Inner Demons Volume 1 Chapter 25

Now Li YunXin saw why this piece of jade had been called the Illuminated Jade Slips, because it WAS illuminated.

Since his arrival in this world, he had been deeply impressed by many things -- For example, creating salt by painting on a paper, demons, flying swords, and people’s beliefs in cultivating to become immortal.

However, even a combination of these, wouldn't be a match for this moment - the moment when he saw the sentence.

His chest was suddenly filled with excitement mixed with other emotions. He had the experience of 2 lives, but now he was still shocked.

It was...turned on.

After recovering from the shock, a question came to his mind.

Since he found this jade slip hidden by his parents, he had tried countless method to activate it, so that it would grant him of some kind of miraculous power to save him from that dangerous situation. However, it acted like a normal piece of gla.s.s -- it showed no reaction to his experiment. When he transported his spiritual energy, which he gained by cultivating the Power of Water and Clouds, into the jade slip, his energy was like clay oxen entering the sea[1].

However, now at this night, it was turned on.

Holding it in his hand, Li YunXin spent 2 minutes to be surprised, and used another 3 minutes to think of all the reason he could find.

In his conclusion, the most possible reason was... the demons.

He had tried many thing. He dipped it into water, burned it with fire, burned it with sun light, and transported spiritual energy into it, but none of them worked.
If there was one thing special which happened to him these days, it must be...

Running into great demons.

First, it was Lord Nine, and then, there were Bai YunXin and her maid.

Maybe...it was the demonic energy of the great demons which affected this stuff, but why would the Illuminated Jade Slips, which was left by the Painting Saint 2,000 years ago, have been activated by demonic energy?

Then what was the Painting Saint!?

A strange but familiar feeling flowed in Li YunXin’s chest. It was a warm stream, which he had thought that he would never feel again.

Now he knew that, in this world...

He was not alone.

At least, there had been someone with him.

He took a deep breath, ignored the noisy cat demon, and tapped 9 times under that line of words with his shaking finger.

The jade slip remained silent.

He thought for a while, and tapped for another 18 times.

This time, with a piece of gentle and stunning music, the words on the jade’s surface disappeared, and the light on it started to flow. Then Li YunXin saw dense words on it.

Li YunXin didn’t care about the content, instead, he checked the expressions, tones and style of the words. Then he closed his eyes, and breathed out. He looked at the top right corner of the jade slip, and tapped on it for a few times.

As he did this, this “most valuable treasure of painters”, had become a piece of transparent gla.s.s again.

He thought he had figure out how to turn this thing on, probably.

Although he had only read a bit of the content inside, he understood why it hade been called the most valuable treasure of painters.

Cultivators needed experience to pa.s.s their trials. They needed to feel everything and every emotions in this world. However, a person’s life, could be hard, or easy. A life including a comeback from its hardest time, would be impressive enough. If a person could have experience more than 3 mental states, his life story could be regarded as a legend.

It was so depressing that life was always so short. For the cultivators, their time was even more valuable. If they had no time to feel the hundreds of emotions by themselves, they must get a.s.sistance from the outside. In this case, the artworks of the painters worked as good as the elixirs, while they were totally different.
However, the painters were humans,too. Their own life experience was also limited. What is more, in the ancient ages, when the painters were still called pigment priests, they were disciples of one of the 3 Taoist Sects, and lived fine lives. How were they supposed to gain the experience of a hard life?

A person’s inner demons and karma were usually the result of his greed, delusion and aversion, and these 3 poisons were usually a result of the hards.h.i.+p of his life.

That’s why there was few famous paintings about hard lives.

The most famous painting in this world should have been “A Dream of the Red Mansion” by the ancient painter XueQin the Immortal[2].

XueQin the Immortal was born in a cultivators’ family. His parents were attached to one of the grotto-heavens, and were both really powerful at that time. Thus he had enjoyed all kinds of honors and wealth when he was a boy. However, in his teenage, the painting sect met its wane, so he had also experienced the cruelty of the world, and had saw both good and dark sides of people. Since he started his life of a hermit, he had spent ten years on “A Dream of the Red Mansion”. This immortal master used all the knowledge and powers he got, and put all the joys and sorrows he had experienced into this painting. When this great piece of artwork was finally done, he died in his exhaustion.

Later, during the war, 7 chi[3] of “A Dream of the Red Mansion” had been destroyed from its end. Despite of this, it was still treasured by the cultivators - It was regarded as the second precious painting in the world, just below “The Eight Ancient Scrolls”, which was created by the Painting Saint.

It was said that if a cultivator had examined this painting carefully enough, he would be able to experience endless misery, so that his heart of Dao would be quenched.

And now in the Illuminated Jade Slips...

There was something even more precious.

Li YunXin realized that, if he could find a stable source of demoniac energy for this jade slip, he would be able to learn and digest all the knowledge within it... By doing this, he could probably become a legend, like the Painting Saint who lived 2,000 years ago.

He would be able to sense all 7 emotions and 6 desires of people, control his sorrow and joy as he wish, paint the flowers and beasts with their every details, and when he released his brush, even 10 thousand li[4] of landscape could be placed on one piece of paper.

However, he needed to solve his current issues at first.

That demon Bai YunXin wanted to follow him. He wouldn’t take her sword to Wei City as she wished -- That sword must be a beacon, with which the demon could easily find him.

Thus he’d better go somewhere else.

He needed to take this little cat demon with him, since it had demoniac energy, which he could use.

He also wanted to figure out the truth behind all the hiding of his parents, and this hunt after him.

All 3 priests from the school had been killed by the demons. Let those who cast their greedy eyes on the Illuminated Jade Slips cause some troubles for the demons!

At the same time, he would find a good place to study it, dig out the secrets of the Painting Saint, and then...

Then he would think about his plan for the future.

He breathed out, calmed down, and put the jade slip into his robe: “Let’s move. If you want this body, bind it, and follow me. When I find a better place for you to stay, let this girl rest in peace.”

The cat demon was pleased about this, she could only use this body temporarily though. Seeing Li YunXin walked away, she warped her belly with the torn-up clothes quickly, and followed him with unstable steps.

Li YunXin and the cat demon travel in the forest with alert. After 15 minutes, they finally saw the gra.s.sland outside the forest -- it was the direction where they came from, when they were escorted by the bandits.

He stopped behind a tree, and peeped with alert.

Suddenly, the cat demon yelled with surprise. Then she bent over with excitement, and reached out her hand. She looked at Li YunXin’s back, and purse her lips. She wanted to do something, but was afraid to be criticized.

Finally, her nature overcame her worries. Squinting, she patted that thing on Li YunXin’s waist really fast, and giggled: “Yee? Em, ha, it’s back. Em...Ha-ha, it’s fun, yee?”

Li YunXin furrowed his eyebrows, and said: “What are you…”

His words stopped half-way, when he saw what was on his waist.

That sword which Bai YunXin gave him, and was thrust deeply into the ground by him, had come back  on his waist by itself.

Translator's notes:
[1]Clay oxen entering the sea:
[2]“A Dream of the Red Mansion红楼一梦图” by the ancient painter XueQin the Immortal雪沁真人:
May be referring to "Dream of the Red Chamber" by Cao XueQin(1715-1763) , while it's actually a novel instead of a painting in real life.
Xue=Snow
Qin=To seep
[3]Chi:A Chinese unit of length.
7 chi≈161.7 cm
[4]Li:Another Chinese unit of length.
10,000 li≈4,158 km

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Translator: Rienne