Another night of snow.
After sunrise, icicles formed on the eaves of the houses in Snow Forbidden City, and the falling ice shards clinked as the wind blew them to the ground.
Bai’s Ancestral Hall.
The decoration here is very elegant; centuries-old wooden houses are orderly situated and have not been eroded by time. Each year, after the freeze, the mahogany dwellings seem to brim with new vitality.
In the courtyard, a very old ginkgo tree grows.
Below the ginkgo tree, a wicker chair gently rocked as a woman rested on it, her long hair cascading down. She held a book in her hands and read silently. The wind stirred her black hair and paged the book, creating a rustling sound.
Just looking at this scene, it would be hard to believe.
The woman sitting quietly, reading in the Bai’s Ancestral Hall, was the Bai Family’s Miss Bai Lu, known as the "Witch".
"Miss... aren’t you going out today either?"
A servant came with water and asked curiously.
These past few days, the servant had always seen Miss Bai reading under the ancestral hall’s tree, which was somewhat out of character...
Bai Lu shook her head.
She focused on her book and spoke softly, "These days I’m meditating here in the ancestral hall, not going anywhere... Just leave the water here."
The servant set down the glass and slowly departed.
"This is really... unheard of."
Two elders who were there on business saw this and couldn’t help but whisper to each other, voicing their astonishment.
Ever since Bai Lu, that little witch, could walk, she had rarely missed an opportunity to stir up trouble outside. Days like today, when she quietly stayed in the yard reading a book, were exceedingly rare.
Or rather, unheard of!
Anyways, they had never seen it happen.
"The ’ginkgo’ inside the ancestral hall holds the power to ward off evil and bestows blessings, planted by the Bai ancestors, and it has lived for hundreds of years."
Bai Lu closed the book and exhaled a wistful sigh.
"Hiding here... I shouldn’t encounter any so-called ’ominous disasters,’ should I?"
No one would have thought.
That the Bai Family Witch, who once plagued Snow Forbidden City with unrest, would willingly "cleanse her heart and change her face," hiding and reading in seclusion in the old house, merely because of a prophecy of ten short characters.
[ "Miss Bai, you’ve been shrouded in ominous omens these past few days; better not to go out or disaster may befall you." ]
Ironically, the person who spoke these words was a Divination disciple of Tomb Guardian Master Qianye!
This made it impossible for Bai Lu not to believe.
If Bai Lu knew now... that the so-called "ominous omens" were just something Gu Shen casually mentioned to scare her.
She would probably be furious enough to storm back there again.
However, these days of Meditation were not without their rewards; she felt much more at peace... yet she always found her mind flashing back to scenes she had seen in the "Thorny Dreams".
Black flowers bloom, Ning River burned to ashes.
On the dried-up riverbed stood a girl in a white dress, ethereal as a god.
This image was etched in her mind.
Bai Lu wanted to forget, but couldn’t... She was naturally intuitive and, upon leaving that Dream, she subconsciously felt that this memory held great significance for her?
Now, she sort of understood that the "mysterious girl" who appeared in her memory was the second successor of the Qingzhong Divination Technique.
This was also why she was willing to read and meditate in the Bai’s Ancestral Hall.
She didn’t much trust Gu Shen.
But she was willing to believe... that mysterious girl from the Dream.
So a guiding force from the unknown led her to the ancestral hall, into a realm of solitude.
She tried to use her own power to silently find the "answer" in her heart.
Only, the "answer" was not easy to find... Reading, fasting, meditating, and meditating again allowed her to reach a peaceful state and return to the final point of the Ning River memory, but beyond that, there were no more revelations.
This only confirmed one thing.
Gu Shen spoke the truth.
This mysterious "second successor of Divination" must possess tremendous spiritual power to enter her Dream silently and erase all traces...
Regrettably, Gu Shen didn’t want to say more.
About that mysterious girl... Bai Lu didn’t even know her full name.
If she were to search based on a portrait, what she saw in her "Ning River" memory was just a vague face, glowing with a snowy radiance, absolutely impossible to reproduce.
The ginkgo tree’s leaves rustled.
A leaf slowly drifted down.
It landed on a page of Bai Lu’s book, and at the same time, a gentle voice reached her ear.
"You’ve seemed quite contrary these past few days."
The speaker was several miles away from the ancestral hall, his spiritual power so vast that it could be concentrated into a thread, spanning thousands of meters to reach the ginkgo tree by the Bai’s Ancestral Hall.
She closed the book, stretching lazily, "I’m tired of causing troubles... Taking a rest."
"Your brother is gratified to hear that."
There was only one person who could use this title, Bai Chen.
Bai Chen said with a smile, "You must have noticed, right? Since today, there have been more people around the ancestral hall?"
Bai Lu nodded; even at this early hour, people were already coming and going.
Although they all maintained a distance from the ginkgo tree,
Their voices were inevitably a bit noisy.
"These few days the Elder Council will begin to get busy, and with the ancestral worship coming up, the ancestral hall won’t be so quiet. Many people will continue to come and go... If you find the ancestral hall too noisy, I can take you somewhere else," Bai Chen communicated telepathically, "How about it?"