"You need to... go home? I'd give you the dumbfounded spiel that this is the Sunsong Province and not the Starblood Province, but there's no way you're so starved that you've forgotten that. So I take it that your actual home is in the Sunsong Province and that the Starblood Province was just one of the places you wandered to, correct?"
Xiao Yin Yu was momentarily caught off-guard by Yin Long's sudden statement, but she wouldn't have reached her current realm if she allowed herself to stay dumbfounded for long. She was curious how Yin Long's wanderings had taken him all the way to the other side of the planet, but every question had an opportune time to be asked, and this was not the time for that question. Yin Long had asked her if she wanted to come along so he obviously wouldn't be pulling out lies at this point, Yin Yu had already proven herself far more sincere than Xue Qiuling.
"It was my home, but it already feels like several lifetimes have passed since I actually did so. Now my home is wherever I end up heading. Anyway, you coming or not?"
Yin Long's life had been so much more eventful ever since he was forced to leave the Lang clan, there was always something new to see or learn, someone new to meet. Each day felt more like a second, and no second was ever as long as he wanted it to be, so it really felt like he had left the clan for many years already. Yin Yu hadn't left his side during the 21 days he had showcased his life and starved himself so there was even less of a chance that she would leave now, this was a once-in-a-lifetime chance to learn more about Yin Long's actual origins.
"There's no way I'm not coming, just lead the way."
Yin Long had already expected her to give an answer like this, she wouldn't have stuck by side until now if she was planning on leaving when things were finally happening. He took some dried rations out from his interspatial ring and forced them down his throat with some water, making sure that he only had a handful.
He had to hunt a Demonic beast while in his starved state, but Hongzai had talked about the state he was in back when she first gave the mission. But three days had already passed since then, so as long as he didn't eat too much it was fine for him to force down a little bit. After he forced everything down his dry throat, he raised his gaze and pointed towards the ceiling, his eyes scanning the myriad of vines that hung down.
"Can your wind get us up there? There will be several thousand holes in the ceiling that will lead to the outside, that's the easiest way to leave this place."
Yin Yu raised her head and followed Yin Long's finger, her gaze sweeping across the distant ceiling. Her cultivation was higher than his so she could just barely see the holes scattered about the earthen dome above them, some were too small, but she did see some that would fit their party.
"It'll be a bit annoying, but not impossible. But the faster we do it the better, it wouldn't be a pleasant fall."
She quickly made the calculations as she spoke, generating a wind that was strong enough to lift the three of them wasn't actually a problem. The problem was the fact that she would have to control and maintain this wind as they ascended what looked to be at least somewhere around 20 kilometres. She would also have to contend with the wind that was already present at that height so time would not be her ally in this situation.
But Yin Long didn't look the least bit worried as he nodded his head and placed his hand on Jin Wang's head, ruffling his mane to make sure that he wouldn't complain about having someone else carry him. Yin Yu also didn't waste any time, Yin Long's wounds were still being healed by the medicine she applied, but since he didn't care about it, neither should she.
Her Qi gushed out and turned into wind, simultaneously snatching up a bit of the surrounding wind to lessen the burden she would have to bear. Their feet quickly left the ground as they shot into the air, the group's hair fluttering violently as they soared towards the ceiling. Yin Yu clearly put everything into speed, there was no point in wasting energy by shielding them from the force of the wind if it resulted in them turning into paste on the forest floor.
But while the struggle against the other winds that high up was a bit turbulent, Yin Yu managed to get them to one of the larger holes without much problem. The hole was just large enough for the entire group to squeeze in and climb up, Jin Wang using his claws while Yin Yu and Yin Long could use their fingers like claws. They had to climb a few tens of metres before they finally breached the surface, but the land above wasn't all that different from the land below so it all just felt the same.
"I'll need a minute before we head to the city, there's something I need to find first."
Yin Long waved his hands a few times to get rid of the dirt on them as he spoke, his head moving about as he inspected the surroundings. He started to walk without waiting for Yin Yu to give a response, quickly finding a somewhat narrow river that quietly meandered about. He walked along the shore of the river, his eyes narrowing as he peered into the water.
"Should be around here...There."
His knees bent and his hand shot down in the water when he found what he was looking for. When he pulled back his arm, he was clutching a black eel whose lower half split into eight segments, tiny thorn-like barbs covering each segment. He clenched his fist and crushed the skull of the eel, stopping its incessant squirming.
A bit of his Qi seeped out from his skin and bisected the eel, his fingers nimbly plucking out a small black sack from one of the two sections. The two halves of the body were tossed to Jin Wang and then Yin Long crushed the small sac over his head, the ink stored within it spilling out onto his head. He quickly rubbed it into his hair, dyeing the beautiful silver a dark black, adding a bit of mud to it to give it a more earthen, more natural shade.
"Lend me some of your make-up. That skin-coloured powder is good enough."
He stretched out one hand while using the other to dig up more mud, Yin Yu looking at him somewhat strangely as she handed him the powder. He applied the mud to his face to alter the shape of his chin and cheeks, quickly drying and hardening the mud before covering it with the make-up. He then held up his hand and gathered his Qi, two bright yellow discs appearing above his palm. His gaze was locked on the two discs for a bit as they shrank, his pupils swimming for a bit before he shook his head.
"Ah, forget it."
The two discs dissipated as he pulled back the yellow law, replacing it with the law of blood to create two crimson discs instead. Yellow was the colour of the Lang clan, it was the colour he had worn all the time when he still lived there. But he was no longer Lang Yin, he lost the right to that colour the moment he forced his own sister to kill him.
He pushed the two discs into his eyes when they shrank enough, covering his pupils with them so that they turned from black to crimson. He made them a bit transparent so that they became a dark shade of red, making it look a bit more natural. In only a short time, his appearance had changed quite drastically, Yin Yu's gaze roaming across his body for a bit.
"It seems like your circumstances aren't all that favourable. Do I need to memorize a fake name for you?"
Everyone had their own story and circumstances, and just this act of disguising himself showed that Yin Long's story with his hometown wasn't entirely pleasant. He might even be a wanted criminal who was sentenced to death there, it would be a somewhat reasonable explanation for his wandering and why he went so far away. Yin Long made sure that his disguise was safely secured to his face before shaking his head and washing his hands in the river.
"No, the name Yin Long is good enough."
He spoke quite simply, but Yin Yu knew that his statement could mean multiple things. It could mean that only his appearance was known in the city so his name was fine, or it could mean that the name Yin Long was fake from the very start. But seeing as he introduced himself so naturally with that name, it could be that the once fake name had already become what he considered to be his actual name.
Her guess was quite close to the truth, it was just that she hadn't considered the idea that Yin Long may have had two names from the very start. One was for the public and one was for the family, with the latter becoming his true name once his chains were removed. Yin Long had already abandoned the name Lang Yin so he saw no need to tell Yin Yu about it, drying his hands as he stepped away from the river.
"Alright, I'm ready. Time to dredge up some old memories."
Too much had happened since he had left his home, it was inevitable that some things would become fuzzy and hazy, no matter how important they were. So for the sake of his sword, it was time to refresh those memories and the emotions they had brought, even if some of them may be painful.
Yin Yu didn't say anything and simply followed Yin Long as he started walking, Jin Wang sticking close to Yin Long's side as always. This forest was quite familiar to Yin Long since he had hunted here many times, as Bai Xiang said, he was a warrior, it was in blood and death that he would find himself.
Thanks to this it didn't take them long to find the path out from the forest, but parts of the city were already becoming visible before they left the cover of the trees. Yin Yu had seen it from within the forest, but when she saw it properly her jaw almost dropped.
"This...This... Isn't this Wolfsoul city? The ancestral home of the Lang clan?"
The city that stretched out ahead of her was so big that it seemed to cover everything, it stretched up to cover the sky and spread to the sides so far that it covered the entire horizon. It was gargantuan beyond imagination, it was so large that she found it hard to call it a city, it was even larger than some of their surrounding cities. That was Wolfsoul city, the home of the Lang clan that once ruled an entire three provinces.
"I'm surprised you knew just from looking at it."
Yin Long's words weren't just for show, Yin Yu hadn't recognized Underearth Forest so he hadn't expected her to recognize Wolfsoul city. Standing there and looking at the city, his heart couldn't help but move slightly, this was where he was born and had grown up, so many of his memories had been made here, both the good and the bad. But all those emotions were pushed down a bit thanks to Yin Yu's following statement, a familiar cold chill from his previous profession emerging in his chest.
"It would be stranger if I didn't know. There's only a single city larger than this, and that's the ancestral home of the Hungering Heaven sect. And true, I may not know much about the dangerous areas of other provinces, but there's no large clan or sect that won't know about the Lang clan. They've fallen from grace long ago, but everyone is still keeping a close eye on them, all they need to return to their old tyrant status is a single powerhouse. Their current matriarch is showing signs of possibly reaching that stage so news about the clan has started circulating more frequently recently."
