Shizun - 001 - Reflections of 10,000 years

Mo Changkong, originally an evil sword spirit, was taken in as the first disciple of the immortal of Wujian peak, taught for millennia, but he acted as if he was a wild animal, humiliated his peak, used evil methods, and behaved immorally.

After the incidents, he betrayed his sect, named himself the king of ten thousand demons, unleashed violence, murdered people like weeds, then triggered a volcano’s inferno, butchered 9 cities, hurt tens of thousands of lives, and did not repent.

KILL HIM!

KILL HIM!

KILL HIM!

The sinful demon could not escape divine wrath; three realms came together to vanquish him. At the battle of Jueling, corpses covered the fields and the blood ran like rivers. The god in charge of his punishment ran several demonic chains through Mo Changkong’s scapula and ribs, then used eight giant dragons to drag him into purgatory, so this untameable evil sword could be securely pinned onto Demon Slaying Cliff.

Demon Slaying Cliff is the place where capital punishment is doled out upon great demons.

The sword bones are snapped with divine lighting, the soul is destroyed, the prisoner is placed into purgatory, with ten thousand years of punishment, then the demonic body is stripped away, the cultivation is stripped, and they are cast into the cycle of reincarnation to be punished eternally in the moral realm.

Purgatory is filled with the bloody scent of despair.

Mo Changkong was covered with wounds, but he still tugged at the chains in his body, and laughed arrogantly without even a hint of repentance. He was a bad seed, a hopeless evil, wasn’t this the natural ending for someone who did the crimes that everyone thought he would do?

Murderous, blood thirsty, cruel, without an ounce of pity....

There was no mistake in the sentence the gods doled out.

The only mistake was, the heavens should have snuffed out this bastard when he was born, so that he would have never had the chance to go against the natural order, to go against morality, to madly force the feelings he could never have, to bitterly entangle the person he shouldn’t have been entangled with, to bind himself with his own threads, to sink ever deeper, and become the epitome of comedy.

Now, it didn’t matter if his soul was scattered and he suffered in his future incarnations.

He simply did not care at all.

... ...

Dark clouds gathered, carrying with them the lighting of tribulation slithering about like snakes. For some reason, the planned punishment had been delayed, almost as if it was waiting for something.

Mo Changkong suddenly remembered, before capital punishment, family and teachers were permitted to say their farewells to criminals...

But, would he come?

Mo Changkong stopped struggling without realizing. He opened his red eyes, strained at the distance, but could not gleam anything from the darkness other than the death-like silence.

He shouldn’t hope.

Mo Changkong remembered him with a little bitterness in his heart. When he first cultivated sentience as a sword, he did not understand the world and fought to survive like a violent beast. It was that man with the perpetually half worn out clothes who picked up this heartless man, beat him to hell and back, then nursed him back to health and turned him from a beast to a man.

He had smiled while holding the brush and said, “My name is Lu Yunzhen, from now on I’m your Shizun.”

Mo Changkong had struggled out of the tub, splashed water into his face, and simply responded with, “pah!”

In the beginning things had been thoroughly unpleasant. He was forced to bathe, forced to brush his hair, forced to wash his hands, forced to wear clothes, forced to sit with good posture, eat with good manners, not to grab at meat with his hands, not to pick fights, even speaking vulgarities would lead to his palms being struck by a ruler. He even had to learn to read, and if he didn’t understand he’d simply have to learn one hundred times. Mo Changkong had spent every single day trying to figure out how to murder his teacher, and had used his chicken scratch writing to jot down his plans in a little notebook, even including how to gobble his Shizun up.

He really could not win back then.

Shizun had cultivated with the sword path and ascended, there was no better swordman than him in all the realms. Every time he had tried to instigate a sneak attack or run away, Shizun never got frustrated and had simply brought him home with a smile and called him a good boy.

“Changkong finally stopped sneaking around, so obedient.”

“Changkong finally learned not to curse at girls.”

“Changkong can finally read wanted notices and know they’re not looking for you, what good progress.”

“I have the best disciple in the world.”

“...”

Shizun definitely had problems with his eyes! How could he possibly say something this shameless!

Mo Chankong ran away many times, was captured many times, and finally got used to things.

Shizun’s sword forms were harsh, but his face was very pretty, without the sternness of immortals. He liked to smile, and his smile was beautiful. His soft eyes were like plum blossoms in March, the ends of his eyes down turning like a crescent moon. He even had two small dimples, and easily gathered the adoration of those around him.

Mo Changkong liked Shizun’s smile, but he didn’t like it when Shizun smiled at others. Every time he saw it, he had to stir up some kind of trouble so that Shizun would only pay attention to him again.

But, Shizun was frank and generous, loved to help others, enjoyed other’s companies, loved drinking, and was great at cooking. He had friends all over the world from the gods above to mortal beggars. Everyone adored the Yunzhen Immortal, Wujian Peak was always lively with guests, not to mention the two subsequent troublesome disciples.... what an eyesore.

After Mo Changkong grew up, his temperament got worse and worse, but he did not understand why he became that way...

Finally, he realized that he had coveted his Shizun. He could not voice this feeling that the world would disapprove of, and was tormented every day by jealousy, desire, and rage. The dark thoughts grew deeper and deeper into his heart, and he became a beast who sought immorality.

Everyone slowly noticed his thoughts and tried to warn Shizun that Mo Changkong was a wolf cub that could not be controlled.

Shizun never believed them, and said that he was good by nature and deserving of his ongoing trust.

But the results had shown, Shizun had misjudged him.

He was an ungrateful beast, who had used his Shizun’s kindless and love, and plotted for the sword immortal to fall into the abyss of desire. To lie on him, again and agin, until the truth was revealed.

Shizun was shocked into silence, and hurried away.

Ha, a bad seed is always a bad seed.

He had been beyond remedy for a long, long time...

... ...

The chains had halted the flow of demonic energy within him, and the violent pains had disoriented Mo Changkong and made him think of the past.

The god in charge of his punishment had looked at him darkly and said, “You will definitely regret this.”, then left.

Mo Changkong thought the entire thing was laughable. He had spent his life being unrestrained and didn’t even know the concept of regret. If he had the gall to commit heinous crimes then he dared to see through the consequences. It was only ten thousand years of imprisonment and suffering in his reincarnations, that was barely anything.

Shizun’s body was wonderful.

It was worth it.

The Yanluo Palace had always been close with Shizun and insisted on making him reincarnate as an animal.

He had praised the decision.

To make a beast into a beast again, there was nothing more fitting.

Mo Changkong chuckled, but then noticed a small lantern appearing in the darkness, like hazy starlight. Slowly he heard heavy, clumsy footsteps which slowly became more stable as it approached.

As the footsteps got closer, every step tugged at his heart.

Mo Changkong felt like his body was frozen. Forgetting about the pain, he unconsciously tugged at the chains in the cliff. Unfortunately his hands were nailed down and would never come out even if he tugged them bloody, and he could not hid his state. Shizun was clean and disliked mess. He was covered in blood and grime right now, he was too dirty. He had to clean himself up, otherwise he would be nagged at and dragged into a bath.

The lantern drew nearer.

It was a normal oil lantern and could only light about three feet. His Shizun’s pallid visage was just barely reflected.

Shizun had lost weight, had dwindled.

The scandal of being defiled by his disciple had already spread across the heavens. Even if he had a lot of sympathy, with all this weighing on him he must not have been eating and resting well, right?

Mo Changkong stopped struggling, stared for a moment, considered things, then smirked again and wolf-whistled at Shizun. “My good Shizun, how did you remember to come to see me? Is it that you simply couldn’t forget how well I had played with you in bed? Did you want to go for another round before our farewells?”

Lu Yunzhen was silent for a while, then quietly said, “That’s not what you truly mean in your heart, don’t say things that invite misunderstandings.”

His eyes were bright and free of resentment.

Mo Changkong slowly turned his head away to avoid his gaze and sneered, “What else could I possibly have meant?”

Lu Yunzhen slowly approached and took out a clean handkerchief. He wiped at the blood stains on Mo Changkong’s face, brushed his hair out of his eyes, and revealed the black tattoo on the left half of his face.

This was a pattern of the ancient gods, almost as if there were two long black snakes resting on his face. They meant “evil” and “sin”, and would stay with his soul in eternal reincarnation.

Mo Changkong was disquieted by the gaze and wanted to snark, but even as the words reached the tip of his tongue he simply could not bring himself to speak.

“This may be the last time we see each other,” Lu Yunzhen said sincerely, “What is it that you truly want to say to me?”

Right, this is the last time...

Mo Changkong lowered his head. His heart was filled with love and hate, a thousand phrases and ten thousand words, but in the end he could only hoarsely gather together one sentence. “Shizun... take care...”

Lu Yunzhen finally laughed. He wanted to pat the head of the man in front of him, but as he lifted his hand he realized Changkong was no longer the child of the past. He was too tall now, and they’d had too much happen between the two of them; many of their old habits had simply passed them by.

He withdrew his hands bashfully, “This teacher pleaded for you.... Your sword bone will no longer be removed and after your imprisonment you won’t be forced to reincarnate either...” Mo Changkong was shocked. The heavens were ruthless. How could they possibly accept pleading and lightening such a heavy sentence? He suddenly had an awful premonition.

Lu Yunzhen grew paler and coughed twice softly. He quickly covered his mouth, pretended he was lowering his lantern, and looked away.

The scent of blood was simply too strong in that place and had numbed Mo Changkong’s sense of smell. And the darkness had obscured his vision. It took him til now to notice the scent of blood on Lu Yunzhen.

Mo Changkong realized that something was wrong, he used all his strength, forcibly ripped his hands from the nails which held them, and lunged at Lu Yunzhen without caring how much his bones and tendons were smashed.

This wasn’t much of an attack.

But the unparalleled sword immortal had lost the ability to dodge, and could only take half a step back with difficulty as Mo Changkong easily snatched him into an embrace.

Lu Yunzhen had never expected him to escape the bone nails and tried to push him away in a panic, but he didn’t have any strength.

The little paper lantern fell to the ground and quickly caught on fire, shedding more light on the surroundings.

Lu Yunzhen scolded, “Let go of me.”

Mo Changkong reached down with a dark expression, and discovered the blood seeping through the black robes of the man in his arms. Some of the blood had already started to dry, but more kept flowing out.

This injury......

Mo Changkong exclaimed with shock, “Shizun! Where is your sword bone?”

When sword immortals ascended, they would gain a piece of extremely hard sword bone. It was their base of cultivation. When the sword bone breaks, the owner would range from losing all cultivation to losing their life.

Lu Yunzhen’s sword bone wasn’t broken, it had been gouged out of his body. The only person who could have done such a thing was Lu Yunzhen himself.

Mo Changkong couldn’t believe what he was seeing, “This is your pleading?”

The punishment to break his sword bone had been lifted, because Shizun had undertaken it for him. The punishment for reincarnation was.....

“Your crimes are partially on me. “ Lu Yunzhen knew that he could hide things no longer and didn’t argue. He simply put his palms over Mo Changkong’s heart. In the center of his palms was a hidden blood spell, which glowed with a golden light as it guided the invisible trail of karma into his own body. He said heavily, “Many things turned out like this because I didn’t teach you properly. And I should carry part of the burden for letting you onto the crooked path.”

If the disciple made a mistake, there must be punishment.

Ten thousand years of punishment was painful, but at least there was an end to it. But eternal reincarnation had no future.

He didn’t come here to bid his farewells, but to give Mo Changkong a chance to live and redeem himself. His pleading wasn’t to reduce the sentence, but to accept the crimes, to take on the sins of immorality into his own body, to carve out his sword bone, to take on the punishment of reincarnation.

Mo Changkong almost went mad. “I’m a bad seed who did endless evil deeds! I’m never going to repent! I don’t need you to save me!”

“Changkong, your nature.... isn’t that bad.” Lu Yunzhen’s voice grew softer and softer, his breath became lighter and lighter. “It’s this teacher who made too many mistakes... and led you to this day...”

“Shizun, don’t you hate me...”

“No...”

“Shizun, I...“

All his life, he was selfish and rebellious and never knew regret. Now, he felt the pain of regret pierce his heart, but it was too late. Thinking back, he had never said a single word of the truth in his heart. Even in bed he was terrified of rejection, and would rather play things off frivolously and hurt him rather than reveal his true feelings.

“Shizun, I love you...” “Since I was young you were in my heart...”

The flame on the ground went out and everything was plunged back into darkness.

Mo Changkong held the man in his embrace rightly, and carefully cut open his own heart. “I know my love is a crime that the world won’t accept, I was too terrified to let you know, but...”

He stopped speaking.

The man in his arms had stopped breathing long ago.

The body was cooling.

It was too late....

He didn’t say what he should have said, and now it was all too late.

The lightning of tribulation finally fell, and continuously tortured his soul with the worst pain the world had to offer. Mo Changkong held the icy corpse in his arms and did not make a sound.

He held it too closely, almost burying it inside himself.

No one could take Shizun away from him.

...

One could not feel the flow of time in purgatory.

After millennia, the corpse turned into a skeleton, the skeleton turned into dust, and then finally disappeared into his palms, no matter how hard he tried to keep them...

“Shizun, I was wrong.”

“Shizun, I’ll listen to your teachings from now on.”

“Shizun, I won’t do bad things anymore.”

“Shizun...” The tall man on the demon slaying platform finally lowered his head.

If there was another chance, if he could meet that man again.

He wouldn’t ask for it.

He would never ask for it again.