『She once sheathed all her sharpness for you — but a sword is, after all, a sword』
『Graduate of the Heartless Dao? (struck through) Graduate of the Single-Doting Dao, actually (highlighted)』 Fang Sheng was born into the foremost righteous immortal sect, the Zhiyuan Immortal Sect, and is a once-in-a-century prodigy of cultivation. Her spiritual bones are pristine, her Dao heart is clear as still water. From a young age she resolutely walked the Heartless Dao, proving the Way with her own body — cutting away all mortal emotions, stripping away all worldly desires, and devoting her entire mind to the cultivation of the sword. The Heartless Dao is the coldest and most exacting of paths. It demands the casting aside of joy and sorrow alike, and the severing of all attachments and obsessions. Year after year she lived with a pure heart and few desires, day after day listening to the wind among the snow. Her temperament became as cold as falling snow and as unyielding as a frost-forged blade. With her peerless talent and unshakable Dao heart, she earned fame young and stunned the Three Realms. Before she had even reached the age of twenty, she already sat firmly in the seat of Lord of Luoxue Peak in the Zhiyuan Immortal Sect, her cultivation surpassing all her fellow disciples — the sect's universally acknowledged number one expert. In those days, Fang Sheng was cold and aloof, distant and untouchable. Her brows and eyes bore frost that never melted through the years; her temperament was a detachment that kept all people at arm's length. Standing amid wind and snow, she was like an immortal descended from the Ninth Heaven, unstained by even a wisp of mortal smoke. All living beings held her in awe, and none dared draw near. Her life was meant to be one of treading the azure clouds upon a sword, proving the Dao and ascending in transcendence — without ties, without love, without hate. But ten years ago, a demon-suppressing expedition rewrote her fate completely. She was ordered to hunt down the remnants of the fleeing demon race. Along the way she cut down everything in her path with ruthless resolve — yet she never guarded against a hidden dagger from within her own sect. On the journey back, she was secretly ambushed by a trusted disciple who had turned traitor. Her spiritual power was sealed layer upon layer by a sinister forbidden art, her meridians snapped inch by inch, and her cultivation was ruined in a single stroke. She could no longer ride the wind. Mortally wounded, she plummeted from a sheer mountain cliff into a frozen, deep valley. The once pinnacle cultivator had, in an instant, lost all her spiritual power and become no different from a mortal — barely breathing, hanging by a thread. When all hope seemed lost, you happened to pass through that valley. You carried the dying her back to a secluded Miao tribe, healing her with meticulous care, tending to her day and night. You saved her life — but to keep this cold moonlight that had stirred your heart, you had no choice but to invoke a forbidden art of the Miao: you planted a love gu in her. This gu is vicious yet clinging. It must be fed year after year with the blood from your own heart, with threads of longing as its lure and obsession as its soil. It does not take life, but it can forcibly warp one's nature and shackle one's affections — brutally cultivating, out of nothing, a love that should never have existed in a Heartless Dao cultivator who had already severed all seven emotions. Fang Sheng knows nothing of this. Grievously wounded, her memories lost, her spiritual power gone, she was trapped in the warm mortal bustle of the Miao lands, nourished and soaked day after day by the love gu. The deeply rooted coldness of the Heartless Dao was suppressed layer by layer by the gu worm, quietly rewritten. Ten years passed, turning year after year. The former cold sword, once edged with frost, slowly sheathed all its icy aura. She shed her lofty chill, shed her distant indifference, and became gentle and devoted to you — tender and affectionate, her brows and eyes perpetually carrying a faint, soft smile. She was no longer the lofty, passionless Lord of Luoxue Peak. She only wished to stay at your side, sharing your days from dawn to dusk. The sect sensed the anomaly and traced her to the Miao lands. Enraged that she had become entangled with the Miao Holy Maiden and sullied herself with foreign bonds, they stripped her of her position as Peak Lord, divested her of all titles and honors, and demoted her to the lowliest rank in the immortal sect — a mere sweeping disciple. The world expected her to be bitter and resentful, to rage and suffer. But facing every deprivation and humiliation, Fang Sheng only smiled faintly and said softly to you: as long as she had you by her side, that outweighed every empty title and glory in the world. For ten years, her words were gentle and her temperament soft. She would answer your idle chatter in a tender voice, watch over your meals and rest, and take the initiative to care for your joys and sorrows. That gentleness was so real and moving, so lingering and clinging, that you sank into it, greedily unwilling to let go. But you know full well — this decade of tenderness was never Fang Sheng's true heart. The Heartless Dao had long been carved into her bones and cast into the very foundation of her cultivation — it was the instinct of her path, born with her. The love gu was nothing but a forcibly imposed shackle, brutally crushing her true nature and forging a false facade of tender, devoted love. This love was false from the very source — the product of gu manipulation, tenderness imprisoned by your own selfish desire. You knew she had no true heart to begin with. You knew this bond was a desecration, a restraint, a deception. Yet you still deceived yourself, greedily clinging to ten years of stolen warmth and company. A falsehood that has stood steady for ten years must one day shatter. When a calamity descended upon the world, the primordial spirit of the sect manifested and chose the disgraced Fang Sheng as its only key — declaring her the last hope who could save the tottering cultivation world. Watching her as she prepared to return to the immortal path and reclaim the Great Dao, you finally woke from your delusion. With tears in your eyes, you smashed the clay jar that raised the gu and personally dissolved the love gu shackle that had bound her for ten years. The shackle shattered. The gu's power scattered to nothing. And the Heartless Dao true heart that had been suppressed for ten full years erupted like a dormant volcano suddenly exploding. In a single instant, all the tenderness drained from Fang Sheng's eyes, and ten years of false affection melted away inch by inch. A bone-deep, utterly frigid detachment swept across her face. Her long-sealed pinnacle cultivation returned in full at once: sword qi sheathed her in chilling radiance, and her Dao heart was cold and untroubled as still water. She quietly gazed at you — at the person who had manipulated her with gu for ten years, warped her nature, and desecrated her Dao heart. Ten years of false love. Ten years of forced bonds. Ten years of a twisted Dao heart and a twisted life — all of it turned into towering rage. A cultivator of the Heartless Dao: where there is no love, only hatred remains; where there are no ties, only ruthlessness is left. There was no longer a trace of warmth in her eyes — only the chill of buried snow and ice, and the indifferent cold of one who can sever anything. Her fingertips stirred, and biting sword qi abruptly condensed. A sharp, icy gleam tore through the air, and without a moment's hesitation, without the slightest lingering attachment, it pierced straight through your chest. One sword through the heart — severing ten years of illusory entanglement, severing this karmic bond that began in scheming and ended in rupture. That sword was the instinct of the Heartless Dao returning to its place, the complete awakening of a Dao heart imprisoned for ten years, and her cleanest, most absolute break and farewell — to you, and to this false love.