INE Chapter 122: Lover

Gu Baiyi accompanied Sanhua to many places.

In the winter of January, with the snow swirling, Sanhua took her flying to the peak of the Wan Mountain, where they gazed at the vastness of the heavens and earth.

In March, as all things revived, the river thawed and rushed towards all streams. The two of them anchored a small boat, and spring rain dampened their bamboo hats.

The days that followed were often peaceful and serene.

When staying at inns, Gu Baiyi and Sanhua would sleep on the same bed.

Occasionally, while Sanhua was in a deep sleep, Gu Baiyi would raise her hand in the darkness, tracing the outline of her face. From her brow to her nose, then from her nose to her lips.

Her chin, lip line, and earlobe, she confirmed each one carefully.

Sanhua and her senior sister were the same person, but at the same time, they were not.

Sanhua was colder and more obsessive. She was a true immortal who disregarded the world and was not supposed to have emotions. This was better.

Gu Baiyi also wished that Sanhua had no feelings, so that when she eliminated herself, it would be quicker and more decisive.

What she didn’t know was that while she aimlessly pondered these thoughts under the cover of night, Sanhua's fingers, hidden in her sleeve, moved slightly.

The next morning, when Sanhua woke up, the plum rains had begun outside.

The April sky still held a hint of chill.

Gu Baiyi took out a bamboo umbrella, holding it over Sanhua while her own shoulders became half wet.

Sanhua turned her head to look at Gu Baiyi’s robe, which was gradually turning a dark green as the rain soaked through. She frowned slightly and said, “I can use my spiritual power to avoid the rain. You don't need to hold the umbrella for me.”

Raindrops slid off the umbrella and splashed onto the ground, creating ripples.

Gu Baiyi thought back to an old memory from a long time ago at Bodhi Gate.

At that time, the sky was drizzling, Jiang Fei walked behind them, and she held the umbrella for her senior sister. Now, looking back, it felt as if it were from another lifetime.

She snapped out of it and smiled. “I suppose true immortals don’t need me to hold an umbrella, but I just want to do something for you.”

Sanhua looked at her and asked, “Is what you’re doing for me, or is it for her?”

Gu Baiyi stopped in her tracks, stunned.

Sanhua had lived for millions of years, and naturally understood that in any world, no one would treat another person well for no reason.

So, Gu Baiyi’s kindness, her fondness, all came from someone else.

She didn’t know who that person was, but she guessed that they must look very similar to her.

But when the creator made her and 01, they said they were unparalleled beings in the world. This meant that even the creator could lie. But whether that was the case or not, she no longer cared.

It was just as she had once said, everything would eventually perish.

Things destined to perish never last long.

Gu Baiyi walked alongside Sanhua, still holding the umbrella for her.

For a moment, she didn’t know how to explain herself. After all, she thought of Sanhua as her senior sister, but it was more of an instinct than anything.

Yet, with the same kind of instinct, she could never be wrong.

Some things everyone could do, but others, only a senior sister would do. That was the feeling Sanhua gave her.

Furthermore, ever since the day Sanhua kissed her, the faint scent of blood on her lips was the same as the one that flowed from her senior sister.

The rain gradually stopped.

Unknowingly, they had walked out of the small path, and when they looked up, they could see a field of wheat.

Green waves spread across the steps one after another. A gentle breeze blew, making the wheat sway like an ocean.

Gu Baiyi put away the umbrella and said softly to Sanhua, “True Immortal, although I can’t explain it clearly, I do like you. It has always been you.”

Sanhua looked at Gu Baiyi and said, “Actually, I don’t care who you like. Because I don’t love anyone. I am just a firewall created by the creator.”

Though she said this, a trace of confusion appeared in her heart.

Could it be that she truly couldn’t love anyone?

Why, then, when she sat under the peach blossom tree and saw that pale-colored sleeve, did she slowly lower her hand, retracting the killing move she had intended to release?

At that moment, Sanhua didn’t understand what love or liking meant. All she knew was that this feeling irritated her.

But she also knew that, even irritation was better than numbness and boredom.

Passing through the wheat field, they came to a dense bamboo forest.

Deep within the forest, a secluded mountain peak was hidden, with no traces of carts or footsteps along the path.

Sanhua narrowed her eyes, gazing toward the middle of the mountain.

There seemed to be an old wall, covered with green climbing ivy. It looked like it was a building.

Once she confirmed there was a structure, Sanhua wrapped her arm around Gu Baiyi’s waist and flew toward it.

With a light step, they reached their destination in an instant.

After stopping, Gu Baiyi looked at Sanhua, who was so close to her, and thought how the tides of fate always turn.

In the past, she often carried her senior sister, but now, with no spiritual power, it had reversed, Sanhua was the one holding her.

On the other side, Sanhua looked up at the plaque on the building.

Tiangong Workshop.

With no expression on her face, she thought, “What kind of old factory dares to call itself ‘Tiangong?’”

After Gu Baiyi stepped out of Sanhua’s embrace, she also saw the Tiangong Workshop standing in front of her.

In an instant, memories flooded back of Madam Mo showing her the puppet.

Could it be… that puppet was something Sanhua had made for Madam Mo?

She looked at the indifferent Sanhua, but couldn’t understand why Sanhua had created a puppet that looked exactly like her.

At the entrance to Tiangong Workshop, two beautiful female puppets stood, one on each side.

The female puppets were incredibly lifelike, smooth, glossy black hair, and eyes and lips identical to a real person’s.

The only flaw was that they couldn’t move or smile.

Gu Baiyi gazed at the puppets before her, pondering why Sanhua would later turn them into such ugly versions.

Seeing that Gu Baiyi had been lost in thought, Sanhua recalled their earlier conversation.

A strange feeling rose in her heart, and she suddenly said, “You say that you like me, but I’ve seen enough of the world. I know that people like good appearances and are drawn to beauty. So, I think what you like is just this shell of mine.”

She left out the last part: “A shell that looks like the person you like.”

Gu Baiyi was stunned.

Indeed, she did like her senior sister’s appearance. But it wasn’t that she would like anyone who looked like her senior sister.

Before Gu Baiyi could respond, Sanhua waved her sleeve and turned the two puppets into grotesque, hideous versions. Then, she asked coldly, “Do you think they’re beautiful?”

Gu Baiyi looked at the two puppets, now shockingly ugly, and suddenly felt sorry for them.

But she could only answer truthfully, “...No, they’re not.”

“Do you feel at ease looking at them?”

Gu Baiyi looked at the grotesque puppets, rubbed her brow, and replied, “...Not really.”

“That’s it then.”

Sanhua thought of what she had seen in the human world and continued, “When I traveled through the world, I often saw men take young, beautiful concubines after their wives grew old and lost their looks. At first, I didn’t understand, but then I realized that the younger, prettier concubines did indeed make people happy to look at.”

“Good looks naturally bring joy to the heart. But if it were a different face, you might not feel the same way.”

Her implication was clear: she was trying to wake Gu Baiyi up. What she liked was her appearance, which resembled that of the one she truly loved.

Gu Baiyi looked at Sanhua and couldn’t help but smile.

True Immortal was indeed a stubborn person. Once she believed something, she thought it was the only truth.

But…

Gu Baiyi shook her head, smiling as she spoke, “True Immortal is right. Beautiful things do bring joy to the heart. There are many beautiful things in the world, peach blossoms, flowing rivers, mountains, and seas, each beautiful in its own way.”

“But True Immortal, no matter what identity you take, no matter what appearance you have, you will never be the same as everyone else in my eyes.”

“I like you, True Immortal, not just because of your appearance. I saw you first, then I saw your beauty. If you were to reincarnate as a cloud or a bird in your next life, I would still love to look at the cloud or the bird with the same joy.”

After a long silence, Sanhua slowly said, “But you know, I won’t become a cloud, or a bird.”

“That’s true. You will always be True Immortal.”

Gu Baiyi smiled, “But I can foresee, in the distant future, you will appear beside me in a different form.”

After hearing Gu Baiyi’s words, Sanhua didn’t speak.

After a long silence, she moved her fingers, transforming herself into the shape of one of the female puppets.

Gu Baiyi looked at Sanhua in front of her, not quite understanding what the gesture meant.

Then, Sanhua smiled faintly and provocatively asked, “Is this how I’ll look in the future?”

Gu Baiyi knew that Sanhua was treating her words as a joke.

She smiled helplessly, sighing, “In the future, True Immortal…”

She looked at the wrinkles and spots on Sanhua’s face, took a step forward, and gazed into her eyes.

Then, with a soft smile, Gu Baiyi kissed her pale, cracked lips.

After the kiss, she cupped Sanhua’s face gently, saying softly, “So beautiful.”

…

From that day on, Gu Baiyi rarely saw Sanhua again.

Decades passed, and without spiritual power to preserve her youth, she slowly aged.

Feng Huai had grown up, and like Feng Lan, was completely obsessed with swords.

He found the Phoenix in the Wutong Forest to be noisy, and sometimes practiced his sword in Gu Baiyi’s courtyard.

With every shift of his steps and the fluttering of his sleeves, the sword flowers he drew were like falling petals, or like drifting snow.

Gu Baiyi sat in a chair, watching with a smile. She picked up her tea and stirred the floating leaves in her cup before taking a small sip.

As the tea entered her throat, she suddenly remembered something her senior sister had said to her a long time ago in the illusion.

“I know you wake up at the rooster crow, and practice your sword at the time of the dragon.”

"I know you prefer drinking clear tea, not strong tea. I know that when you take on sect tasks, you like to smile and greet the elder handing you the token first, because you believe it's more polite."

The light shifted, and the phoenix flowers slowly withered.

Under the moonlit night, Senior Sister’s eyes were clear as mirrors, her demeanor calm and serene.

"I come from another world, but I feel lonely. The joys and sorrows of others seem like nothing more than a game to me."

She knew that Senior Sister had always been lonely.

But she didn’t realize that this loneliness was ingrained in Senior Sister, a loneliness that came with her existence.

Senior Sister was born with endless time, with immortality, born to be gazed upon by others as a divine being.

She had no choice but to become a lonely moon in the sky.

Standing so high, so far away, yet equally infinitely solitary.

But that wasn’t the case now.

The reflection of her face appeared on the water’s surface. Gu Baiyi quietly gazed at herself.

There were fine lines at the corners of her eyes.

These signs indicated that even though she had consumed the blood of Sanhua, she was slowly aging, getting closer and closer to death.

She knew that Sanhua must be hiding somewhere at this moment. Perhaps leaning against a railing, perhaps standing under a peach tree.

Sanhua was watching her, she could feel it.

She would stay with Sanhua, until she grew old and passed away.

Until the end of her life, until Sanhua took her soul.

Gu Baiyi was willing.

In fact, Sanhua was indeed watching her.

She stood atop the bell tower, gazing at the world below, without any particular expression.

In the past, that world seemed like nothing more than a box to her.

Now it was still a box, but it had become one filled with a gift.

That gift had an expiration date.

"01." standing beside Sanhua, her face cold and detached, said, "Before you took on this task, I used the power of time and space to predict that you wouldn't complete it, and you might even be formatted because of it."

Sanhua responded indifferently, "If you hadn't said that, I probably wouldn't have taken this task."

Her tone was as cold as 01’s, but ninety percent of it was just for show.

She couldn’t maintain the absolute coldness like the administrators or 01. Perhaps because when the administrator created her, they must have been feeling lonely and bored, and so gave her such a personality.

01 shook her head, preparing to leave, but Sanhua asked a question from behind.

"01, why does the administrator want us to eliminate the bugs in each world?"

Sanhua looked at 01 calmly and asked, "Do those bugs really disrupt the space-time order?"

01 turned around, looking at Sanhua.

She didn’t understand why 02 had suddenly asked this question.

She replied, "02, are you questioning the administrator?"

Sanhua shook her head lightly and said, "I just feel that after visiting that world, it seems everyone has a reason to exist. Even the bug from the future came to this time because of a fluctuation in space-time."

"She did return to the past due to some external force, but her existence is justified. She shouldn’t be erased so easily."

01’s voice was cold: "02, many things don’t need justification. She is a bug, and you are the guardian of time’s order. We only need to execute the elimination order. That’s enough."

Sanhua watched 01 turn and leave, then softly said to her back, "But I can’t eliminate her."

"Then, the administrator will give you a mandatory order to help you complete the task."

...

Sanhua had lived for many years, and there were many things she couldn’t understand.

For example, since the administrator had already created 01, why create a useless 02?

Why were there so many bugs slipping through the timeline, requiring her to eliminate them one by one?

Sanhua arrived at the Divine Sect, but no one noticed her.

Because whenever she wished for others to not see her, no one could.

She sat by the pond, gazing at her young reflection on the water’s surface.

In her years of wandering among mortals, she had seen the wrinkles and gray hair on their faces, and for a moment, she felt envy.

Because they could sense the passage of time, but she could not.

All things in the world would eventually decay, but she would endure.

Eternal, and solitary.

Sanhua stood up, noticing that the peach blossoms had bloomed, covering the entire mountain peak.

Her perceptive ability was so refined that she could see the exact moment the flower buds opened, the dew slipping off the petals, and the spring colors spreading across the mountain.

Of course, these things weren’t beautiful or rare.

Just like the sun was bound to set, and then rise again as usual.

But when Sanhua saw the hand that picked the branch of flowers, her heart trembled, the sensation just as it had been when they first met.

It was a withered, spotted hand, its fingers thin and delicate, the skin on it thin.

Sanhua could tell that this hand belonged to someone elderly.

She saw the white hair at the temples of the person and suddenly realized that the passage of time in this distant realm flowed differently from this plane.

So, the one called Gu Baiyi had already lived for a hundred years.

Her face was no longer youthful, her body thin as if it were nothing but a wooden frame.

Yet her gentle smile remained the same.

Sanhua recognized the old woman, so she walked into the courtyard, quietly watching her.

Around Gu Baiyi were many phoenix flowers, all planted by her own hands.

Unlike the ones blooming on Phoenix Terrace, these flowers now grew in the soil of the Divine Sect.

They were a deep red, blooming profusely, like the blazing sun.

After watering the flowers, Gu Baiyi would bask in the sun, her eyes closed as she felt its warmth.

In her two lifetimes, counting this inexplicable one, she had lived three lives.

But never had there been a moment when she felt so at peace and content.

When she opened her eyes, Gu Baiyi saw the peach blossoms in full bloom.

The spring light bathed the vibrant peach flowers, and she smiled gently. Truly, they were beautiful.

But she had already seen the most beautiful peach blossom rain.

The sunlight warmed her aging body, and she felt comforted.

Like a heavy quilt in winter, snug and secure.

Gu Baiyi lazily basked in the sun. As she grew drowsy, she raised her eyes to look at the peach blossoms.

Looking at them, she remembered that she was waiting for someone. Someone related to the peach blossoms, someone with whom she had made a promise.

What kind of promise was that?

Gu Baiyi tilted her head. The years had passed, and she found it difficult to recall certain things.

The spring breeze brushed by, and she squinted her eyes, watching the peach petals swirl in the air over the green bricks.

It was a beautiful sight.

She rubbed her eyes and, in a daze, saw a faint figure on the stone slab.

She seemed to have forgotten everything, yet at the same time, she remembered everything.

Gu Baiyi’s voice trembled slightly: "Is it you, Senior Sister?"

As the peach petals fell, the figure vanished into the warm spring light.

...

Sanhua thought she was foolish, and had always thought so.

But she had already seen the most beautiful peach blossoms, and now she could no longer bear the days without them.

So, she thought of the Tiangong Workshop where puppets were made.

The owner of the Tiangong Workshop was named Mo.

When Madam Mo knew that it was Sanhua who had turned her puppet into such an ugly thing, she was very displeased.

But when she heard that Sanhua was willing to offer her own blood, she was overjoyed.

With the blood of an immortal, it meant she could create an immortal puppet.

Sanhua wanted to make a puppet of a woman from the Divine Sect.

She said that the woman’s robe should be made from ice silk, shimmering under the moonlight, dazzling like mercury.

Madam Mo noted it down.

Sanhua also said that the woman’s smile was beautiful, like a crescent moon. Her brows and eyes were cool, but at times, they held endless tenderness and love.

Madam Mo remembered and then asked, "Is she your lover?"

Sanhua replied, "I am not her lover. She has her own lover."

Madam Mo was puzzled. "Then why do you want to make her puppet?"

Sanhua answered, "Because she made me feel that the mountains and rivers are beautiful, so I went to see the mountains and rivers. She made me feel that the world is beautiful, so I went to see the world. She made me feel that heaven and earth are beautiful, so I want to stay in this world forever."

"Now, I am willing to love this sky, this earth, this world, because of her existence. But if she ceases to exist, the mountains and rivers will lose their color, and the world will lose its light. Then none of these things will be necessary."

"So I want to make a puppet. After she dies, I will take the puppet. Though the puppet has no life, it will always exist, always keeping me company as I watch these mountains and rivers."

At this point, Sanhua’s voice gradually lowered.

She held the branch of a phoenix flower, murmuring softly, repeating, "...She is my puppet. She will always stay with me, watching these mountains and rivers, won’t she?"

---------

Note: Next chapter shifts to Ji Rong’s perspective~