The dress seemed rendered in only a few strokes, yet it captured a woman's grace and lithe form so vividly it stirred the imagination. Though only her back was shown, at the corner of the painting, she seemed to be its very center.

"Why... why are there two people in this painting?" Gui Ji wondered.

Without question, based on legend and the Rain Concubine's statues among the nobility, the woman hiding behind the pine tree, gazing with longing, was Rain Concubine. But who was that mysterious woman, visible only from behind, yet so captivating and thought-provoking?

Yuyin saw two lines of inscription beside the painting, bearing a profound, willful spirit. Naturally, it was Rain Concubine's own writing.

"Even as I command rain and ride dragons, leveling mountains, why will you not cast me a single glance? I only wish to see you again before the end of days. Then I could die without regret. —Rain Concubine."

"Senior Rain Concubine..." Yuyin didn't know who that ancient mysterious woman was, but she could read everything in Rain Concubine's eyes as she hid behind the ancient pine.

This was clearly the same Rain Concubine, so willful and self-indulgent, yet now she revealed the heart of a maiden in love, shy and nervous and torn, as if her very soul had been captured by this mysterious woman. She gazed on without resentment, without regret.

Yuyin's heart ached with sorrow. She could now feel what Rain Concubine's grief truly was.

Such mournful will echoed through this cold tomb. Senior Rain Concubine had died without ever reuniting with that woman...

What immense regret.

People say nothing is sadder than a dead heart, but what of when the heart lives on while the soul perishes? What helplessness...

A tear fell from Yuyin's eye, unbidden.

The crystal tear dropped onto the cold stone floor of the tomb.

"You have come."

"Within my tomb chamber are seven walls of murals, unknown to the world. I want you to look at them, starting from the left, one by one. Then you will know my story. Then I have a treasure, the longsword on the altar, and an inheritance, something in the small box beneath. it. Take them both."

"I do not want you as my disciple. I do not want your repayment. I only want you to look at those paintings and know my untold story. That, perhaps, is the true legacy I wish to leave behind."

"Let the world call me foolish or obsessed if they will. I waited three thousand years for that woman, my soul withering away in sorrow and melancholy until I died. Perhaps I could have ascended to immortality... but how could those so-called carefree immortals, those self-satisfied mediocre souls, ever know the taste of true love?"

Only Yuyin could hear these words.

"Senior Rain Concubine, when I accepted the Rain Inheritance, you told me not to become like you. Did you mean for Yuyin to cherish those by her side?"

"Senior Rain Concubine, Yuyin has come to honor you." Yuyin knelt side by side with Gui Ji before Rain Concubine's portrait and kowtowed three times.

Yingluo, Little Yuan, and Teacher were still on Earth. Senior Lian and Senior Jing; she didn't know if they had returned safely... Yuyin didn't know why Li Su wanted to exterminate Earthlings, but she would never let it happen. Even if she couldn't stop it, she would take Teacher and the others and flee to Prison Abyss.

She must protect those important to her. This was not Rain Concubine's mission that Yuyin shouldered through accepting the inheritance, but her will, her love and loyalty.

After paying respects, Yuyin rose and walked along the wall from left to right, examining each mural. Every one told of that mysterious woman. The murals said nothing of Rain Concubine's own birth, nothing of her cultivation to immortality, none of the divine miracles that shook Prison Abyss in Ghost Clan legend.

These seven walls told of how Rain Concubine, as a young maiden, first met that mysterious woman. How she secretly watched her. How she became entranced by the woman's world-shaking arts that could topple mountains and shift stars with a wave of her hand. How she followed her to learn water secret arts, sword techniques...

How she thought of her, cherished her, waited for her when alone.

Until the end, when Rain Concubine's soul withered and her life faded, that mysterious woman still had not returned. The final painting showed this generation’s great female demon god, admired by countless souls, celebrated as a peerless beauty, even slandered by those who could not have her, dying alone.

"Senior Rain Concubine, Yuyin lacks the power to reverse heaven and earth, to turn the cycle of reincarnation. Otherwise, one day I would resurrect you and help you find that woman."

"Such hopeless waiting is too despairing. Yuyin truly does not want this to be your ending."

Yuyin's eyes held a trace of stubborn resolve. Though she could do nothing now, she understood the word "if," the word "infinite."

She stepped forward solemnly and reached for the longsword.

Heavy.

This longsword was about the same length as Yuyin's Yue Maiden Longsword, but at least ten times heavier. If not for her vast increase in strength in Prison Abyss, she might not have been able to wield it.

Holding this sword felt like grasping a celestial river.

Yuyin took a deep breath and grasped the jade-white hilt with her other hand, preparing to draw.

Rain Concubine's will came again: "This sword is named Tears Exhausted, Sky Clear. It was forged from my tears and Iron River ice crystals. When my tearful eyes ran dry, the world was freed from flood and rain. My sorrow also brought death to countless people. Perhaps that was my sin. Use this sword to atone for me."

"Tears Exhausted, Sky Clear..." Yuyin seemed to feel that in ancient times, when the world fell, Rain Concubine had cried until no tears remained, causing floods to fill the heavens. But finally, the earth saw clear skies and all living things revived.

"They say Senior Rain Concubine was vicious, selfish, a demon goddess of her age? Yet this sword, Tears Exhausted, Sky Clear, reveals her true heart." Yuyin's slender hand tightened on the hilt.

Zheng!

She drew the sword. In the dark tomb, the blade flashed, and for an instant, it was like daylight.