Nightfall

The State of Pureness was the most mysterious state of Haotian Taoism which no one had witnessed in the cultivation history after the Everlasting Night.

For the real powerhouses in the world, there was one question that had confused them the most—how high the Headmaster was.

Master Qishan in the Lanke Temple once guessed that the Headmaster had reached the State of Pureness, which strongly proved how high and powerful the State of Pureness was in people’s eyes.

The Headmaster proved his state on the Wilderness which was beyond everyone’s imagination, but actually, even the Headmaster himself hadn’t run into a man who had reached the State of Pureness.

Eldest Brother hadn’t met one, either. All of his fragmentary knowledge on the State of Pureness came from the library in the back of the Academy’s mountain. Him shouting “the State of Pureness” was just a guess.

He felt he was close to the truth, or nothing could explain what was happening on the Abbey Dean.

Ning Que finished writing the character. He gathered all desires and borrowed thousands of cutlasses from thousands of people in Chang’an City, but no one expected that the Abbey Dean would reach the State of Pureness when he was nearly killed by Ning Que.

Eldest Brother couldn’t believe that there was someone living in the world who had actually reached that legendary state.

But that was happening before him, so vivid and so real.

The Abbey Dean surely honored his name as the most powerful man in the one-thousand-year history of Haotian Taoism, and he was second to Haotian.

The State of Pureness was beyond the Five States. In fact, it was the state beyond all others because its reach was beyond this word.

When attaining the State of Pureness, it meant that the cultivator was beyond any other forces in the world.

The clear sunshine poured on the cliff, and the green pine trees cast shadows on the stone. As breeze was flowing by, the pine branches waved and dusted the dirt off from the stone, but the shadows remained still.

Now the Abbey Dean’s blood and flesh had become lotus petals, and his bones had become lotus roots. He lived in the pure water instead of the mortal world. Therefore, Ning Que’s cutlass, which he borrowed from the mortal world, had no way to reach the Abbey Dean.

The cutlass had broken through three states beyond the Five States in succession. But how would it deal with the pureness?

The iron cutlass had slashed the Quietus, the Boundless, and the Divine Demon Realm. Ning Que was at the peak of his morale and spirit; the scary and endless Qi of Heaven and Earth inside him could burst out at anytime.

People liked to consider because they knew about things, and they felt annoyed when considering. That was how Eldest Brother was like now. He knew nothing about why the Abbey Dean could flow in the air, and why he looked even cleaner. Therefore, he considered no more, and all he had in mind was to chop this opponent of his.

Finally his cutlass cut down.

Trailed by the flare spreading for more than ten miles, the iron cutlass finally finished writing that character in the blue sky.

All things littered on the Vermilion Street were rolled up by the wind summoned by the cutlass, and were then thrown to the Abbey Dean.

There were silver ingots, gold bars, bird-and-flower paintings of the Calligraphy and Painting Shop, women’s cosmetic powder and hairpins, and old censers from the small Taoist temple.

There were iron pans and broken gongs, over-night tea from the teapot, urine from the chamber pot, left-over steamed buns, meat fillings with onion taste, and even human waste blown out of the drain.

No matter if they were ugly or beautiful, sweet or stinky, delightful or disgusting, they were just how the mortal world was like.

Ning Que’s cutlass hacked with the aura of the whole mortal world, including its disgusting side.

When things were mixed up, they often lost their own identity. People wouldn’t be able to tell they smelled sweet or stinky, or if it was a silver ingot or a chamber pot. They didn’t see any difference in human waste and gold bars.

In the wild wind, the Vermilion Street and the whole city of Chang’an became extremely dark and windy, then it grew even darker, as if the night were falling.

Continuous clanging came out of the street wrapped in darkness.

The Abbey Dean was floating in the air like an undefiled lotus, with red petals and white stalks.

Countless things from the mortal world attacked him.

Meat fillings with onion flavor fell on his face, then rolled down, leaving thick gravy and chopped onion on his beard.

A gold bar hit him heavily on the chest, his flesh hanging like flower petals twitched. A print was then left on his chest; it was the seal of the Tang Empire’s national treasury.

The chamber pot narrowly missed his right shoulder and spilled a disgusting yellowish urine. A box of powder dispersed on his face, painting his whole face white.

The Abbey Dean was soaked in blood and was covered with stains. Two pieces of rotten vegetable leaves were hanging on his belt, and there were stains of human waste beside the wound of his broken fingers.

He became extremely filthy.

He had never been this filthy in his life, not even before he reached the State of Pureness.

He spent his life traveling in the South Sea, yet there was no dirt on his shoes. However, now he had to face the ablution of the mortal world, and tried to overcome all the smells of the world.

But the filth from the mortal word stayed outside his heart, and outside his body.

He was still in the State of Pureness, which repelled all the harm that befell him.

He could keep his body and soul clean as long as he kept his Taoist Heart in peace.

However, his body and soul were so tightly connected that when his body was influenced by the human world for long, his heart and soul would no longer stay peaceful.

The scene was, of course, shocking because the legendary State of Pureness had appeared once more after countless years, or even after several Everlasting Nights.

Shockingly, soon after its reappearance, it encountered its most powerful opponent in the mortal world—the mortal world itself.

The lotus was shivering in the dim wind and it might wither or die at anytime soon.

The Abbey Dean continued resisting Ning Que.

The fight was between the ultimate state and the mortal world. Nobody knew how it would end.

Not even Haotian.

Jiang Rui, a swindler and a fraud, was the most notorious ruffian in Sanyuanli. But he was actually a real coward, even more cowardly than the most common ruffians, so even young kids looked down upon him.

He was homeless and lived everywhere on the streets. So, he hadn’t received the notice from the Imperial Court. He didn’t wake up until the bell in the city rang. Then he heard loud noises brought to him by the wind.

Jiang Rui had no idea that it was the fight between the Abbey Dean and the Academy. He didn’t even know what was happening in Chang’an City now. But when he found that the streets were empty and the government runners who were supposed to be patrolling the streets were all gone, his confusion was immediately replaced by bliss.

He stole embroidered cloth produced by the South Jin Kingdom. He even wanted to pick up several silver ingots when he found the door of the local government treasury had been broken, but he was so timid that he gave it up in the end.

Though being a ruffian, he was as prideful as any other Tang. So when he returned to the small yard of his and thought back to his timidity earlier, he felt ashamed.

To erase the shame, he made up his mind to do the thing he had thought about for long. He took a pointy knife out of his clothing and sneaked into the courtyard of the Villiage Head. He was going to kill the big yellow dog that had bitten him when he was a child.

That happened more than ten years ago and the big yellow dog was now too old and too weak to resist him. As he shoved his pointy knife in, the dog breathed its last.

Jiang Rui even doubted whether the old yellow dog had been killed by him or by its own old age.

But anyway, he had finished the task of his life. He carried the dog back to his small yard; he skinned and chopped it, preparing to light the stove and cook it.

At the same time, he heard someone talking on the street.

He couldn’t understand any of that conversation. Later he heard two young men crying, and he could tell one of them must be the poker-face guy of the Zhang’s.

Jiang Rui climbed the wall with both hands and glanced into the street. Soon he learned roughly about what was happening in Chang’an City, which terrified him so badly that he instantly hurried back to his small yard.

He went blank for a while, looking at the water to be boiled in the pot and the dog meat on the chopping board.

Then he thrust the knife on the board and poured the bloody dog meat into the pot.

He knocked down the old and shabby wall, picked up tens of bricks and held them in his arms. Later he climbed up the wall again, and took out one of the bricks, throwing it at the Taoist in black.

He thought he would be safe this way, and he had the mixed feelings of anger and pity for the dog, so he broke into curses at the Taoist.

“Take my brick and go to hell, you bastard!”

Then Jiang Rui died. Nobody knew that he had finished the biggest task of his life today. And nobody knew that the small yard had a half collapsed wall, with dog meat cooking in a pot.

The Abbey Dean’s Quietus hung over Chang’an City and extinguished the fire in the stove. The water in the pot stopped boiling but the dog meat remained soaking in it until the water became all bloody.

Ning Que pulled his Podao out of the snowy street, and at the same time, the pointy knife on the chopping board jumped up. Blood on the knife had yet to dry up, and a light steam was coming out of the pot.

A character came into being in the blue sky. Then the wind swept by the Vermilion Street and wrapped it in darkness. It was as if the night had come in advance, hanging over Chang’an City, including the small yard.

A dark wind came violently and from all directions. It broke the eaves beside the streets, and pulled down the remaining half wall in the small yard; even the dog meat in the pot was blown away.

The pot was swept away by the wind, flying over the wall and into the street. Finally, it fell onto a man.

It fell on the Abbey Dean.

The dog meat in a bloody soup was poured on the Abbey Dean’s head.

He was soaked in blood soup, from head to toe.

Dog meat fell on his wounded body.

If he was a lotus, the meat was hanging on his petals.

Blood dripped off the petals.

His body was stained, then his heart.

The Taoist Pureness was finally conquered by the mundanity of the mortal world.

Confusion emerged in the eyes of the Abbey Dean.

“I killed you.”

Said Ning Que.

His iron cutlass fell on the Abbey Dean’s left shoulder, on his flesh.

Although the Pureness had been conquered, the Abbey Dean was still nearly eternal because he had reached so high in the Divine Demon Realm.

So Ning Que cut with full strength.

He bent his left knee slightly. The Great Spirit was howling, and endless Qi of Heaven and Earth flowed into his cutlass. He wielded it down, leaving a scary wound on the Abbey Dean’s body.

The clean and peaceful lotus was rolled up by the dark wind, then withered, its petals falling down.

Ning Que’s attack contained the vicissitudes of Chang’an City endured over a thousand years, and the expectations of all its residents.

The Abbey Dean was cut and fell, floating to the south of the long street.

Blood spilled all the way.

Hundreds of “Yi” Talismans in the streets and alleys of Chang’an fell on his body again.

Thousands of cutlasses in Chang’an City chopped him.

In the darkness and amidst the cutlasses.

Seven of the Abbey Dean’s fingers were cut off like lotus roots.

Then his legs were separated from his body.

His abdomen was torn open. His internal organs were deeply damaged.

Dog blood and human waste polluted the depths of his body. The pollution was irreversible.

The southern gate rumbled and a human shaped hole appeared on the gate.

The Abbey Dean was thrown out of Chang’an City.

He had been planning to leave since Ning Que pulled out the cutlass, but not in this way.

The black wind lifted the Abbey Dean’s body and made him dance wildly.

Those big rocks by the lake outside the southern gate were chaotically rolling in the wind.

Even the broken Stone Array Tactics couldn’t halt Ning Que’s cutlass wind for a moment.

Four miles away to the south of the city, there was a lake.

When the savage wind swept by, the lake water was brought up to later fall like rain.

The Abbey Dean fell heavily on the lakeshore.

The clean lake water then fell on him, washing away some of the filth on him.

Several fishes fell on his side, jumping and struggling.

The wind waved out by Ning Que’s cutlass kept heading south.

The lake gradually grew peaceful and sunny again.

The Abbey Dean was staring at the blue sky. His lips were moving as if he wanted to say something, yet no a word came out.

He turned around and saw the fishes struggling in the water.

They struggled for a moment, then they accepted their fate and soon died.

He stared and learned something from it.

There were footsteps on the lakeshore.

Chen Pipi knelt down before the Abbey Dean.