At that thought, Shen Qingshuang suddenly felt a kind of relief she could not put into words.
“I understand now.”
She finally spoke.
After saying this, she slowly rose to her feet.
She looked at Ye Jiuhuang, her gaze utterly calm—calm as a lake sealed beneath a thin sheet of ice.
“Since you are a woman now, the bond between us as Dao companions should officially end as well.”
After a brief pause, she spoke softly.
“Isn’t that right, Sister?”
At that form of address, a trace of softness appeared in Ye Jiuhuang’s eyes for the first time.
Not because of lingering affection, nor because of guilt. It was simply because an old bond had finally found its resting place.
She looked at Shen Qingshuang and gave a slight nod.
“Yes, Little Sister.”
Hearing those words, Shen Qingshuang suddenly felt the enormous stone that had weighed on her heart for so many years truly begin to loosen.
She said nothing more.
She merely turned and walked out of the pavilion along the jade path she had taken to arrive, one step at a time.
The wind was still blowing outside.
In the distance, Sword God Palace remained bustling. Immortal bells rang, congratulations echoed, spirit birds cried out, and guests came and went. Everything proclaimed the grandeur and irrevocability of this wedding.
The entire world was moving forward. No one would stop for even a moment over an old love.
Ye Jiuhuang stood in the pavilion, watching Shen Qingshuang’s departing figure. The corners of her lips curved faintly.
Then she turned and left as well.
Without hesitation.
Without looking back.
Because she knew exactly where she needed to go.
She had to return to the reception hall, continue welcoming guests on Ye Xuan’s behalf, continue overseeing the wedding, and continue standing before everyone as the Sword God Palace Master.
Meanwhile, Shen Qingshuang walked back along the jade steps.
She did not walk quickly, and her expression remained calm.
The relationship between her and Ye Jiuhuang had finally come to an end.
From this day forward, Ye Jiuzhou—the person who had awakened her first love, whom she had waited for eight thousand years, and for whom she had repeatedly told herself, “Just wait a little longer,” through countless bitter nights—no longer existed.
The person she had loved was dead.
Truly and utterly dead.
The one living in this world was Ye Jiuhuang.
A woman who had never loved her, who had always regarded her as a gift that could be given away to someone else, yet who had been so frank that Shen Qingshuang could not even bring herself to hate her.
Shen Qingshuang had thought she would want to cry.
But she did not.
She merely felt empty.
When Shen Qingshuang reached the end of a covered bridge, her footsteps suddenly came to a halt.
Someone was waiting for her ahead.
A man stood beside the bridge in white robes, with a vast sea of clouds and swathes of blooming sword-tree flowers behind him.
He stood there casually, yet seemed like an unparalleled divine weapon with its edge concealed—noble, cold, and unfathomably deep.
It was Ye Xuan.
He had been waiting for some time.
The wind lifted his sleeves ever so lightly and stirred a few loose strands of hair across his forehead. When his deep black eyes turned toward her, there was little curiosity and no surprise, as though everything had already been within his expectations.
Shen Qingshuang met his gaze, and her heart trembled faintly.
Only then did she suddenly realize that, after speaking with Ye Jiuhuang, she should have been utterly exhausted. Yet the instant she saw Ye Xuan, an inexplicable sense of calm settled in her heart.
Ye Xuan looked at her, the faintest smile slowly forming at the corners of his lips.
“Have you finished sorting things out?”
His tone was ordinary, even somewhat light, as though he were asking about a minor task that should have been completed long ago.
But when Shen Qingshuang heard it, the tip of her nose inexplicably grew sore.
She nodded.
“Mm.”
Ye Xuan did not ask what they had discussed. He did not ask whether she was sad, whether it hurt, or whether she had truly let go.
Those questions were not important to him.
Shen Qingshuang looked at him, then suddenly seemed to make up her mind. She slowly raised her hand and gave him a formal salute.
It was not the customary greeting.
Nor was it a subordinate’s salute.
It was more like a solemn declaration of a new beginning.
“My name is Shen Qingshuang. It’s a pleasure to meet you properly.”
The words sounded simple.
But Ye Xuan naturally understood what they meant.
In the past, she had been Ye Jiuzhou’s Dao companion. Now, she was not.
Now, she was Shen Qingshuang.
Ye Xuan looked at her, and his eyes became more serious than usual.
The next moment, he raised his hand and returned the salute.
“My name is Ye Xuan.”
The two looked at each other for a moment before Shen Qingshuang lowered her hand.
She looked at Ye Xuan and asked quietly, “Did you know all along that I would go to her?”
Ye Xuan’s expression remained calm. “More or less.”
“And you also knew that I would sever things with her completely?”
“I knew.”
“Weren’t you afraid I wouldn’t be able to let go?”
Ye Xuan glanced at her. His eyes were as calm as ever, yet there was an indescribable certainty in them.
“If you truly couldn’t let go, then you wouldn’t be Shen Qingshuang.”
The words caused Shen Qingshuang’s heart to tremble faintly.
She had not expected Ye Xuan to answer her that way.
Shen Qingshuang lowered her eyes, and the corners of her lips unconsciously curved into the faintest smile.
“You have more faith in me than I do in myself.”
Ye Xuan let out a soft chuckle and looked at her with gentle eyes.
“Come on. Let’s go back first.”
“All right, Husband,” Shen Qingshuang replied with a light smile.
Deep within the imperial palace of the Great Jin Immortal Dynasty.
The night was as dark as ink. Layer upon layer of golden restrictions shrouded the entire imperial city, making this palace complex—one that should have belonged to a mortal emperor—look more like an immortal palace towering above the Nine Heavens.
Countless streams of dragon qi coiled above the palace halls, transforming into indistinct golden phantom dragons. They suppressed the eight directions and cowed all living beings.
Yet at this very moment, inside the bedroom belonging exclusively to the First Emperor in the deepest part of the imperial palace, the atmosphere was so oppressive that it was almost difficult to breathe.
Chu Jinghong stood alone before the window.
She was not wearing the black-and-gold imperial robes that symbolized supreme authority during court assemblies. Instead, she wore a close-fitting black-and-gold gown that outlined her tall, mature figure to perfection.
Her long hair spilled over her shoulders. Without the majesty of an emperor, she possessed a more breathtaking beauty—and a more oppressive darkness—that made it difficult for anyone to look directly at her.
In her hand, she still clutched the wedding invitation, which had nearly been crushed to pieces.
The invitation’s Daoist aura continued to circulate.
For the past several days, Chu Jinghong had not slept soundly even once.
Whenever she closed her eyes, she saw Ye Xuan.
Whenever she opened them, she still saw Ye Xuan.
What repeatedly surfaced in her mind was both the man from her previous life—the man she had imprisoned at her side, who had endured endless grievances yet continued to watch her silently and wait for her—and the Ye Xuan of this life, whose wedding invitation announced that he was about to marry Ye Jiuhuang, about to exchange wedding vows with another woman before the entire world.
Past and present, guilt and possessiveness, love and obsession, regret and madness—all of them tore at her heart like countless venomous snakes.
She was almost driven insane.
Yet she could not go mad.
Because she was the First Emperor.
She possessed the entire Great Jin Immortal Dynasty. Behind her stood billions of living beings, along with countless sects, ancient clans, armies, and territories dependent upon the dynasty.
She could not erupt into madness at the slightest provocation like Xiao Honglian.
Every action she took would bring about countless consequences.
So she could only endure.
Endure until her eyes were webbed with blood vessels.
Endure until her fingernails repeatedly dug into her palms.
Endure as the jealousy burning through her heart—nearly scorching it to ashes—remained suppressed within her chest, searing her internal organs with a dull, lingering pain.
“Ye Xuan…”
She murmured that name under her breath, her voice hoarse and restrained.
“How could you…”
“How could you marry someone else…”
By the time she reached the final sentence, her voice had begun to tremble faintly.
Just then.
A barely audible series of footsteps came from beyond the palace doors.
A palace maid knelt outside, trembling with fear. Through the doors, she spoke cautiously. “Your Majesty…”
Chu Jinghong did not even turn around. She merely said coldly, “Speak.”
The palace maid was clearly terrified by the aura surrounding her. Even her voice was shaking. “Your Majesty, Lin Jiutian… Lin Jiutian has arrived.”
The moment those words were spoken, the already dark and ominous expression on Chu Jinghong’s face suddenly turned icy.
She slowly turned her head. The chill in her phoenix eyes seemed to solidify in an instant, and the temperature throughout the entire bedchamber appeared to plummet beneath that single glance.
“Lin Jiutian?”
She uttered the name one word at a time. There was no surprise in her tone—only undisguised disgust and killing intent.
The palace maid trembled all over, not daring even to raise her head. “Y-Yes…”
Chu Jinghong said nothing more.
But her breathtakingly beautiful face had already darkened as though covered by a layer of frost.
As for that name, how could she merely be angry?
She was utterly disgusted.
Lin Jiutian was one of the people in this world she least wanted to mention and most dreaded seeing.
Not because he was powerful.
Nor because he was difficult to deal with.
But because he was an indelible stain upon her.
. As long as he maintains the villain image and follows the plot to the grand finale, he can obtain generous rewards and return to the real world. So Gu Chen'an entered the role and began to act as a scumbag villain, but who would have expected that the female leads could hear his inner thoughts. Miss Su from the Su family was shocked: "I originally thought Gu Chen'an was a scumbag, but I didn't expect he turned out to be a gentleman! What? You said I have to call off the engagement? I definitely won't, I'll piss you off!" Bai Yuan Tian was dumbfounded: "Young Master Gu is usually unreasonable and a complete brat, but he actually calls me little sweetie in his heart? What, Young Master Gu even said he likes me?" As the female leads' images collapsed more and more, the plot also collapsed with it. Gu Chen'an looked at all this chaos. "Ladies, don't aggro me, if you keep this up the male lead really will stab me, I still need to survive to the grand finale!"
for mindless slaughter, this isn't for you.] My name is Ye Shu, and I'm a transmigrator. It seems I'm supposed to be the protagonist, but that feels pretty unlikely. This world has been invaded by a system. The antagonists on the other side have suddenly become pure, flawless saints. The female leads have been force-fed the so-called "original plot," making them think they've been reborn. Now, everyone thinks I'm scum. Including the old lady in my ring. And here I am, in the Monster Beast Mountain Range, braising pork. To put my situation in perspective— It's as if, the moment Xiao Yan stepped into the Monster Beast Mountain Range, the Soul Emperor already knew he would become the Flame Emperor, and Yao Lao had been turned to the enemy's side. I have nothing right now. Oh wait, that's not true. I do have a white-haired loli child-bride who's the Heavenly Dao, and her only skill is acting cute. So, tell me guys... what are my chances of making it to the end?
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."
