“Xiao Honglian had witnessed with her own eyes the betrayal of the husband she loved. She had also watched her Senior Brother—the man she had hurt countless times—die a gruesome death while trying to save her…”
“She had gone completely mad. And she had finally awakened.”
“Her overwhelming regret and agony fully awakened her innate constitution. Trapped at the brink of death, she broke through her cocoon at the last moment. Not only did she shatter the seal, she transformed directly into a fiendish asura crawling out of hell.”
“With her own hands, she tore apart the exotic-flame defensive formation Xiao Huo was so proud of, then ripped the man she had once worshiped as a god into a skyful of bloody fragments! Using the Myriad Flames Devouring Heaven Art, she swallowed Xiao Huo’s origin completely, leaving not even a drop behind!”
“After that battle, the land within a radius of ten li was reduced to a barren wasteland. Xiao Huo’s soul was utterly annihilated, and not even an intact corpse remained.”
Ye Xuan abruptly rose to his feet and spread his arms wide. His golden-black imperial robes snapped in the howling wind, making him seem like a true demon god looking down upon the mortal world.
“But the woman who walked out of that mountain of corpses and sea of blood was no longer the foolish junior sister who knew nothing but chasing after men.”
“She had become the peerless powerhouse now renowned throughout the human realm, a figure whose name struck fear into countless orthodox sects—”
“The Flame Emperor, Xiao Honglian!”
Ying’er fell silent for a moment before the corners of her lips curved into a seductive smile.
She said softly, “Come to think of it, Husband, back then you were willing to let the Eight Desolations Refining Heaven Flame burn you just to save her. You even allowed Xiao Huo to shatter your crown chakra…”
“You truly loved her deeply, didn’t you?”
Hearing Ying’er’s sigh, Ye Xuan slowly picked up the finest spirit tea from the stone table.
He gazed at his reflection in the teacup—at that flawless face, now imbued with boundless indifference—and suddenly let out a deeply self-mocking laugh.
“Loved her deeply?”
Ye Xuan shook his head. His eyes, black as ink, held not the slightest trace of warmth. There was only an extreme clarity and icy detachment born of seeing through the mortal world.
“Ying’er, you think far too little of me—and far too highly of her.”
He raised the teacup to his lips and took a shallow sip. “How could I possibly fall for a trashy woman like that? It would be nothing less than courting death.”
“If I had truly developed feelings for her, then the moment I saw her give everything she had to that man, Xiao Huo, without the slightest restraint—or the moment I saw her take the Hehuan pills I had bought with everything I possessed and climb into Xiao Huo’s bed—my Dao heart would have shattered long ago.”
“It was precisely because I had regarded her as nothing more than a useful tool, a chess piece, from beginning to end, that I was able to maintain a clear mind through centuries of humiliation and abasement.”
Ye Xuan casually set down the teacup. His toe idly ground against the smooth, gleaming back of Ye Qingcheng, who was serving as his footstool, eliciting a muffled groan from the Grand Elder of the Hehuan Sect.
“Love is reserved for those who deserve it. Xiao Honglian is not worthy.”
Hearing Ye Xuan’s uncompromising and ruthless judgment, Ying’er knit her brows slightly, apparently puzzled.
She tilted her head and pondered for a moment before unable to resist asking, “But… Husband, I actually feel that she isn’t as vile as Xia Lengyue. After all, from beginning to end, Xiao Huo was her only husband.”
“Though she was blind enough to choose the wrong man, she remained utterly devoted to Xiao Huo, faithful to him until the end. In the cultivation world, where the strong prey on the weak and cauldrons are everywhere, such loyalty is rare and precious, isn’t it?”
“Faithful?”
As though he had heard the greatest joke in the world, Ye Xuan’s deep eyes flashed with heavy mockery.
He turned to look at Ying’er’s sweet, innocent face and slowly shook his head coldly.
“Ying’er, you’ve only seen the surface.”
Ye Xuan’s voice echoed through the silent imperial garden. “She is the same as Xia Lengyue—cold and selfish to the core. You think she loved Xiao Huo? You’re wrong.”
“From the very beginning, the one she loved was herself!”
“To satisfy her desire to cling to the strong, she could abandon her senior brother—her childhood companion, the man who had shown her such profound kindness—without a moment’s hesitation.”
“To preserve her position as the ‘principal wife,’ she could cast aside her dignity and curry favor with a man who treated her like discarded trash. Her so-called devotion was nothing more than a tool for moving herself.”
Ye Xuan set the teacup down heavily on the stone table, producing a crisp, muffled clack. “But... none of that matters anymore.”
He rose slowly to his feet and looked down upon the sea of clouds below. A strange light flickered in his profound black eyes, as though he had sensed the convergence of some destined encounter.
“I think she’s almost here.”
Almost the instant Ye Xuan’s words fell—
Outside the Sword God Palace, the once clear, cloudless heavens underwent a terrifying transformation!
In the blink of an eye, the entire sky was dyed a heart-pounding dark crimson. It was not the color of sunset, but an inferno formed from extreme heat and fire laws condensed to their purest limit!
“Crack! Crack!”
Unable to bear such an incomparably terrifying pressure, space itself shrieked like shattering glass. Vast spatial fissures spread wildly through the sea of flames like black lightning.
Then, a scarlet beam of light, dazzling beyond measure, tore through heaven and earth like a primordial sword splitting eternal night.
Within that crimson radiance lay an overbearing imperial might capable of incinerating the heavens, boiling the seas, and annihilating all things. The Sword God Palace’s protective grand formation was instantly triggered. Countless streams of sword qi soared into the sky, only to let out cries of strain beneath the crushing pressure of that red light.
Before the eyes of the masses—
The crimson radiance gradually receded, transforming into the phantom of an enormous red lotus that covered the heavens and the earth as it slowly bloomed above the nine skies.
At the lotus’s heart, a woman appeared with arrogant grace, stepping upon divine flames that filled the sky.
The moment she saw the woman clearly, even Ying’er, who had witnessed countless beauties, could not help but draw a sharp breath.
What kind of woman was she?
Contrary to what people might have expected, she was not dressed in crimson imperial robes symbolizing dominance and destruction. Instead, she wore a robe of soft, elegant green, as gentle and refined as misty rain over the southern waterways.
Her green robes were pristine, fluttering in the wind.
Her beauty was peerless, enough to topple kingdoms. There was not the slightest trace of worldly dust upon her features; instead, her brows carried an air of absolute coolness and detachment.
Against the backdrop of a raging sea of flames that seemed capable of destroying all things, she resembled a pure lotus blooming quietly amid the inferno—aloof and independent, untouched by the mortal world.
This stark contrast did not diminish her majesty. Instead, it imbued her with an inscrutable aura and peerless grace that made anyone who looked upon her feel an urge to fall to their knees in worship.
This was none other than the supreme overlord who now shook the Great Thousand World—the Flame Emperor, Xiao Honglian, who had single-handedly slaughtered countless ancient orthodox sects and climbed to the pinnacle atop a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood!
And yet, even this exalted female emperor, who had already severed herself from the seven emotions and six desires, was now staring intently at a certain direction behind the Sword God Palace.
From there came an aura so familiar that it had penetrated to the depths of her soul—an aura that had tormented her day and night for thousands of years amid endless remorse and anguish.
“Buzz!”
Without the slightest hesitation, Xiao Honglian did not even bother with a few formal pleasantries. She simply tore open the void, and her figure vanished from where she stood.
Meanwhile, in the Imperial Garden.
Looking at the figure in blue standing proudly above the firmament, the corners of Ye Xuan’s lips curled into a smile that was as gentle as a spring breeze, yet cold enough to freeze the marrow.
“That blue robe… It does bear some resemblance to the one you wore back at the Scarlet Flame Sect.”
Ye Xuan murmured softly. Then his figure rippled like water, leaving behind only an afterimage as his true body transformed into a streak of light and shot toward the aura hurtling through the air.
The next moment.
Deep within the sea of clouds above the Sword God Palace, two figures collided with a resounding boom, having crossed thousands of years of time and the boundary between life and death.
Gale winds howled around them, churning the sea of clouds.
The instant Xiao Honglian truly saw the man before her, her supreme aura—powerful enough to incinerate the heavens—was extinguished as though a bucket of icy water had been poured over her head.
Her entire body froze in midair, as if a restraining spell had been cast upon her.
“It really is you…”
Xiao Honglian’s voice trembled violently. This was not the majesty of an emperor, but the sob of a fragile girl who had been lost for countless years and had finally glimpsed a ray of hope.
Her beautiful eyes, which had been as cold as ice only moments ago, were now opened as wide as they could go.
Her gaze clung greedily to Ye Xuan’s face like creeping vines, tracing his brows and eyes, the bridge of his nose, and the familiar curve at the corners of his lips. She refused to miss even the slightest detail.
It was exactly the same.
Though countless years had passed, though they had endured death and reincarnation—
The man before her possessed the exact same appearance, figure, and even that unique aura she had yearned for throughout the thousands of years. He was identical to the senior brother who, back then, had used his flesh and blood to shield her from the fatal karmic flames before the Eight Trigrams Alchemy Furnace.
How was this possible?
Tsunamis of shock erupted in Xiao Honglian’s mind. The unbelievable revelation nearly tore her reason apart.
She clearly remembered that her senior brother had been killed while saving her, Xiao Huo’s palm shattering his celestial crown!
She had personally watched his soul disintegrate into nothingness within the Eight Desolations Heaven-Refining Flame, without leaving behind even a fragment of his remnant soul.
Later, she slaughtered the entire Xiao Huo clan and began searching frantically for her senior brother’s reincarnation.
Yet even after becoming the lofty Flame Emperor and scouring the Three Thousand Dao Provinces, she could not find the slightest trace of him.
How could he be standing alive before her now?
Even if he had truly received some heaven-defying opportunity and reincarnated, how could his reincarnation possibly retain the exact same appearance and aura?
Could it be… could his death back then have been nothing more than an illusion?
Countless thoughts collided wildly in Xiao Honglian’s mind. But the moment she saw Ye Xuan’s gentle smile, all reason and doubt crumbled completely.
“It really is you…”
Xiao Honglian reached out with her fair, jade-like hands, wanting to touch Ye Xuan’s cheek. Yet halfway there, she withdrew them as though struck by lightning, afraid that what stood before her was merely a fleeting dream that would shatter at the slightest touch.
Seeing her so cautious and utterly humble, Ye Xuan smiled faintly. His smile was as warm as the spring sunshine.
His thin lips parted, and he spoke two words:
“Junior Sister.”
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."
d intelligence to keep the plot moving, and sometimes even the protagonists are forced into absurdly dumb decisions. Why does the A-list celebrity heroine in urban romance novels ditch the top-tier movie star and become a lovestruck fool for a pockmarked male lead? Why do the leads in historical tragedy novels keep dancing between love and death, only for the blind healer to end up suffering the most? And Gu Wei never expected that after finally landing a villain role to stir up trouble, she’d pick the wrong gender! No choice now—she’ll just have to crush the protagonists as a girl!
y came from. The chests contained supplies, currency, class-change scrolls, skills, talents… and even godhood! The laws of the world were completely rewritten. This became a world where everyone gambled with their fate! Some people, despite having nothing, opened a divine artifact and rose to the top, eventually ruling the world. Others went bankrupt, opened nothing but worthless junk, and leaped from skyscrapers in despair. Lin Ye arrived in this world from another reality, utterly bewildered. “What is going on? Why is everyone a gambling addict?!” “Opening chests? No way. I refuse to gamble. I’ll start with myself!” Until— On his first chest, he obtained a Mythic Talent: Void Incarnation! He could become completely intangible, pass through all things, and reduce everything to nothingness! … On his fiftieth chest, he obtained a Mythic Weapon: Blade of Karma! With a single slash, karma shattered, twisting the universe and overturning the myriad phenomena of creation! … On his ninety-ninth chest, he obtained a Mythic Divine Treasure: Primordial Purple Energy! It could split open the heavens and earth, create all things, and evolve countless worlds with a single thought! Lin Ye: “Now that I think about it… shouldn’t someone have told me that every chest is guaranteed to contain something Mythic?!”
