Chapter 70: The Broken Soul Ladder

“Put me down. I’ve recovered almost completely. I can sit here and rest for a while, and I’ll be able to walk again soon.” Seeing that I was confused, the master didn’t rush to answer my question, but instead asked me to put him down.

Hearing him speak, I knew that he had slowly begun to recover. As long as he got over the initial discomfort of the soul shock, he would recover quickly.

I let him down as he asked, and he sat down on the stone slab to rest. It looked like he didn’t want to answer my question. I heard the sound of fighting from the town below, and I was worried. I thought to myself, how can Master be so calm?

Finally, I asked him, “Master, why did you not hurry me to count the steps?”

The master looked at me and then looked at me again. He then took my arm and stood up, gesturing for me to follow him as he said, “Chengyi, I hope that the more impatient you are, the calmer you will be. At least you should learn not to let others see that you are impatient.”

“Mm,” I took a deep breath and nodded. I knew in my heart that my master would never harm me.

“Because you will have to shoulder a great deal of responsibility in the future, you should learn to be more perceptive. You grew up with me, and I regret that I didn’t beat you up enough. After all, the character that is shaped in childhood is too simple compared to this complicated world. Simplicity is not bad, and for Taoist disciples, it is easy to be praised. But human calculations are not as good as the calculations of heaven. Who knows what burden you will have to carry in this life?” The master seemed to be a bit chatty. He rarely chatted like this before, but after we reunited, he seemed to have started to chatter more often.

In the middle of his speech, he stopped and pulled me to a halt.

I looked at the master, thinking that he had something to say, but this time he said to me, “Chengyi, this cobblestone road is the only road to the village where Qiangzi practices.”

“Ah, isn’t that a secluded village?” I implied that it would be too obvious to build a road specifically for it.

“Haha, is the real situation that simple? Do you know what this staircase is called?” Master asked me, but he knew that I would not answer. So he said directly, “It also has another name, called the Broken Soul Staircase. After a hundred stairs, if you want to walk up this staircase in a normal way, you will definitely not be able to. If you are not careful, you will lose your life. This is a small matter. The worst result will be your soul flying apart.”

“Huh?” I looked at this ordinary stone staircase. Apart from the fact that it looked a little worn out from the passage of time, I couldn’t see anything strange about it at all.

“Don’t worry about it. Now, you listen to my instructions. Next, you will jump two steps at once, and stay close to the right side,” the master said seriously.

When he told me the alias of this ladder before, I was really scared. I dared not be negligent, and moved to the far right of the ladder, then took two steps across the two ladders and stepped on them.

Everything was quiet and nothing happened, but I inexplicably felt nervous and couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if I didn’t follow the master’s instructions and walk up the stairs. At the same time, the effect of the secret technique began to gradually fade, and my body couldn’t help but feel weak.

The master climbed the stairs in the same way, and for the time being, he did not discover that my secret technique was almost over. He then directed me again, “Next, go directly to the next step and step on the middle of the step.”

The ‘after-effects’ of the secret technique came quickly. Once it started, it was like a flood that had broken through the dam, and there was no time to stop it. I was able to endure it at first, but as soon as the master’s voice fell, I couldn’t help but lean on the master’s body. The pain began to appear on my body, like countless ants drilling in my muscles. I was immediately unable to move, and even my vision and hearing became blurred.

“Chengyi?” Master discovered that something was wrong with me, but immediately understood what was going on. This time, Master carried me on his back without hesitation, and whispered to me, “Chengyi, bear with it a little.”

In fact, what else could I do but endure? I was pale, because my body was in pain, and all my muscles were cramping up. I could only grit my teeth and try hard to endure, so that I wouldn’t completely lose control of my body and fall off my master’s back, or put all my weight on my master.

Ordinary people can feel this. If you are carrying a conscious person, or because the pressure points are different, you won’t even feel much weight. If you are carrying an unconscious person, you will find that it is the same person, but he will be many times heavier.

I just tried to lighten the burden on the Master a little, but this time the attack was so severe that many secret acupoints were opened, and since Uncle Chen was not there this time, I quickly lost consciousness and was left with only a clear sense of pain.

Time always passes particularly slowly in pain, and this pain from the body and soul can only be borne by oneself, not shared by anyone else… In this torment, I don’t know how long it took.

When the pain faded and my consciousness returned, I felt like I was being thrown onto my master’s back. The bright sun in the sky shone into my eyes, blinding me and making it hard to open them.

But I knew it was afternoon. I felt that my whole body was drenched in sweat, and the clothes on my body were almost all wet and stuck to my body, steaming… and Master was still climbing the ladder of death. Judging from the contact with his body, he was also covered in sticky sweat, and his footsteps were somewhat heavy.

This situation made me want to get off Master’s back and walk on my own… But just like every time after using the secret technique, when the aftereffects set in, after feeling so clear-headed and resisting the pain, I was exhausted to the limit from the soul, and I didn’t stay awake for two minutes before I passed out…

When I woke up again, it was night.

The night wind in the mountains had dispersed the heat of the day, and I felt much better. Apart from some fatigue, I was basically completely recovered.

The flickering firelight told me that it must be nighttime and that we had already climbed the terrifying ladder of souls.

I woke up, and my master was the first to notice. He didn’t say much, just handed me a cup of water that was just the right temperature. I was already thirsty, so I took the cup and drank it in one gulp. My master took the cup and poured me another from the water bottle.

After drinking the water, my master handed me a bowl of cooked food, which was nothing more than meat jerky in a mushy sauce. I always found it very unappetizing, but after a long day of hard work, it tasted surprisingly good.

All of this is going on in silence, with a strange kind of tacit understanding and naturalness, as ordinary as breathing… After living together for a long time, trusting each other, any two people will become like this.

Whether their relationship is that of brothers, friends, family or husband and wife, it is not easy to cultivate such feelings.

I was thinking about one question while I was eating. Is it destined that I will never be able to repay the debt of gratitude I owe my master in this life? Or did he owe me in a previous life? Today, I just killed my way up the mountain while carrying him on my back, and then he immediately carried me up the ladder of death. Is this fate clearly meant to be like this?

If I have to be in debt, then so be it. The thing people fear most is not being in debt to someone. If you are still thinking that you owe someone, then you must not be close enough to that person in your heart. The thing people fear most is not being in debt to someone. If you are still thinking that you owe someone, then you must not be close enough to that person in your heart. The thing people fear most is not being in debt to someone. If you are still thinking that you owe someone, then you must not be close enough to that person in your heart. The thing people fear most is not being in debt to someone. If you are still thinking that you owe someone, then you must not be close enough to that person in your heart. The thing people fear most is not being in debt to someone. If you are still thinking that you owe someone, then you

And if I owe my master, does that mean that I will meet him again in my next life? This feeling makes me feel more at ease.

After I finished this simple meal, my hungry stomach felt much better… and at this time, all the problems I had during the day came back to me one by one.

“Master, have we climbed the Broken Soul Staircase?” I asked.

“Look for yourself,” said the master, pointing with his finger. It was only then that I noticed that the place where the master and I were camping was on a small, flat patch of grass, like a platform in the mountains that had been deliberately built, only it looked much more natural here.

And the direction that Master pointed to was the Broken Soul Staircase, right? But it ended here, and what was special was that at the end there was a wooden frame with a strange-looking drum fixed between the frames, and the drumsticks were hanging on the wooden frame.

“The Broken Soul Ladder. Those who don’t know how to walk it will naturally break their souls if they try to force their way through. But for those who know how to walk it, it’s no different from a normal ladder,” said the master.