My best friend asked me if I was still doing system tasks.

Luo Hanying ascended the Inquiry Steps and looked around, only to find herself enveloped in mist, unable to see anything outside.

Everyone says there is no danger on the path to enlightenment, but for peace of mind, she still took out her brush and held it tightly, just in case she needed to use it sometime.

"Tell me, what is your explanation?"

A muffled human voice came from the mist, and for a moment it was impossible to tell whether it was a man or a woman.

Luo Hanying, startled by the sound of wind and cranes, immediately stopped and shouted, "Who goes there?!"

The words slipped out, and she remembered what Yun Yanshu had just said, wondering if they were phantoms of the seniors.

Luo Hanying took a few more steps up and could vaguely hear fragmented conversations.

"And ask my own heart, it changes ten times and five times, it is difficult to fully understand, so it is better to fall into emptiness;

To live towards death, to roam the world freely, having fulfilled divine destiny, what is there to fear in this life?

……

"Poetry, wine, zither and chess, the world of wind, flowers, snow and moon; fame, leisure, wealth and honor, free and easy, like a god."

……

"The Way cannot be named; it resides freely within the heart."

……

Luo Hanying tried to understand the meaning of those words: "Ask my heart... has it changed a lot? Or has it always been changing? It's hard to understand completely, so why not just fall from the sky?"

As she spoke, she chuckled to herself: "What utter nonsense..."

Why not fall into emptiness, emptiness... void?

Luo Hanying scratched her head: "What do you mean by living towards death... How can you live if you're already dead... Don't live? Is death also eternal life? After death, the soul wanders everywhere? So you 'roam the universe'?"

So now that we know the fate of the soul is...death, we don't need to worry about the physical body anymore?"

Luo Hanying pouted: "Forget it, I don't necessarily need to stay here to comprehend or know what the senior is thinking. Let's hurry up and enter the illusion."

She mustered her spirits and rushed uphill a few steps, the music coming in fits and starts.

Luo Hanying saw a phantom figure sitting on the steps, patting a waist drum full of ethnic flavor. Behind the figure stood a person playing the flute, and the two played an unknown tune together.

"Huh?" Luo Hanying circled the illusory figure a few times and murmured, "Generally speaking, shouldn't I learn this piece of music at this time?"

What a coincidence! I actually did learn piano for a few days, but there aren't any Western musical instruments around here..."

Luo Hanying squatted down and listened quietly for a while. The illusory figure floated and gradually dissipated into the mist.

She looked at the calligraphy brush in her hand and a thought suddenly popped into her mind: Was it because she claimed to be a Confucian scholar that she heard and saw these things?

These all seem to be things like 'rites, music, archery, charioteering, calligraphy, and mathematics' that Confucian scholars would face.

Luo Hanying put the brush away, and as expected, nothing strange happened afterward.

"It seems the Dao Seeking Rank is quite enthusiastic, enjoying giving extra help to cultivators whose types have been identified..."

Luo Hanying murmured, "How many steps is this? Oh no, my memory is terrible, I can't remember."

1127, did you count how many steps I took?

She repeated in confusion, "1127? oi! Can you hear me?"

Luo Hanying suddenly felt a sense of weightlessness in her body. She was both surprised and delighted: It's here!

Luo Hanying struggled to open her eyes and reached out to shield them from the glaring light.

"Nurse! Nurse! Doctor! She's awake! She's awake! Come quick, come see her! She's awake!"

Luo Hanying tilted her head, startled by the figure that lunged at her: "Whoa... Mom?"

Who else could this beautiful woman with a haggard face and dark circles under her eyes be but Luo Mu?

That hurried voice just now belonged to her second aunt.

"Little snowman, my little snowman, you're finally awake..." Mother Luo gently touched Luo Hanying's face. "How are you feeling? I was so worried about you, I can't live without you..."

Little Snowman is Luo Hanying's nickname.

Luo Hanying was born on a snowy day. When Luo's mother woke up in the delivery room, she looked out the window at the ice and snow on the river and then at the lovely baby in her arms. She thought of the poem "Nine Songs: Xiangjun" which says, "With cassia oars and orchid paddles, we cut through the ice and snow." Thus, Luo Hanying's name came from this poem.

At that time, Luo's mother had decided on the name "Han Ying" and asked Luo's father for his opinion. Luo's father readily agreed and said on the phone that it would be better to call her Little Snowman as a nickname, as it would suit the child's cute appearance perfectly.

Ruan Chayan used to call her that too, but after Luo Hanying went to high school, she felt ashamed and wouldn't allow anyone to call her that anymore, but her mother was always an exception.

"Mom, I don't feel anything..." Luo Hanying said, then fell silent. She actually did feel something. "Okay, I'm a little dizzy, and it seems to hurt a bit..."

Where are my legs?!

Luo Hanying stared blankly at her missing right calf, thinking to herself, "Why is this illusion so unpredictable? It's one thing to kidnap me with my family right away, but how did it end up crippling me?!"

Why are my hands and face covered in bandages?!

The department director, deputy director, and attending physician were followed by resident doctors, interns, and nurses who quickly performed a series of examinations on Luo Hanying to determine her current condition.

Luo Hanying was reluctant to cooperate with the examination; to her, it was all a lie. Her priority now was to find the exit from the illusion as soon as possible.

Luo Ergu and later Luo's maternal aunt went together to hear the doctor talk about her condition, while Luo's mother stayed in the ward to tell her about the current situation.

Luo Hanying's attitude changed from being absent-minded at the beginning to beginning to doubt herself.

Through her mother's tearful account, Luo Hanying learned that three months ago, she went out to eat hot pot with Ruan Chayan and encountered terrorists, who then took all the customers in the hot pot restaurant hostage.

The hot pot restaurant has three floors, and the terrorists planted explosives on each floor.

Fortunately, the explosives were relatively weak, so even though they accidentally detonated the explosives on the third layer while confronting the authorities, Luo Hanying still survived the explosion.

But her good fortune only saved her life, and not everyone has such good luck. As a result, Luo Hanying lost her right leg, while Ruan Chayan died in the explosion.

Luo Hanying fell into a deep sleep, and the doctor said he might never wake up and would become a vegetable.

Ruan Chayan has already been buried in Cui Shang City, while Luo Hanying was taken from a hospital in the United States to a hospital in Kyoto by her family after her condition stabilized to receive a new round of treatment.

Luo Hanying kept asking herself, "Is it true?" She called 1127 in her mind over and over again, but received no response no matter what she did.

Luo Hanying was at a loss. She remembered Yun Yanshu's words and realized she could no longer distinguish between illusion and reality.

Every word Luo Mu said was so reasonable, and the place seemed so real, yet 1127 remained silent.

Luo Hanying didn't know if her experience in the Canglan Realm was a dream, or a dream she had used to escape reality during her three months in a coma.

She did not find the jade pendant that Yun Yanshu had given her on her person.

Luo Hanying covered her head, unable to recall the details of those events. Every person, every word, every scene was fading away, and those insignificant traces were insufficient to prove whether they were real or false.

She collapsed onto the bed and lost consciousness.