Gu Chengyin had figured it out: the moment you gave these women even the slightest bit of hope, they would immediately start causing trouble.
It was a common flaw among women—or perhaps an instinct as innate as talent.
Give them a pole, and they would dare climb it.
Give them a crack, and they would dare squeeze through it.
Give them the slightest hint, and they could interpret it as permission to do whatever they pleased—and then actually proceed to do exactly that.
Take Luo Zhao, for example.
Just moments ago, she had looked as aggrieved as an abandoned puppy. But the instant she learned that Gu Chengyin had no intention of eating her, she switched forms at once.
Her goal was actually very simple—so simple that it was almost adorable.
She wanted to be eaten.
Because being eaten would mean that an indelible connection had been forged between them.
It would mean that Gu Chengyin could no longer simply pat himself on the backside and walk away.
And so Luo Zhao used provocation to conceal her longing, arrogance to conceal her unease, and the term “small fry” to conceal the words she could not bring herself to say: Don’t leave.
But no matter how well Gu Chengyin understood her, that did not mean he would indulge her.
For nothing else, Luo Zhao’s current appearance—practically begging to be ravished—was enough to land squarely on Gu Chengyin’s temper and dance repeatedly on the last of his patience.
He did not refrain from eating Luo Zhao because he was afraid.
He simply felt that doing so would bring too much trouble afterward.
The meat might be delicious for a moment, but the aftermath would be a crematorium.
That saying was no joke.
Given Luo Zhao’s identity, status, personality, and relationship with Lin Qingyan, actually sleeping with her would be like burying a time bomb in his own harem.
He would have no idea when it would explode, or how much destruction it would cause when it did.
From a cost-benefit perspective, the drawbacks even outweighed the advantages.
This was not indecisiveness. He was simply using his upper body to think instead of his lower body.
But that did not mean Gu Chengyin was afraid to eat Luo Zhao.
Nor did it mean he would turn a blind eye when she arrogantly provoked him.
And so Gu Chengyin spoke:
“Your cultivation should have reached the late Foundation Establishment stage by now, Your Highness, correct?”
Luo Zhao was taken aback by the question.
She had not expected Gu Chengyin to suddenly bring this up, but she still nodded and gave a quiet hum of confirmation.
After receiving her answer, Gu Chengyin continued:
“Since that’s the case, you won’t be affected by the cold anymore.”
Luo Zhao froze.
Her eyes widened slightly as she tried to digest the information contained in those words.
Gu Chengyin was right.
The Foundation Establishment stage was precisely the process of tempering the mortal body—the transformation from an ordinary person subject to birth, aging, sickness, and death into a cultivator.
Upon reaching the later stages, a cultivator would have true qi protecting the body. Not only would they be immune to invading cold, they would not even fall ill.
Common colds, fevers, chills, headaches, and all the other ailments caused by exposure to the weather…
To a late-stage Foundation Establishment cultivator, asking whether they might trip over an ant while walking was practically laughable.
It could be said that, by this point, the physical body had become so powerful that it was nearly saintly.
Ordinary natural conditions could no longer affect it in the slightest.
So the question was: why had Gu Chengyin suddenly brought this up after she had deliberately provoked him?
Luo Zhao’s mind was filled with countless threads racing back and forth.
She tried to connect every clue and piece together a complete answer.
Gu Chengyin did not look at Luo Zhao.
His gaze fell upon the cultivators in the martial arena below before he continued:
“Your aunt’s Heart-Calming Pagoda is surrounded by a spiritual barrier.”
“No matter what happens inside, no one outside can see or hear the slightest thing.”
Luo Zhao’s heart gave a violent leap.
She seemed to understand what Gu Chengyin intended to do.
The Heart-Calming Pagoda was Lin Qingyan’s magical treasure, surrounded by a spiritual barrier.
This barrier not only blocked outside attempts to spy in; it also isolated everything inside from the outside world.
In other words, no matter what happened within the pagoda, no matter what they did atop the tower, no matter what sounds they made, what expressions they wore, or what postures they assumed, no one outside would be able to see or hear anything.
The Heart-Calming Pagoda was a small world—a small world completely cut off from the outside.
And Luo Zhao was currently in that small world, standing atop the pagoda with Gu Chengyin.
Beneath the starry sky, in a place where no outsider could see or hear them…
At that very moment, Luo Zhao noticed that Gu Chengyin’s hand had come to rest on the buttons of her clothing.
Her heart instantly panicked. She instinctively seized Gu Chengyin’s hand and said in utter nervousness:
“I’m sorry, Master! I know I was wrong!”
There was no hesitation, no pointless word, no excuse or struggle.
Luo Zhao immediately offered the most sincere apology she could.
She was the Crown Princess.
The most honored woman in all of Great Luo.
How could she possibly do something so shameful and perverse?
Even if… even if no one outside the pagoda could see, it still wouldn’t do!
Even if the spiritual barrier blocked everything, it still wouldn’t do!
They were out in the open, atop the tower, beneath the starry sky.
If she really were… here…
How would she face herself afterward?
How could she continue to uphold the identity of Crown Princess?
How could she still stand tall in court and look at outsiders with that cold, aloof, and solitary gaze?
Luo Zhao did not dare continue thinking about it.
But Gu Chengyin had no intention of letting her off.
It was not that he had failed to notice her panic, nor that he had not heard her apology, nor that he did not know what was going through her mind at that moment.
Gu Chengyin knew.
He knew everything.
And precisely because he knew, he was even more certain that a verbal apology would be useless.
With Luo Zhao, he had to treat her the same way he treated Lin Qingyan and Shangguan Yunying.
He had to train the lesson into her until she could not even get out of bed. Only then would she truly settle down.
Where were Lin Qingyan and Shangguan Yunying now?
Sleeping quietly.
They were not causing trouble, saying outrageous things, or repeatedly testing his patience.
They were obedient, well-behaved, and silent.
Not because they had learned from their mistakes and changed.
They were simply too thoroughly “trained” to have the strength even to open their eyes.
That was why this was the best method.
There was no need for lectures, reasoning, or earnest persuasion.
All he had to do was wear them out, leave them limp, and drain them of the strength to even entertain troublesome thoughts.
They would naturally become obedient, well-behaved, and quiet.
The method had worked on Lin Qingyan and Shangguan Yunying, so it would work on Luo Zhao as well.
And so Luo Zhao could only watch helplessly as Gu Chengyin slowly removed her clothes, one piece at a time.
The process was agonizingly slow, as though he were deliberately tormenting her.
Each button he undid and every garment he removed felt like another second ticking down.
At last, Luo Zhao closed her eyes.
She did not dare look at herself in that moment, nor at Gu Chengyin’s expression.
Even less did she dare look toward the Heavenly Master’s Pavilion cultivators outside, who were diligently practicing below.
Although those cultivators could not see her in her current state, the very feeling of being unseen yet still surrounded by people—
It made Luo Zhao feel as though she had been stripped bare and thrown into the middle of a public square.
saw a female celebrity tied up and stuffed in the trunk! Little did he know, countless cameras were aimed at him at this moment - this was a new type of reality show. The first randomly selected passerby was caught in less than an hour. But when Xu Moru was selected, things started to take an unexpected turn. "Damn, this isn't how the script goes. This Xu Moru is too bold, he's not following the rules at all." "Crap, is this guy taking it seriously?" "The female celebrity has been scared to tears!"
s + Rent Collection Wealth】 At the start, he inherited a rundown house in the urban village from his grandfather. The house had no tenants, but the moment he was diagnosed with a terminal illness, a self-proclaimed empress from the Tianxuan Continent arrived as his first tenant. Ye Chuan soon discovered that with every new tenant moving in, not only did he receive massive daily payments, but he also obtained unique items related to their backgrounds. 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Tiger Strength Pill—dramatically enhances physical power!】 【Acquired Bai Qianshuang’s related item: Deer Blood Pill—significantly boosts vitality!】 …… From that day on, all sorts of bizarre tenants began appearing in the house: the empress from Tianxuan Continent, an apocalyptic sorceress from the Magic Realm, a mysterious scientific girl who fell through a spacetime rift… Every single day, he received strange, powerful items and endless money. Then one day, he suddenly realized—he had become invincible. Enough, enough! Stop giving me more!
e bizarre and supernatural had descended. The previous emperor was a thoroughgoing tyrant; no longer satisfied with human women, he had set his sights on a stunningly beautiful supernatural entity. He met his end in his bedchamber, drained of all his vital essence. As the legitimate eldest son and crown prince, Wang Hao was thus hastily enthroned, becoming the young emperor of the Great Zhou Dynasty. No sooner had he awakened the "Imperial Sign-In Intelligence System" than he was assassinated by a Son of Destiny—a classic villain's opening. The Great Zhou, ravaged by the former emperor's excesses, was in national decline. The great families within its borders harbored their own treacherous schemes, martial sects began to defy the imperial court's decrees, and border armies, their pay and provisions in arrears, grumbled incessantly against the central government. Fortunately, the central capital was still held secure by the half-million Imperial Guards and fifty thousand Imperial Forest Army who obeyed the court's orders, along with the royal family's hidden reserves of power, barely managing to suppress the realm. As the Great Zhou's finances worsened and supernatural activities grew ever more frequent, the court sat atop a volcano. Ambitious plotters everywhere dreamed of overthrowing the dynasty, and even some reclusive ancient powers emerged, attempting to sway the tides of the world. At the first grand court assembly, the civil and military officials nearly came to blows, fighting tooth and nail over the allocation of fifty million taels of silver from the summer tax revenues. The spectacle opened Wang Hao's eyes—the Great Zhou's bureaucracy was not only corrupt but also martially proficient, a cabinet of all-rounders. Some officials even had the audacity to suggest the emperor release funds from the imperial privy purse to address the emergency. Wang Hao suddenly felt weary. Let it all burn.
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.
