Chapter 6

Chapter 6

It Turns Out the One Who Was Supposed to Be Sacrificed Was Me

In that instant, something in my mind shattered with a deafening roar.

Of course.

From the Mirror of Past Lives, I had only seen the raid on my home on my wedding night and the signing of the Pact in the Underworld, but I hadn’t seen the very beginning.

Why were the Zhenbei Marquis Manor and the Xie Family exterminated on the same day?

Why would Siming descend to the Mortal Realm in person?

Why was I, a soul who should have been reincarnated, allowed to stay and become Meng Po?

Every point that didn’t make sense suddenly connected at this moment.

The one Siming wanted to capture was never just Xie Wujiu.

It was me.

I stared at him intently. “What exactly is inside me?”

Siming looked at me for a moment, then suddenly gave a soft smile. “Since you want to know, I shall grant your wish.”

He raised his hand and swept it across the air. Suddenly, a flash of celestial light appeared before my eyes.

It wasn’t the Underworld; it was a high platform in the Mortal Realm from three hundred years ago.

Nine Life Lamps burned upon the platform. In the center stood a young girl in white-it was me. Her wrists were bound by a Red Thread, and beneath her feet was a dense Star Pattern Formation. A group of Celestial Officials stood outside the formation, led by Siming.

“Su Du’s fate is unique; she can bear the Celestial Pivot,” someone said.

“By sacrificing her, the Destiny Plate can remain stable for another five hundred years,” another added.

My heart turned cold as I listened.

I was nothing more than a sacrificial offering.

Siming’s voice rang out. “Unfortunately, Xie Wujiu led his troops to storm the formation and snatched you away.”

The scene shifted to a sky filled with fire.

Xie Wujiu was covered in blood, carrying me on his back as he leaped from the high platform while arrows rained down behind him. He looked back and said only one thing: “Ah Du, don’t be afraid. I’m taking you home.”

But we never made it home.

That was why the raid happened later, why the families were exterminated, and why the death trap on our wedding night was set.

For the Destiny Plate to be stable, someone had to die.

And Xie Wujiu, as it happened, refused to believe in that fate.

Siming withdrew his technique, and the surroundings returned to the night of the Underworld.

“Do you understand now?” He looked at me. “If Xie Wujiu hadn’t acted recklessly back then, why would the Three Realms have suffered so many complications? You serving as Meng Po, the Underworld remaining stable, and reincarnation continuing as usual-this was supposed to be the best ending. Yet he refused to be peaceful, clinging to that obsession for nine lifetimes.”

“So that’s why you want him dead,” I whispered.

“Correct.”

“If he dies, what about me?”

“You will continue to be Meng Po,” Siming said. “Forget all of this and brew the soup for another seven hundred years. For you, this is not a bad thing.”

I suddenly laughed.

I laughed until tears came to my eyes.

“Not a bad thing?”

I brewed soup on the bridge for seven hundred years, saw off the person I loved most nine times, and watched him die more miserably with each passing life while I remembered nothing. I could only feel a faint ache in my chest every time I saw him, thinking it was just an old ailment.

And you call this ‘not a bad thing’?

My laughter grew louder and louder, until even the King of Hell began to frown.

Then I turned and asked the King of Hell, “Do you also think this is a good ending?”

The King of Hell avoided my gaze.

With that one look, I understood everything.

It wasn’t that he didn’t know.

He had simply accepted it.

The Underworld accepted being a vassal to the heavens; reincarnation accepted being a millstone for Heaven’s Mandate; the ghosts on the bridge accepted lining up to drink the soup; and even I had accepted it for seven hundred years.

But today, I refused to accept it.

I bent down and picked up the soup ladle that had fallen on the ground.

It was the one I had used most comfortably for seven hundred years. The handle was polished smooth from use, and there were small scratches I’d made during moments of boredom. Everyone saw it as a tool for serving soup, but only I knew that every ingredient added to the Meng Po Soup-its weight and its urgency-was determined by this ladle.

As I gripped the ladle, I suddenly felt it was more natural in my hand than any blade or spear.

Siming seemed to sense something was wrong and raised his hand to form a seal.

But I was faster than him.

I swung my hand back and slammed the ladle into my own palm. Blood surged out instantly, flowing down the handle. With a flick of my wrist, I cast the blood into the River of Forgetfulness. The surface of the water immediately erupted into black waves.

Having been Meng Po for seven hundred years, brewing soup and sending off souls, I had long since become one with the River of Forgetfulness.

My blood was the key to opening the river.

“Meng Qi!” the King of Hell’s expression finally changed. “Stop!”

I would not.

The River of Forgetfulness Water rose in a massive wave, crashing directly into the Soul-Capturing Formation. Countless forgotten cries, laughs, and grievances surged up from the bottom of the river all at once. These were the fragments of obsession left behind by every soul I had sent off over the past seven hundred years. Usually suppressed at the bottom of the river, they were all awake today.

For the first time, Siming took a step back.

“You’re insane.”

“Yes.” I looked at him, blood still flowing from my palm, my smile growing colder. “I told you when I resigned-I’m insane.”

I used the momentum of the water to lunge forward, smashing half of his protective golden light with a single strike of my ladle. Black and White Impermanence and the Soul-Capturing Soldiers were knocked aside by the waves of the River of Forgetfulness, and the King of Hell was forced to prioritize stabilizing the Underworld’s barrier.

In the chaos, Xie Wujiu suddenly grabbed me.

“Ah Qi, enough.”

I looked back.

He looked at me with that familiar expression of helplessness and heartache.

“If you keep going, your soul will shatter.”

“Then let it shatter.”

“But I can’t bear to see that,” he said.

I was so angry my eyes turned red. “Why is that the only thing you know how to say?”

He suddenly raised his hand and gently touched my blood-stained palm.

“Because in every life, that is the only thing I’ve ever wanted to say to you.”

In the next instant, he spun around and actually ripped the Soul-Annihilating Talisman from his chest, slamming it into the space between his own brows.

My mind went blank.

If a Soul-Annihilating Talisman fully entered a soul, not even an immortal could save them.

“Xie Wujiu!”

He looked at me and said softly, “Ah Qi, this time, it’s my turn to see you off.”

With that, he charged straight toward the Reincarnation Platform at the end of the River of Forgetfulness.