[Primordial World, Great Qin] This Daoist Is Going to Become a Sage

[Primordial Era Arc: Becoming a Disciple]

Yuan Xi knelt outside the Eight Views Palace for three days and three nights without a drop of water.

The palace doors opened a crack. Xuandu lowered his eyes to look at her, his voice soft. "Junior Sister, come in. Master has been waiting for you for a long time."

She looked up and saw a gentle, jade-like Daoist standing in the morning light.

The Supreme Purity Sage yawned inside the hall. "Pour the tea."

Only later did she learn that during those three days she had been kneeling, the Supreme Purity had chopped down an entire mountain's worth of spirit wood to make pills, all because she had once fainted from low blood sugar.

[Great Qin Arc: First Meeting]

At a dilapidated shrine on the outskirts of Xianyang, Yuan Xi was hanging her Daoist robe out to dry.

The young Ying Zheng pushed open the door with two guards and saw a Daoist nun mending her clothes, her stitches crooked and uneven.

He frowned. "Are you really a Daoist?"

Yuan Xi did not even look up. "I am."

"I have been unable to sleep lately. The old ministers at court all harbor ulterior motives. Tell me, how many days can I hold on to this throne?"

Yuan Xi finished her last stitch and said coolly, "Your heart is unsettled, so everyone looks suspicious to you. Heaven's mandate says two generations, but it never said you couldn't rule for ten thousand generations."

Ying Zheng was stunned.

He clenched his sleeve. For the first time, he felt someone's words pierce him to the bone, every single one.

[Human Sovereign: Finale]

On the day Fusu ascended the throne, Ying Zheng did not look back.

Alone in his carriage, he headed west through Hangu Pass. When he reached the outskirts of the Three Sovereigns and Five Emperors' sacred grounds, he reined in his horse and looked back.

The palaces of Xianyang stood tall and majestic, the streets teeming with people, the fortune of humanity soaring into the heavens.

A slender figure stood atop the city tower. She did not wave or say goodbye.

Ying Zheng smiled, then rode away.

On the tower, Yuan Xi withdrew her gaze and turned, sweeping her sleeve.

"On the path to immortality, there is neither sorrow nor joy."

Behind her, Xuandu had appeared in the shadows at some unknown point. He said quietly, "Junior Sister... was it worth it?"

Yuan Xi did not pause.

"The mortal world is worth it. The Dao I have realized is to protect this world, because it is worth protecting."

Xuandu watched her figure disappear. An old scar in his palm began to burn faintly.

Ten thousand years had passed.

He still had not said those words.

Aspiration: In a game that makes no sense, become the one who makes the least sense of all.