The Mad Empress

A mocking sneer appeared on Ye Xuan’s face.

He deliberately leaned closer, pressing his swollen, reddened cheek against Wu Lingxiao’s nearly breaking face. The hot breath he exhaled carried the scent of blood and sprayed directly across the tip of her nose.

“Wu Lingxiao, have you sat on that imperial throne for so long that it’s made you stupid?”

Ye Xuan’s voice was low and chilling. “Back then, when I begged you for resources, it was because I needed them to stay alive—to protect this cultivation of mine. But now, I’ve already reached the Refining Void Stage.”

He paused. Blood-colored patterns swirled in the depths of his eyes. The majestic aura of a Refining Void expert resonated faintly within him, causing even the chains of time surrounding them to tremble.

“After reaching the Refining Void Stage, I can draw the spiritual energy of heaven and earth into my body. Those so-called treasures of the Great Xia Immortal Dynasty are nothing but piles of trash in my eyes. Since I’ve already accumulated enough garbage, why should I continue wagging my tail and begging at the feet of its owner?”

Wu Lingxiao suddenly seized Ye Xuan by the collar. The golden flame was stirred by her frantic movement, scorching the sleeve of her left arm until it was charred black.

The agony that pierced into her soul forced a low growl from her throat, yet it only made her gaze appear even more deranged.

Wu Lingxiao bent down and buried her face in the crook of his neck, inhaling deeply. Her voice carried a frenzied plea bordering on desperation.

“Why are you forcing me? Why are you making me your enemy? Don’t forget—I can remove your [One Conquest, Eternal Conquest].”

The sleeping chamber fell into a strange silence.

Ye Xuan felt the warmth of the Female Emperor’s tears against the side of his neck.

It was the vulnerability of the Great Xia’s greatest beauty—enough to drive every man beneath heaven mad.

Yet Ye Xuan merely turned his head slowly. His gaze swept over the quietly burning golden flame before finally landing on the dragon bed, which had been reduced to a scene of utter devastation.

He let out a derisive laugh.

“Remove it?”

Ye Xuan’s voice was as light as though he were telling a joke. “Wu Lingxiao, do you really think I need this [One Conquest, Eternal Conquest]?”

He stared into her tear-filled eyes and spoke each word distinctly, with enough force to shatter every one of Wu Lingxiao’s fantasies.

“I’ll say it again. The reason [One Conquest, Eternal Conquest] can bind women like you is because you so-called sluts are all restless by nature—rotten to the core, filthy whores.”

“But Ying’er is different. Bai Qianqiu is different. They love me because I am Ye Xuan, because I gave them a bond worth devoting their entire lives to. Even without [One Conquest, Eternal Conquest], they would beg to remain by my side and shield me from the storms of the myriad worlds. Women like them have the word ‘loyalty’ engraved in their souls. Why would they need a curse to bind them?”

Wu Lingxiao’s face turned deathly pale.

It was as though her spine had been torn from her body. She slumped beside Ye Xuan’s waist, and the phoenix-like eyes that had once controlled the lives and deaths of all beneath heaven were now filled with disbelief and absurdity.

She realized that the greatest weapon she possessed was, in Ye Xuan’s eyes, utterly worthless.

“Y-You really aren’t afraid?”

“Afraid of what?”

Ye Xuan sneered, his tone contemptuous to the extreme. “Go ahead and remove it. Do you think that once you do, I’ll beg you to stay? No, Wu Lingxiao. If you remove it, that means I’ll finally be able to kill you with my own hands without any reservations, then cast your soul into the Nine Netherworlds Purgatory, where you’ll never reincarnate.”

“Since you want me to leave so badly, then I refuse to go!”

Wu Lingxiao panted heavily, her eyes crimson, almost as though they were bleeding tears.

“You’re fond of that little maid, aren’t you? You think she’s pure and unsullied, don’t you? I’ll go kill her right now! I’ll throw her into the filthiest beggars’ den and turn her into someone just like me!”

“Go ahead and try.”

Ye Xuan’s voice remained calm, but beneath that calm was a murderous intent powerful enough to destroy heaven and earth.

“If you touch her, I guarantee that the eight-thousand-year foundation of the Great Xia Immortal Dynasty will be reduced to ruins before the sun rises tomorrow.”

“Ye Xuan!”

Wu Lingxiao let out a shrill scream, completely losing control of herself.

She lunged at him, and the two began grappling once again within the sleeping chamber.

There were no techniques, no divine abilities—only the most primitive, savage tearing and striking, filled with hatred.

The dragon bed collapsed.

The gauze curtains were shredded.

The black-gold chains let out a strained, rumbling groan amid their furious struggle.

Wu Lingxiao sank her teeth into Ye Xuan’s shoulder, drawing a splash of bright-red blood.

Ye Xuan, in turn, suddenly flipped her beneath him. He pressed both hands firmly against her face, forcing that once-arrogant visage deep into the disordered silk sheets.

“If you want to keep pestering me… then I’ll pester you to the very end!”

Wu Lingxiao snarled between ragged breaths, tears mingling with sweat and blood as they streamed down her face.

“You belong to me… Even if you die, you can only die in my bed!”

That night in Weiyang Palace held no imperial dignity and no transcendence belonging to cultivators.

There were only two beasts trapped in an emotional wasteland, gnawing at and wounding each other. Yet amid that ultimate agony and entanglement, they sank into a mad cycle that seemed destined never to end.

When dawn finally broke through the layers of shadow surrounding the palace and cast its light upon the cracked white-jade doors, even the palace attendants waiting in the distance did not dare raise their heads to look.

Creak.

The heavy doors of the chamber were slowly pushed open.

Ye Xuan stepped out.

His once-extravagantly luxurious black-gold robe was now tattered beyond recognition. The collar had been torn open, exposing a neck covered in purplish bruises and scratches.

More conspicuous still was his face. On those impossibly handsome features capable of turning all living beings upside down, there were now patches of blue and purple, with a streak of dried blood at the corner of his mouth.

Wu Lingxiao’s condition inside the chamber was clearly even worse.

Her long hair hung loose, and she stood barefoot amid the ruins of the dragon bed, which had been pulverized into dust. Her black-gold imperial robe hung loosely from her body, failing to conceal the marks left by their frenzied struggle.

Her eyes were webbed with blood vessels—the result of an entire night without sleep and of lingering on the brink of madness after her reason had completely collapsed.

“Ye Xuan…”

Wu Lingxiao’s voice was hoarse. She stared fixedly at his back, every word forced out between her teeth like blood.

“If I hear you call me a ‘discarded woman’ again… I swear that even if I have to sacrifice the Great Xia, even if I have to scatter this cultivation of mine, I will make sure you and I… perish together!”

This was more than a threat. It was a nearly despairing plea—the last shred of dignity belonging to an emperor whose pride had been trampled into the mud.

Ye Xuan stopped.

He slowly turned around. His gray-white eyes held not the slightest trace of pity, only the cold indifference of someone who had endured countless calamities.

Yet the moment his gaze touched Wu Lingxiao, his fingertips trembled faintly. A dark-red gleam, imperceptible to outsiders, flashed through his eyes.

[Questioning the Heart].

It was one of his special divine abilities, capable of seeing the love and desire buried deepest within a person’s heart—the things that could never be faked.

Within Ye Xuan’s field of vision, Wu Lingxiao’s figure disappeared. In its place was a crimson blaze burning with such frenzy that it had already begun consuming itself.

That was… love.

This was no ordinary attraction between a man and a woman. It was a terrifying emotion, cruelly warped by [Once Conquered, Forever Conquered], and further twisted by eight hundred years of guilt and obsession.

Ye Xuan’s heart trembled faintly.

He knew the time was right.

If he continued to verbally humiliate her without restraint as he had the night before, this Female Emperor—already half-mad—might truly detonate her divine soul and drag him with her to the underworld.

He had not lived long enough yet. He had not returned to the pinnacle. He did not want to die alongside a madwoman in some twisted lovers’ suicide.