Chapter 54
Alzheimer's disease.
What kind of illness was that?
After the initial shock passed, everyone fell into uneasy contemplation.
Judging from the name alone, it sounded like some kind of senility that struck in old age—a ridiculous notion.
Could cultivators really suffer from something so strange?
Almost instinctively, everyone turned toward the most authoritative figure present.
The Medical Sage.
The Medical Sage: "..."
Wait.
What exactly was that voice just now?
He glanced around in astonishment, only to discover that everyone else seemed perfectly calm, as though nothing unusual had happened at all.
He opened his mouth on reflex, wanting to ask what was going on.
But the moment he did, a terrifying force slammed down on him.
His throat tightened violently, as if an invisible hand had wrapped around his neck. The pressure was so overwhelming he couldn't utter a single sound.
Worse still, an instinctive sense of danger screamed through his mind-if he forced himself to speak, he might actually explode and die on the spot.
"Senior Brother, stop talking immediately!"
Shi Hua's expression changed the instant she noticed the abnormal flush spreading across his face. Remembering her own earlier experience, she hurriedly sent him a voice transmission.
Among everyone present, only the Medical Sage was hearing Lou Yuqing's inner thoughts for the first time. The sudden impact had caught him completely unprepared.
Hearing Shi Hua's warning, he immediately swallowed back the words at the tip of his tongue.
At once, the suffocating pressure vanished.
"Huff—"
The Medical Sage exhaled sharply, cold sweat soaking the back of his robes. He lifted a sleeve and wiped his forehead, his usually elegant demeanor nowhere to be seen.
That force had been far too tyrannical.
His thoughts churned violently as he looked toward Lou Yuqing again, his gaze turning indescribably complicated.
Lou Yuqing, meanwhile, remained blissfully unaware. She was currently staring at the gossip panel, searching for information on Alzheimer's disease herself.
Honestly, she found it hard to believe too. How could a transformed great demon suffer from something like this?
That kind of illness sounded more appropriate for mortals.
At the same time, faced with everyone's expectant looks, the Medical Sage could only shake his head helplessly.
Since the day he began practicing medicine, he had never encountered such a disease before—he had not even heard of it.
Suddenly, Shi Hua's eyes lit up as realization struck her.
"Senior Bai Yuan is a demon, not a human," she transmitted quickly. "Maybe Alzheimer's is an illness unique to demons. Senior Brother only studies human ailments, so it's normal he's never seen it before."
Everyone immediately found the explanation reasonable and turned toward Bai Yuan once more.
The Primordial White Turtle paused mid-motion, fingers stroking his snow-white beard as he eyed them suspiciously.
Something about the way they were looking at him felt... strange.
"Senior Bai Yuan," Sect Leader Qingxuzi said gently, gesturing for Shi Hua to activate the transmission stone, "listen to Lingzhu's voice. It may help jog your memory."
The transmission stone flickered.
A rough female voice burst out immediately: "Did you ask Old White Turtle already? What did he say? Back then, when I went to Wendao Sect, he agreed so readily!"
Lou Yuqing jerked her head up in shock.
That voice again?!
Beside her, Si Nidie's eyes widened slightly.
The lofty, majestic image she had imagined of the Spirit Ape guardian beast shattered on the spot.
Who would have thought such a stunning, legendary spirit beast would speak with a voice this aggressively rugged?
The two exchanged a silent look, each seeing the same disbelief reflected in the other's eyes.
"I seem to remember... a little," the Ancient White Turtle murmured slowly.
He lowered his head, painstakingly digging through the fog of his memories.
A long while later, he finally sighed.
"I still can't recall it."
Everyone: "..."
This illness really was serious.
Shi Hua could only helplessly explain the situation to Lingzhu through the transmission stone.
"We still don't know exactly what kind of illness this is, but one thing is certain—Senior Bai Yuan's memory has deteriorated."
Inside the distant cave, Lingzhu Zhenren immediately began pacing anxiously around the stone table.
"Old White Turtle's condition has gotten worse," she muttered. "When I saw him before, he clearly said he was much better."
Though she kept calling him "Old White Turtle," her attachment to him was anything but shallow. Otherwise, she never would have entrusted her child to him in the first place.
Years ago, disaster had struck the Spirit Ape clan.
Lingzhu's parents had been ordered into battle, only to suffer an ambush on the way. Gravely injured and with no other choice, they used a teleportation array to send the still-young Lingzhu thousands of miles away in hopes she might survive.
By sheer coincidence, the previous Sect Leader of Wendao Sect found the cub just before a demonic beast could devour her.
He saved her life and brought her back to the sect.
But the sect leader was burdened with countless responsibilities and couldn't personally raise a spirit beast cub, so he entrusted the task to the Primordial White Turtle.
Until she reached adulthood, the Primordial White Turtle had practically raised her himself.
So Lingzhu had always known about his condition.
The first time it happened, he forgot to bring her the sweet fruits he had promised. She became so angry she ignored him for three entire days.
Later, when incidents like that became more and more frequent, she gradually stopped minding.
Back then, Lingzhu had only thought the old turtle was becoming forgetful.
She never imagined that one day, he would forget even her.
Hearing Lingzhu Zhenren's voice through the transmission stone, the Primordial White Turtle frowned slightly.
This junior was rather rude.
How could she keep calling him "Old White Turtle"?
And yet, strangely enough, he felt no anger at all.
Instead, the name settled over him with a familiar warmth, as though he had long since grown used to hearing it from her.
Lingzhu...
The Primordial White Turtle silently repeated the name in his heart.
An indescribable emptiness spread through his chest.
He knew instinctively—he had forgotten something very important.
"Zaomo, we can't delay any longer. We need to return to the sect immediately."
Lingzhu Zhenren abruptly rose to her feet. Anxiety over the White Turtle's condition had already overwhelmed everything else.
Before her words had even fully fallen, she transformed into a streak of golden light and shot straight out of the cave.
"Wait—!"
Zaomo didn't even have time to stop her before she vanished.
Left behind, he sighed helplessly toward the direction she had disappeared in. Then he quickly pulled out an array plate and cast several hand seals into it.
Light burst outward instantly.
The entire cave distorted, disguising itself as nothing more than an ordinary mountain wall.
Only after confirming the formation had activated did he hurriedly chase after Lingzhu.
—
[Finally found it!]
Lou Yuqing stared at the bottom of the gossip panel, nearly moved to tears by how hard this information had been to dig up.
Lines of text slowly surfaced before her eyes—
[The Primordial White Turtle inherited bloodline powers from the Primordial Era and was born with the innate divine ability of petrification.]
Petrification...
Si Nidie immediately caught the key point.
Her gaze unconsciously drifted toward the scattered gray-white stone fragments still littering the ground.
So that was it.
Earlier, when Senior White Turtle looked like a giant rock... was that actually his petrified state?
Was that how he slept?
Meanwhile, Sect Leader Qingxuzi and the others understood the terror of that divine ability far more deeply.
Three hundred years ago, during one of the darkest periods in Wendao Sect's history, two major sects learned through unknown means that Immortal Venerable Zixiao of Wendao Sect had entered closed-door cultivation for a life-and-death breakthrough.
The two forces secretly joined hands and launched a surprise assault from a million miles away.
Everyone understood one thing clearly: Without additional Nascent Soul cultivators entering the battlefield, victory would ultimately be decided by the strength of each side's Nascent Soul experts.
Whichever side possessed more Nascent Soul cultivators would claim victory.
Against one enemy sect, Wendao Sect could have crushed them decisively.
Against two at once, however, even they began to falter.
After all, the enemy side possessed three to four more Nascent Soul cultivators than they did.
At the time, Immortal Venerable Zixiao had already reached a critical point in his breakthrough to late-stage Nascent Soul.
If he forcefully exited seclusion to join the war, he could instantly reverse the battle.
But the price would be catastrophic.
The backlash from a failed breakthrough could permanently destroy his chances of ever advancing further. In the worst-case scenario, even his cultivation might regress.
And if Wendao Sect lost a Nascent Soul cultivator...
Even if they somehow survived this calamity, other factions would inevitably descend like vultures, repeating the same disaster all over again.
In the cultivation world, strength was everything.
The weak were never worthy of holding vast resources.
If Wendao Sect were carved apart and devoured piece by piece, would it still remain the glorious sect it once was?
Back then, Sect Leader Qingxuzi had faced an impossible choice.
Should he notify Immortal Venerable Zixiao... or not?
This decision would determine the sect's future.
Its continued glory.
Or its decline.
In the end, Qingxuzi gritted his teeth and suppressed the news entirely, leading the whole sect into battle to buy time for Zixiao's breakthrough.
He gambled everything on one possibility—
That Zixiao would break through in time.
But breakthroughs at that realm were never quick. Some took months. Others, years.
Wendao Sect endured for one month using the mountain-protecting formation.
Another month by detonating countless magical artifacts.
Another half-month through sheer consumption of offensive talismans.
And finally—the disciples themselves took to the battlefield.
Blood stained every inch of the sect.
The once-pristine white jade palaces darkened beneath layers of battle and death until, under the cover of night, the entire sect resembled a monstrous beast waiting to devour anyone who approached.
In the end, Wendao Sect was forced into retreat.
To preserve what strength remained, they abandoned most of their territory and withdrew to the nine main peaks and the lands behind them, desperately making their final stand.
Outside the formation barrier, the enemy leader laughed arrogantly.
"You're already exhausted! Surrender now and I may spare your lives. But if you continue resisting, once we break through this place, not a single one of you will escape!"
At that moment, despair spread through the sect like poison.
Some disciples even attempted betrayal.
In the dead of night, they brought Restriction-Breaking Pearls to the formation barrier, planning to shatter it and offer themselves to the enemy sect as proof of loyalty.
Fortunately, Sect Leader Qingxuzi had prepared for such a possibility and swiftly suppressed the rebellion.
And then—the Primordial White Turtle awakened from hibernation.
It crossed space directly into enemy territory. With a single thought, the enemy leader was petrified into stone.
Then the White Turtle lightly tapped the statue with its snow-white shell. The stone body shattered instantly into countless fragments.
The enemy army's morale collapsed on the spot.
And the Primordial White Turtle pressed forward relentlessly.
One after another, five Nascent Soul cultivators died beneath its hands.
No matter how they fled, none escaped.
—
[Senior Bai Yuan's second innate ability is spatial divine power.]
Lou Yuqing was stunned.
Compared to the illusion arts of the Spirit Ape clan, Senior Bai Yuan's abilities were terrifyingly practical in actual combat.
Once targeted by him—death was inevitable.
Sect Leader Qingxuzi recalled the events of that year, his heart heavy with emotion.
That had been the most perilous period in the history of the Wendao Sect. If they had failed to withstand the enemy's assault—if the sect had truly fallen that day—then he would have become a sinner for all eternity.
Fortunately, Senior Bai Yuan had been there.
Though he spent most of his time in deep hibernation, whenever disaster struck, he would awaken and unleash his divine abilities, crushing the enemy's morale in one devastating blow after another.
The Wendao Sect had turned the tide from desperate defense to full counterattack, driving the invaders back and reclaiming their lost territory.
And afterward—Senior Bai Yuan disappeared once more.
No traces left behind. No name. No identity.
The Primordial White Turtle glanced at Sect Leader Qingxuzi with visible confusion, clearly wondering why the man was staring at him with such strange intensity, as though he had saved his entire family line.
Qingxuzi: "..."
No. That was not it at all.
It was reverence.
Admiration.
Gratitude.
Meanwhile, Lou Yuqing's thoughts continued drifting through everyone's minds.
[Senior White Turtle also possesses an ability ordinary people could only dream of. It's because of this ability that the bloodline of the Primordial Era was able to survive until now.]
[Among the Primordial beings of his generation, aside from a tiny handful who preserved their bloodlines through special methods, almost all of them had already perished long ago.]
Si Nidie leaned back sharply.
Damn... that incredible?
She immediately pricked up her ears and listened even more carefully.
[That ability is longevity.]
[Tortoise-type spirit beasts are naturally long-lived to begin with. Once they reach the Nascent Soul stage, living for hundreds of thousands of years is already normal.]
[And with the blessing of Senior White Turtle's innate longevity talent, he easily survived for over a million years.]
[But only half of that time was spent awake. The other half... was spent asleep.]
Everyone fell silent.
[As time passed, Senior White Turtle's waking periods became shorter and shorter, while his hibernation periods grew longer and longer.]
[Now, he rarely awakens at all.]
[At the same time, his memories gradually fade away during those endless periods of sleep. And when the day comes that he can no longer awaken...]
Lou Yuqing paused.
[That will be Senior White Turtle's true death.]
The words landed like thunder.
Everyone felt their minds buzz violently.
Si Nidie covered her mouth at once, barely suppressing the sound that almost escaped her throat. Her gaze fixed on the white-robed old man standing before them, emotions surging chaotically in her chest.
So...
Senior White Turtle was already nearing the end?
"What's with you juniors today?" the white-robed elder said helplessly, shaking his head. "If you want to look at me, just look openly. Do you think I'd refuse?"
He clearly had no idea what awaited him.
Or perhaps... he had already forgotten.
The realization only made the atmosphere heavier.
Sect Leader Qingxuzi forced himself to speak. "We were disrespectful. Lingzhu said she's already on her way back to the sect. Senior... once you meet her, perhaps speaking with her will help you recover some of your memories."
His voice carried an unmistakable weight.
Longevity was not immortality.
The price of surviving so long was endless sleep... and endless forgetting.
If Senior Bai Yuan regained all his memories now, then sooner or later, he would also remember the approach of his own death.
And that would be far crueler.
The white-robed elder remained completely unaware of the thoughts weighing on everyone's minds. Seeing their bitter expressions, he merely lost interest and lazily shifted his gaze away.
Then suddenly, his eyes paused.
Among the crowd, one person stood out.
Lou Yuqing.
She smiled at him.
Unlike the others, her eyes held no sorrow.
Because compared to the fate displayed on the system panel, the outcome before them now was already infinitely kinder.
To have a chance to change destiny... that alone was an enormous blessing.
Then her thoughts slowly echoed once more in everyone's ears.
[Several years ago, Senior White Turtle awakened from hibernation and was sunbathing by the middle of the lake when he happened to run into True Person Lingzhu, who had returned to the sect.]
[She entrusted the little monkey to him and asked him to pass a message to the sect.]
[Unexpectedly, not long after Lingzhu Zhenren left, Senior White Turtle's Alzheimer's suddenly relapsed. He sealed himself away and entered a petrified state.]
[The little monkey circled around the stone sculpture for ten whole days.]
[During that time, it tried desperately to crack the stone open. Its hands became swollen and red from pounding on it, but the sculpture never moved at all.]
Everyone's hearts tightened involuntarily.
[Later, it became too hungry to endure any longer and finally left the back lake. It sneaked into the spirit herb garden and stole thousand-year-old cocktail flowers.]
[After that, it committed several more crimes.]
The atmosphere abruptly became strange.
Even the heaviness from earlier cracked slightly.
The little monkey... really had been quite busy.
[Then one day, it wandered into Qishan's spirit fields to steal spirit rice and met Ruan Qingzhu there.]
[Under Ruan Qingzhu's careful care, the little monkey slowly adapted to that kind of life.]
[It ran freely through the forests and mountains, rolled beneath waterfalls, and even piled up fruits to brew monkey wine...]
[But those peaceful days came to an abrupt end after Steward Chen witnessed it using its divine abilities.]
The atmosphere instantly turned cold again.
Everyone already knew what happened afterward. After all, the case had already occurred.
And Shi Hua herself had personally handled it.
As she listened to Lou Yuqing's thoughts, a faint unease gradually rose in her chest.
If everything had ended well, there would have been no need for Yuqing to explain all this.
Which meant—something bad was coming.
Shi Hua's heart clenched hard.
[Steward Chen feared his own involvement in capturing the little monkey might leave behind evidence, so he secretly contacted a spirit beast trafficker from the black market.]
[While Ruan Qingzhu was away, the trafficker proposed a deal.]
[Ruan Qingzhu refused to sell the little monkey. Enraged, the trafficker kidnapped her parents to threaten her.]
[Even after struggling for a long time, Ruan Qingzhu still refused. Instead, she used a Thunderfire Pearl to threaten the trafficker.]
[But Yuan Chenxing suddenly slammed into the door at that exact moment. The Thunderfire Pearl exploded, killing Ruan Qingzhu and the others.]
[All clues were erased. Steward Chen escaped completely unscathed.]
Shi Hua's lips gradually paled.
Just as she feared.
The little monkey had intelligence and divine powers, but it still didn't understand the saying: you can't judge a person by appearances.
That was why it had fallen for Steward Chen's deception so easily.
The Medical Sage quietly grasped Shi Hua's trembling hand and transmitted his voice softly. "Don't be afraid. Yuqing is telling us what truly happened. The little monkey is still alive now."
Shi Hua gave a faint hum in response.
Outwardly, she remained calm. But inwardly, anxiety had already begun spreading uncontrollably.
What if the little monkey had truly vanished?
What if Lingzhu rushed back to the sect only to discover her child missing?
They had already claimed ignorance regarding the little monkey's existence. If Lingzhu refused to believe them, would she think they were merely making excuses?
And what if—Senior White Turtle passed away before Lingzhu arrived?
If that happened, they truly wouldn't even be able to explain themselves if they jumped into the Yellow River.
Just as Shi Hua's thoughts spiraled, Lou Yuqing's inner voice continued.
[After waiting a long time for Ruan Qingzhu to return, the little monkey eventually ran back to the rear lake to seek help from Senior White Turtle—but Senior White Turtle was still unconscious.]
[Coincidentally, Steward Chen also arrived at the rear lake that day and happened to encounter the little monkey.]
[The greed he had barely suppressed immediately resurfaced. Using Ruan Qingzhu as bait, he lowered the little monkey's guard and easily drugged it before taking it away.]
Shi Hua slowly closed her eyes.
Then Lou Yuqing revealed the rest.
[Steward Chen concealed his identity and passed through multiple middlemen before finally selling the little monkey to a Beast Taming Sect.]
[That sect was neither fully righteous nor entirely demonic. After acquiring the little monkey, they immediately killed Steward Chen.]
Served him right.
Si Nidie instantly let out a viciously satisfied snort.
"To bargain with a tiger over its prey... he should've expected to die."
Shi Hua's expression darkened further.
The little monkey had actually ended up in the hands of a Beast Taming Sect.
As a beast tamer herself, she knew all too well what methods some beast tamers employed.
When faced with a top-tier spirit beast like the Spirit Ape, they would stop at absolutely nothing to force a contract.
"A willing contract?" Those people would sneer at such a thing.
They had endless torture methods at their disposal.
Once the spirit beast's will was completely crushed, it would naturally become obedient property.
Sect Leader Qingxuzi and the others clearly thought of the same thing. Their faces instantly darkened with fury.
[The young master of the Beast Taming Sect had reached the age to contract a natal spirit beast and applied to form a contract with the little monkey.]
[The little monkey refused without hesitation.]
[The young master had been spoiled since childhood and always got whatever he wanted.]
[Since soft methods failed, they switched to force.]
[The little monkey endured three entire months of torture. Its body became covered in wounds.]
[At the end, the young master gave it one final chance. But it still refused.]
[Then came the cruelest torment of all. Under the final wave of mental torture, the little monkey's consciousness finally collapsed.]
Lou Yuqing abruptly stopped there.
Her eyes closed tightly.
She couldn't imagine what the little monkey had endured.
The system panel even contained audio and visual records.
But she didn't dare click on them.
Just reading the text already made her feel suffocated.
If she actually saw it... she didn't know whether she could bear it.
"Damn it!"
Shi Hua finally exploded.
A punch slammed outward.
Azure spiritual power shot across the lake like a streak of lightning, instantly blasting open a pitch-black void above the water before the space slowly repaired itself.
The Primordial White Turtle looked at her in surprise. What was wrong with this girl?
[What's wrong with Elder Shi Hua?]
Lou Yuqing also turned toward her in confusion.
Under everyone's gazes, Shi Hua forcefully suppressed the rage boiling inside her chest and replied stiffly, "I'm angry at Lingzhu for being irresponsible."
This was not merely an excuse.
Shi Hua genuinely resented Lingzhu a little.
As a mother, how could she have ignored her child for so many years?
Lou Yuqing accepted the explanation without suspicion.
The Primordial White Turtle, however, clearly didn't believe it.
Shi Hua's anger far exceeded what her words suggested.
Still, he was too lazy to think deeply about it.
Meanwhile, Lou Yuqing's thoughts continued.
[Three days after Steward Chen abducted the little monkey, Senior White Turtle finally broke free from his petrified state and awakened.]
[But by then, he had forgotten everything again. His mind was blank.]
[He vaguely felt that he had forgotten something important, but no matter how hard he tried, he could no longer remember.]
[And then... his time finally came.]
[On a beautiful evening, he quietly sat beside the lake in meditation and passed away. His body transformed into a stone turtle sculpture.]
Everyone's hearts sank completely.
So this awakening... was Senior White Turtle's last.
The Primordial White Turtle had originally been annoyed by everyone's strange gazes and was already considering leaving when he suddenly heard Lou Yuqing speak aloud.
"Senior, do you have any unfulfilled wishes?"
The Primordial White Turtle paused. "My wish?"
Lou Yuqing nodded.
The old man chuckled. "You really are an interesting little girl.
"My wish... hm. Probably to recover my memories." He spoke lightly, almost jokingly. "I don't know why, but I feel like... if I can't remember, I'll regret it forever."
A deep sorrow surfaced in everyone's eyes.
Because if Senior White Turtle truly regained his memories—then he would also learn how tragically the little monkey had died.
And the guilt alone might destroy him.
Fortunately... none of it had happened yet.
There was still time to change everything.
Then Lou Yuqing's thoughts echoed once more.
[When the little monkey died, perhaps the mother-child bond reacted. An overwhelming grief suddenly surged through Lingzhu Zhenren's heart.]
[She immediately contacted Shi Hua to ask about the little monkey's condition.]