The Last Disciple - Book 1 and 2

The Trial 9 - The Celestial Heavens

Bai Qians memories of Chang Sea was a blur of happiness.  Her time in the Immortal world had been exciting and filled with all manner of excitement and laughter, but she couldn't help but go over the reason how she ended up following Ye Hua into a place that is forbidden to all Mortals as well as her initial meeting with Die Feng which he had already told her about.

Heavens Laws forbid Mortals from entering the Immortal Realm because it absolutely interferes with their own fates and also because Immortality is earned through lifetimes of learning and experience.  Also, the Immortal world is filled with all manner of magic and energies that Mortals are not allowed to know about it let alone see because it is not conductive to their learning and can cause a disruption to their fates should such knowledge come too soon in their evolution.

Which immediately brought back to mind Ye Huas explanation that he was a practicing Daoist who had learned a few magic tricks in order to gain Immortality.  Laughing at her own stupidity for believing such a grand lie,  she couldn't help but marvel at how quickly the lies came to his tongue, it was one of many that he managed to pull out at a moments notice.  But still, such magic is not known to Mortals no matter how far they are in their evolution, if they were that advanced, they would not be in the Mortal Realm, but the Immortal Realm, because such magic belongs only to those who have studied for centuries in the Immortal Realm, not the other way around.

But blindly she had believed him, and like the weak Mortal that she was, she followed him back to his own world while still believing that he was who he said he was, just a Mortal like her with a few magic tricks up his sleeves.

Regardless, she had enjoyed herself.  The Crystal Palace had been so beautiful compared to her little cabin, and she had not wanted to leave.  The colours for a start enthralled her, as did the people.  Everyone was so kind and generous but looking back on her time, she now understood what it was that she had seen.  In her Mortal form, she had never known war, so it was obvious that her first meeting with the Mermaids was in fact the onset of the Mermaid Wars.

And this raised even more questions regarding her state of mind.  Mermaids were a Mortal fantasy, something parents told their children about to fill their heads with all manner of fantastical imaginings.  So in truth, her Mortal self should have been more afraid of their appearance which she wasn't.  Of course the battle was frightening for her, because Su Su had not seen battle before, but their forms were accepted immediately.

And this brought back her little black snake turned Dragon.   Allowing her mind to go back briefly, the anger rose again.  The snake had definitely been injured so this was in fact the truth and possibly the only truthful part of the whole sorry story,  but the moment he erupted into his true form, having saved her from being beaten or worse killed, she had looked at that snake without a hint of fear.

And this surprised her.  Because a Dragon and Mermaids should be feared, especially to the Mortals, so why was it, that two fantastical beings who are relegated to bedtime stories as myth, did not frighten her?  It was as if everything that Ye Hua had brought into her Mortal life was a given, acceptable and believable.  No matter what she saw, she merely took it all in her stride as being normal.

And it was her lack of fear that perhaps also played a part in what was to come.  Had she shown a more natural reaction to both creatures as any other Mortal had, which was caution, then perhaps the rest of the story might have been much different.  But then, even in her Immortal form, she feared nothing, so this was obviously a part of her true nature that she had taken into her trial with her.

Now allowing her mind to linger as long as she could on the last of her trial that would see her smile, she then took herself to the Peach Tree Grove where Ye Hua had taken her.  She had recognized Zhe Yans wine and the scent of the Peach Blossoms as being familiar, but the seal on her memories was strong, too strong for her to understand how she seemed to know that place.  And it was also to a part of the Grove that she would sometimes sit with Zhen Zhen to play her zither while he dreamscaped.  This was where a part of the mind leaves the body to travel outside of its confines while fully aware of itself and its surroundings, and Zhen Zhen would use it to practice his fighting skills without the chance of being hurt while also having full freedom to move.