The sage was determined to die.

"Brother, is that story true?"

Chu Xi stared at the deep pit, but soon lost interest. She turned to look at Chu Ze and suddenly brought up the topic.

"Brother, you don't seem like the type to like telling stories at all."

Chu Xi pretended to think for a moment and said, "Brother, you're not hiding something from me, are you?"

"I might be hiding a lot from you," Chu Ze smiled and said, "Which one would you like to hear first?"

Chu Xi scratched her head and sighed, "Oh well, never mind then, just don't tell me, lest I accidentally leak it out later."

"It's alright." Chu Ze calmly looked at the pit and suddenly said, "That story was originally false, but it wasn't entirely false either."

"What do you mean?" Chu Xi paused, as if suddenly realizing something, and said to him, "Now that you mention it, I think I remember something."

He scratched his head in frustration and said, "I think there was something like that, but I can't remember it very well..."

Chu Ze reached out and scratched his younger brother's head, saying, "It's already good that you can remember these things. There are some people who might not even know anything about what you can remember."

His brother clearly didn't realize who "someone" was.

"That village existed to cultivate a literary mind," Chu Ze said, carefully choosing his words. "That village was once in our Chu Kingdom. Of course, those people didn't know they were just grains of sand being manipulated. They truly believed that the river was a gift from the gods..."

At this point, he couldn't help but scoff, revealing the dark side of his country. Chu Ze showed neither anger nor regret; his calmness seemed to have already pierced through all his emotions.

"That fisherman had a grudge against his neighbor. He once had a child who was still an infant when his mother fell into the river with him and was swept away and drowned. His neighbor was right on the bank, but he did not help."

"His wife and children were separated, and he had no way to vent his pain, so he naturally began to resent his neighbors."

Chu Ze calmly stated, "So on the day autumn arrived, he also threw the neighbor's child into the river to drown."

"Is there no reversal?" Chu Xi asked.

"A plot twist?" Chu Ze shook his head. "No, the child really is dead. But..."

He gave a brief, ironic smile: "The child he drowned with his own hands was actually his biological son. After the child died, a neighbor told him the truth."

Chu Xi's face showed shock: "Who would believe such a thing?"

"Of course he didn't believe it," Chu Ze said, pointing to himself. "But when I, a prince of Chu, told him in person, he believed it."

Chu Xi slowly opened his eyes, his gaze filled with disbelief. He subconsciously asked, "Brother, why did you do this..."

"Because of the Wang family, and also because of that Wenxin." Chu Ze closed his eyes, and when he opened them, a strange emotion flashed in his eyes. "The result was unexpected; that Wenxin really appeared."

He slowly looked up at the sky, his tone somewhat nostalgic: "It was a heart that really enjoyed devouring people's emotions. All negative, collapsing, desperate emotions, especially those after being betrayed, could attract it."

"They tried many things and eventually discovered that as long as an ordinary person was driven to the brink of collapse, it could attract them, but no one could capture that literary heart."

"That person... must have been deceived for at least several years," Chu Xi murmured. "How tragic."

"No, he was deceived his whole life," Chu Ze said. "I killed him with my own hands."