Dual Cultivation System: The Villainous Servant’s Rise

Chapter 286: To Meet Again as if for the First Time

On the day of the celebration, Leng Ye swept into Xiao Yuruo’s palace, ready to hurry her preparations.

Only then did she realize the chambers were utterly, unnervingly empty.

A cold dread washed over her. *This is a disaster.*

***

A day earlier, a special guest had arrived at the Qingzhou City Lord’s Manor.

It was Xiao Yuruo.

Unable to breach the gates of the Heavenly Void Sect herself, she had only one recourse to contact Han Lie: his father, Han Zhentian, the current City Lord.

***

Within the Heavenly Void Sect, Han Lie was in his element, enjoying a rare moment of peace in the Overlord Hall with Zhuo Hongyi, Qin Lan, and Xiao Qingge. At Zhuo Hongyi and Qin Lan’s invitation, he was experiencing the simple joy of instructing the next generation.

The Overlord Hall’s newest recruits were mostly at the Foundation Establishment Stage. Revitalizing the hall to compete against the seven veteran departments in the upcoming Sect-wide competition was a monumental task. To that end, Qin Lan and Zhuo Hongyi had decided to focus their efforts on cultivating a handful of disciples who showed exceptional talent and diligence. What the Overlord Hall needed now wasn’t just numbers, but true pillars who could carry its future.

“Elder Han!”

As Han Lie guided the disciples on the square before the hall, a Sect steward hurried towards them, his expression urgent.

“Elder Han!” the steward called again as he arrived, bowing formally. “City Lord Han Zhentian of Qingzhou City is here to see you. He requests an audience.”

“Oh?” Han Lie’s eyebrow arched in surprise. He turned to the women beside him. “I’ll go see what this is about.”

“Of course, go ahead,” Zhuo Hongyi and the others nodded. They all knew his father was the City Lord and thought nothing of it.

In the Sect’s reception hall, Han Zhentian was leisurely sipping a cup of hot tea. A moment later, Han Lie strode in like a tempest. “Father. What brings you here today?”

Han Zhentian was a man of efficiency, intent on not wasting his son’s time. “There is a matter I must discuss with you.”

Han Lie had assumed his father was simply going to ask him to visit home when he had the chance.

Instead, Han Zhentian’s next words stopped him cold. “Yesterday, a guest arrived at the manor. Fairy Xiao Yuruo, the Young Pavilion Master of the Myriad Sword Pavilion. She said she needed to see you and entrusted me with this message.”

“Wait.” Han Lie’s eyes widened. “Father, did you say Xiao Yuruo? The Young Pavilion Master of the Myriad Sword Pavilion?”

“Yes. Are you not acquainted?” Han Zhentian confirmed with a nod.

“No… we are,” Han Lie replied, his mind racing. He paused, a storm of thoughts brewing within him. “Where is she now?”

“She said to tell you to go to the Buried Immortal Mountain Range. She will be waiting for you there.”

“Understood.”

After seeing his father off, Han Lie didn’t waste a single second. He tore through the sky, heading straight for the Buried Immortal Mountain Range.

Deep within a valley in the mountain range stood a long-abandoned teahouse. As Han Lie emerged from a spatial rift, he immediately sensed it—a familiar aura, emanating from within that derelict building.

*Yuruo…*

An image of her stunning face, unseen for so many years, surfaced in his mind, and a wave of profound nostalgia washed over him. He had no idea where she had been all this time, but one thing remained certain: her feelings for him had been real.

Shaking off the memories, Han Lie tapped a foot against the void and vanished, reappearing an instant later at the teahouse entrance.

Peering inside, he saw her. A woman in a practical, form-fitting tunic, her face obscured by a wide bamboo hat, sat alone at a table in the center of the hall. It was the exact same attire she had worn when they first met at the Clear Breeze House in Qingzhou City.

But… the woman herself was completely different.

The aura she projected was a world away from the girl he remembered. Whether it was his imagination or not, the Xiao Yuruo before him now possessed a profound stillness, a composure forged in hardship. And beneath that calm, he could feel a dangerous, razor-sharp edge that demanded respect.

After a moment’s hesitation, Han Lie stepped inside.

“A beautiful fairy like you, sitting all alone. Mind if I join you?”

Xiao Yuruo simply waved a delicate, jade-like hand, gesturing for him to sit.

Through the translucent veil of her hat, her eyes locked onto his. Her vermilion lips parted, and her voice, laced with a sorrow that cut him to the quick, drifted across the table. “It’s been a long time. Have you… been well?”

Han Lie’s brow furrowed. He immediately caught the broken undercurrent in her tone. But then, the memory of the letter he’d received at the Clear Breeze House all those years ago surfaced, and a grim understanding dawned. If he had received such a letter from ‘her,’ then it stood to reason she had received one from ‘him.’

“I’ve been well enough,” he replied, offering a gentle smile. “And you?”

She didn’t answer. Instead, she silently retrieved a letter from her robes and pushed it across the table toward him.

His curiosity piqued, Han Lie opened the envelope. As he read the contents, a sigh of relief and understanding escaped him.

“Why?” Xiao Yuruo’s voice was low, trembling with a decade of unanswered pain. “Can you give me a reason? Or was I never important to you at all?” Her voice cracked. “I explained everything in my letter. My Master was sending me to the Sect’s Life and Death Gate for training. Couldn’t you have waited? Not even a few years?”

Faced with her volley of heart-wrenching questions, Han Lie simply smiled. “I did receive your letter back then,” he said softly. “But its contents seem to have a few… discrepancies… from what you remember.”

“Wh-what do you mean?” she stammered, utterly bewildered.

Without another word, Han Lie reached into his Storage Ring and produced a letter of his own—one he had kept for nearly ten years. The paper had yellowed with age, but the ink was still clear.

He handed it to her.

As Xiao Yuruo’s eyes scanned the page, the color drained from her face. The veil of deception was torn away in an instant, and the pieces of the last decade slammed into place with brutal clarity.

“Heh… heheh… HAHAHAHA!”

A dry chuckle escaped her lips, quickly escalating into a wild, broken laugh. It was a sound of pure, venomous fury and crushing disappointment. Not at Han Lie, but at the one person she was supposed to trust above all others: her Master, Leng Ye.

Until this moment, she had foolishly believed Leng Ye had finally seen reason, that she had stopped trying to obstruct their love.

It was all a lie.

Leng Ye’s constant urging for her to train at the Life and Death Gate hadn’t been a sign of support. It was a cold, calculated scheme to drive a wedge between them. Once she was sealed away, her Master had been free to intercept her letter, to twist its words or rewrite it entirely. Leng Ye held all the power.

If she hadn’t followed the desperate hope in her heart, if she hadn’t secretly fled to find him… she would have lived her entire life suffocating under the weight of this lie.

“Hahahaha! So that was it,” she seethed, the words dripping with scorn. “I wondered why my Master had suddenly changed her stance, why she became so… accommodating. It was all a damned lie. No wonder. No wonder!”