"It was Hua Tianshu and his sister, Hua Meifang."
It was a shocking answer and Jie Fu Lian couldn't help but feel that it was a bit odd.
"How can it be them?"
"They came to help, but when they arrived, they found you and Shizun unconscious in front of the east gate," Yin Ru spoke softly, with no rush as she explained, "They closed the gate together and that Hua Meifang..."
Yin Ru paused and pressed her lips together as she took a minute to continue, "She was just as reckless as you."
"Eh?"
"Atleast you woke up with your life intact but Hua Meifang is still unconsious."
Jie Fu Lian gulped as he heard this and his eyebrows creased together but he didn't ask anything nor did he voice out any opinions.
In the first place itself, his recollection of this name, Hua Meifang, wasn't much.
He had never seen her and the only reason why he had heard her name before was because she was Hua Tianshu's sister.
Yin Ru sighed as she stopped herself from saying anything too excessive and spoke, "You should consider yourself lucky. Even with his sister almost at the verge of death, he still bothered to carry you back here."
Jie Fu Lian was silent and his mood was also hard to decipher.
In reality, even Yin Ru had been shocked that day. Hua Tianshu had carried both his sister and Jie Fu Lian back to the Yan sect.
Even Jie Fu Lian's father had been abandoned and Yin Ru was the one who went to get him back.
If Yin Ru were in his shoes, she was sure she would have headed back to the HuiXue sect in order to get her sister treated first, but Hua Tianshu surprisingly came over to the yan sect.
When asked, he had simply justified his actions by saying the Yan sect was closer, but Yin Ru felt as if something was wrong.
Yin Ru was sure that Jie Fu Lian and Hua Tianshu had never met. In fact, not only had they never met but they didn't have any connection with each other either.
However, back then, when she looked at the expression on Hua Tianshu's face, she felt as if the boy was a bit too worried about Jie Fu Lian.
It was definitely odd, but since Yin Ru couldn't be too sure about it, she didn't bother bringing it up in front of Jie Fu Lian.
When Jie Fu Lian was fully awake, he went to visit his father, but his father had entered seclusion after just a day of waking up and hence, Jie Fu Lian couldn't see him.
When he returned back to his room, he found that both his senior and junior martial sisters and brothers were waiting for him.
They were glad to see that he was okay and they stayed around to talk to him.
After about half a day, they all left in order to let him rest, but Jie Fu Lian was clearly not in the mood to rest.
For some reason, he couldn't forget the feeling of helplessness he felt that day.
'There is a darkness in you,' The words of that demon rang in his head and caused him to feel confused.
He couldn't help but feel that his survival was nothing more than a mere stroke of luck.
If Hua Tianshu and Hua Meifang hadn't been there, he would have perhaps already been eaten by another demon.
Death...
He had almost faced it and he had greatly feared it, but now that he had returned from the edge of the yellow river, he couldn't help but feel the need to get stronger so that he would never have to experience such a feeling again.
He sat down on his bed with his legs crossed. He closed his eyes and concentrated on controlling his spiritual Qi.
Just like the demon had said, Jie Fu Lian didn't have a very impressive innate talent. No matter how much he would cultivate, there was a limit to his growth. When he hits his limit, he would be stuck at a bottleneck and would forever remain mediocre.
Currently, his cultivation speed was considered to be impressive but he knew that his limit wasn't far.
He meditated for a week and in that week, the words of the demon haunted him all day and night.
In the end, when he finally opened his eyes, tears were streaming down his cheeks.
He had a realization.
A realization that he might never be able to stand on the same level as Hua Tianshu.
It was pathetic of him to think of the latter as his rival.
Hua Tianshu was born with a superior gold spiritual root, one that was only seen once every thousand years. How could Jie Fu Lian ever even dream about beating such innate talent...?!
It was hopeless to even try!
He didn't know why but when he thought about how hopeless his case was, he couldn't help but bawl his eyes out.
He cried for three hours and then, he had another realization.
Although he wasn't born with a superior spiritual root, he was still born with the talent of forging spiritual weapons and items.
In the next few days, he gathered up his thoughts and got ready to forge a new spiritual sword.
That day, he hadn't been able to close the east gate because he didn't have enough spiritual energy left with him.
There was an abundance of Spiritual Qi around him at that time, but he wasn't able to use any of it simply because his body was too slow and couldn't digest all that grass.
The problem was him and his limit to store and use spiritual energy.
Destroying that limit was impossible for him and hence he didn't even bother trying.
After thinking about it a lot, Jie Fu Lian decided to forge a sword.
A sword that could gather Qi from its surroundings without needing a master.
A sword that would have no limit to the spiritual energy it can store.
A sword that could defy the heavens.
If he could succeed in forging such a sword, Jie Fu Lian could rest assured that nobody would ever have to bet their lives on closing a door to the demon realm.
With no time wasted, he started collecting all the materials needed and entered seclusion in order to truly focus on his work.
Two weeks passed and he suddenly came out of that seclusion with a pale lifeless face and a broken sword that looked nothing better than scrap metal.
His thoughts were clear. His skills were also not lacking.
There was no reason for him to fail and yet, he had failed.
His first try at forging the Qi-collecting sword miserably failed.
Perhaps there was a reason why such a sword had never been forged before. It wasn't because nobody had the idea, it was simply because everyone who had the idea, failed to make it a reality.
Yin Ru was worried for the boy but when she asked, he merely shook his head and said that he was okay.
The boy's lips were pale and dry, his eyes were sunken in as if he lacked both sleep and energy.
He was clearly not 'okay' but Yin Ru didn't bother pressing him about it.
He was already old enough to make decisions for himself.
However, Yin Ru had certainly not expected the boy's next decision to be so dangerous and reckless.
Just after a day of coming out of seclusion, Jie Fu Lian insisted on travelling north to the Jin sect.
At first, Yin Ru didn't think much of it and casually asked him why, however, the boy's answer truly shocked her to the core.
"I want to enter the Eternal hell tower."
She felt as if her mouth was almost about to hit the floor from the shock and it took an entire minute for her to question back, "Why would you want to enter that damned thing...?!"
The eternal hell tower, as it's name suggested was a place that was akin to hell. To be more accurate, it wasn't exactly a place, it was a celestial-grade spiritual item.
Created almost a thousand years ago, it was an item with the purpose of tormenting the mind, body and soul of anyone who entered.
If you died and really went to hell, perhaps you could enter the circle of rebirth and come back, but once you entered this eternal hell tower, you were bound to be trapped for all eternity with no hope.
The only way of coming out was if somebody from the outside helped you or if you managed to prove to the eternal hell tower that you were worthy enough.
Only criminals having a long record of unforgivable sins had ever been sent to that eternal hell tower!
"I want to go and train," Jie Fu Lian replied, he had no reluctance and seemed to be pretty clear with what he wanted.
"I can't let you go and welcome death."
Yin Ru was also quite determined to stop the boy, however, the next day, the boy had already disappeared before sunrise and Yin Ru didn't need to guess in order to conclude where the boy had headed off to.