Empress Dowager Wen's eyes flickered, but a trace of hesitation flashed across her face.
"Your imperial father said we shouldn't provoke Qin Xiao..."
She didn't understand the meaning behind these words.
Although her heart was filled with resentment towards Qin Xiao, she had to obey Emperor Qinwu's words.
Qin Rumeng raised her head, revealing a snow-white swan-like neck, and let out a cold snort from her nose.
"Imperial Father is making a fuss over nothing. What does Qin Xiao think he is? If he dares to resist, I, the princess, will whip him to death!"
She raised the purple spiked whip in her hand, which was covered in blood-red barbs gleaming with a cold light.
As Qin Xiao's second elder sister, she had once used this very whip to ruthlessly punish him.
Not only that, she had even rubbed salt all over Qin Xiao's body and whipped him for two whole days.
It was in the dead of winter, the twelfth lunar month, when the air itself seemed to freeze into ice.
Seeing chunks of flesh falling from Qin Xiao's body as he turned purple from the cold, blood dripping everywhere, was a scene that made her feel exceptionally vindicated whenever she recalled it.
In this family, she was the one who bullied Qin Xiao the most, and the one who looked down on him the most.
Qin Rushuang nodded in agreement, wearing a cold sneer.
"Second Sister is right. We have no need to fear Qin Xiao. In fact, allowing him to come see us is already an honor for him."
"Qin Xiao making such a big commotion is probably just to see us and beg for our forgiveness. He doesn't even look at what kind of thing he really is!"
"Does he even deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as Yu'er?"
Thick disgust filled the eyes of the two women, their disdain completely undisguised.
Empress Dowager Wen hesitated, but eventually nodded.
"Alright then, I'll go look for Qin Xiao right now."
Qin Rushuang stopped Empress Dowager Wen.
"Imperial Mother, if you go see Qin Xiao in person, wouldn't that be giving him too much face? He should be the one rolling over here to see us!"
"Besides, he bullied Third Sister, he still needs to kneel down and apologize to us!"
Malice glinted in Qin Rushuang's eyes, and a wicked smile curled the corners of her lips, as if she could already see the sight of Qin Xiao kneeling on the ground and kowtowing for mercy.
"Yes! Exactly!" Qin Rumeng clapped her hands in cheer, her smile both callous and arrogant, the cruelty in her eyes practically overflowing.
"We cannot go to Qin Xiao ourselves, that would be a loss of dignity. He should roll over here and kowtow in apology to us!"
Empress Dowager Wen frowned, but before she could say anything.
"Alright, Imperial Mother, don't worry. Leave this matter to your daughter."
"I will find a way to make him come and plead guilty to you."
Qin Rumeng patted her chest in guarantee, her eyes brimming with confidence.
But right at this moment.
"Pfft!"
A mouthful of fresh blood sprayed onto the desk, splattering all over the floor.
"Eldest Sister!!"
Qin Rumeng's face paled in shock, and she hurriedly ran over.
Qin Rushuang's face was ashen, her body swaying as she heavily leaned against the desk, narrowly avoiding a fall.
"Eldest Sister, what's wrong?"
The moment Qin Rumeng's hand touched Qin Rushuang, she immediately felt a bone-piercing chill.
She quickly let go.
Empress Dowager Wen was also startled upon seeing Qin Rushuang vomit blood.
Qin Rushuang's face grew paler by the second, and her aura gradually became weak and unstable.
Anything she touched was instantly covered in a layer of ice crystals.
Cold air raged around her, and even the ground formed ice shards.
A gust of freezing wind blew past, causing the temperature in the grand hall to plummet. The sheer cold made everyone present involuntarily shiver.
"Quick, hurry and summon the imperial physician..."
"It's no use, Imperial Mother. This is the cold poison from the Nine Yin Profound Veins..."
Qin Rushuang gritted her teeth, her voice as faint as a thread.
She forced herself to stay upright, biting her purpling lips as she spoke with great difficulty.
"When the cold poison acts up, ordinary people cannot cure it. One can only endure it by force."
Though she said this, the biting cold felt like blades scraping across her skin, slicing apart every nerve in her body.
This was a physical defect of hers.
She possessed the Nine Yin Profound Veins, inherently extremely cold. Once it acted up, the cold poison would erupt and flood every meridian in her body, making one experience endless freezing cold until they completely turned into an ice sculpture.
Originally, those born with the Nine Yin Profound Veins could not live past twenty, yet Qin Rushuang had managed to live six years longer.
"How could this be? Why did the cold poison flare up so quickly this time?"
Qin Rumeng's face was filled with anxiety. Seeing Qin Rushuang's agonizing state, she was at a loss for what to do.
"Eldest Sister clearly recovered a year ago, why would she suddenly fall ill now?"
Empress Dowager Wen also watched anxiously from the side, but to no avail.
The two of them could only watch helplessly as Qin Rushuang curled up into a ball, collapsing onto the bed with pained groans.
Her body was like a fish thrown into an ice cave, constantly struggling and thrashing, yet unable to escape.
"A year ago..."
Qin Rushuang muttered to herself, memories from a year ago surfacing in her mind.
A year ago.
Her cold poison had acted up, and it was the most severe bout she had ever experienced. Her body was sealed in ice, her blood froze into frost, and her consciousness grew blurry.
She genuinely thought she was going to die.
Fear, helplessness, and despair had enveloped her.
It was at that very moment that a warm current of air suddenly surged into her body, dispelling the chill within her.
That warm current was like salvation, like a ray of dawn, allowing her to see the light again from the darkness.
And the person who saved her... was none other than Qin Xiao!
"So it really was him..."
Under the threat of death, Qin Rushuang finally recalled the hazy memories of that day.
She remembered Qin Xiao holding her, slicing open his palm, and feeding drops of his blood into her mouth. A warm current, as comforting as the morning sun, surged through her limbs and bones.
Yet, her first reaction upon waking up back then was to raise her hand and slap Qin Xiao across the face.
She had even cursed at him, calling him a worthless scoundrel and a lecher who was taking advantage of her.
Only now did Qin Rushuang finally realize that she had wronged Qin Xiao.
"Find... find Qin Xiao... only he can save me..."
Qin Rushuang's voice was low and hoarse, like the final cry of a dying beast.
"Alright, alright, alright, Imperial Mother will send someone to find him right away!"
Empress Dowager Wen, with tears in her eyes, nodded repeatedly.
"Imperial Mother, I will go find Qin Xiao."
After Qin Rumeng said this, she rushed out of the grand hall, running outside.
...
Meanwhile.
Inside the Taiji Palace.
Draped in a black and gold dragon robe, Qin Xiao stood tall on the steps. His facial features were handsome and refined, his gaze profound, and his entire being exuded an awe-inspiring coercion.
Below him.
Over a dozen people knelt on one knee, looking up at that domineering figure, their eyes brimming with fanatical reverence.
"Greetings, Your Majesty!!"
"We congratulate Your Majesty on ascending the throne as Emperor!"
They all bowed down in unison.
"You are all my subordinates who have traveled thousands of miles to come to this dragon's pool and tiger's den. Let's dispense with these empty formalities. All of you, rise."
Qin Xiao looked down from above and raised a hand.
The crowd stood up and said in unison, "Thank you, Your Majesty!"
The middle-aged man leading them wore a black robe and gently waved a white feather fan in his hand, his pitch-black eyes occasionally flashing with a sharp gleam.
"General, oh no, Your Majesty."
"You have finally ascended the throne as Emperor. We thought that your journey to the capital this time would leave you unable to even protect yourself..."
The person who spoke was none other than one of the chief strategists under Qin Xiao's command... Jia Xu!
uld barely embark on the path to immortality. Just as he was on the verge of death, his golden finger awakened. No matter whether it was poison, drained blood and vital energy, diminished lifespan, or any other physical debuff caused by paying a price—once midnight passed, everything would be refreshed. From then on, whenever someone asked what kind of person Chu Ran was, the answer was simple: Forbidden arts that other cultivators dared not learn? Chu Ran would learn them. Prices that even demonic cultivators dared not pay? Chu Ran would pay them. Lifespan that even righteous cultivators dared not burn? Chu Ran would burn it. All the blood essence in his body? Take it. Want both his hands and feet? He would cut them off and send them to you. You say he’s finished? He wasn’t built to sit idle. You think he’s gone mad? No—he was simply waiting for midnight. From that day onward, Chu Ran would respect neither Heaven nor Earth, bow to neither gods nor ghosts. He had only one wish: For midnight to arrive a little sooner.
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
s the Eldest Princess, renowned for her cold and aloof detachment, became the most docile of lambs, obeying his every command without question. But when the final move was played on the chessboard, as Gu Chenghan seized everything and ascended on the verge of apotheosis, that very Princess suddenly embraced him from behind, her tone carrying a dependence never heard before: "Wait... you haven't yet... commanded me to love you forever." Gu Chenghan froze abruptly. She... hadn't been hypnotized?! ... [The Eldest Princess's Diary] [When my soul was extracted, becoming the sole spectator outside my own shell] [At first, there was overwhelming fury, until I saw] [How he used my sword to effortlessly shatter my inescapable doom] [How he wielded my authority to eradicate fatal conspiracies I had never even detected] [Like a deity, he rescued me from the deep mire I was trapped in] [If not for those annoying vixens, he and I would be a match made in heaven] [I think I am ill, gravely ill] [My deity should belong to me alone] ... "Hypnosis? Oh, it succeeded, my dear Master." "Only this time, it's my turn to hypnotize you."
and couldn't return to the real world. Finally, I gave up and decided to go with the flow, only to discover that writing a diary could make me stronger. Since no one could read it, Su Luo wrote freely, daring to pen anything and everything. Female Lead #1: "Not bad. This diary helped me steal all the protagonist's opportunities. I just want to get stronger." Female Lead #2: "I don’t care about reaching the peak of the cultivation world. Right now, I just want to enjoy the chaos." Female Lead #3: "What? Everyone around me is a spy? I’m the Joker Demon Lord?" ... It’s so strange. Why is the plot completely off track, yet the ending remains the same? Are you all just messing with me?!
