“Our examination is rather difficult.” Jun Yu spoke slowly, “I’m afraid you won’t pass and will give up halfway.”
Kun Peng really fell for this provocation as expected. The eleven or twelve-year-old boy stiffened his neck, full of confidence, and said, “There’s no way I won’t pass.”
Jun Yu let out a light chuckle and took out a talisman paper from his robe, slowly unfolding it. “If you truly fail, will you give up then?”
“Whoever dares to give up is a dog,” Kun Peng said without even blinking. As soon as he finished speaking, the talisman paper in Jun Yu’s hand flashed with a faint light.
A word contract was formed.
Kun Peng sensed a mysterious binding force in the unseen realm and frowned, asking angrily, “What did you do to me?”
“Don’t get worked up. It’s just an ordinary word contract. It’s only to keep you from going back on your word in the future, so the contract serves as proof.”
Jun Yu carefully put the talisman paper away. With this contract, Kun Peng wouldn’t dare break his promise for the dignity of his clan. To pass the examination, he would surely pour all his effort into it. By then, there’d be no need to worry about him having time to go out and cause trouble.
Jun Yu’s plan was perfectly calculated. Anyway, without a few hundred years, Kun Peng would never pass this examination.
“Now, let’s handle proper business. Carry me to the Nether Sea.”
“The Nether Sea is very hot. If my cultivation isn’t enough, I’ll turn into grilled fish.” The youth was clearly unwilling. He plucked a feather from his own body, about ten feet long, and handed it to Jun Yu. “Just follow this over.”
Jun Yu frowned slightly. He wanted to take Kun Peng along precisely to keep him from making trouble during this time. Still, the other resisted returning to the Nether Sea, even going so far as to ruthlessly pull out a spiritual feather from the top of his own head.
Kun Peng’s three spiritual feathers were different from ordinary feathers. Pulling them out was no different from weakening his own cultivation with his own hand.
And in this age of thin spiritual energy, raising one’s cultivation was an uphill battle.
“All right then. If you don’t want to go, I won’t force you.” Jun Yu took the spirit feather from him. “But to keep you from accidentally causing trouble and startling the people, you can’t wander around these days.”
“You can have that man who caught me watch over me,” the young Kun Peng interrupted. “I can’t beat him, so you can rest easy.”
Now that the young Kun Peng had come back to his senses, he was starting to think that the person who caught him was probably the very immortal he had come out looking for. It was just that he had been too shocked when he was first captured, and didn’t react right away.
Jun Yu lowered his eyes in thought. That wasn’t a bad idea, but… would it trouble the Master too much?
Besides, Kun Peng was so noisy. What if he ended up tiring the Master out?
Jun Yu worried for a good while, and in the end, still decided to test the waters.
He brought the young Kun Peng back to the villa’s front door. There was no one in the living room. Jun Yu asked a cleaning puppet and learned that the person was in the study.
So the two of them went upstairs and walked to the study. The door wasn’t closed. Jun Yu immediately saw the person he was looking for, holding a cinnabar brush and drawing something. He raised his hand and knocked on the door three times.
“Jun Yu?” Qi Heng put down the brush he was using to draw talismans.
Jun Yu brought Kun Peng inside and saw that next to him lay an ancient book. The pattern on the talisman paper in front of Qi Heng looked similar to the one in the book.
“Master is interested in making talismans?”
Jun Yu was puzzled, and at the same time began wondering whether he had anything similar in his own collection.
Over these past few days, Jun Yu had come to realize something too: a thousand years ago, the Master had always worried about the state treasury, yet now, even when he offered up his own collection of gold, silver, and jewels, they seemed unable to stir any interest in the Master at all.
Now that he had finally seen Qi Heng take a liking to something, Jun Yu only wished he could gather every similar book in the world and bring them all over.
Qi Heng didn’t answer him, but instead looked at the young Kun Peng behind Jun Yu. “You want me to watch over him for you?”
Jun Yu froze, feeling a little embarrassed. “So the Master already saw through my intention.”
Qi Heng glanced indifferently at the young Kun Peng. “He can stay.”
“Thank you, Master.” Jun Yu’s tone relaxed a little. “I’ll be back as soon as possible.”
Qi Heng didn’t ask him where he was going, only pushed the yellow talisman he had just finished drawing toward him. “Take this with you.”
Jun Yu stepped forward and carefully put the talisman away. This was the first gift the Master had ever given him.
And it was written by the Master’s own hand! He absolutely couldn’t lose it. Once he came back from the Nether Sea, he would buy a safe just to lock it up.
With a solemn expression, Jun Yu left.
The study fell quiet. The young Kun Peng looked at the man in white before him, hesitated for a moment, then spoke. “Hey, are you an immortal?”
Before Qi Heng could answer, he continued, “I know you’re an immortal, don’t try to fool me.”
Qi Heng’s fingers moved slightly, and the scattered things on the table all returned to their proper places. His voice was cold. “So, what is it you want to say?”
The young Kun Peng bit his lip. “Then do you know why the Nether Sea turned into scorched earth?”
“Because of a calamity,” Qi Heng said. “And this is only the beginning.”
The Nether Sea connects to the Six Paths of Reincarnation. But now that the Six Paths are covered by scorched earth, even the Kun Peng is helpless. How could ordinary souls possibly pass through the Nether Sea and enter reincarnation?
Kun Peng glared at him. “Since it’s a calamity, then why aren’t you worried? Aren’t you immortals the ones who love saving the world the most?”
In the inherited memories he carried, those immortals all loved to rescue the common people.
“When the human world has calamities, do you think immortals are exempt from calamity?” Qi Heng had indeed thought about intervening to change the calamity. But the moment he made a move, Heaven’s warning had immediately come upon him.
This calamity was Heaven’s way of giving all beings both a trial and a new beginning.
No matter what, the Heavenly Dao of this world was a merciful existence that truly regarded all life equally. Even facing its own dissolution, it had prepared a final arrangement for all beings.
“I don’t understand what you’re talking about!” Kun Peng puffed out his cheeks. “Just tell me, can you solve the Nether Sea’s scorched earth problem or not?”
Qi Heng only said, “Hasn’t someone already gone there? Besides, those immortals who save the world like you imagine, chances are, you’ll get to see them very soon.”
For some reason, a sudden, bone-deep sense of dread rose in the young Kun Peng’s heart. In his ears, it was as if he heard a tremendous rumbling, as though something massive was collapsing.
Qi Heng raised his hand, made a quick calculation, then got up and walked to the window, looking outside.
Outside the window, the sky was calm and the breeze was light. But just now, the Ninth Heaven had collapsed.
The process of the Heavenly Dao’s dissolution had begun.
“What are you looking at?” The young Kun Peng came over to the window too, imitating Qi Heng and peering outside. By chance, his eyes fell on the distant parasol tree, and he suddenly exclaimed in delight.
“Hey, there’s a bug on that tree!”
After saying that, he turned into a little bird and flew out.
Qi Heng raised his hand and pointed—bang!—the window slammed shut with a heavy sound.
In his whole life, he had never seen a Kun Peng that liked eating bugs. It really thought of itself as an ordinary little bird.
The window was made of clear glass. When the young Kun Peng flew back, he didn’t notice for a moment and crashed straight into it. With a crash, the glass window shattered into a pile of shards.
The young Kun Peng froze in midair, flapping his wings.
“What was that thing that just fell?”
Qi Heng rubbed his brow. He’d still ended up getting thrown off by Kun Peng’s way of thinking. It wasn’t an ordinary bird, so how could ordinary glass withstand it crashing into it?
Fortunately, besides the chef on the first floor, everyone else in this villa was just a puppet.
That evening, Qin Luo came home from work.
As soon as he stepped through the door, he saw a young boy in the living room who hadn’t been there before and was instantly stunned.
His guard went up at once. Just then, footsteps came from the stairs. Qin Luo looked up and immediately pointed at the boy and asked,
“Great-uncle, who is he?”
Qi Heng’s gaze turned icy as he looked at the boy lounging with his legs crossed, watching a TV drama. “Kun Peng, take your claws off the coffee table.”
Seeing him frown, the young Kun Peng hurriedly pulled his feet back.
“Kun Peng?” Qin Luo reacted immediately, his anger flaring. “You’re that Kun Peng that kept flying around on purpose and causing trouble for our Bureau?”
Knowing he was in the wrong, the young Kun Peng weakly tried to defend himself. “I wasn’t flying around on purpose. I was looking for someone!”
Qin Luo ground his teeth. “If you wanted to look for someone, couldn’t you have taken human form first and then looked slowly?”
“You humans all know the higher you stand, the farther you see.” The young Kun Peng used a line he had just learned from a book. “I was just flying around in the sky. I didn’t hurt anyone.”
Putting what he learned to use, he really was the best.
“Hah—” Qin Luo let out a cold laugh, thinking this creature really had no sense of how big it was.
“The Kun Peng will go to the Bureau tomorrow to learn. Qin Luo, remember to take him,” Qi Heng said.
Qin Luo froze, then immediately said, “Great-uncle, did you forget? Tomorrow I have to go to An City to investigate the zombie sightings.”
There was no way he was taking this Kun Peng along. If it caused trouble again, wouldn’t he be dragged down with it?
Qi Heng frowned slightly, thinking it over. “Then take him to the Bureau tomorrow and have someone there teach him some basic knowledge.”
“But… the Dragon Lord isn’t at the Bureau. If he causes trouble, I’m afraid no one there can keep him in check…” Qin Luo spoke hesitantly.
Qi Heng gave the Kun Peng a brief glance, then raised his hand and struck a sealing spell onto him. “For now, you won’t be able to return to your original form.”
The Kun Peng’s cultivation wasn’t high anyway. There was no need for a stronger restriction.
The young Kun Peng tried to turn back into his true form, but quickly realized he really couldn’t.
The next day, Qin Luo took the young Kun Peng to the Special Management Bureau. But when he went to get Kun Peng’s personal information registered, he froze up too.
Because the Kun Peng didn’t have a name.
Qin Luo paused for a long while in the name field, then pulled out his phone browser. He searched for an online name generator, randomly clicked a link, and hit generate.
“See if there’s a name you like.” Qin Luo handed the phone to the young Kun Peng. But the young Kun Peng was just newly born. How could he recognize these characters? To him, they looked pretty much like patterns.
The young Kun Peng stared at the phone for a long time, then finally picked one that looked simple and nice as a pattern.
“I like this one!”
Qin Luo leaned over for a look, his expression turned indescribable. “You’re a Kun Peng, and you want to be called Niu Xiaohua[mfn]Little Flower Cow[/mfn]?”
The young Kun Peng quickly shook his head. “No, I’m a Kun Peng, not a cow.”
He thought for a moment, then clapped his hands. “Got it! Just change the ‘Niu’ to ‘Kun’, then it’s fine!”
Qin Luo: “…”
“Still not okay?” Seeing him silent, the young Kun Peng asked tentatively.
“Then… how about you ask the immortal to name me?”
Qin Luo thought about it. It seemed reasonable, so he pulled out his phone and dialed the villa’s landline.
After about half a minute, the call connected. Qin Luo quickly explained Kun Peng’s request.
“A name?” Qi Heng absentmindedly calculated when the Eighth Heaven would collapse. “Since he’s a Kun Peng, call him Yu Kun or Yu Fei then.”
As soon as he finished speaking, the call ended.
Qin Luo offered the two names for the young Kun Peng to choose from.
“I want both!” The young Kun Peng’s eyes lit up. “I’ll use them in turns!”
