Han Xuhan was still slightly dazed when he was brought inside the ancient building by the maniacal Elder Rong.
"Tell me, young man, did you like flying like an immortal?" Elder Rong asked on the way rather vindictively after making sure that Elder Cai was outside earshot.
Han Xuhan became certain that Elder Cai's suspicion was accurate. This man just wanted to traumatize young recruits about the art of flying swords.
But this lackadaisical attitude of the cultivator kept confusing him. Whatever the result of his ancestry test meant, it had frightened the wits out of everybody in the test site. Elder Rong himself didn't seem very friendly from the way he had abducted Han Xuhan.
But the man didn't seem to be taking the job very seriously. He was in a petty, sadistic world of his own.
His thoughts were interrupted when they reached the foot of the temple. The mysterious fog couldn't hide much from his gaze at such a close distance.
Observing the surroundings, Han Xuhan couldn't help but feel that he had stepped inside a utopia hand-crafted by a patient of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.
The staircase leading to the entrance of the temple was abnormally smooth despite being carved from stones. Every edge, every curve, the complex joints, the designs, the even-sized grass on the soil—it all looked perfect, too damn perfect.
It felt like a virtual reality made using artificial intelligence. Influenced by the uncanny sensation, Han Xuhan felt his earlier boldness seeping out of his body.
Past the entrance, the insides of the temple gave off an even more oppressive aura of fakeness. The only exceptions were some servants working in the hallways and corners. It gave the eerie atmosphere some life.
Eventually, they stopped in front of a closed doorway so tall that it made regular humans appear dwarfish. Elder Rong announced himself and pushed the doors open gently, and then without any warning, kicked Han Xuhan inside.
Clutching his butt, Han Xuhan turned around in a hurry, only to see the thick, gigantic doors closing in and trapping him inside. Rapid sounds of fading footsteps on the other side told him that the Elder was running away swiftly.
Immediately, Xuhan flattened his back on the door and turned around to survey the chamber he was locked in.
It was bigger than he had imagined, with a ceiling so high that he couldn't throw a stone to hit it. But the chamber was also pretty much empty, except for...
With a shiver going down his spine, he realized that he was not alone.
A man was sitting on the floor in the middle of the room, seemingly lost in meditation.
Grizzled looks, sharp features, a sizable beard, and shoulder-length gray hair made him look impressionable. In terms of appearance, this man came off as someone crossing his fifties.
Thinking of how long the lives of cultivators could stretch, Han Xuhan decided to treat this man as a respectable senior on the same level as old man Ming Zi.
This was most likely to be the Sect Master whom he was supposed to meet. And he looked incredibly pissed for some reason, even though his eyes were closed.
Not daring to interrupt his meditation, Xuhan decided to stay silent and still. But that silence did not last long. A few seconds later, the senior abruptly opened his eyes, startling his tense nerves.
Meeting the senior's penetrating gaze, Han Xuhan felt a premonition that his eyes could see through everything!
Even his most secret thoughts wouldn't stay secret before those eyes. An inhuman glow was flashing in that glare...
Moving imperceptibly, Han Xuhan put both of his hands over his crotch, shielding that precious area from that pervasive gaze.
It'd be unfortunate if he gave this senior an inferiority complex while being exposed like this. This was basic etiquette, after all!
However, the old man noticed the covert action and didn't quite seem to appreciate the gesture of goodwill. He immediately became so incensed that the veins on his neck bulged out for a moment before he could control his fury.
"YOU....!"
Seemingly lost for words, the sect master of Crimson Snow Sect gritted his teeth before calming himself down and speaking again.
"Did Elder Rong explain to you why you've been brought here?"
Hearing the cold question, Han Xuhan shook his head, which made him angrier.
"Good, good, good! That brat really needs another hands-on lesson on flying. Does he think I don't hear the mischief he gets up to with the young disciples, hmph!"
Clearly, the sadistic habit of Elder Rong was inherited. The PTSD was a generational feature!
"Now listen attentively, because I won't bother explaining twice."
Han Xuhan was simply relieved that his death didn't seem imminent yet. Nodding like a good boy, he focused his attention fully on this grandpa.
"Are you familiar with the concept of reincarnation?"
Han Xuhan nodded immediately. Which avid Xianxia reader was not familiar with it? Part of the charm of the genre was the fantasy that death wasn't truly the end. Rebirth was a possibility, and being reborn with a golden finger was a wet dream.
But why was this topic being brought up? He himself was a transmigrator, not a reincarnated protagonist.
"To the cultivators who have stepped into a sufficiently high realm, the cycle of reincarnation is a very ordinary passage of life.
"To shed mortality, one must understand what the essence of mortality is. Every immortal cultivator has reincarnated once at least in their lifetime of cultivation."
Well, that was interesting to learn. Could it mean...
"However, the heavenly law is not something that can be so easily manipulated to man's convenience. More often than not, the process of voluntary reincarnation goes awry somewhere, and the world ends up with some oddities whose destinies have been twisted and crushed into an unrecognizable state.
"This is akin to a tribulation from the heavens on those who continuously challenge the way of mortal life. That ancestry test you took was a precautionary step for us to detect these unfortunate freaks."
Sufficient to say, Han Xuhan's mind was already forming some strings with his current predicament to these new pieces of information. He couldn't help but feel excited and confused at the same time.
"Does that mean I was an immortal in my previous life? But..." he trailed off, recalling his ordinary life on Earth.
Why did the Sect Master's theory seem to be wrong...?