Soul Lock

The Sleeping Ghost and The Lost Deity

Another ten years.

Neither Ju Xin nor Lan Ye was seen around for the next ten years.

Until...

"What happened?" a hoarse voice asked in the empty room, a pair of blue eyes checking the surroundings frantically. Wen Lan was lying on his own mattress in the palace of Xin. But who brought him there?

His question was answered by three blue ghost fires. They were the souls of two twin brothers around fifteen and their grandfather. The twins were notorious thieves who switched into assassins when they noticed it was more lucrative. Although they seemed bad, their sole purpose was to save money for their grandfather's medicine which was extremely expensive. One day, the twins' identity was revealed and they were killed alongside their grandfather. As the twins were Yin souls, their door was Ghost, but their grandfather's wasn't. Still, like Wen Lan, he chose to go through the Ghost Door so that he could be with his grandsons.

Wen Lan met them before he visited the living world, in the middle of the usual chaos of Huang-quan. As these three were in ghost fire form, which meant they were weak souls, and they looked indifferent towards everything, Wen Lan befriended them. When he got the throne, he didn't forget them and took them in as his generals. Such a cutie, right?

"Did you bring me here?" Wen Lan asked, looking at them.

The blue fires of the twins jumped up and down, meaning yes. They preferred not to talk much as it required spiritual energy.

"What happened though?"

This time, the twins came face to face, or you can say fire to fire, and started pushing each other before they threw themselves to the opposite sides of the room. Then, A'Song and the grandfather went near A'Hong and dragged him to Wen Lan's bed.

As it was a wonderful performance, Wen Lan understood everything. "Thank you," he said with appreciation and the blue fires jumped up and down again, "how about Ju Xin? What happened to him?"

The fires flew right to left, meaning they didn't know. Then, they flew towards a bench and brought Lan Ye a white sword with a golden fire carving on the scabbard.

It was Ju Xin's sword!

Suddenly, Wen Lan felt a panic in his heart. Ju Xin wouldn't be dead or badly injured, right? He cursed Lei Gong inwardly for intervening. All he wanted was to beat Ju Xin a bit and leave the curse mark which would function as Soul Lock, but that stupid Lei Gong and the scary-cat people ruined everything!

Then a sudden thought came to his mind. "By the way, how long have I slept?"

One of the twins jumped up and down while the other made a circle next to him.

"Ten days?"

Left and right.

Wen Lan frowned, "it can't be ten years, right?"

Up and down.

"WHAT?!" How could it be possible?! Ten years!

Wen Lan kept sitting on the mattress in shock for a while, his hands around his head. When he calmed down, he dropped his hands off his head and said "find out what happened to Ju Xin in these ten years."

Interestingly enough, although it is believed that Heaven is full of lovely deities, in the sense of dignity and loyalty, Huang-quan is much better than Heaven. Even when Wen Lan was sleeping, neither the creatures in Xin nor the other Ghost Kings ever attempted to seize his throne.

On the other hand, when Ju Xin wasn't found anywhere after the battle, Heaven stopped looking for him, thinking he would show up by himself eventually. As Ju Xin was an unwanted character in Heaven for many, forgetting about him wasn't that hard. Soon, he became a dinner topic for entertainment which was fueled by Lei Gong as he was the only deity in the battle alongside Ju Xin. Only Yushi Huang and Zhu Shen let Ju Xin linger in their mind, hoping he didn't die and would come back with a good explanation.