My Shijie Seems Intent on Destroying the World – Chapter 25
by Little PandaQuestioning the Heart
She Only Wants to Eat Well, Sleep Well, and Be Happy One Day at a Time.
With the new clothes ordered, Ah Yun drove the carriage through the bustling streets and found an inn for them to stay at.
Qi Zhi, still thinking of the liveliness outside, pushed open the window the moment she stepped into the room.
A puff of soft snow slid off the windowsill, brushing past her hand with a trace of early spring’s lingering chill.
Qi Zhi shivered and drew her hand back. Hugging her scented hand warmer, she lifted her eyes to the street below.
Across the way was a small courtyard where two little girls with pigtails were hard at work building an enormous snowman.
Their padded floral jackets made them look round and clumsy. Cheeks flushed red with cold, breath puffing out in little white clouds, they stood on tiptoe trying to set a freshly rolled snowball onto the snowman for its head.
Then someone’s hand slipped. Before the head could be seated, it gave a soft “plop,” tipped sideways, tumbled off, and smashed shapeless on the ground.
The two girls froze, staring at each other.
After a brief silence, one of them scooped up a handful of snow and hurled it at the other. With a shriek, the two broke into a giggling snowball fight around their half-finished snowman.
The children’s laughter melted into the hum of the street. Vendors hawked their New Year wares; some people hurried past, others strolled and chatted at leisure.
At the far end of the long street, a deafening crash of gongs and drums suddenly erupted, drowning out every other sound without the slightest courtesy.
A lion dance troupe came weaving down the street, performing with all its might, trailed by a crowd of followers and onlookers.
People at the roadside pressed aside to clear a path, necks tucked, hands in sleeves, watching the majestic lions with smiles on their faces, chattering to one another about the spectacle.
The snowball fighters stopped too, squeezing into the crowd, tilting their flushed little faces up to applaud the dancing lions.
The lions danced the length of the long street, gathering more and more followers along the way.
Qi Zhi had never seen such liveliness. She stared, entranced, until the sound faded into the distance and the street fell briefly quiet — only then did she slowly come back to herself.
How lively it all was—
She had spent five hundred years on Mount Qiongju, and never once had she seen anything like it.
Truth be told, she wanted to have a snowball fight too. But no one would play with her.
Truth be told, she wanted to chase after that boisterous lion dance troupe too. But she didn’t quite dare.
Qi Zhi sat by the window, lost in a daze for a good long while. At last, hugging her hand warmer, she went downstairs, glanced around, and found Ah Yun in a corner, cracking melon seeds and sipping tea, gazing idly out the window. Brimming with curiosity, she asked, “What was that just now?”
Ah Yun: “The noisy thing?”
Qi Zhi: “Mm!”
Ah Yun: “That was a lion dance troupe.”
Qi Zhi: “So many people followed it! Is it some kind of ritual?”
Ah Yun shook her head. “Just a performance.”
A hint of bewilderment flickered in Qi Zhi’s eyes. She sat down beside Ah Yun and grabbed a handful of melon seeds from the plate. “Such a big production for that?”
“It’s a show for people to watch — for the fun of it,” Ah Yun said breezily. “It’s not really that big a production, is it?”
She said Xiaoshan County was small and its population sparse. Today looked so lively only because everyone was celebrating the New Year.
The mortal New Year was a boisterous affair almost everywhere, she said — in some places there were even temple fairs to wander once night fell.
“Temple fair?” Qi Zhi didn’t understand.
“That’s right! Temple fairs have loads of tasty things and fun things, and all kinds of performances! Fire-breathers, sword-swingers, dragon lantern dances, poetry games and riddle-guessing… And once the night grows late, the city tower puts on fireworks.”
“What are fireworks?”
“They’re those bursts of fire that fly up into the sky and explode.” Ah Yun paused, then added, “Honestly, they’re nothing special. Not half as bright as a casual wisp of my spiritual power.”
Qi Zhi ignored the second half of that. Her eyes brimmed with longing. “Will there be any here?”
Ah Yun: “I asked around. Nope, none here.”
Qi Zhi: “…”
Seeing her disappointment, Ah Yun hurried to console her. “Don’t worry — stick with Qingshi, and you’ll see everything!”
Qi Zhi pressed her lips together and nodded, unconsciously hugging the hand warmer a little tighter.
That night, when all fell quiet, candlelight glowed in the inn’s back kitchen. Pot after pot of dumplings1 was boiled, and a portion went to every guest staying the night.
Qi Zhi curled up in her room and ate until she was stuffed.
Afterward she rested a while, called for a basin of hot water, and took a bath.
By the time her hair was dry, she burrowed comfortably into the covers, closed her eyes, and slept soundly.
Though there was nothing special about this little county, they would still be staying two more days — they couldn’t pack up and continue on their way until the tailor shop delivered the finished new clothes to the inn.
With nothing to do during the day, Qi Zhi couldn’t find Ah Yun at the inn, and didn’t dare disturb Mu Qingshi, so she wandered the streets alone.
Passing a teahouse, she happened to hear a storyteller inside, and couldn’t resist ordering a pot of tea and taking a seat in the corner.
Come to think of it, less than a month had passed since Tiandao Sect’s annihilation and the Daoist Venerable’s fall, yet the tale had already spread until everyone under heaven knew it.
Perhaps because so many wanted to hear it, today’s storyteller was telling precisely the story of the former Tiandao Sect.
“Legend has it that long, long ago, Tiandao Sect was not called Tiandao Sect at all — it was the Wendao Sect!”
“In those days the Heavenly Gate had not yet been severed, and the Heavenly Realm’s spiritual spring still nourished the mortal world. Mortal and demon alike, if they cultivated to the Heavenly Tribulation Realm and endured the Heavenly Lightning Tribulation, could ascend as gods!”
“Alas, the Demon God Changyan burst upon the world, refining a natal sword from his own spine — a sword named Powang!”
“The moment the sword appeared, black clouds swallowed the sky and blood lightning coiled like dragons!”
“Wreathed in black mist, the Demon God stood in the air above, gazing down upon heaven and earth. With a single swing of his sword, the Demon Realm’s mountains collapsed and split, and all its demons bowed in submission!”
The storyteller’s voice rose and fell; at this point he suddenly knitted his brows and heaved a long sigh.
“But even after unifying the Demon Realm, the Demon God Changyan’s heart was not yet content. Borrowing the might of a spiritual vein, he rent the void with his demonic sword, opening a passage between the human and demon realms upon Mount Baopu. Leading tens of thousands of demon soldiers across the mortal world, he marched straight upon the Heavenly Court, seeking to restore the Demon Clan’s glory and become lord of the Three Realms!”
“Fortunately, evil cannot prevail over righteousness. Though the Demon God stood peerless beneath heaven, he was still defeated by the combined might of the Heavenly and Mortal Realms.”
“At the moment of his death, the Demon God spent his last thread of strength on one final, heaven-shaking strike, drawing the world’s resentful qi into a barrier that only demons could cross — severing the Heavenly Gate and cutting the Heavenly and Mortal Realms off from one another forever!”
“The Demon God perished, his demon soldiers scattered, and the rift upon Mount Baopu was sealed with divine power.”
“The demon soldiers left stranded in the mortal world could not return to the Demon Realm. They had no choice but to hide their identities and skulk through the mortal realm, until over a long, long stretch of years, mortal cultivators wiped them out to the last!”
Cheers erupted all around. The storyteller slapped his gavel2, and when the crowd fell silent, he cleared his throat and carried the story onward.
“But though the Demon God died cleanly enough, he left behind a natal sword — steeped in resentful qi past breaking, beyond even the gods’ power to destroy. Together, they had no choice but to seal it upon Mount Qiongju!”
“That war severed the Heavenly Gate so suddenly that four gods never made it back to heaven, and were left stranded in the mortal world from then on.”
“One Divine Maiden remained in Mount Qiongju to guard the seal. With a god in its midst, more and more cultivators came to the Wendao Sect to inquire about the Heavenly Way, and in time it became the Tiandao Sect.”
Someone called out a question: “What about the other three gods?”
“Yes!” someone echoed. “There were clearly four gods — how did the mortal world only get one Tiandao Sect?”
“Well asked!” The storyteller struck his gavel again, shaking his head with a sigh, his voice growing heavier. “The gods who pursued the Demon God into the mortal realm all descended as primal spirits, while their true bodies remained in the Demon-Subduing Formation above the Heavenly Realm’s spiritual spring. Once the Heavenly Gate was severed, their primal spirits could not return to their bodies. They weakened day by day, fated sooner or later to scatter between heaven and earth.”
“With the Heavenly Gate severed, no god could ever descend again. Yet the demonic sword remained unbroken, and they could not rest easy. To protect the world for the long years ahead, they resolved to pour all their remaining divine power into a single person — to extend that one’s lifespan, and in their stead, and in the Heavenly Realm’s stead, to keep watching over the mortal world.”
At these words, sighs of sorrow rose all around.
The storyteller went on. “The Divine Maiden dwelt in the mortal world, and in the blink of an eye more than three thousand years passed. The demonic sword’s seal held firm, evil demons rarely appeared, and Tiandao Sect grew ever more prosperous — though it kept itself exceedingly low-key.”
“Then, at some point, a Demon Venerable named Huiyue arose in the Demon Realm. Five hundred years ago, he crossed the barrier between the two realms alone and slipped secretly into the mortal world — intending to seize the Four Spiritual Veins, stir the Heavenly Realm’s spiritual spring, and bring a world-destroying tribulation down upon the mortal realm!”
“In that hour of peril, the immortal sects rallied behind the Divine Maiden. They gave everything they had; countless lives were lost. At last they gravely wounded that would-be World-Destroying Demon upon Mount Qiongju!”
“But because that fiend’s body could neither die nor be destroyed, the Divine Maiden had no choice but to scatter all of her divine power, sealing away his flesh, blood, and divine soul entire!”
“From that day on, no gods remained in the world, and the immortal sects withered, their talent thinning year by year.”
Qi Zhi let out a soft sigh without meaning to.
She had listened so intently that she never noticed her tea going cold.
Someone slid into the seat beside her and asked quietly, “How’s the story?”
Qi Zhi snapped back to her senses, looked at the person before her, and shivered.
“Sh-Shijie…”
Her eyes went wide. She opened her mouth, wanting to explain something, and discovered she had no possible defense.
She couldn’t have — no, she absolutely should not have — been in a place like this, listening to a story like this, and been caught at it by Mu Qingshi, who might very well be the World-Destroying Demon in that very story…
“The newly succeeded Daoist Venerable resolutely shouldered the burden of all living things, leading the sect’s disciples to slay countless evil spirits over five hundred years — and so Tiandao Sect became the foremost immortal sect of the mortal world!”
The storyteller’s voice still rang in her ears. Mu Qingshi gave a soft scoff of laughter.
Qi Zhi bit her lower lip, lashes dropping, and shrank into herself without daring a sound. The ten fingers wrapped around her hand warmer trembled faintly, beyond her control.
Mu Qingshi glanced at her trembling fingers, then with a light smile warmed the tea that had gone cold. “That look on your face — as if you’d committed some terrible crime.”
Qi Zhi: “…”
Mu Qingshi: “It’s just a story. Why so nervous?”
Qi Zhi’s eyes darted about. Summoning her courage, she sneaked a glance at Mu Qingshi, and seeing not a trace of anger in her eyes, she blinked and said in a small voice, “This story… I knew a tiny bit of it before. Just a tiny bit… Today’s the first time I’ve heard it in full…”
As she spoke, she pressed her lips together, and her mouth suddenly felt parched. She simply gulped down the tea Mu Qingshi had warmed for her in one go.
“And what did you think of the story?” Mu Qingshi’s tone was perfectly ordinary, as if it were an idle question.
Qi Zhi: “Heart-stopping?”
Mu Qingshi: “Anything else?”
Qi Zhi: “Um… Sweeping and magnificent?”
Mu Qingshi: “That’s all?”
Qi Zhi: “…”
Heaven help her — what else was she supposed to say?
“They say that when this demon appeared in the world, a dark moon hung in the sky — exactly like the anomaly over heaven and earth when Tiandao Sect was destroyed a month ago! Some say the World-Destroying Demon has come for revenge against Tiandao Sect!”
Qi Zhi frowned at that. She looked up at the storyteller, then at Mu Qingshi.
After a moment of silence, she blinked and offered, “This Demon Venerable Huiyue really is amazing!”
Mu Qingshi: “Aren’t you afraid?”
“Terrified!” The words were out before she could think.
Then, lowering her eyes, she considered it seriously and said softly, “Someone that powerful — if she truly wanted to destroy the world, I don’t suppose anyone wouldn’t be afraid. But afraid or not, life goes on. How such a person ought to be dealt with, whether she really means to destroy the world — none of that is mine to worry about…”
She said she was only a blade of grass. Torn from the soil where she’d taken root, she’d go wherever the wind carried her.
She only wanted to eat well, sleep well, and be happy one day at a time.
Mu Qingshi gazed at Qi Zhi’s downcast eyes for a long moment. Then she leaned in slightly, brought her lips to Qi Zhi’s ear, and asked softly, “What if I am this demon?”
Her breath was warm against Qi Zhi’s ear, and Qi Zhi’s heart pounded wildly.
She pressed a hand to her chest, answering almost on instinct.
“Just don’t kill me!” she said, then shrank her neck and added, “If you have to kill me, could you do it while I’m asleep, so I don’t feel any pain…”
Mu Qingshi’s eyes curved. She gently ruffled Qi Zhi’s hair, then looked up at the storyteller and sighed, “Today’s story really wasn’t told in much detail.”
Qi Zhi: “…”
She couldn’t follow that at all. It felt like there was something hidden between the lines.
Mu Qingshi turned back to her, smiling. “What do you want to eat? I’ll take you.”
That, she understood!
Qi Zhi drew a long breath and said softly, “It’s cold out. I want something hot.”
Mu Qingshi: “How about hot pot?”
Qi Zhi: “No…”
Mu Qingshi: “For someone with such a timid heart, you sure dare to follow me around.”
Qi Zhi at once lifted her little face. “Then I’ll eat it!”
Mu Qingshi laughed despite herself and rose to her feet. Qi Zhi hastily caught her sleeve and trailed after her, out of the teahouse.
Back in the teahouse, the story went on — it seemed to have reached the World-Destroying Demon’s origins.
Qi Zhi looked back one last time, and caught only a single line: “The world has twin moons—”
She froze. By the time she came back to herself, they had already walked a long, long way.
The author has something to say:
Qi Zhi: Stories and all that — I’ll hear them out and let them go. I really just want to slack off!
Footnotes
- 饺子 | jiaozi | Boiled dumplings eaten during the Lunar New Year; their shape resembles gold ingots, symbolizing wealth and the ushering in of a prosperous year.
- 醒木 | xingmu | The storyteller's wooden gavel; a sharp slap on the table signals the start of a tale, a dramatic turn, or the end of a session.
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