Wu Duxiu slowly opened her eyes.
"Another new day," she murmured to herself.
An Eighth Transformation Immortal Gu circled through the modest little cottage.
Path Immortal Gu — Medicinal Fragrance!
It was a healing Immortal Gu, filling the entire cottage with a rich herbal aroma. But the stench of decay clinging to Wu Duxiu's body was equally powerful; the medicinal fragrance could do nothing to mask it.
The two scents mingled together, becoming almost unbearable even for Immortal Gu Masters.
Each day that passed was one day fewer.
Wu Duxiu knew that her great limit was not far off.
At this moment, she lay in bed, gazing at the scene within the cottage, yet her heart was filled with tranquility.
There had once been a time, back when she was only a Sixth Transformation Immortal Gu Master, when she fell in love with a Demonic Path Gu cultivator and suffered severe punishment from her clan.
She had been confined to this very cottage, forbidden from leaving for fifty years.
She never imagined that this confinement would give her the fortune of immortality.
It turned out that within this cottage lay the powerful inheritance of a Wu family ancestor. Wu Duxiu obtained it and secretly cultivated in seclusion, her strength growing rapidly by leaps and bounds.
She had even used the powerful Blessed Land connected to here to secretly meet her lover time and again. The Immortal Gu Masters of the Wu family never imagined that, right under their very noses, Wu Duxiu had been openly defying the clan's rules.
During those years, Wu Duxiu had been perfectly content, immersed in incomparable happiness.
The woman she had been then was a young, beautiful fool — ignorant of the darkness of the human heart, blind to the fact that the lover she adored harbored his own schemes.
Time flowed on.
After thousands of years apart, Wu Duxiu had returned here once more.
Now she was on her deathbed, her great limit approaching, the remaining span of her life to be counted in days.
This old woman was steeped in weariness and the weight of years. Her clouded gaze seemed to leap across a millennium, looking back to the past — every laugh, every joyful moment spent in this cottage during those youthful years surfaced in her mind, one memory at a time.
In those recollections, it seemed as though it was always bright spring.
The cottage window stood open. A gentle breeze, carrying the scent of flowers and fresh grass, playfully drifted inside.
A young woman — beautiful as could be, radiant with youth, her eyes clear as water and utterly captivating — sang within the cottage. She swept and cleaned, attended to all manner of humble household chores, and yet she was exuberant, practically dancing with joy.
Back then, happiness had come so easily. But as the years gradually accumulated, that simple kind of happiness drifted ever further away.
As for that lover — Wu Duxiu's very first love — she had already forgotten him.
The memories had grown hazy.
The pain he had once inflicted on her, the agonizing torment that had kept her tossing and turning through sleepless nights, the hatred that had gnawed at her until both body and mind were exhausted — all of it had long since scattered with the wind.
Creak.
A soft sound as the cottage's wooden door was slowly pushed open.
Wu Duxiu struggled to turn her head. Through a hanging veil of linen, she caught sight of a familiar figure.
She was not surprised. This was by her will.
She was the Grand Elder of the Wu family, a supreme figure who had wielded power for thousands of years. Without her consent, who would dare set foot here?
"You've come." Wu Duxiu spoke with great effort, her voice utterly feeble.
But the visitor was supremely reverent, kneeling on the ground and bowing deeply: "Your child greets Mother."
The man appeared middle-aged, ordinary in appearance. He was sturdy of build, with long, narrow brows and eyes that lent him an air of sinister severity.
Wu Duxiu spoke: "I summoned you to tell you something. You have a half-brother — different father, same mother — whom I bore in the Eastern Sea. I will leave everything of the Wu family to you. As for my own personal inheritance... that will go to him. Do you understand?"
The middle-aged man hurriedly kowtowed, his forehead pressing against the floor: "Your child understands."
"You may go." Wu Duxiu fell silent for a moment before continuing.
"Then your child takes his leave!" The middle-aged Immortal Gu Master was exceedingly cautious. He rose slowly, backing away several steps with his body bowed, then turned and walked out of the cottage, gently closing the door behind him.
He did not dare breathe a word, his face a mask of respect that never wavered — until he had made the entire journey back, crossing several mountain ranges, and finally returned to his own Immortal Gu House. Only then did his expression change.
"That old woman has lost her mind!"
"On the verge of death, and she wants to summon back her illegitimate bastard!"
"That mongrel — couldn't he have just stayed put in the Eastern Sea? Why does he have to come back and fight me for the inheritance?"