Chapter 386
As his will to live dimmed, Lin Hui recognized, with a vague clarity, that he was spiraling toward self-destruction. If he let it continue, he would lose the desire to exist entirely before ever reaching his goal.
So he went back to check on his parents in this lifetime. Finding them well, he left behind a sum of wealth and set off to wander the Republic.
City populations had thinned considerably across the country. Yet every pair of eyes he encountered held the same familiar fire—a pure, ardent hope, an upward hunger.
He crossed paths with Xie Tieniu from the sword hall.
Tieniu no longer went by that name. He was Xie Chengxin now—Deputy Commander of the newly established military district spanning three cities, Xidong City among them. He was missing an arm. His features had grown weathered and hard, far removed from the younger man Lin Hui remembered. He had also started a family; a graceful, gentle wife stood at his side, and the picture they made together was one of quiet contentment.
Lin Hui did not approach for a reunion. He only watched from a distance, noted that the Indestructible Holy Pupil's guaranteed resurrection on Xie Chengxin's body remained unspent, and quietly left.
Everything had settled. And yet, just as he had expected, the Heaven Immortal factions held back. They made no move. Instead, they cooperated fully with the new government—dismantling and normalizing their forces and holdings, even donating vast wealth to fold themselves seamlessly into the momentum of the new era.
As the strings of time slowly receded, the cultivation speed of his sword method plummeted once more.
Lin Hui felt his physical strengthening taper off. He understood the logic of it: Heaven Immortal experts cared little whether their subordinate lineages and factions were annihilated. Whenever they wished, they could simply relocate, take in a handful of disciples, and rebuild a new lineage from the ground up. Hunting down their sects to force them into the open was therefore a futile strategy.