“A treaty?”

“Fascinating, isn’t it?” Nie Chenhui sang as he took a bite of the pastry in Ge Nianlan’s hand.

Ge Nianlan’s expression pinched. He placed the pastry down and brushed his hands together. “Why is a treaty needed?”

Nie Chenhui chewed silently and glanced at Ge Nianlan with a raised brow. Ge Nianlan tried to hold his composure as he watched the centuries-old skeleton jing in the skin of a teenage boy, chew slowly in order to get on the nerves of a ten-year-old.

Even the swallowing part was loud and obnoxious.

“What do you see here, Young Lord?” Nie Chenhui asked with a grandiose gesture towards the large map, pinned to the board behind him.

“A map of the continent,” Ge Nianlan said.

“Correct! And what do you see here?” Nie Chenhui pointed to a long strip between two of the landforms.

“A river.”

“Also correct! Now, let me teach you a few words. This says Yinxue Region. This over here says Yunheng Region,” Nie Chenhui explained. He gestured to another area. “What is this?”

“A…a river?”

“Correct again!” Nie Chenhui praised exaggeratedly. He clapped his hands together. “Now, what do you think is different between this river and the first river?”

Ge Nianlan pushed aside his annoyance and scrutinized the map. The second sliver started inland and eventually either led into a larger body of water or out into the ocean. However, the first river was like a cut down the middle, with both ends leaking out into the ocean. The more Ge Nianlan stared at it, the more confused he felt.

“With…how separated these two masses of land are,” Ge Nianlan hesitantly started, “Why is this still considered one continent?”

“What an outstanding question!” Nie Chenhui said. He stood up, with a slight rock to his steps, and sat down on the long table in front of the map. While gesticulating, Nie Chenhui explained, “These two land masses used to be one. This river, that cuts the two land masses in half, is called the River of Forgotten Souls or, colloquially, Sijun River. Do you see this area over here?”

Ge Nianlan nodded.

“This is where the Yellow Springs are said to begin,” Nie Chenhui said with a smile.

Ge Nianlan couldn’t help but note how oddly white the skeleton jing's teeth were.

“It didn’t used to be like this several hundred thousand years ago,” Nie Chenhui said. “Before, the Ghost Region and the Mortal Realm were two separate entities, but because of a big war between righteous cultivators and devil cultivators, the entire Three Realms were thrown into chaos. There are even rumors that gods, who have not shown their faces in centuries, had descended to help the righteous cultivators battle against evil!”

“And in the end, the righteous cultivators won?” Ge Nianlan asked.

Nie Chenhui cackled evilly. Ge Nianlan was fascinated by the glint in the skeleton jing's eyes. “No, Young Lord! The devil cultivators won.”

Ge Nianlan frowned slightly. “Then, the world now…”

“Let me finish first,” Nie Chenhui said with a slight wave of his hand. “No! Wait, actually, let me tell you how they lost, haha! It’s actually quite amusing, Young Lord. You’ll get a chuckle out of it.”

Ge Nianlan sat straighter at attention, waiting for Nie Chenhui to speak.

“So, in the past, the righteous cultivators sure were something! As long as you had a sliver of talent, you could ascend as easily as you are able to buy a bundle of fresh vegetables in the morning market,” Nie Chenhui said. “It was their glory days. And at the head of it all was a righteous, heroic man, titled ‘Lord Immortal Hanqing’.”

“It sounds like Lord Immortal Hanjing,” Ge Nianlan commented.

“Oh, one thing at a time, please! The ‘han’ characters are different! And it’s qing not jing,” Nie Chenhui said. “I should make sure to tell Lord Jia to pay attention to your pronunciation during your lessons.”

Ge Nianlan pouted. He was working very hard on it, you know…

“Anyway, this Lord Immortal Hanqing was quite a character! In an era where the best was as common as a pebble on the side of the street, he was like the roundest, flattest rock you could find by the riverbed,” Nie Chenhui said.

“Why…that?” Ge Nianlan asked.

“Oh, you should try to find a very round, flat rock one day, Young Lord. The perfect rock to skip across the river is difficult to find but, again, not the worst,” Nie Chenhui rambled. “Anyway—please stop distracting me—he was special. I believe even the gods favored him. At seven, he had already formed a golden core. At ten, he stood at the top with his outstanding swordsmanship. At a hundred, he was breaking through Nascent Soul—don’t look at me like that. Just imagine, hm…it’s as impressive as if a baby who was six months old suddenly started speaking.”

Ge Nianlan gasped in awe.

“Exactly. So, this Lord Immortal Hanqing is a very outstanding person! He was dedicated to protecting the people, loyal to his sect, and most importantly he believed in the truest and most absolute form of justice. I’m sure people thought he was a stick-in-the-mud for being such a stickler for the law, but in some ways, they should have been grateful,” Nie Chenhui said. He smiled. “Young Lord, please take this story as a lesson—humans are fickle.

“Lord Immortal Hanqing put his life on the line, time after time. He fought hard, won many battles, and never protested even when his comrades threw him to the frontlines to be gnawed at and eaten by the most gruesome of dark arts that the devil cultivators had to offer,” Nie Chenhui said. He lifted a hand and Ge Nianlan watched as a swirl of dark energy was conjured at his fingertips. “Devil qi—what do you know about it, Young Lord?”

“Some might say that it is the gathering of the world’s most negative emotions. It can damage one’s heart and pollute one’s mind,” Ge Nianlan said.

“Yes,” Nie Chenhui said. He picked up a rag doll beside him. The dark energy slowly coiled around the doll’s neck and engulfed its head. “Now, what do you think might happen if someone who was the complete opposite of this horrid method, was subjected to such disgusting, wretched things for an extended period of time?”

“They…” Ge Nianlan had yet to finish his thought when the doll’s head popped off and rolled to his feet. “Oh.”

“He was a great cultivator, but devil cultivators are very creative in how they take down their enemies,” Nie Chenhui said as he dangled the doll by its arm. “Besides, regardless of who you are, if you are the human meat shield that takes every attack first, there is bound to be resentment! So, the devil cultivators took advantage of that. Slowly, but surely, Lord Immortal Hanqing’s mind was corrupted. He was weakened by his injuries and soon, he wasn’t able to resist the Heart Demons anymore. Then, one day, he fell into Qi Deviation!”

Ge Nianlan’s eyes widened.

He remembered the term, because that was what Ge Jinsheng had died from in the future he had seen. Due to some kind of guilt, as well as other previous afflictions, the Devil Lord had gone crazy and completely flattened Black Mane Palace to the ground. Afterwards, Ge Jinsheng was eliminated by Huai Zhen and Huai Zhen became the Supreme Devil God. Without Ge Jinsheng to ground him, Huai Zhen then turned around and killed Baili Liuye as well and, as his final act of revenge, burnt the Mortal Realm to a crisp!

Though Ge Nianlan didn’t quite understand why he was able to see a future past his own end. Perhaps this was another way the cursed artifact drove people crazy. If your own death wasn’t enough, then see the end of the world!

“Lord Immortal Hanqing tried his best to hide his ailment, but whenever his resentment grew, he would Qi Deviate. And, one day, he was unable to hold back. With a flick of his wrist, he flattened an entire forest! And then, suddenly, everyone who was ever grateful to him turned their back on him. They vilified him, saying that he was a monster that must be stopped! If he ended up completely falling to the devil path and going insane, then the Devil Cultivators had another upper hand in this already uphill battle! So, they had to eliminate him.

“And that, they did,” Nie Chenhui giggled. “After Lord Immortal Hanqing’s death, the righteous cultivators lost their pillar, and they collapsed completely. They were unable to battle anymore. When they were so busy dealing with something that wasn’t even a problem, the devil cultivators were working hard to disrupt the Dragon Veins that gave these cultivators their power. And they succeeded! If it weren’t for those god and deities, I fear that there would not be any spiritual cultivators in the world today.”

“So, how did they help?” Ge Nianlan asked.

“Five people,” Nie Chenhui said. He drew out five circles on a piece of paper. “Each person prayed to a separate god and created a matrix by planting nine trees in the shape of an octagon, all throughout the continent. These nine trees would then connect to one tree in the center of the matrix. It is said that Lord Immortal Hanqing’s dearest friend was the one who headed this all. And she sacrificed herself to make this matrix work. This is the birth of the Dragon Tree.”