Times Have Changed [MDZS]

Chapter 2: Revisiting the Past

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Chapter Two

“Wei Ying! Look at the hostile and resentful energy here. Through the ages, hundreds of cultivation clans tried to purge it. But all failed. If the living entered here, both his flesh and soul would never come out again. You! Will never come out of here either!”

Shaken and puzzled, Wei Wuxian snapped his eyes wide open to break free from a traumatic nightmare. He dreamed of Yunmeng Jiang Sect drowning in flames, of Uncle Jiang and Madam Yu’s death, of the piles and piles of blood mixed with purple, of the nerve-wracking feeling of being hunted, of the days and nights of painfully watching the golden brilliance being removed from his body, and finally closing his eyes to accept his demise.

The terror of falling into the land of no return still lingers, sending shivers through his spine, a deja vu that took away all his reasons. Noises came like a tidal wave, flooding through Wei Wuxian’s ears. It was like an ocean of whispers, rustles, and giggles, loud and soft, circling and penetrating, from front and behind, above and below.

Eyes bloodshot with madness, Wei Wuxian’s malicious laugh suddenly resonated like a call for hostility and resentment to twist and coil upon him.

He hated Wen Chao to the core and if given a chance, he would kill him over and over again. He vowed to hunt him down, to torment and torture him, to make him see what it’s like to run for his life, that death is better than living! He vowed to pull Wen Rouhan from his seat, to wreak havoc and destroy Qishan, and turn the Nightless City into a burial mound by massacring all the Wens!

He…he needs to kill them. No, not all the Wens!

He bent over, mindlessly rubbing his palm over his chest with strong strokes, hoping to bury the pain of losing his family. The Jiangs? Not them…if not them, who?

Don’t…don’t go!

At some point, it was like he was suddenly back in the Demon Slaughtering cave, reaching and pleading for the two backs to not go, saying that the righteous sect would never uphold their promise, and helplessly crying for the foreseeable fall of the two people dear to him like siblings.

His mind buzzed. Wei Wuxian grunted his teeth, as he clutched his head with both of his hands, nails threatening to dig through his scalp, as if doing so would finally ease the uncomfortable confusion and nausea that he was feeling. Vivid images plunged his mind like an opera where the villain was played by different faces, sometimes the Wens, sometimes the greedy hypocrites of the orthodox sects, and most of the time him. It was like a never-ending dream.

Now, was he still the Wei Ying dreaming of the future? Or was he the Yiling Patriarch who travelled back to the past?

But, does it matter? He will still protect those that he wanted to protect and save those that he wanted to save!

Wei Wuxian woke up, beads of sweat decorating his forehead. His pitiful grey robe soaking wet, clinging onto his body, and reawakening the pain of the achingly familiar wounds. He slowly opened his heavy eyelids, revealing a pair of listless silvers, a window to the soul that had experienced too much suffering. This time, there’s no violence, there’s no madness, only weariness. Wei Wuxian was tired. That dream loop took away all his spirit. The revisiting of his past life felt like a never-ending race of pure torture, confusing and forcing him to reflect upon the things that had happened.

He inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly, attempting to calm his ragged breathing, and untying the knots within his heart. His whole life felt like a nightmare, and he selfishly wished that it was completely so. But the burden and ever so painful scars in his heart could never be erased and would always remind him, that no matter how tragic, it was all real.