When Ye Xuan called out her name, Tushan Honghong suddenly raised her head, her sickly eyes erupting with a twisted, ecstatic light.
She didn’t even notice the killing intent in Ye Xuan’s gaze. She only clung desperately to his leg, rubbing her face madly against his pant leg, greedily inhaling the scent of him:
"Husband! You remember! You still remember me!"
"I was wrong... I was truly wrong! I know I was wrong!"
"After you died, I sat before the jade cage, staring at your cold corpse, and only then did I finally understand that all those male concubines combined couldn’t compare to even one finger of yours!"
"I regret it! I regret it with all my being!"
Her voice suddenly turned manic, her eyes gleaming with a chilling, hair-raising light:
"So I killed them all!"
"Three thousand male concubines—I skinned them and pulled their tendons one by one, lighting their souls into lamps of eternal torment! Their blood flowed for an entire month! It dyed the entire Demon River red, soaked the entire Demon Land, leaving three hundred miles barren and lifeless! Hehehe, Husband, did you see it? Do you know?"
She let out a laugh that didn’t sound like it came from a sane person—a laugh woven with crying, madness, sorrow, and pride—making one’s skin crawl:
"For three hundred years, I’ve traveled like a madwoman across every inch of the Three Thousand Dao Prefectures, searching for your reincarnation... Through wind, frost, snow, and rain, I never stopped... And today, I’ve finally found you!"
"Husband! Let’s start over! In this life, I’ll have only you—only you alone!"
On the flying boat, Wu Lingfeng and Ying’er listened with faces ashen.
For a mortal scholar who died in a past life? Slaughter three thousand male concubines? Turn a river into blood?
But then—
"Bang!"
A heavy, dull thud. Ye Xuan lifted his foot and, with absolute contempt, kicked Tushan Honghong squarely in the chest.
That kick carried all of Ye Xuan’s unbridled force—heavy, powerful, breaking the air with a sharp crack.
The supreme Demon Emperor of the Refining Void stage was sent flying like a severed kite, slamming hard into the glowing barrier at the edge of the flying boat. The impact sent ripples through the barrier, and she herself coughed up a mouthful of bright red blood.
Tushan Honghong slumped against the barrier, clutching her chest, her face pale as death. Her disheveled red hair clung to her cheeks, smeared with blood—a picture of utter misery.
But she still stared at Ye Xuan, unwavering.
Her eyes were filled with confusion, pain, and a pitiable hope.
Ye Xuan slowly turned and looked down at her.
And his face—
That unmatched, peerlessly handsome face—was now twisted in a terrifying, extreme brutality and savagery.
Not anger. Not hatred. But something colder than hatred, deeper than anger—a bone-deep contempt and disgust rising from the very depths of his soul.
A faint smirk tugged at his lips—the smirk one gives when crushing a tiresome insect:
"Start over?"
Ye Xuan raised his head and let out a short, mocking laugh:
"A mere ant at the Refining Void stage."
"Who do you think you are, to chatter before me?"
"Clang!"
A clear sword cry tore through the silent sky.
Ye Xuan slowly reached out and grasped the Sun-Slaying Divine Sword hanging at his waist, its blade blazing with blinding golden solar flames.
As the sword left its sheath, a terrifying heat descended like the sun crashing into the mortal world, distorting the air for several feet around. Visible heatwaves rippled outward. The golden flames leaping along the blade cast Ye Xuan’s face in half-light, half-shadow—cold and savage.
The sword’s tip pointed directly at Tushan Honghong’s brow.
Under that deadly, stabbing light, Tushan Honghong’s pupils violently contracted!
Those peach-blossom eyes, once brimming with joy and obsession, now finally filled with genuine terror.
"Husband..." Her voice cracked. Her lips trembled as if she couldn’t believe it: "You... you want to kill me?"
"Naturally."
Ye Xuan answered without hesitation.
That calm was more chilling than rage.
"Why?"
Tushan Honghong suddenly broke down.
Her eyes turned red, tears flooding down like a bursting dam, mixing with the blood at the corner of her mouth, making her exquisite face both tragically beautiful and utterly despairing.
Her voice tore through sobs, screamed with the last breath in her throat:
"Can I not be forgiven?"
"I’ve heard there are many past lovers who wronged you by your side now! That Empress of Great Xia! Those Demon Venerables! Which of them didn’t betray you? And yet you keep them close!"
"I’ve offered my heart! I’ve risked my life! Why?"
"Why can’t I even have a chance to atone!"
"Forgiveness?"
Ye Xuan paused.
Then he threw back his head and laughed.
Not a soft laugh—a loud, wild laugh, the laugh of someone hearing the most absurd, most idiotic joke in the world, unable to hold it in any longer!
The laughter stopped abruptly.
Ye Xuan suddenly lowered his head.
His eyes, reflected in the golden flames, shot out two icy, soul-piercing beams.
He stared at Tushan Honghong, his gaze frigid:
"You truly are unbearably foolish."
He lifted the Sun-Slaying Divine Sword and stepped forward, one slow, deliberate step at a time, closing in on Tushan Honghong.
In his eyes, all pretense, all warmth, vanished entirely, revealing the darkest, coldest, most terrifyingly rational madness buried deep in his bones:
"You think I keep those vile women by my side because I’m still attached to the past? Because I’m full of forgiveness? Because I can’t bear to touch them?"
"You’re wrong!"
Killing intent exploded in his eyes. His teeth clenched, and he forced out each word from between them, bare and bone-chilling:
"I keep them by my side because they are strong enough! Because the resources in their hands can bring me immense benefits!"
"Because I’m still not strong enough—I can’t kill them yet—so I have to endure and wait!"
"Until the day I’m strong enough to crush them, I’ll take back everything they owe me—every last bit—with interest!"
Hearing this, Wu Lingfeng’s hand unconsciously tightened.
She stood at the side of the flying boat, her face pale as iron, her lips white, her blood seeming to freeze halfway.
For the first time, she saw so directly, so starkly, into Ye Xuan’s inner world—a realm she usually dared not even dwell on: absolute rationality, absolute coldness, absolute utilitarianism.
It was not something born of human nature.
It was a heart tempered by countless reincarnations—betrayed countless times—hardened and sharpened by years and despair into something cold and hard as iron.
At that moment, Ye Xuan continued to approach, stopping in front of Tushan Honghong. He looked down at her as the tip of his sword gently pressed against her trembling, pale chin, forcing her face slowly upward.
His gaze held neither hatred nor fury.
It was more like that of a calculating merchant appraising a piece of discarded goods that had utterly lost its value, delivering a final valuation.
"But who do you think you are?"
Ye Xuan’s voice was casual, as if he couldn't even be bothered to waste an extra ounce of emotion on her.
"A mere Void Refining cultivator—in my eyes now, you’re not even worthy of being called an ant. You don’t even have the right to be used by me!"
"And now, you’ve come knocking on my door yourself..."
The corner of his mouth curled into a smile—one so cold it could freeze the soul, a smile that sent a chill down one’s spine.
"You are courting death!"
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
his freshman year, Su Bai accidentally bound the "Indulgence Tycoon System." 【Sleeping in? Reward: +$1,000】 【Spent $288 at a street barbecue stall? Cashback: +$2,880】 【Dropped $14,396 on in-game skins? Special reward unlocked: A brand-new Porsche Panamera!】 Luxury cars, penthouses, corporate shares, financial empires… College life was all about living freely and doing whatever he pleased! … When the adorably naive academic genius faced family medical bills and financial struggles, Su Bai waved his hand dismissively: "Your future is on me." "Wuwu~ Big Brother is so good to me! I’ll become a scientist to repay you!" When the genius girl got bullied by a shady professor? Su Bai casually dropped a billion-dollar investment, forcing the university to grovel and beg for her return. A company’s funding chain collapsing? Su Bai smirked—cash was the one thing he’d never run out of. Years later, when people traced the rise of the AI prodigy beauty, who was the man behind her success? Not just that—Su Bai also became the tsundere campus belle’s unattainable dream, the contrast senior’s daily necessity, and the beautiful counselor’s emotional anchor…
to panic—he has a system. As long as an investment target dies, he can claim a reward. And since he is immortal, the one thing he has plenty of is time. ... Countless years later. “Immortal Emperor of Longevity? I invested in him.” “Supreme Celestial Venerable? I invested in him.” “Undying Empress? I invested in her.” “...” “Heh. Once they’ve all died, even the Heavenly Dao will have to kneel and call me Dad.”
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.
