"Are you Liu Ji?"

Looking at the old man in front of me, panting and with white hair, I found it hard to believe.

"It's me, Immortal Elder. It has been fifteen years since we last met, and I have grown old."

He sat on the stone chair of the Longevity Platform, gently caressing the stone table in front of him.

"Fifteen years? You've been down the mountain for fifteen years?"

I looked at the surroundings, as if just a moment ago I had slain the Black Dragon, but he said fifteen years had passed.

"How old are you this year?" I asked.

No, no, even if it had been fifteen years as he said, fifteen years ago he was just a teenager. How could he have turned into an old man with white hair?

"I am sixty-two years old," Liu Ji stroked his white beard. "Elder, have you forgotten? I was almost fifty when I descended the mountain that year."

The one he addressed as "I" had become me.

But my mind was in chaos, and I paid no attention.

"What about Ying Zheng?"

"Ying Zheng died during his Eastern expedition."

"No, not that Ying Zheng. Yes, it's Hu Hai, where is Hu Hai?"

"Hu Hai? He had already committed suicide in the palace before the fall of Xianyang that year."

"Then...do you know about Hu Ji?"

"Who is Hu Ji?"

"Hu Hai's mother."

"Hu Hai's mother was not known to the public. After the palace was breached, no trace of her was found."

"No! That's wrong! You said, did Ying Zheng eat people!"

"Though he was cruel, there is no evidence of him eating people."

"Then what about Xu Fu?"

"Are you referring to the sorcerer who escaped to the sea back then?"

"Yes! He told Ying Zheng about the method of immortality!"

"What is this method of immortality?"

"Eating people! Eating people can grant immortality!"

"That is a fallacy."

"What?"

"I said, that is a fallacy. Haven't you realized, Shaman?"

As he spoke, the voice of the old man in front of me gradually grew louder, until it resounded like a grand bell, shaking the ears and echoing through the Southern Mountain.

The sunlight on the Southern Mountain became scorching.

"Who are you?"

I asked.

No one answered.

The Longevity Platform was empty, without a single person.

"Who am I?"

I felt myself, under the sunlight, becoming scorching hot and ethereal.

"I am Lu Sheng."

A voice sounded in my ear.

Is that so?

I am Lu Sheng.

I opened my eyes, and the figure standing in front of me transformed into a beautiful young girl.

"I am Hu Ji," she opened her arms towards me, as if wanting to embrace me.

"No," I reached out my hand and pressed it against the soft neck of the girl, "I am the Shaman."

"Hu Ji, you never existed, right?"

I exerted pressure with both hands, and a sinister smile appeared on Hu Ji's face.

"I did exist."

"Don't you remember? You devoured me!"

She let out a giggling laughter, and then, like a bubble, she burst at my fingertips.

A radiant light enveloped me.

I lifted my head and gazed directly at the distant and dazzling sun above.

I felt myself melting.

But I wasn't panicked.

After losing everything, I would become immortal.

I am not mad.

I am not mad.

I am not mad.

[End of 'The Cycle of Immortality']