Even after reaching the third tier, Si did not ease up on his training. Instead, he doubled down, cultivating even during the daylight hours when there were no bodies to bury or clean.
Luckily, grave slaves were only permitted in two places: their shacks or the graveyards. Though it was the most detestable job in the realm, it was also the least physically demanding and the least time-consuming. As long as one could endure the corrosive effects of extreme yin qi, there were few real burdens attached to the role.
Si seized upon this freedom without hesitation and drove himself even harder, pushing his cultivation to a relentless extreme. This drew glances from those around him, yet they quickly dismissed him as another grave slave who had lost his mind and paid him no further attention. As long as he fulfilled his duties by digging, stripping, and burying the corpses when new batches arrived, no one cared how he spent the rest of his time.
What they failed to understand, however, was the consistency of "Si's" madness. Four months into his radical cultivation, whispers began to spread. Slaves in distant corners of the Bi clan grounds gave him a name: mùdì qíngrén, the Grave Lover.
Even the soldiers and household maids of the main estate became aware of him, and rumors soon followed that the Bi family itself had taken notice of the infamous Grave Lover.
Contrary to what everyone believed, Si welcomed this development. In his past life, it had been precisely such rumors and idle gossip that drew the attention of the one person who had wounded him most deeply, physically, mentally, and sexually. Yet she had also been the reason he rose to become patriarch of the Bi clan.
Si bore no resentment toward her. In truth, she was among the few he had sincerely mourned. Her death had come from a minor mishap during his revolt to dethrone the Yunhe royal family. Though he had succeeded in seizing the throne, he had been left grieving for more than a year.
If he could meet her again sooner rather than later, it would only serve his advantage.
Regardless, he ignored the gossip and continued cultivating without pause. Day and night blurred together. When he was not a grave slave tending to corpses, he was a cultivator consumed by discipline. At other times, he became a patient instructor, correcting Bao's flaws and teaching him how to extract the utmost value from the meager resources available to a cultivator without backing. He knew that once he entered the Bi family military, their time together would become scarce. Because of that, he was determined to forge a solid foundation for Bao while he still could.
This left a profound impression on Bao. To him, Si was no longer merely a friend. He had become the elder brother Bao had never known.
Bao began making a conscious effort to understand this new version of Si. He would even sneak close to the burial grounds at night, observing him from a distance. This quiet routine continued without fail for six months.
28 Weeks Later, 16th Day of the 7th Month
"Ka! Ka! Ka! Ka!"
Bao staggered back in alarm as the thick layer of ice that had encased Si throughout the night and into dawn began to fracture. Cracks spread first from his joints, then raced across his entire body. For a brief, terrifying instant, an emerald glow flared within his eyes before fading into stillness.
"Fourth tier of the foundation realm. I am finally an esteemed foundation realm cultivator," he murmured between uneven breaths, his skin trembling faintly.
Si was paler than ever. Several strands of his hair had turned white, and his breathing had slowed to a steady, unnatural rhythm. In his past life, his superiors had called him Ice Doll for his appearance, his muted emotions, and his distant demeanor. Yet it had been these very traits that drew the attention of the person now approaching him.
Lady Lian of the Bi family was thirty-two, yet time seemed unwilling to leave its mark upon her. Her beauty did not strike like lightning; it lingered, like the final note of a zither echoing through an empty hall. The longer one looked, the more difficult it became to look away. Her features were refined without being fragile.
Her almond-shaped eyes carried a quiet authority that even seasoned retainers dared not meet directly. Her skin bore the pale clarity of untouched porcelain, a stark contrast to hair as dark as wet ink, gathered into an elegant knot secured by a single jade pin. She did not adorn herself extravagantly; a simple robe of muted violet was enough.
Memories surged through Si's mind, his emotions twisting into a knot. Facing someone he could neither love nor hate freely was never easy.
"Please, slow down, my lady!" cried a boy of eighteen as he chased after her. Si recognized him instantly.
Yan Cheng!!!
Hostility replaced every other emotion in Si's gaze the moment he saw the familiar, delicate-faced favorite of Lady Lian.
"To think this fellow is actually as useless as they said!"
In a single glance, Si assessed his cultivation. Sixth tier of the foundation realm.
A year ahead of this moment, when they had first met in his past life, the boy had already stood at the sixth tier. Talentless in every meaningful sense, his only advantages were a pleasing face and the physical charms Lady Lian had grown accustomed to before Si's arrival. Si's composed beauty, measured reactions, and quiet nature had stirred something deeper within her, reminding her of the men who had once captured her heart in her youth.
Jealousy and fear of being replaced had driven Yan Cheng to challenge Si to a duel, and it had cost him his life. That victory had marked the beginning of Si's rise, both within the Bi family and beyond. To defeat a cultivator one tier higher was rare. To do so decisively, despite a three-year gap between them, had captivated many. Lady Lian among them.
From that moment on, she had replaced Yan Cheng with Si. What followed was a descent into repeated violations and coercion, which eventually twisted into a secret relationship. Lady Lian had, in truth, forced him into loving her, making her the first of many married women he would entangle himself with over the course of his three-century life.
In this world, maturity came early. Fourteen was considered the age of marriage. Even Lady Lian's eldest son had taken a wife at that age.
One might wonder how she had dared act so brazenly beneath her husband's nose. The answer was simple: resentment.
Married into the Bi clan as Bi Xian's second wife at the age of fourteen, she had been promised a life at the heart of Yunhe's political stage. She had turned away younger suitors who had sought her as their first wife, choosing instead to accept a lesser position for the promise of greater power. Yet the clan's decline had begun soon after. Years of conflict and mutual blame between husband and wife had left her with a deep bitterness toward Bi Xian, a man she believed had trapped her in a life of mediocrity beneath the guise of empty promises.
Unable to attract high-status men due to her marital ties and the family's waning influence, she turned her attention to the Bi clan military, selecting her personal guards and companions with care.
Si had risen from a disposable tool to a man she trusted. She had offered him the means to seize the Bi clan for himself. In him, she saw hope, the possibility of reclaiming the life she had once dreamed of. She had placed everything upon him.
It was no exaggeration to say that Lady Lian had been among the first to truly believe in him. Perhaps that was why he had kept her by his side until the events of the Yunhe revolt.
Even now, he could recall the weight of that loss. Though he had been unable to shed tears for her, he had felt the absence of someone important.
"And now, fate has brought us back together, my lady. This time, we shall not part again."