The Strange Daoist’s expression remained, as always, indifferent.

He looked at Mr. Zhuang, looking at this junior brother he hadn’t seen for several hundred years. His pitch-black pupils revealed a trace of vigilance and solemnity, but then, again, a look of stunned surprise.

Here, there was nothing.

No layout, no killing intent.

And this junior brother of his, his oil exhausted and lamp dry, was completely different from the unbridled, arrogant, and untamed heaven-bestowed talent he remembered.

A wave of anger inexplicably surged in the Strange Daoist’s heart. His voice also carried a chilling coldness:

“Your Heaven’s Mechanism Derivation Calculation, eh?”

“Your Immortal Heaven Array Flow, eh?”

“Your entire body of cultivation, ability, means, and schemes, eh?”

Mr. Zhuang smiled bitterly, “Exhausted path, end of the road. Reversing heaven is powerless, why bother wasting those efforts, eh…”

A fierce look surged in the Strange Daoist’s eyes.

“So, you’re just waiting to die here?”

Mr. Zhuang was silent, and then lightly sighed, “Everyone is born, and everyone dies…”

“At birth, one thinks man can conquer heaven. At death, one finally knows reversing heaven is powerless…”

“I am the same, senior brother…”

The Strange Daoist’s pitch-black pupils revealed anger at his lack of striving and hatred for his inaction. “Even if you die, you can die later. Your Heaven’s Mechanism Derivation Calculation, it’s impossible not to calculate a trace of vitality…”

“Calculate it out, and what then, eh?” Mr. Zhuang countered.

The Strange Daoist was startled.

Mr. Zhuang smiled, his tone revealing deep fatigue, his breath also weak to the extreme. “It’s just dying early or dying late, that’s all…”

“The Great Dao fifty, Heaven Derivation forty-nine…”

“I am the forty-ninth generation sect master, the absolute number of the Heaven’s Path. The sect ends here, and my fate also ends here.”

“No matter how I calculate, the result is the same.”

“Heaven’s Mechanism Derivation, inevitable number, cannot change…”

The Strange Daoist’s expression became more and more severe. After a moment, all emotions calmed again. His expression became cold and indifferent once more.

The Strange Daoist said faintly:

“Good, then I will fulfill you.”

The Strange Daoist’s pale right hand grasped, and from thin air appeared an ancient, simple long sword. The sword body was ancient bronze, engraved with mottled, obscure, and interchanging patterns that seemed both real and not.

“Mustard Seed Sword…”

Mr. Zhuang murmured, a nostalgic expression appearing on his face, also with the calmness of facing death.

Just at this time, the nearby array patterns trembled, the barrier broke open, and Bai Qingcheng, who had sacrificed the Brocade Mountains and Rivers Umbrella, appeared.

She saw Mr. Zhuang, his face as white as paper, his hands tied, waiting to be slaughtered.

She also saw the Strange Daoist, his face full of killing intent, holding a long sword in his hand.

Bai Qingcheng’s heart trembled. “Senior Brother!”

The tip of the Strange Daoist’s sword stopped in front of Mr. Zhuang’s body. He turned back and looked at Bai Qingcheng, his expression cold and strange, and said indifferently:

“Master died, the sect perished.”

“I am not your senior brother, you are no longer junior sister…”

Bai Qingcheng’s heart was bitter. “Still please senior brother, spare his life…”

The Strange Daoist’s cold expression gradually faded. On his strange face, a trace of a mocking smile appeared.

This trace of a smile was extremely strange, as if it was pieced together from the faces of many different people.

The Strange Daoist’s voice also became noisy.

It was as if many people were cold-laughing together, speaking together.

“Spare his life…”

“Things have come to this point, what’s the use of talking about sparing his life?”

The Strange Daoist looked at Bai Qingcheng and said indifferently:

“If I don’t kill him, how can I take the Return to Ruins Map?”

“If the Return to Ruins Map isn’t taken out, how can your Bai family seize this map? If this map isn’t seized, how can you find the Heaven Burial place?”

“Before you came, did the old folks of the Bai family ask you to ‘stand by and watch’?”

“They don’t want you to interfere, they are happy to see it happen.”

“They also want me to kill this junior brother of mine!”

“What about you, eh?”

“You keep saying to spare his life, but in your heart, eh?”

“How could you not be calculating him?”

“You want to scheme for the inheritance of his Innate Array Flow, you want to steal the secret of Return to Ruins Heaven Burial, to establish merit for the Bai family, to pave the immortal path for your pair of Heavenly Spirit Root children.”

“You call him senior brother, but in your heart, when did you ever consider him a senior brother?”

Bai Qingcheng’s face was pale. She wanted to say “No, it’s not like this…”, but the words reached her mouth and she felt unable to speak them. A deep guilt also arose in her heart.

The Strange Daoist looked at Mr. Zhuang again, his gaze complex, and said faintly:

“I chased and killed you for several hundred years…”

“This junior sister of yours, you regard her as a close sister, but she has also been calculating you for a lifetime…”

“Before, you accepted many disciples, without one who wasn’t a heaven’s proud son, but in the end, they all betrayed and left, not one willing to stay by your side…”

“Dao Court wants to kill you, strip your Dao Bone.”

“Demon Sect wants to kill you, seize your Dao Chart.”

“And that Master you always respected…”

A trace of a cold smile floated on the Strange Daoist’s face.

“How was your Qi Sea broken?”

“And how was your Knowledge Sea depleted?”

“Who could have set up the sky-covering scheme to calculate you, eh?”

“It’s… Master…”

Bai Qingcheng’s pupils shook violently. Her face revealed a look of disbelief. This matter, she had never heard of before.

The Strange Daoist’s gaze was fierce. He looked at Mr. Zhuang and continued:

“It was Master using you! From the beginning, from accepting you into the sect, it was all his schemes.”

“Master… upheld the sect’s legacy teachings. From the beginning, he was searching for a person with a heaven-born Dao Bone!”

“He searched for a lifetime and finally found you.”

“Do you know why?”

Mr. Zhuang’s expression was indifferent.

The Strange Daoist cold-laughed, and said to himself: “Because a heaven-born Dao Bone is the key…”

“The secret of Return to Ruins Heaven Burial is hidden in a drop of ‘Heavenly Person’s Blood’ passed down from ancient times tens of thousands of years ago.”

“This drop of blood is indestructible through ten thousand tribulations, it cannot be erased.”

“Therefore, it must contain the opportunity for immortality.”

“For tens of thousands of years, no one could penetrate the mystery of this drop of blood.”

“But, Master, he figured it out…”

The Strange Daoist’s expression was solemn, his gaze trembled slightly.

“This drop of Heavenly Person’s Blood, indestructible and eternal, with hidden mystery internally, cannot be comprehended. Then it can only be fused into a human’s bloodline, hatched out…”

“And the qualified person to fuse this drop of Heavenly Person’s Blood is a person with supreme natural talent, a heaven-born Dao Bone…”

The Strange Daoist looked at Mr. Zhuang and slowly said: “That’s you, junior brother…”

“Master, from the beginning, did not treat you as a disciple, or even as a ‘person’…”

“In his eyes, you were just a chess piece of Heaven’s Mechanism Derivation, a tool, an embryo for nurturing Heavenly Person’s Blood and discerning Return to Ruins Heaven Burial…”

“Do you know how this ancestral blood is nurtured?”

“Yes, you know…”

Mockery appeared in the Strange Daoist’s eyes. “Even if you didn’t know before, you should know now…”

“Master imparted all the sect’s inheritance to you, making you an unparalleled cultivation genius. He waited until your cultivation was accomplished, then schemed to kill you!”

“First, he shattered your Qi Sea, letting your cultivation leak out;”

“Then, he shattered your Knowledge Sea, causing your divine sense to be greatly damaged;”

“Ordinary people, whether their Qi Sea or Knowledge Sea is shattered, will mostly die and their dao will vanish. But you will not, because you have a heaven-born Dao Bone and bear Heavenly Person’s Blood.”

“When both your Qi Sea and Knowledge Sea were shattered, the heaven-born Dao Bone then became your Knowledge Sea and Qi Sea, supporting your vitality.”

“This is ‘pulling up seedlings to help them grow’…”

“Letting the heaven-born Dao Bone lose the support of Qi Sea and Knowledge Sea, it quickly absorbs Heavenly Person’s Blood, overgrows, thereby accelerating the fusion of Dao Bone and Heavenly Blood.”

“Once the fusion is complete, the Heavenly Person’s Blood will be refined.”

“And on your Dao Bone, the secret hidden in Heavenly Person’s Blood will manifest! That is, that one, Return to Ruins Heaven Burial Map!”

“At this time, kill you again…”

“Strip your Dao Bone…”

“Then you can obtain this complete Return to Ruins Heaven Burial Map, containing ancient opportunity!”

Bai Qingcheng’s face became paler and paler.

She never thought that the always amiable Master’s schemes were actually so deep, so… ruthless…

Master adopted senior brother and treated him like a son.

But he harbored a scheme of “even a tiger will not eat its cubs”.

And in her eyes, the senior brother Zhuang, who had supreme natural talent and was unparalleled in the world, was actually just a “tool” used by Master…

The Strange Daoist looked at Mr. Zhuang, his tone a little sorrowful, and with some mockery:

“You are proficient in Heaven’s Mechanism Derivation. In this lifetime, no one can outcalculate you, but from beginning to end, from birth to death, there hasn’t been a moment when you haven’t been calculated by others…”

“Those people, they revere you, they fear you, but no one cares about you.”

“Whether it’s Dao Court or Demon Sect, everyone, they only want you dead!”

“They only want to kill you, dissect your heart, dismantle your Dao Bone, to see what opportunity is hidden on your body!”

Mr. Zhuang’s face was a little desolate, but more so, it was calm.

“Yes ah…”

He looked at the Strange Daoist again, seemingly wanting to see the shadow of the former gentle and elegant senior brother, who smiled genialy, from that sinister face.

But, he couldn’t see it…

He had already gradually forgotten what his senior brother once looked like.

Mr. Zhuang was a little regretful and sighed slightly.

The Strange Daoist looked at Mr. Zhuang, his gaze surging with indescribable anger and disappointment!

After saying so much, he was still an appearance of desirelessness, understanding life and death.

The ferocious human faces on the Strange Daoist’s face were presented in a jumbled manner, finally merging into one again, dissipating without a trace. His gaze became ruthless and indifferent.

The Strange Daoist raised the Mustard Seed Sword and pointed it at Mr. Zhuang.

“Senior Brother, stop!”

Bai Qingcheng was greatly shocked and hastily shouted.

She wanted to step forward, but was confined by the Strange Daoist’s backhand with Strange Dao array patterns.

Bai Qingcheng’s gaze froze. She sacrificed the Brocade Mountains and Rivers Umbrella. Between turns, brocade light flowed, but these lights were dissolved one by one by the strange array patterns.

Without using Feather Transformation Power, she simply couldn’t break free.

Bai Qingcheng’s heart was bitter.

Whether it was cultivation, divine sense, array, or even divine consciousness calculation, she was not a match for this former senior brother, now the Strange Daoist.

She could only watch with wide eyes.

Watching the Strange Daoist’s Mustard Seed Sword stab into senior brother Zhuang’s chest, then dissect open the heart veins, and take out a section of crystalline, jade-like “heaven-born Dao Bone” condensed under the heart, which maintained the depleted Knowledge Sea and shattered Qi Sea…

Not a drop of blood flowed out.

Because all the blood was exterminated by the Mustard Seed Sword qi.

On the Dao Bone, it was crystalline and translucent.

It seemed to have extremely complex, vast, ancient, and profound patterns, naturally formed, fused with blood and bone, engraved on this “heaven-born Dao Bone”.

This map was shaped like an array diagram.

Exactly that Return to Ruins Heaven Burial Map, which all cultivators and great powers dreamt of!

The instant the heaven-born Dao Bone was stripped, Mr. Zhuang’s vitality gradually tended to depletion.

His face became even paler, the light in his eyes also gradually dimmed, his whole person’s breath also gradually became ethereal, nearly nothing…

Bai Qingcheng’s heart ached.

The Strange Daoist also looked at Mr. Zhuang, lost in thought.

He knew this scene would happen sooner or later.

But he still didn’t seem to think this scene would actually happen…

He himself had killed his junior brother…

Mr. Zhuang’s breath was already very faint, but he still had a breath left, seemingly still concerned about something.

Heavenly Person’s Blood, heaven-born Dao Bone, Return to Ruins Heaven Burial, these, he didn’t care about too much…

“Senior brother…”

Mr. Zhuang murmured softly, “In consideration of fellow disciples, don’t make things difficult… those few little disciples of mine…”

The Strange Daoist’s expression was dazed, then cold and indifferent again, just about to speak mockingly.

Just at this time, several golden shackles suddenly appeared in the air.

These shackles had majestic, rough Great Dao array patterns manifested on them. As soon as they appeared, they formed a cage, seemingly wanting to firmly lock the Strange Daoist.

The Strange Daoist sneered, “Fancying to reap the benefits, old thing!”

His gaze froze. He directly swallowed the heaven-born Dao Bone into his abdomen. Then his whole body was densely covered with black-gray array patterns. These array patterns swallowed and dissolved his flesh one by one, from outside to inside…

And the Strange Daoist’s figure also gradually faded, gradually dissipating…

In the void, an aged and majestic voice rang out:

“Heaven’s Mechanism Strange Escape… trying to run?”

The golden light in the air was more abundant, shackles layered.

But it seemed, fundamentally, they couldn’t stop the Strange Daoist’s escape method.

His body annihilated little by little, disappearing without a trace. Only when leaving, he looked at Mr. Zhuang one last time.

This gaze was extremely complex, and contained some pain. In the end, only determination remained.

Afterward, the Strange Daoist disappeared.

A cold hum rang out in the air, and subsequently the golden light dissipated, also disappearing without a trace. It seemed some unknown strong one followed the strange calculation’s clue and chased after the Strange Daoist…

In the Hidden Array Pavilion, only Mr. Zhuang remained.

Having lost the Return to Ruins Heaven Burial Map, Mr. Zhuang, on the verge of death, was no longer cared for by anyone…

No one cared about his life or death.

Bai Qingcheng walked forward and helped Mr. Zhuang up. She felt Mr. Zhuang’s body was lighter than willow catkins, thinner than paper. Her heart involuntarily trembled.

“Senior brother…”

Mr. Zhuang slowly opened his eyes, looked at Bai Qingcheng, his gaze gentle, smiling faintly, but did not speak.

It seemed he didn’t even have enough strength to speak again.

Bai Qingcheng’s expression was nervous. “Senior brother, you cannot die!”

After a long while, Mr. Zhuang then opened his mouth. His voice was very light, very tired:

“I have calculated for a lifetime, I am very tired. I want to sleep for a while…”

Bai Qingcheng’s heart ached. “Senior brother, you cannot die! In this world, aren’t there things you want to do, people you want to see, eh?”

Mr. Zhuang hesitated for a while, then still shook his head and murmured: “Gone, in this world, there are no people I want to see anymore…”

Mr. Zhuang finished speaking, then slowly closed his eyes. No matter how Bai Qingcheng called out, there was no reaction at all.

The little blood color that remained on his face also disappeared completely.

The faint vitality also gradually dried up, like spring water seeping into the desert…

Bai Qingcheng looked at Mr. Zhuang’s expression, her face blank.

She never thought she would see this scene.

See her own senior brother die in front of her.

That was senior brother Zhuang…

That kind of supreme natural talent, that kind of outstanding talent, that kind of unbridled.

No matter what happened, he always calculated without omission. No matter what mistake she made, he would tolerate it. No matter what she wanted, he would find a way for her.

Senior brother was right.

She was also calculating senior brother.

But…

She always thought, no matter how she calculated, senior brother was still that senior brother, that senior brother proficient in Heaven’s Mechanism Derivation, confident in everything.

Not like now, with no blood on his face, all vitality gone…

“Senior brother… is going to die?”

A huge panic spread throughout her body.

Bai Qingcheng’s whole body trembled.

People must die.

But she had lived for several hundred years, never realizing, and never thinking, that there would really be a day when the senior brother who treated her like a close sister, always tolerated her, took care of her, would… die?

She only felt a suffocation in her chest, her heart twisted like a knife.

Two streams of tears flowed silently.

Bai Qingcheng wiped her cheeks, looked at the tear drops on her fingertips, and murmured: “Originally, I still shed tears…”

Die…

Bai Qingcheng suddenly shuddered.

“No, he cannot die!”

“Senior brother… he cannot die!”

Master died…

Senior brother entered the demonic path…

If senior brother also died, in this world, those who once cherished her would all be gone…

“Senior brother cannot die!”

“But… how can I save him, with what can I save him?!”

Qi Sea shattered, Knowledge Sea depleted, Dao Bone stripped, vitality dissipated… under this situation, any pill is useless…

Bai Qingcheng’s heart was suffocated. She involuntarily clutched her chest, enduring the pain, her thoughts urgently turning.

After a moment, a thought flashed in her mind, and she suddenly said:

“Si Tu True Person… Qian Kun Clear Light Lamp…”