Chapter 719 — The Bride in the Cold Coffin

The Woodcutter Sage stopped before one cell, studied the edict, and said in a low voice, "My eldest disciple once entrusted to my third disciple some geographical charts to pass on to me. One of those charts was a map of the Dark Prison, and the place marked upon it was the deepest point of the Dark Prison."

His face darkened. The founding patriarch of the Heaven Sage Sect had done many things in his search for the sage's way — many things even the Woodcutter Sage would not have dared to think or to do.

Yet to this day this eldest disciple had not been seen again; no one knew whether he lived or died.

"He must have come to the Dark Capital, and so wished to send word to me. On the map Shen Mu gave me, at the marked place there was a tiny rune — left by my eldest disciple — and this rune-mark is the sign of the divine ability Di Yiyue most commonly used."

Here he fell silent, deeply worried for the founding patriarch's plight.

The Old Angler praised him: "Your eldest disciple is indeed extraordinary, to have stolen into this place unseen and unfelt and found where Di Yiyue is. Your other two disciples are no ordinary men either. I have met Jingping's Imperial Preceptor — talent unmatched, even greater than yours in your day — only your youngest disciple is somewhat impudent. But then again, in this operation of yours, hiding it from your youngest disciple and using him as bait — is that really well done?"

The Woodcutter Sage's eye twitched. He analyzed the edict upon the cell door in fine detail and said, "There is a great monster hidden in his brow; he will not die. A little hardship will do him good. He is too young, and still a bit naive."

"Naive?" Fu Riluo and Chi Xi snorted in unison; both had suffered greatly at Shen Mu's hands.

The First Ancestor pictured Shen Mu being naive, and his expression too turned a little ugly.

The Woodcutter saw through the edicts upon the door; his vital essence circulated and transformed into runes, and the runes lit up, illuminating the edicts one after another.

Each illumination undid one seal within the edicts. His speed was extraordinary; he transformed countless vital-essence runes, and layer upon layer of seal within the edicts opened.

After a long while, the Woodcutter Sage raised his hand and gently lifted the edict away.

Though the others admired his methods, they were not overly astonished. As the chief of the Four Great Heavenly Masters, the Woodcutter was famed for his erudition; there was almost no seal in all the world he could not break!

The prison door creaked open with a grating, unpleasant sound, and a rush of cold wind struck their faces, stirring their clothes; soon their brows, whiskers, and hair were hung with bits of ice.

"From of old, the amorous are left only regret; sweet dreams have ever been the first to break. Is it that plucking a flower cannot bring release? How pitiful the willow-down, drifting and scattered so."

A plaintive sigh came from within the prison, cold to the very heart of a man. Fu Riluo said in surprise, "This famous Heavenly King Di Yiyue is a woman?"

The Woodcutter Sage nodded and stepped first into the prison.

It was a chamber of ice, dreadfully cold; nine ice dragons coiled around the chamber, hanging head-down, feet-up, their heads toward the ground, and where the nine dragon heads ringed was an ice coffin. In the coffin lay a woman of peerless beauty, dressed in black, yet crowned with a phoenix crown and draped in a rosy mantle, lying quietly within the transparent coffin.

Her skin was whiter than snow, made whiter still by the black bridal robe.

She lay in the ice coffin as though floating amid cloud and mist, serene and mysterious.

The nine ice dragons breathed cold icy air straight at the coffin, as though they wished to freeze the corpse within.

But the bride's corpse in the coffin had already woken. She opened her eyes, gently lifted one hand, and raised a finger white as jade and spring onion; on the finger was a most magnificent black ring, set with sharp spikes.

Crack, crack, crack.

One ice dragon after another shattered in an instant, leaving only the last; the ice dragon showed a look of terror and curled itself into a ball.

The Woodcutter Sage stepped forward and took the corpse-woman's hand. The bride in the ice coffin slowly floated up and settled to the ground, her eyes full of weariness.

"Please, Southern Heavenly King, return to your place!" the Woodcutter said in a low voice.

Di Yiyue said bleakly, "What good is returning to my place? I am already dead."

Only then did the others notice that her forehead had a hole pierced through it, the thickness of a finger, wounded by some unknown thing; through the wound they could see the wall behind her.

Though she wore black, the garment was of the cut and style of a bridal robe; on her head was still the phoenix crown, and on her shoulders the rosy mantle; on the crown was a bridal veil of purple gauze and red, already lifted, revealing a lovely face.

She must have been sitting quietly by the marriage bed on the night of her wedding, her heart a little anxious and a little sweet, when in the single instant the purple-and-red veil was lifted, an enemy's blow took her life.

The only one who could come so close to this First Heavenly King of the Kaihuang Heavenly Court was her beloved, her bridegroom.

It was her bridegroom who stabbed her to death as he lifted the veil.

"In those days Kaihuang intended to summon the Heavenly King to stand against the calamity, but no sooner had the Heavenly King married than word of her death came; the calamity erupted, and countless of the common folk died or were wounded."

The Woodcutter Sage said, "In those years the Heavenly King sought mastery in all quarters and studied under the Four Emperors, all for the sake of contending with the heavenly calamity. Now the calamity has come again. The Heavenly King missed it once; she must not miss it a second time. As for the matter of your death — my youngest disciple has already resolved it. You can revive."

Di Yiyue murmured, "I can revive?"

She turned her head and looked at the ice dragon cowering in the corner.

The ice dragon trembled and said in a shaking voice, "Spare me, my lady! We too acted on orders; we had no choice but to freeze my lady's body and primal spirit..."

"My lady?"

Di Yiyue's face turned cold. "You call me my lady? When has Di Yiyue ever leaned upon a man? Even the Heavenly Master would not dare call me my lady; he can only call me Heavenly King. You dare call me my lady? Call me Di Yiyue!"

The ice dragon hesitated, then said cautiously, "Di Yiyue..."

Pop —

He burst apart all at once, becoming a whirl of flying ice shards; his primal spirit too was shattered beyond all shattering.

"To call me by my name is disrespect to me. Death is too light a punishment!"

Di Yiyue turned around and laughed. "Let us go and meet the bridegroom. It has been twenty thousand years since I saw this faithless man; even after my death he never came to see me. How I long to carve a bloody wound like mine into his brow as well..."