Inside the Meditation Pagoda, the eternal lamps burned quietly.
The firelight cast a dim, twilight-like glow within the pagoda, projecting their shadows onto the ground, overlapping and leaning against each other.
A faint scent of sandalwood lingered in the air; it was a special calming incense from the Celestial Master Mansion, designed to help one focus the mind and stabilize their Dao foundation.
Lin Qingyan's emotions finally calmed down.
Her red eyes gradually regained their clarity. Tear stains remained, but no new tears welled up.
She took a half step back from Gu Chengyin's embrace and raised her eyes to look at him.
Gu Chengyin did not move.
He just stood there, letting her look at him while he looked back at her.
Their eyes met in silence.
Tiny teardrops still hung on Lin Qingyan's eyelashes, shimmering faintly under the eternal lamps like butterfly wings adorned with morning dew.
Her lips moved slightly, wanting to say something, but she swallowed it back.
Gu Chengyin kept waiting.
Waiting for her to calm down, waiting for her to be willing to speak, waiting for her to take the initiative to open her mouth.
Now that clarity had returned to her eyes, he knew he could ask.
"So," Gu Chengyin's voice was very soft, "Little Aunt wants to take a look?"
Lin Qingyan was slightly startled, and then a trace of tenderness flashed through her eyes.
Gu Chengyin understood her.
He knew what she wanted to do without her even having to speak.
This feeling...
Lin Qingyan lowered her eyelashes, hiding that tenderness deep in her eyes, and nodded.
"Yes."
Her voice still carried the hoarseness from crying, but it was already much steadier.
"Although the entire memory can only be seen after the inner demon disappears."
She paused, looking up at him, a complex emotion flashing in her eyes.
"But with Chengcheng here, I can forcefully take a glimpse."
"So..."
Lin Qingyan didn't continue, but her meaning was self-evident.
Gu Chengyin understood.
The inner demon was the seal of this memory.
The seal was very strong; the memory could only be completely liberated when the inner demon thoroughly vanished.
Under normal circumstances, this would take a long time. It required Lin Qingyan to weaken the inner demon bit by bit and slowly approach the truth.
But now.
He was here.
He was someone who could control the inner demon, someone who could drastically weaken it, someone who...
could help Lin Qingyan forcefully break through the seal.
Coupled with her own control over the inner demon.
It was indeed possible to do it.
Just one look.
Gu Chengyin's brows furrowed slightly. He didn't agree immediately.
His gaze fell on Lin Qingyan's face, looking at her eyes that had regained clarity, at the well-hidden yearning deep within them, and at her slightly pursed lips.
"If it's just one look..."
Gu Chengyin's voice was a bit hesitant.
"I shouldn't refuse."
Lin Qingyan's eyes lit up for a moment.
But Gu Chengyin's next sentence made her heart tighten slightly.
"But..."
Gu Chengyin looked at her, the worry in his eyes almost overflowing.
"Your Dao heart..."
Gu Chengyin didn't know how to say it.
Just touching the edge of that memory had made Lin Qingyan cry like this.
Crying like a rain-drenched pear blossom, completely falling apart, like an injured little beast shivering in his embrace.
And this was just touching it.
Just sensing the existence of that memory.
If...
If she actually saw something.
Saw some bloody and cruel truths.
Would her Dao heart shatter because of it?
Lin Qingyan looked into Gu Chengyin's eyes and read his worry.
Her heart couldn't help but warm up.
This man was worrying about her.
Not worrying about whether she could do it, not worrying about whether she would succeed, but worrying about her Dao heart.
Worrying that she would get hurt.
Lin Qingyan took a deep breath and shook her head.
"It won't."
Her voice was firm, as firm as an oath.
"My Dao heart is not that fragile."
Right at this moment, Lin Qingyan suddenly took a step forward and buried herself in Gu Chengyin's embrace once again.
"Besides, now... I have you."
Gu Chengyin's expression shifted; Lin Qingyan meant that she now had a new spiritual pillar.
And this spiritual pillar was him, which was why she dared to directly face this sealed memory.
Lin Qingyan lifted her head from Gu Chengyin's embrace, her eyes full of stubbornness.
"I will just take one look."
"I'm begging you, Chengcheng."
Lin Qingyan's voice softened, carrying a hint of pleading.
"If I can't take a look..."
She paused, her eye rims reddening a bit more.
"My Dao heart will be covered in dust."
Gu Chengyin fell silent.
Although he had thought about keeping his distance from Lin Qingyan.
But definitely not now, not when Lin Qingyan's spiritual power was overdrawn and she needed him the most.
"Alright, what do I need to do?"
After getting Gu Chengyin's consent, Lin Qingyan's expression actually became strange.
She looked left and right, her gaze patrolling the pagoda, seemingly confirming something.
Confirming whether the Meditation Pagoda's concealment formation was intact, confirming if anyone was peeking, confirming...
that it was just the two of them here.
Gu Chengyin watched her movements, an ominous premonition rising in his heart.
Lin Qingyan finished confirming, withdrew her gaze, and then leaned close to Gu Chengyin's ear. Her breath was warm and carried a faint trace of tears.
Her lips almost touched his ear, and her voice was very soft, so soft that only he could hear it.
Then she said a few words.
At first, Gu Chengyin listened very seriously.
But as he listened, his expression changed.
From serious, to stunned, then to shocked, and finally...
his face turned green.
After finishing, Lin Qingyan took a step back, her gaze falling on his face.
Gu Chengyin opened his mouth, then closed it.
Opened it again, and closed it again.
After repeating this three times, he finally squeezed out a sentence:
"No, Little Aunt..."
Gu Chengyin's voice carried incomparable horror.
"Do you really have to electrocute me?"
Lin Qingyan's face flushed slightly.
She turned her face to the side, not daring to look at him, leaving him with only a side profile and a completely red ear.
"You... you watching..."
Her voice was hesitant, as small as a mosquito's buzz.
"I'll get nervous."
"And when I get nervous, I'll still end up electrocuting you."
Gu Chengyin: "....................."
He was completely speechless.
Lin Qingyan's meaning was very simple; he didn't need to do anything.
He just needed to be electrocuted into unconsciousness by her, just like in the carriage.
She would complete the subsequent weakening of the inner demon on her own.
And the reason she had to knock him out with electricity wasn't because he needed to be unconscious for her to cast the spell, but because...
she was nervous.
With Gu Chengyin watching, she would get nervous.
And once she got nervous, she would still end up electrocuting him.
Then it was better to just electrocute him into unconsciousness right away.
He was going to get shocked either way.
"Bring it on."
Gu Chengyin closed his eyes and gritted his teeth, as if heading to the execution ground.
At the same time, he swore in his heart that once he reached the Golden Core stage, the first thing he would do was properly teach a lesson to Little Aunt!
Lin Qingyan turned her head back. Seeing Gu Chengyin's expression of facing death unflinchingly, she couldn't help but console him:
"It's okay, Chengcheng."
"I'm very skilled at it now, it won't hurt."
Gu Chengyin: "..."
Although these words were meant as comfort, why did they sound so weird?
Just as he was about to speak, his vision suddenly went black.
His consciousness plunged into the abyss.
transmigrates into the role of a villainous rich second-generation kid in an urban fantasy novel, and gets bound to a god-tier choice system. Right at the start, he catches the female lead stealing exam papers! This triggers the villain's choice options! [Choice 1: Pretend you didn't see anything] [Choice 2: Loudly call her out, drawing everyone's attention] [Choice 3: ...] And thus, a twisted villain is born. To avoid getting killed by the protagonist, he has no choice but to take down all the protagonists first. Jiang Che: Nobody understands being twisted better than me!
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
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?!
ive and Ruthless] Before his transmigration, Ye Xuan was playing a game called "Severing Emotions to Attain the Dao." The game's core wasn't about leveling up by fighting monsters, but about conquering various "bad women" with wicked personalities and cold, fickle natures. There was only one method to conquer them: stay unwaveringly by their side, then die at a critical moment, driving them to madness after losing the protagonist. The higher their level of regret, the higher the player's score. To dominate the server, Ye Xuan conquered all the bad women. In the early stages, he showered them with boundless tenderness, only to choose to sacrifice himself for them later, making them weep bitterly and drown in regret. Among them were: Xia Lengyue, the unfaithful immortal wife who chased after powerful men and discarded her husband like trash. Ye Qingcheng, the Demonic Venerable of the Joyous Union Sect, who appeared pure and innocent but was, in reality, promiscuous. Wu Lingxiao, the Empress of the Great Xia Dynasty, who lusted after men and loved maintaining a harem. Bai Qiangu of the Endless Demonic Sect: a bloodthirsty mass murderer. However, when the protagonist transmigrated into the game world, he made a horrifying discovery. Eight hundred years had already passed. The bad women he had conquered had now each become deities and revered ancestors. Faced with the endless stream of toxic women coming for him, Ye Xuan could only rely on his god-tier acting skills to carve a path of survival through this world of treacherous women.
