The soul transference technique, or yí hún zhī shù, allows a person's soul to be moved into an animal's body. However, this is a heaven-defying art, and the practitioner will suffer divine retribution, eventually dying of widespread bodily decay. Few in the Xuanmen would perform such a forbidden art for others. Moreover, the animal into which the soul is transferred cannot be just any creature; it must be one with a certain level of cultivation, and such beings are rare and difficult to find.
To find an animal with enough cultivation to house Li Ke's soul, Miao Feng ventured deep into the mountains. She finally found a green banded snake with a single golden line just one day before Li Ke's scheduled execution.
Although this snake was not Miao Feng's ideal vessel for soul transference, the urgency of the situation left her no time to search for another. Out of necessity, she had to make do.
After finding the green banded snake, she instantly teleported to the imperial prison. Initially, she considered swapping herself for Li Ke, thus sparing him the indignity of inhabiting a snake's body. But, as she had anticipated, Li Ke adamantly refused her offer. In the end, she resorted to the soul transference technique, moving Li Ke's soul into the green banded snake that had cultivated for over two hundred years.
From then on, she took the little snake and hid in the deep mountains to cultivate. Li Ke was initially resistant. The idea of a prince becoming a lowly snake crawling on the ground was so unbearable that he contemplated death many times. Later, Miao Feng used some unknown method to gain control over Li Ke, promising him that she would find a way to restore his human form.
Decades passed, and Miao Feng realized she had been deceived by the book. Li Ke's soul was locked irrevocably within the snake's body. Despite her best efforts, she could not extract his soul. Furthermore, if he died in his current serpentine form, he would remain a snake in his next life.
She had intended to save Li Ke, but had instead doomed him. Even facing beheading, he at least had the chance to be human again in his next life. Now, he was destined to be a snake, life after life…
She had condemned the person she cared for most to eternally dwell in the animal realm. Regret and helplessness tormented her daily. The divine retribution from her forbidden art also caused her unbearable agony, with large parts of her body decaying and proving impervious to any medicine, leaving her disfigured.
Adding to her woes was a pressing concern: the green banded snake, having cultivated for over two centuries, could continue to live through further cultivation. However, Miao Feng was still mortal. Coupled with the heavenly punishment, as she neared a hundred years of age, Miao Feng knew her own life was drawing to a close.
A person's death is like a lamp extinguished. Their destined connection should have ended, yet Miao Feng could not let go of her feelings for Li Ke. She also could not bear the thought of Li Ke being unable to become human again due to her mistakes. Thus, she gambled all her cultivation, and the fortunes of her descendants for generations to come, by locking her soul consciousness. This way, even through reincarnation, she would not forget her experiences in this life, including her deep affection for Li Ke.
She was determined to find a way to restore his human form. If not in one life, then in two; if not in two, then in all lives to come. This unwavering resolve was etched into her very soul.
She settled Li Ke in a cave on Mount Baekdu that was perpetually frozen. Snakes naturally hibernate in winter, and despite being a human soul, Li Ke could not resist the snake's innate nature. He fell into a deep slumber in the cave.
With Li Ke safely settled, Miao Feng peacefully concluded her life, which was perhaps a blend of the beautiful and the absurd.
In her second life, she was born the daughter of a farmer. Due to her sealed soul consciousness, she possessed memories of her past life from birth. However, as an infant, she was unable to act independently. She never played with children her age as a child would. To observers, she seemed to be engaged in inexplicable activities.
She performed strange actions daily, leading her family to believe they had given birth to a simpleminded child and to largely leave her to her own devices. No one realized that this seemingly small child was actually cultivating the highest forms of Xuanmen arts.
By the time she was eight or nine years old, she ran away from home and traveled a thousand miles to the ancient ice cave on Mount Baekdu. She retrieved the green banded snake, and thus began their intertwined fate, life after life.
Despite Miao Feng's exceptional talent, each life required her to start cultivating anew. Moreover, the forbidden soul-sealing technique she employed meant that she never lived past thirty years old in any life. She also suffered greatly before her deaths. Even so, her desire to restore Li Ke to human form never wavered, nor was it ever realized.
Until a hundred years ago, she encountered a genius in metaphysics. A simple exchange of ideas enlightened her, leading her to discover a method to restore Li Ke's human form. This method involved utilizing the resentful energy of vengeful spirits. Li Ke would absorb sufficient vengeful energy, which would then be transformed into immense power. This power would be used to force his soul out of the snake's body and then injected into a human body.
However, this required a substantial amount of vengeful energy. Over a hundred years ago, it was a time of widespread warfare, famine, and rampant spirits. Collecting vengeful energy was easy.
Unfortunately, Miao Feng's lifespan was too short. After less than three years, she was on the verge of death. Entrusting Li Ke to an unrelated person worried her, as she feared that person might have ill intentions and harm him. Thus, she was forced to halt her undertaking.
This interruption lasted for nearly a century.
Her actions across multiple lifetimes were too contrary to the heavenly way, and she was punished with eighty years of imprisonment in the Avici hell. Upon her subsequent reincarnation as a human, the nation had become peaceful, making the collection of vengeful energy exceedingly difficult.
Out of necessity, she devised this plan: using Li Ke's own yin coffin to gather souls, and personally intervening to foster the formation of the blood-clothed vengeful spirit. All this was done so that Li Ke could absorb enough vengeful energy to be reborn as a human.
At this point, Ye Huo Huo and the others understood. "My Master once told me a story about a Xuanmen master a thousand years ago who used the art of instant teleportation to easily decapitate an enemy commander in their camp and then vanish gracefully before everyone's eyes. Could that have been this elder? It's just… the subsequent departure and the actual events differ. You didn't leave using teleportation; you were rescued and taken away by Li Ke."
Miao Feng lowered her gaze, looking at the small, jade-green snake in her palm. Her eyes were filled with tenderness, her thoughts seemingly returning to a thousand years ago, to that night in the enemy camp. For that one glance amidst the flashing blades, she had lingered for a millennium and endured a millennium of torment.
"Do you regret your decision then?" Ye Huo Huo voiced the question everyone wished to ask.