Door-to-Door Challenge

Just then, Gu Jingchen tore his gaze away from Ye Jiuhuang and fixed it on Ye Xuan.

A terrifying killing intent burst forth from his eyes, the blue veins on his forehead bulging one by one, and his entire face twisted into that of a malicious fiend.

"You are Ye Xuan?"

He took a sudden step forward, and the bluestone under his feet shattered with a crisp crack.

He pointed at Ye Xuan, his voice brimming with disdain and fury: "You leech who climbed up by relying on a woman, what right do you have to marry Ye Jiuhuang?"

"Other than living off a woman, what else can you do? What battle achievements do you have? What merits have you earned? What right do you have to stand by Ye Jiuhuang's side?"

After spitting out these words in one breath, his chest heaved violently, and his eyes were filled with ferocious malice: "Ye Jiuhuang is the Sword Sovereign! A peerless heavenly pride of the highest order!"

"She is pure, unworldly, and stunningly elegant. How could a filthy, despise leech like you ever be worthy of touching her?"

Ye Xuan's expression remained as calm as still water, completely unperturbed.

But Ye Jiuhuang's face had already darkened completely.

Her blue robes fluttered without any wind, and the silver long sword on her back let out a clear, resonant hum.

An overwhelmingly terrifying killing intent erupted from her in an instant, and the temperature of the entire White Jade Square plummeted to freezing point.

The red lanterns hanging under the corridor instantly coated themselves in a thick layer of frost, before bursting into countless shards.

She stepped forward slowly, each step carrying with it towering, overwhelming pressure. Those cold, clear eyes of hers were now filled with bone-chilling killing intent.

"Gu Jingchen."

Ye Jiuhuang's voice was like a cold wind from the netherworld, scraping against the ears of everyone present: "Back then, I spared your life because I knew how hard you had worked to cultivate, and that you did have a modicum of natural talent. I never once thought to kill you."

"Even when you pestered me again and again, I only had you expelled from my sect, never once harboring the urge to take your life."

"But today, you dare to act so wildly and insult me right in front of my husband."

Her right hand slowly wrapped around the hilt of the sword on her back, and silver sword light began to flow, like a river of stars waking up in her palm.

Her voice grew even colder: "Do you truly think I would not kill you?"

Locked in her gaze, Gu Jingchen's body trembled involuntarily.

Yet the madness and infatuation in his eyes did not fade even a little.

He stared at Ye Jiuhuang in a trance, a sickly smile spreading across his face: "Kill me. To die by your hand, I would do so with no regrets."

He spread his arms wide, as if he was about to embrace death itself: "What an honor it is for me, Gu Jingchen, to die under the sword of the one I love most in this life! Kill me! Kill me, so that you will never forget me for the rest of your life!"

"My blood will forever stain your blade! My name will forever be carved into your dao heart!"

Watching this scene unfold, Ye Xuan just shook his head.

His expression was calm, no trace of anger or disdain in his eyes, only a profound indifference that saw through everything.

He looked at Gu Jingchen as if he was watching a stray dog rolling around in the mud.

"You really are foolish," Ye Xuan said plainly.

Gu Jingchen snapped his head around, glaring furiously at Ye Xuan: "What did you say? You're nothing but a leech, what right do you have to call me foolish?"

"I said you're foolish," Ye Xuan's voice remained calm, yet carried a chill that sent shivers down one's spine: "And you are truly foolish. Foolish beyond saving."

He slowly stepped down from the stone steps, walking towards Gu Jingchen one steady step at a time.

His strides were unhurried and composed, his white robes brushing gently in the morning breeze, and his entire bearing exuded a quiet, unshakable grandeur.

"You think if you die by her sword, she will remember you?"

A sardonic smirk tugged at the corner of Ye Xuan's mouth: "Let me tell you, she won't. The only thing she will do is frown as she wipes the blood off her blade, and mutter that you've dirtied her sword. Then she will forget you entirely, so much so that she won't even be able to recall your name."

"For thousands of years you've pestered her, and has she ever cared about you? Not once. The reason she never bothered to kill you is not because she couldn't bear to, it's because you don't deserve it. You don't even qualify to make her summon the urge to kill."

Ye Xuan's voice was not loud, but every word was like a sharp blade, gouging deep into Gu Jingchen's heart: "You abandoned your sect, your clan, and your own dao path for her. You think that's deep affection? You think that could move her?"

"Don't delude yourself. No matter how much you give up, she will never spare you a second glance. Because from start to finish, everything you have done is nothing more than self-indulgent sentiment."

Gu Jingchen's face drained of all color, his lips trembling violently, too stunned to utter a single word in rebuttal.

Ye Xuan continued, his voice growing even icier: "The most ridiculous part is that you drown in your own self-indulgent fantasy of deep affection, never realizing that Ye Jiuhuang never wanted to have anything to do with you at all."

"Every time you appear before her, it is nothing but harassment. Every confession you make is an insult to her. You call yourself the Lovestruck Sword, but in her eyes, you are worth less than a stray dog by the roadside."

"Because even a stray dog won't chase after her and nip at her heels for three thousand years."

Gu Jingchen's expression shifted completely. The madness and infatuation on his face instantly gave way to utter, explosive rage. His eyes blazed red, and the sword qi swirling around him surged wildly, whipping his tattered blue robes into a frenzy.

"Shut up!"

He shrieked, his voice raw with hysterical hatred: "What do you know? What do you know about true deep affection? I am the only one worthy of Ye Jiuhuang!"

"I love her more than anything in this world! I would die for her! Could you ever do that, you good-for-nothing leech? Could you die for her?"

At those words, Ye Xuan suddenly laughed.

His smile was faint, yet brimming with unmistakeable irony.

"You are willing to die for her?"

He repeated the words softly, a flicker of complex emotion passing through his eyes: "Even if you died for her, it would never change the fact that she does not love you."

"Your so-called deep affection is nothing but possessiveness. What you truly want is to turn her into your own property."

Ye Xuan's voice was as calm as still water, yet it boomed like a thunderclap right next to Gu Jingchen's ear: "But you will never understand that. Because from start to finish, the person you love is not Ye Jiuhuang at all. You love the self-image of Gu Jingchen, the man who dotes on her so deeply that he would go mad for her!"

"If you truly loved her, you would respect her choice. She chose me, so you should have left quietly. Instead, you chose to stir up trouble on her wedding day, to humiliate her, to enrage her, and to force her to bear the stigma of taking a life."

"Is this love? This is selfishness. This is despicable. This is disgusting."

"Your so-called devotion is nothing more than sentiment that moves only yourself, and disgusts everyone else around you!"

The moment Ye Xuan finished speaking, the entire square fell dead silent.

The Azure Emperor, who was standing in the crowd, trembled violently the moment she heard those words.

She clenched her fists so tight that her nails dug deep into her palms, oozing bright red blood. Every single word Ye Xuan spoke was like a knife, stabbing straight into her heart.

So... so this is what true love really is.

It is not possession, not wailing and begging, not using your own suffering to hold the other person hostage.

It is respect. It is letting go. It is giving the other person their freedom.

But back then, she had done the exact opposite.

For the sake of repaying a debt of gratitude, for the sake of her inner demon, for the sake of her own great dao, she had chosen to betray Ye Xuan, and marry Lu Yanchen.

She hid behind the excuse of "repaying a debt of gratitude" to trample all over Ye Xuan without a single care.

She never respected Ye Xuan's feelings, never spared a thought for how much agony he was suffering.

She assumed Ye Xuan would understand her, that he would always wait for her right where he was, that he would forgive every single wrong she did.

But she was wrong.

Horribly, catastrophically wrong.

Bai Qiangu's face, too, had drained to a deathly pale.

Ye Xuan's words were like sharp knives, digging deep into her heart.

She had gone around proclaiming that she loved Ye Xuan, but what had she done all those years ago?

On a fleeting surge of reckless fury, she had killed Ye Xuan's parents and his little sister.

She had hurt Ye Xuan so badly he was left broken and bleeding, hounded him until he took his own life.

Her so-called love, from start to finish, had been nothing but a cruel, possessive obsession: if I cannot have you, I will destroy you.

Looking back now, what difference was there between her twisted "love" and that of Gu Jingchen standing right there?

These two once unrivaled, arrogant peerless women were now staring straight at their own reflections in this seemingly mad, infatuated Lovestruck Sword.

Disgusting.

Truly, utterly disgusting.

Gu Jingchen stood frozen in place, his face flickering through a dozen different emotions.

He wanted to lash out in denial, but he could not find a single word to argue back.

Every single word Ye Xuan spoke was a sharp blade, slicing right through the carefully woven facade of deep devotion he had constructed, laying bare the ugly, rotten truth hidden beneath it.

Shame curdled into unbridled rage.

"Shut your mouth!"

He roared at the top of his lungs, the sword qi swirling around him spiraling completely out of control, bursting into countless sharp sword beams that shot out in every direction.

The bluestone paving slabs of the plaza were sliced apart by these wild sword energies, crisscrossed with a dense web of deep sword gouges.

His aura surged wildly, his entire presence shifting to match that of a rabid unsheathed sword, dead-set on hacking everything before him to tiny, shattered fragments.

"You keep running your mouth about how I am not half as good as you, so let's fight right now!"

Gu Jingchen stared daggers at Ye Xuan, his eyes blazing with unhinged battle fury. "If you are as capable as you claim, then stop hiding behind women's skirts! Fight me fair and square, man to man! I am going to defeat you with my own two hands right in front of Ye Jiuhuang, and make her see that you are not even remotely good enough for her!"

Ye Jiuhuang's face turned icy cold, and she was just about to draw her sword when Ye Xuan reached out a hand to stop her.

"My lord husband, why waste even a second of your time on a lowly ant like this?" Ye Jiuhuang frowned, her tone sharp with disdain. "I can take his life with a single stroke of my sword."