Crescent Moon World.
When Ah Xiu regained consciousness inside the headquarters of Martial Alliance City, the flames of war that engulfed the world had long since subsided, and this city once again became the holy land of martial arts in the hearts of the people.
In fact, it became even more "holy" than before the chaos, because many people witnessed the Zhongli Goddess—who cut down Qin Yuezhi in one strike—be taken away by a mysterious silver-robed person.
Thus, in rumors within the martial arts community, this "Silver-Robed Ancestor" gained multiple identities as the founder of the Martial Arts Alliance, a powerhouse from the Upper World, and the world's strongest expert.
"Are you awake?" A soft voice rang in her ears. Ah Xiu opened her eyes to glance to the side and saw Red Tail staring at her with a calm smile.
"Senior Red Tail…" Ah Xiu was in a trance, as if she'd gone back twenty years to that afternoon when she snuck into the Alliance headquarters with her senior martial sister.
Now that twenty years had passed, she was no longer the young girl from the past, but Senior Red Tail didn't seem to have changed at all.
"If you're awake, then let's get started!" Red Tail's smile grew brighter and brighter, and her tone was cheerful, but Ah Xiu felt the atmosphere was somewhat oppressive.
Along with Red Tail's words, the ground underneath Ah Xiu lit up. She was actually lying on top of a strange array.
The complex and extremely arcane patterns made even Ah Xiu dizzy when she stared at them—this had nothing to do with her cultivation realm. As someone who lived in an ancient era, of course she never learned plane geometry.
With a thought, she subconsciously used the power of the law she'd just comprehended, creating a sword intent out of thin air.
But this sword intent was created for only a few seconds when someone's will directly crushed it, not leaving even a trace behind.
Ah Xiu immediately felt a stab of sharp pain in her mind. Her head felt as if it was being torn apart; the destruction of her sword intent had injured her considerably.
Only then did she realize that the silver-robed senior was standing off to the side, looking at her blandly.
He wasn't wearing that mask right now, so Ah Xiu could finally see his face— 'H-He's actually this young?'
But soon, Ah Xiu no longer had the time to lament Gu Nan's youthfulness, because she realized that the array under her feet was getting brighter and brighter, while some sort of strange mist was lingering around her.
This mist was actually the power of her destiny, which was temporarily manifested under the effects of the special array.
The mist gently circled in the air, gradually condensing into the shape of a mirror. Ah Xiu, on the other hand, only felt her eyelids getting heavier and heavier. As she was already injured, her consciousness began to fade.
When her consciousness became blurred, a wisp of her soul left her body and went straight into the mirror.
"Sure enough, she has to be awake for it to work." Red Tail couldn't help sighing with emotion when she saw this.
Of course she and Gu Nan didn't wait until Ah Xiu woke up just so they could greet her. In fact, Red Tail already tried to extract Ah Xiu's destiny from her body to make a mist mirror.
But this never-before-seen Void Cutter Realm child of destiny was indeed very different.
Usually, Red Tail sealed the child of destiny's consciousness, cutting the connection between their soul and the outside world, and then extracted the power of destiny from them.
But Ah Xiu's destiny had already initially fused with her soul, so it couldn't be completely separated.
In other words, after stepping into Void Cutter Realm, she was already half of a spokesperson for the plane. It was no longer as simple as merely being favored by destiny.
So Red Tail could only wait for her soul to reawaken, and then find a way to also extract her soul along with her destiny and put as much of that into the mist mirror as possible.
Ah Xiu's soul was already Void Cutter Realm, so only Gu Nan could carry out this operation. Furthermore, they didn't even know if this would actually work…
The power of destiny slowly condensed, wrapping around Ah Xiu's soul to form a ball as both entered the mirror that was still forming.
"My Lord?" Contrary to expectations, Red Tail actually felt like something was wrong when she saw that things were going unusually smoothly and couldn't help glancing at Gu Nan.
"The level of the translation method is too low. Looks like it already reached its limit trying to handle a child of destiny of this level." Gu Nan led all the destiny into the mist mirror at once and shook his head.
This translation method from the Indigo Mound tribe was originally created for Prodigious Realm children of destiny. This was true even for the complete version within the tribe.
Gu Nan borrowed an entire world's destiny to forcibly push a child of destiny to Void Cutter Realm, but regrettably, the other parts of the translation method couldn't keep up.
They were able to seal her soul but couldn't actually extract Ah Xiu's destiny from her body; and while making the mist mirror, the mirror would've been overwhelmed by Ah Xiu's enormous destiny and burst had Gu Nan not personally carried out the process.
In fact, no translation method could possibly have a part involving Void Cutters—those who would research translation methods and had a use for them were bound to be cultivators below Void Cutter Realm, so how would they be able to create a Void Cutter Realm version of the translation method?
Only a special case like Gu Nan would go back and research the translation method even after his realm far surpassed it.
"Let's see if the mist mirror made from a Void Cutter can bring some pleasant surprise, otherwise the gains really won't outweigh the losses."
Leaving aside the troubles of artificially creating a Void Cutter child of destiny, merely this series of complex operations after acquiring the Void Cutter Realm ingredient would be enough to stump a genuine Void Cutter like Lan Si—only Gu Nan could successfully complete it.
Thus, it directly lost any scalability; the production efficiency was way too low.
The light from the array slowly disappeared, and tranquility once again returned to the small courtyard. Ah Xiu's body had already turned to dust as a small mirror fell to the ground.
Red Tail took two steps forward and picked up the mirror. The mirror was covered with a faint layer of mist. It seemed no different from a normal mist mirror.
In fact, the mist on this mirror was actually a little thinner than normal, and one could make out the rough outline of the mirror. Red Tail could actually see a blurry reflection of her own face on it.
Red Tail raised the mirror a little higher and carefully examined it, as if trying to find something out of the ordinary with it.
Right just then, a woman's face suddenly appeared from the mirror and lunged at her!
This shocking turn almost made Red Tail fling the mirror away in fright. Finally, she managed to calm her mind after much difficulty. Cold sweat had actually broken out on her forehead.
"My Lord, look." She hurriedly handed the mist mirror to Gu Nan, pointing to the human face on it.
Gu Nan looked down and saw that it was precisely Ah Xiu's face, only she had completely lost her rationality. It seemed like only her instincts remained.
She was like a ghost sealed inside the mirror, frantically trying to escape from it to no avail. She could only engage in futile struggle.
Gu Nan smiled and gently placed this mist mirror on the ground. Red Tail stared at him in confusion. Just when she opened her mouth to ask, she saw the mist mirror jump violently.
The crisp sound of the mirror hitting the ground reverberated throughout the small courtyard for a long time, but Red Tail felt the atmosphere turn a little eerie.
With her power, she had long since lost any need to be scared of ghosts, but this scene in front of her was way too creepy.
"How interesting." Gu Nan, however, picked up the mist mirror with interest and casually erased the mist on it and handed it to Red Tail. "Find people to complete the missions on this as soon as possible."
"Yes," Red Tail hurriedly agreed, and as she took the mist mirror, she could still feel it shaking gently.
Ah Xiu's face was clearly reflected in the mirror.