Tonight, was destined to be a restless long night.
Moonlight enshrouded, spilling across Snow Forbidden City.
The courtyard of the God of Wine remained utterly silent.
The young boy clad in a white robe slowly emerged from the wooden hut, his face veiled in the moon’s pale and dim sky light, as if a deity had descended to earth, and behind him... the darkness of the room was filled with a thick aroma of wine, as if it had condensed into substance.
He had been planting grapes in the courtyard.
Through wind and rain.
Now... the grapes were ripe.
Mr. Jin and Xu Yan were not serving at the left and right of the young boy’s divine seat; in the darkness, a faint breeze flowed out from the courtyard, seemingly drawing a path towards the distant beyond.
They were not the only ones to have entered this courtyard.
The breeze that now wafted from the courtyard traversed the streets and alleys of Snow Forbidden City... heading towards those who had once entered the small yard and then chose to leave.
Each gust of wind was like an eye.
Compared to the electronic devices arranged above the skies of Changye.
This was the true "Wind Eye".
An intangible spiritual power enveloped the vast cityscape; after darkness fell, it was the first time the God of Wine’s "eyes" opened, following the wind to every street and every shadow of this ancient city.
"Gu Changzhi... seems to have really died,"
the boy murmured softly.
Alone, he left the courtyard, walking northward on foot.
He walked with eyes closed, yet his path was the most direct and straight, as he was surrounded by a circling wind.
The God of Wine crossed the bustling Ninghe Bridge.
Passed the brightly decorated ancient alleyways.
By the banks of Ning River, where people performed lion dances and played music, this handsome young man walked straight through the crowd. The dancing lions and the clapping crowd seemed blindfolded, immersed in the world before them, ignoring someone passing by. Those people appeared as if they were puppets tugged by the strings of the Goddess of Destiny, their movements, the lifting of their sleeves, their steps, artfully avoiding the handsome young man.
The whole world was making way for him.
He continued walking quietly forward, leaving Snow Forbidden City behind, reaching the quiet and spacious cemetery to the north of Changye, a place where his "wine winds" couldn’t reach, a realm of true darkness and eternal gloom.
For the first time, the God of Wine stopped in his tracks.
In his life, he rarely stopped like he did today before a place.
Not because he wanted to "appreciate" it.
But because... despite having the spark of fire and having ascended to a divine seat, he still harbored ordinary emotions within him.
That emotion was fear.
Because of fear, he paused.
In those few short seconds, the God of Wine recalled the scene he had seen many years ago in the Old World.
Then he remembered the words Gu Changzhi had said to him in the Golden Divine Domain a year earlier.
But those two strings of memory were quickly displaced as he thought of his encounters after returning to the Source Tower and the pain in the depths of his heart, where he wanted to open his eyes many times but dared not.
The God of Wine took a deep breath.
Today’s Qingzhong had no breeze.
The Tomb Guardian was slumped over, sitting atop an ancient tree.
Innumerable golden divination threads entangled the old tree.
The clouds above the Four Seasons Wilderness turned into lingering threads, unwound and peeled layer by layer, knitting an outer layer for the old tree. From afar, it resembled a glittering golden tree, and atop its canopy, was the future that humans sought to glimpse but could never truly see.
Master Qianye’s eyes beneath the mask were filled with confusion.
The ominous premonition in her heart peaked today... yet after using Divination Skill, the future she saw was pitch black.
Divination Skill couldn’t predict everything.
Matters and people concerning "gods" and "fire seeds" were taboo and could not be discerned.
Master Qianye adjusted the golden threads, moving her "eye" that prophesied the future beyond the cemetery.
What she saw was still darkness.
But at that moment, the puzzled gaze beneath the mask cleared up.
She understood where that darkness came from.
So she began to activate the grand array of Qingzhong.
Outside the cemetery, the first gust of wind flowed in.
Then the second, the third...
Like a calm lake surface disrupted by a dropped pebble, only the subsequent ripples grew larger... Countless wild winds, carrying the chaotic clouds, dispersed all the Extraordinary Essence from the dome of Qingzhong, the clouds continually retreating towards the inner tomb.
Qingzhong was a lake.
And what fell was not a pebble, but a colossal meteorite.
The God of Wine entered the cemetery.
The moment he stepped into the cemetery, those array patterns began to activate, yet terrifyingly... as soon as he took the first step, the silent fierce winds surged in, and the domain of the god instantly unfolded, within which all things fell under absolute control.
Divine Power pressed against the array patterns of Qingzhong, causing those previously about to burst streams of light to extinguish before they could activate.
The entire sky above the cemetery was obscured by dark clouds.
The bright moonlight faded away at this moment.
Qingzhong plunged into an enduring darkness.
The journey from the entrance of the cemetery to the Giant Statue Ruins wasn’t long, but the God of Wine’s walk took longer than the time it took to leave his courtyard and walk out of Snow Forbidden City.
There were no dancing beings here, no lit lanterns.