Crush's Cold Senior Sister is Actually Childhood Sweetheart - Chapter 28

Chapter 28: An Jin Only Felt a Chill Rushing Down His Spine, and His Bl00d Coagulated.

Ling Qi’s mind was still on the letter that someone had sent, and when she came back to her senses, An Jin was squatting beside the old lady, helping her pick up oranges.

Seeing that it was a bit difficult for the old lady to bend over, she held her back and told her not to move, and she ran back and forth a few times by herself, picking up all the oranges in both baskets.

Ling Qi smiled helplessly, shook her head, and slowly walked toward them.

The old lady on the other side was holding An Jin’s hand and thanking her repeatedly, and she insisted on putting a few oranges in her hand. An Jin couldn’t refuse, so she stood there with two oranges in her hands, a little at a loss.

Seeing Ling Qi walk over, her eyes instantly lit up as if she had seen her savior.

Just then, a couple came over. While the old lady turned around to get a plastic bag, Ling Qi slipped a few bills into the change purse on her waist, and with her right arm around An Jin’s waist, she elegantly left.

“Wow.”

An Jin looked at Ling Qi with an expression of adoration, her eyes sparkling: “You’re so rich.”

“…”

Ling Qi didn’t know what to do with her. She rubbed An Jin’s hair and turned her head back: “Yes, I’m rich. You can buy whatever you want.”

The next second, she regretted it.

An Jin was staring at the aunt selling candied hawthorn on the side, her eyes shining brightly.

The aunt was holding a rack full of candied fruits with both hands. In addition to hawthorn, there were also strawberries and kiwis. A rack of candied hawthorn had fallen on the ground at her feet, and the sugar-coated strawberries were rolling all over the ground, covered in dust. When the gust of wind hit earlier, she had reached out frantically to hold on, but she was still a step too late.

On the tricycle behind her, a six or seven-year-old girl was doing her homework while hugging an iron bucket.

Although she knew that An Jin didn’t really want to eat candied hawthorn, Ling Qi still bought an entire rack for her, which made the aunt selling candied hawthorn so flustered that she pushed her tricycle and took her daughter home early.

After giving the candied hawthorn to the children who had gathered around, An Jin walked in front with a candied strawberry in one hand, occasionally looking back at Ling Qi: “You really don’t want any?”

“…I really don’t.”

An Jin gave an “oh” and then turned back and asked: “That gust of wind just now… can we find out who did it?”

Ling Qi shook her head: “It’s very difficult. There are too many people with immortal roots in the mortal realm. We’ve been unable to manage them for a long time.”

“Unless we can bring all the people with innate immortal bones back to the upper realm now and check them one by one.”

“Doesn’t Emperor Fo Ling want that?” An Jin remembered that as early as when Emperor Qing Yuan was still alive, the boundary between the upper realm and the mortal realm was always clear, and there were never so many people with innate immortal bones left in the mortal realm.

“It’s not that she doesn’t want to, it’s that she can’t.” Ling Qi quickened her pace and walked side by side with An Jin. “Many people in the upper realm… are afraid of her but don’t respect her. They agree to the tasks she assigns on the surface, but behind her back, they’re doing a bunch of things to slow it down. You can’t punish them, and you certainly can’t kill them… Nowadays, no one is short of people, and fewer and fewer are willing to come to the mortal realm to take in disciples.”

“Oh, right.” Ling Qi remembered something halfway through and added, “Yang Chongguang is an exception. She’s dedicated to making Chong Guang Palace the Forbidden City of the upper realm. That’s not taking in disciples, that’s an emperor recruiting citizens who are willing to believe in her.”

An Jin was so amused by Ling Qi’s description that she bent over laughing and couldn’t straighten up for a long time.

The sunlight of the mortal realm shone on Ling Qi’s eyelashes, and her eyes were filled with starlight. An Jin finally stopped laughing, looked up, and asked Ling Qi: “Is there no other way?”

“…Maybe.” Ling Qi looked at her, a very gentle smile in her eyes. “I’ve always been hoping so.”

…

An Jin was still thinking about the meaning of her senior sister’s gaze as they walked into the gate of Chong Guang Palace.

She tried to ask several times, but the other person skillfully changed the subject each time.

When An Jin tried to speak again, a bl00d-red flower was suddenly thrust into her hand. Seeing that her hands were now occupied, Ling Qi thoughtfully took the candied strawberry that she had only eaten half of.

An Jin’s eyes widened, and the flower in her hand was almost scorched by her gaze.

“Reverse Flow Flower?!”

Ling Qi nodded: “Didn’t you say it before? Liao Huan has the right to know the truth, and you can’t make the decision for her.”

“…So?”

What does this have to do with the Reverse Flow Flower?!

“So I think you’re right, and you also have the right to know your own memories.” Ling Qi’s tone was very nonchalant, as if she was just giving her something she had casually picked up on the side of the road.

“…Is that the same thing?”

Ling Qi didn’t answer and continued: “Although I don’t know what you’ll see, it will most likely be the same as mine… it’ll be parts of your own memories.”

“But no matter whose memories they are, you can only watch. You can’t change anything.”

I still don’t want to tell you.

I don’t want to see the fairy-tale castle shatter into pieces. I don’t want to see you forced to take on the banner of the “Ruler of the Upper Realm” even though you don’t remember anything.

But you’re right. Painful sobriety is still sobriety. I can’t make this decision for you.

So I’ll take a step back and give you the choice.

There was a soft light in Ling Qi’s eyes, with no struggle or even expectation, only endless tolerance. It was as if even if An Jin threw the flower on the ground and crushed it the next second, she would still say “well done.”

An Jin’s eyelashes trembled slightly, and her voice was a little hoarse: “Anytime?”

“Yes, you don’t have to rush to make this decision. Even if you want to in a few years—”

Before she could finish, An Jin’s right hand had already tightened, and the bl00d-red flower juice burst open in her hand, dripping onto the ground.

The entire action was fluid, without the slightest hesitation.

Ling Qi’s unfinished sentence was swallowed back whole.

The next second, a transparent mirror appeared out of thin air in front of the two of them. The white light emitted from it was too strong, and An Jin subconsciously raised her hand to block it. Although both of them could see the mirror, only An Jin, who had crushed the Reverse Flow Flower, could move.

Ling Qi was as if she were locked in place by invisible shackles, unable to even move her fingers.

An Jin turned around and looked at her. In her senior sister’s reassuring gaze, she felt her heartbeat calm down a little.

Turning back, she took a deep breath, walked to the mirror, and slowly closed her eyes.

When she opened her eyes again, the entire world was a scarlet red. Everything she saw was bl00d, bl00d of various forms and colors. Deep red marks were solidified on the floating clouds, and a strong smell of bl00d permeated the air. She could feel the sticky residue on the clouds just by taking a step.

In the midst of the chaos, An Jin could only see a scarlet back in front of her.

The woman in the red clothes was kneeling on the ground with her back to her. Her clothes were soaked in bl00d, and the wounds on her arms were crisscrossed, deep enough to see the bone. There was almost no intact skin on her entire body.

Further away, a huge oval formation was suspended in mid-air, surrounded by layers of golden light. In the center of the formation, a blurry figure was confined by chains in a “spread-eagle” position. The chains pierced through the person’s bones and went through their limbs. An Jin only took one look before turning her head away, unable to bear it anymore.

Although it was too far away to see the face clearly, when An Jin looked closely, the oval formation suspended in the air made her breath hitch.

The pattern of the formation was identical to the photos of the Puppet Formation she had seen in the mortal realm not long ago.

The memory of the pattern and the scene in front of her gradually overlapped, and the blurry silhouette that was firmly confined in the center of the formation now had only one possibility.

Emperor Qing Yuan.

An Jin felt her heart race, and a layer of cold sweat seeped into her palms.

She didn’t expect to stumble upon a secret that her senior sister had been investigating for many years, instead of finding her own memories.

The woman in the red clothes in front of her was gasping for air, but she coughed up a mouthful of bl00d foam. Liquid also gushed out of her nose, and the bright red bl00d dripped onto the floating clouds, slowly spreading out.

But she didn’t even look at it, her gaze still fixed on the person in the center of the formation in front of her.

Gripping the sword in her hand tightly, the woman in red propped herself up little by little and slowly stood up.

She gripped the hilt of the sword with both hands. Although her body was trembling uncontrollably, she took to the air the next second and used all her strength to swing her sword and strike the core of the formation.

An Jin’s pupils trembled behind her, and she subconsciously shot out a golden light to try and stop her. The moment she made her move, she realized what she was doing. The golden light went straight through the back of the woman in red and gradually disappeared into the air.

“Stop…”

An Jin couldn’t help but scream in her heart. Her hands at her sides were tightly clenched into fists, and her lower lip was almost bitten through.

But her remaining sanity told her that this was the predetermined outcome from eight hundred years ago.

Now she was just a spectator, how could she change anything?

Rumble—

A sudden roar came from the air, and then the formation began to crack. With a loud “bang,” the formation exploded into pieces, and at the same time, the entire space was torn into fragments.

The huge impact of the formation shattering was enough to destroy all living things within a hundred miles. The person in the center of the formation was instantly blown to smithereens.

They didn’t even have time to leave a single word or even a single glance.

There was no sign of any living person in sight.

Except for the woman in red in front of her.

She seemed to be protected by an invisible force, completely unaffected by the impact of the formation shattering.

Another loud rumble.

A field of red clouds suddenly descended from the nine heavens, and the bl00d-colored floating clouds spread across the sky, stretching as far as the eye could see.

It was as if bl00d had stained half the sky red.

“Ahhhhhhh—!”

The woman in red let out a hoarse roar. Her voice trembled in the air, filled with endless hatred and pain, making An Jin tremble behind her.

Who… are you?

An Jin’s heart was torn by countless emotions. She took half a step forward and then retreated the next second.

They say that in the illusion of the Reverse Flow Flower, you can only see the memories of people who are related to you, so I must know you.

So… who could you be?

If you are truly as pained as you appear, then why did you desperately destroy that Puppet Formation and kill Emperor Qing Yuan just now?

But the woman in red couldn’t hear An Jin’s inner questions. She was still kneeling outside the formation, and a series of painful wails filled the scarlet cloud sea.

After a long time, she seemed to sense something and slowly turned her head.

The moment her face completely turned around, An Jin felt a chill run up her spine, and all the bl00d in her body froze.