Chen Yan's heart skipped half a beat instantly.
What Lin Qifeng had just said was, to Chen Yan, even ten thousand times more terrifying than death.
He exhausted every effort to calm his emotions, making sure his outward behavior revealed no further clues.
"Have you died many times?"
Chen Yan put on a puzzled expression, pretending he didn't understand what Lin Qifeng was talking about at all.
"Yes."
Lin Qifeng said:
"The first time I saw you, whether it was your expression or your movements, you didn't look like a living person."
"So you mean, Master, you have seen the expression and movements of the dead?"
Lin Qifeng said:
"At that time, I should have been about your age."
"Oh?"
Chen Yan continued to feign keen interest.
Silently, the Hidden Immortal Art spun rapidly, suppressing the chaotic true qi in his meridians caused by the emotional surge.
"Do you know who in our sect is the most devoted proponent of the Cause of Calamity theory?"
Fu Qian.
If this had been asked a year ago, Chen Yan would have answered that without hesitation.
That did not mean it remained his answer today.
"I know."
Chen Yan replied.
"Who?"
"Senior Yue Chi, and you, Master."
Hearing that, Lin Qifeng gave a faint, surprised sound, then quickly laughed:
"You are smarter than I imagined."
Was he really that smart?
Chen Yan seriously considered the question.
The answer was clearly no.
He had a very clear self-awareness.
He was never a genius, neither in cultivation nor in intellect.
He might even be slightly below average.
But even a thick-headed person, constantly rubbing shoulders with big figures like Bai Qiming, Fu Qian, Yue Chi, and He Furen, would inevitably improve somewhat.
"When I was twenty-one, I was still a lowly Body Forging realm lackey, though by then I was already a disciple personally taught by the Sect Leader."
Lin Qifeng said.
Lin Qifeng's current real age was fifty-eight.
That meant what he was talking about happened thirty-seven years ago.
He once said he reached Qi Circulation at thirty-six.
As a personal disciple of the Sect Leader, he had taken fifteen years without managing to cross from Body Forging to Qi Circulation.
But from Qi Circulation to Qi Sea, it only took him twenty-two years.
For geniuses that cultivation speed might not be extraordinary.
But for Lin Qifeng himself, the difference between progressing from Body Forging to Qi Circulation and then from Qi Circulation to Qi Sea was like night and day.
Why was that?
Chen Yan could not understand.
"It was that year I saw the dead."
Lin Qifeng continued:
"Do you know who your ancestral master's master was?"
"The student does not know."
Chen Yan answered.
"It was a Grand Elder from the Pivot Court."
Lin Qifeng said.
"May I ask which Grand Elder?"
Chen Yan inquired.
Lin Qifeng was silent for a moment, then shook his head:
"It cannot be said."
Cannot be said?
What did that mean?
"Do you know why I felt you looked like you had died many times?"
Lin Qifeng looked at Chen Yan and said slowly.
Chen Yan shook his head.
"You resemble my ancestral master very much, although the cultivation gap is immense..."
Lin Qifeng said:
"But I can still see his shadow in you."
"Pardon my dullness."
Chen Yan performed a formal bow.
This time he was not pretending to be dumb; he was genuinely baffled.
He had been fed an overwhelming influx of information.
Did Lin Qifeng mean that the Pivot Court Grand Elder... was a dead person?
"You know my ancestral master's name."
Lin Qifeng said:
"You must know."
"...Could you give the student a hint?"
Chen Yan asked.
"All right."
Lin Qifeng nodded, then tilted his head slightly:
"He once used a dao name, a dao name that, you could say, the entire Chenping Continent's cultivation world — even to this day — knows without exception."
Such credentials?
Grand Elders typically have cultivation around Unity or Divine Ability.
Not that Unity or Divine Ability are insignificant — both are among the upper three realms, and even without the Five Great Sects' aura, they are enough to command respect far and wide.
But to make the whole Chenping Continent know your name? Even a top-tier Dao Union cultivator might not achieve that.
Unless—
"His dao name was Kongmiao."
An unimaginable dread and horror washed over every inch of Chen Yan's skin and every hair on his body.
There was only one person in Chenping Continent's history who dared use Kongmiao as a dao name.
"...Yan Yunhe?"
Chen Yan's voice began to tremble.
Over a hundred thousand years ago, the first Immortal Ascension Realm powerhouse of Kongshan Sect.
He created the Kongshan Annotation on True Cultivation, laying the path for later Kongshan cultivators to step into the upper three realms.
But he should have perished around a hundred thousand years ago.
"Your ancestral master was the ninth reincarnation of True Person Kongmiao."
Lin Qifeng said:
"I only learned the truth before your ancestral master resolved his body."
Reincarnation and cycling through lifetimes.
Hearing this, Chen Yan inexplicably felt a slight relief.
Because his deepest secret had not been discovered.
For Chen Yan, it did not matter if others knew his real cultivation or other facts.
Only his ability to reincarnate infinitely was something he could not tolerate anyone discovering.
That was his only trump card.
"It's strange to say, I was by far the most useless and the slowest of my ancestral master's six disciples, yet he liked me the most."
Lin Qifeng said as if recalling something:
"So much so that at the moment he chose to resolve his body, the person he wanted to see was not my master, but me."
Chen Yan listened quietly.
"Your ancestral master told me many things then that struck me so hard they continue to affect me even now...and will affect me in the future."
Lin Qifeng said:
"Among them was the revelation that he was the reincarnation of Yan Yunhe."
"Please forgive the student's presumption."
Chen Yan bowed:
"How did the ancestral master make you believe he was Yan Yunhe's reincarnation?"
Hearing this, Lin Qifeng laughed and held up two fingers:
"Two breaths."
"Two breaths?"
"Exactly, only two breaths."
Lin Qifeng said:
"Before your ancestral master chose to resolve his body, his realm had only been Unity, and then, in just two breaths' time—"
"One breath, from Unity to Divine Ability."
"Second breath, from Divine Ability to Dao Union."
"Even if at the time I was a mere Body Forging ant, utterly insignificant before the ancestral master..."
As he spoke, Lin Qifeng looked toward Chen Yan:
"In the face of such might and shock, how could I not believe?"