With a Name, You Are No Longer a Nameless Monster

"Enough, enough. It's very impressive. How should I put it? It's a bit beyond my expectations."

The mummified corpse froze.

"Great... Great One, what did you say?"

"I said, it's very impressive."

Chen Zhou repeated it, without any hint of perfunctoriness.

"Three seventh-stage combatants are enough to suppress an entire region."

"In the past, if placed in the Eastern Region, they could rival half of the Sea Race army."

"In the Southern Region, they could make those Demon Kings unable to lift their heads."

The mummified corpse scratched her head sheepishly. Was she... really that impressive?

She didn't understand the divisions of cultivation realms. She only knew that these monsters were a part of her body, things she had separated from herself—filthy, disgusting things.

To think that such things could actually receive praise from the Great One.

Chen Zhou looked at her and continued.

"After this, the Western Region may welcome more living beings."

"Mortals, cultivators, demons... all kinds of existences that need to survive on this land."

"The order of the Western Region needs someone to maintain it."

"Can you do it?"

The mummified corpse listened in a daze.

Let her... protect the Western Region?

A monster like her, who only brought disaster—he wanted her to protect this land she had plagued for a thousand years?

"Can I?"

"Great One, I can't... I... I'm just a corpse, a monster."

"How could I... how could I possibly protect others?"

Her voice was trembling.

"You can,"

Chen Zhou interrupted her.

"You and I are of the same kind."

The mummified corpse's entire body shuddered.

Of the same kind?

A noble god and her hideous corpse... were of the same kind?

The mummified corpse opened her mouth.

She wanted to say that it was different.

You are a noble god, a true god.

I am just a monster that stole the divine remains.

But when the words reached her lips, she couldn't utter a single syllable.

Because Chen Zhou's gaze was too calm.

There was no pity, no charity, no high-and-mighty looking down.

He was just looking at her calmly.

Like he was looking at an equal.

Chen Zhou looked at her.

"My true form is actually quite similar to yours."

"Do not doubt it. If I can do it, you certainly can too."

The mummified corpse was completely stunned.

She stared blankly in Chen Zhou's direction for a long, long time.

Then, she lowered her head.

She hugged the eyeballs in her arms a little tighter.

Of the same kind...

Did that mean a monster like her was also qualified... to do something, just like a true god?

She didn't dare to think it.

But she etched those words into her heart.

The mummified corpse lowered her head.

She looked at her hands.

Withered, shriveled hands stained with sinful karma.

But it was these very hands that had just made a seed sprout.

It was these hands that could summon three seventh-stage monsters.

"I... I will try."

Her voice was still very soft, but it held a trace more determination than before.

Chen Zhou nodded.

Then he remembered something. Calling her "divine remains" all the time wasn't a long-term solution.

Since she already possessed an independent personality, independent consciousness, and her own joys and sorrows, she should have an independent name.

"What is your name?"

Chen Zhou asked.

The mummified corpse blanked.

A name?

She instinctively wanted to say her name was Xiaoyun.

But the words reached her throat and she swallowed them back down.

No.

She wasn't Xiaoyun.

Xiaoyun was that kind child, Tuoba Feng's daughter. She had only stolen Xiaoyun's name, stolen Xiaoyun's appearance, stolen Xiaoyun's father, and even stolen a hundred years of Xiaoyun's time.

The mummified corpse lowered her head, her voice muffled.

"I... I don't have a name."

"The Grave-keepers call me divine remains, they call me a monster, they call me an evil spirit."

"They hate me, they curse me, they wish they could grind my bones to dust."

"No one has ever given me a name."

Chen Zhou fell silent for a moment.

Then he spoke.

"Then I shall bestow a name upon you."

The mummified corpse jerked her head up.

Chen Zhou thought for a moment and spoke slowly, "A name is a very important thing."

"Wu Gou once said that a name is the first curse and the first blessing."

"With a name, you have a place to belong."

"With a name, you have a path from which you came."

"With a name, you gain the qualification to be remembered."

"With a name, you are no longer a nameless monster."

"You are yourself."

The mummified corpse listened in a daze.

The first curse and blessing...

With a name, I am myself...

"Great One, you... you are willing to bestow a name upon me?"

Chen Zhou looked down at her.

Chen Zhou nodded.

He thought for a moment, looking at the withered, hideous, and scarred remains before him.

She had been trapped here for tens of thousands of years.

Her eyes had been gouged out, her lips sewn shut.

She had endured ten thousand years of curses and carried ten thousand years of sinful karma.

She didn't even dare to hope for a name.

Yet she still worked hard to suppress the black spots.

She still worked hard to protect this land.

She would still jump for joy because a single seed sprouted.

She would shed tears because of the phrase "useful."

"Lian,"

Chen Zhou said. "Lian as in compassion."

"From this day forth, your name is Lian."

Chen Zhou looked at her.

"Your life has been too bitter."

"No one has shown you compassion, so I shall."

A wind blew from the depths of the desert.

It blew past the god's tomb, past the flower garden, and through the tomb door that had finally opened a crack.

It blew against the withered face of the mummified corpse... against Lian's face.

She stood there, motionless.

Then, she knelt.

She didn't kowtow in panic like before, nor did she curl up humbly like before.

Lian simply knelt, pressing her forehead against the sand.

For a long, long time.

When she finally raised her head, the tears of blood had mixed with the yellow sand, covering her terrifying face.

But she didn't wipe it away.

She gave Chen Zhou a gentle smile.

Her sewn lips pulled tight, making the smile look somewhat distorted.

But it was indeed a smile.

"Lian..."

She whispered the name softly.

"My name is Lian..."

"The name the Great One bestowed upon me..."

"I have a name..."

She repeated the word over and over, as if carving it into her soul.

After a long time, Lian finally stood up.

She walked back to the tomb door.

There, the two grayish-white eyeballs were still lying quietly on the threshold.

They had accidentally fallen out when she was panicking earlier.

Lian crouched down, reaching out with trembling hands to pick them up.

One by one.

She placed them back into her empty eye sockets.

The moment the eyeballs entered the sockets, her body trembled slightly.

It had been a thousand years.

She finally had eyes again.

Though the eyeballs were shriveled, grayish-white, and her vision was blurry.

But they were hers.

They were her eyes.

Lian blinked.

Blurry shadows and light shifted before her.

She saw it.

She saw the yellow sand outside the tomb door.

She saw the flower garden being cultivated.

She saw Su Xue and those busy plant demonlings.

She saw Xiaoyun being held in Tuoba Feng's arms.

She saw that black-robed figure—vague and hazy, as if through a thick veil.

But she saw him.

Lian's tears fell once more.

She lifted her foot and took her first step.

She stepped onto the sand outside the tomb door.

The grains of sand sank between her toes.

It was warm.

She took another step.

And another.

She stood outside the tomb door.

Standing in the sunlight.

Standing in the wind and sand.

The heavenly punishment was gone, the sinful karma was gone, the pain was gone—everything was gone.

There was only the warm sand, the dry wind, and those busy figures in the distance.

Lian lowered her head and looked at her feet.

Withered, shriveled feet covered in cracks.

Sunken into the yellow sand.

Bathed in the sunlight.

She suddenly remembered a long, long time ago, when she first gained consciousness.

Back then, she lay in a coffin, unable to move or see.

She could only listen.

Listen to the Grave-keepers talk, listen to them sacrifice, listen to them die.

She had imagined countless times what the world outside was like.

Imagined the feeling of sunlight hitting her body.

Imagined the feeling of the wind blowing across her cheeks.

Imagined the feeling of her feet stepping on the ground.

Now she knew.

So this was what it felt like to be alive.

In the distance, Su Xue looked up and saw Lian standing outside the tomb door.

She wore a gentle smile and called out loudly, "The sun is strong over there! Come over here, there's shade by the flower garden!"

Lian turned her head blankly.

There was shade by the flower garden.

Someone was calling for her to go over.

She lifted her feet and, step by step, walked toward that patch of green.