Chapter 1618: He Has Been Waiting for You

If the Heaven-Reaching Star Positions were the ceiling for the younger generation of humanity, then Chen Ling was the demon dancing wantonly above that ceiling.

When Li Qingshan heard that the other holders of the Heaven-Reaching Star Positions had been crushed and toyed with by Chen Ling, he didn't feel angry for his companions at all, but almost laughed out loud... As expected of Brother Lin, even after leaving the Red Dust Domain, he was still a dominant existence.

"Then you should know that my real name isn't Lin Yan." Chen Ling said with a helpless smile.

"Whether it's Chen Ling or Lin Yan, it's just a code name anyway." Li Qingshan laughed as well. "Don't be afraid of Brother Lin... no, don't be afraid of Brother Chen laughing at me, but when I first started traveling, I even used the alias 'Li Huangshan', hahahahaha..."

Reunited with an old friend, Chen Ling and Li Qingshan were in high spirits. Their laughter echoed in the quiet street, their thoughts seemingly drifting back to the time when they were still in the Red Dust Domain.

"Actually, I've been keeping an eye on your news, Brother Chen. I heard you were forced to leave the Nanhai Domain, and I was very worried... I had planned to find you, but unfortunately, my strength wasn't enough to cross the Gray Realm to the Ghost Abyss... By the time I heard news of you again, the war had already started."

"Have you been in the Cangyun Domain the whole time since then?"

"Not really, I only arrived a few months ago." Li Qingshan’s gaze swept across the surroundings, and he sighed lightly.

"When I arrived, it wasn't like this here... But a war caused heavy casualties in the Cangyun Domain. Moreover, those Calamities from the Bitter Flesh Turbid Forest almost sucked the nutrients out of the soil, making it extremely difficult for crops to grow. Coupled with the successive outbreaks of the plague, the Lord of Cangyun ordered the constant drafting of people to support the Lingxu Domain, bringing patients from the Lingxu Domain into Cangyun...

After all this back and forth, the Cangyun Domain became what it is today... Viruses running rampant, food shortages, the collapse of public morale; it's nothing short of a living hell."

No wonder everyone was fighting for food. So the food shortage here was the work of the Bitter Flesh Turbid Forest?

Chen Ling was lost in thought.

"But speaking of which, what exactly did the date and performance written on the invitation you gave me mean? If you just wanted to see me, couldn't you have just sent a message?" Chen Ling asked again.

Li Qingshan shook his head:

"Brother Chen, you misunderstood... That invitation was indeed delivered by me to the door of your contact point, but... the person who actually wrote this invitation and wanted to see you wasn't me."

Chen Ling froze. "Not you?"

Immediately after, Chen Ling seemed to think of something.

"Is it Kong Baosheng??"

As he spoke, Li Qingshan had already pushed Chen Ling to the entrance of an opera house.

Chen Ling looked up and saw a familiar wooden opera house standing silently at the edge of the street. The moment he saw it, the Jinghong Pavilion in his mind immediately overlapped with it. Both were almost identical in structure and appearance, just slightly smaller in area than the one in the Red Dust Domain, but the building was newer and the decorations were more refined.

And above this opera house, a familiar plaque full of the breath of time instantly attracted all of Chen Ling’s attention:

——【Jinghong Pavilion】.

Chen Ling was stunned. At this moment, he seemed to have forgotten that he was still in the Cangyun Domain, and his thoughts returned to the Red Dust Domain period... Everything he had experienced since then felt like a dream.

It was too similar, as if the Jinghong Pavilion had been moved from the Red Dust Domain. And Chen Ling could be almost certain that the plaque with the three characters [Jinghong Pavilion] was taken down from the original site.

"Did... Baosheng do all this?" Chen Ling asked in a daze after a long time.

"Yeah." Li Qingshan said with emotion. "When I first saw it, I was shocked too... This kid arrived earlier than I did."

"During the preparation for war in the human domains, all the surviving residents of the Red Dust Domain were evacuated and sent to the Cangyun, Tianxue, and Nanhai domains. Baosheng didn't want to leave at the time, but he couldn't resist the official people, so he ended up hugging the Jinghong Pavilion plaque and coming to the Cangyun Domain alone..."

"Later, he used the money you left him, plus some he borrowed from everywhere, and opened another Jinghong Pavilion in the Cangyun Domain. He actually hired opera singers to perform. When I first came here, business was quite good, and the seats were basically full."

"Brother Chen, you can't imagine how shocked I was when I saw this scene..."

Li Qingshan seemed to recall the prosperous and lively scene here, and added with emotion and guilt:

"When the two of us weren't here... Baosheng really managed the Jinghong Pavilion very well."

Chen Ling looked at the opera house standing before him, unable to speak for a moment.

That's right, he was the Lord of the Ghost Abyss, the Red King of the Twilight Society, a hegemon stirring up trouble outside; although Li Qingshan was a rising star, he had now become a holder of a Heaven-Reaching Star Position, one of humanity's youngest geniuses...

Perhaps the Jinghong Pavilion of the Red Dust was just a stop on their life's journey, a place to rest for a moment before hurrying on...

But Kong Baosheng, an ordinary teenager of only ten-something years, had tried his best to pass on this memory they once shared.

Chen Ling couldn't imagine what the teenager's mood was like when he was alone, hugging the plaque and leaving his home—pain, helplessness, longing, having no one to rely on... In those nights when he first arrived in the Cangyun Domain, would he have curled up and cried? Would he have been looking forward to him or Li Qingshan returning to his side when he was most helpless?

But a teenager's growth is always lonely and agonizing. He didn't wait for him or Li Qingshan, but worked hard silently by himself, stumbling and rebuilding the Jinghong Pavilion... Perhaps from the moment he truly built the Jinghong Pavilion, he had been looking forward to the day when he and Li Qingshan would return and see it.

Looking at the opera house before him, a sense of guilt surged into Chen Ling’s heart. His hands beneath his sleeves clenched silently, and he asked softly:

"Baosheng... where is he?"

Li Qingshan closed his eyes and let out a long sigh...

He moved to the front of the wheelchair and pushed open the door of the Jinghong Pavilion with a creaking sound:

"He has been waiting for you."

The interior of the opera house was very clean, just like in the Red Dust Domain, with almost no dust to be seen, as if someone cleaned it carefully every day. The empty stage was dead silent and dull, and the audience seats below looked like they hadn't been moved in a long time. Everything here was quiet.

Chen Ling pushed the wheelchair and entered the building slowly.

His gaze swept across every corner, from the placement of the tables and chairs to the decorations on the stage, almost exactly the same as in the Red Dust Domain... He walked around the entire first floor and then pushed open the side door in the corner.

In the Jinghong Pavilion of the Red Dust Domain, behind this side door, there should have been a vibrant little courtyard...

But after Chen Ling pushed open this door, what he saw was a small, cramped room.

At the same time,

a thin, pale figure, while coughing violently, struggled to climb up from the bed in the room...