The crowd parted as a Daoist priest was ushered forward, surrounded by those escorting him. He wore a dark teal robe with a diagonal collar and wide sleeves, the garment embroidered with cranes. On his head sat a Hundun crown, and his silver hair flowed down alongside long eyebrows and a long beard. It was none other than Zhishang, the Daoren who had declared Lang Jiuchuan to be a demonic entity.
His eyes were sharp as lightning as he fixed them on Lang Jiuchuan’s face. His brow twitched once. Beneath his sleeve, his fingers moved through divination gestures—he had not made an error in his calculations. This woman bore the signs of an early death; she could not possibly be alive. Yet here she stood, living and breathing, which meant she was an affront to the national fortune of the Great Dan. She would plunge the Great Dan into turmoil.
Whatever caused the common people to fall into turmoil was, by nature, a heretical and demonic thing.
Lang Jiuchuan looked toward him, her gaze cold as ice. “The Daoren of the Quanzhen sect have always placed emphasis on the dual cultivation of life and inner alchemy. Elder Daoist friend—rather than retreating into the deep mountains to seek the immortal path, you have entered the mortal world to smear a young girl with your words. Every single sentence you speak is meant to grind me into the dust. I ask you, Daoren—what path is it that you cultivate? Are you not afraid of accumulating the karmic debt of speech, which would bar you from ever attaining your immortal path?”
“I cultivate the path of the human world,” said Daoren Zhishang, his whisk cradled in his arms as his gaze met hers. “You are a person who should have died, yet you have defied yin and yang, allowing a foreign soul to possess your body—”
“So what if I bore the signs of an early death?” Lang Jiuchuan cut him off. “The Great Dao is fifty; Heaven’s design accounts for forty-nine—there is always a single thread of hope remaining. I encountered a worthy teacher and noble benefactors, and I seized that thread of hope. There is no longer any talk of me needing to die! And setting aside whatever evidence you claim to have that I defied yin and yang—even if I did, look at Heaven’s path. Has it permitted my existence? If Heaven did not allow it, a tribulation of thunder should have descended the very moment I possessed this body, obliterating my divine soul. And yet—what is the reality?”
Daoren Zhishang’s brow furrowed deeply.
“You say I am a demonic entity—do you sense any demonic aura on me? If I were truly demonic, all of you could join forces and eliminate me right now. But I am not evil…” The cold light in Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes surged violently. “Then what you are doing here today is nothing more than purging and suppressing those who stand against you—lawless and without principle. Do not blame me for showing no mercy!”
Her aura suddenly swelled enormously. The coin sword in her palm unleashed sword energy like a surging dragon once more, the blade humming and vibrating, its Pressure Aura pressing down like a mountain.
A demonic entity?
With such a righteous and murderous killing aura, even those who wished to speak lies with their eyes wide open did not dare open their mouths. If this was considered demonic aura, would they not all be demonic entities themselves? After all, the coin sword—while not everyone carried one—was used by at least seven out of ten practitioners as their spiritual instrument.
It was, after all, the most common and widespread implement. The one in the opponent’s hand merely carried a more formidable Pressure Aura, and was likely a high-grade spiritual instrument.
Lang Jiuchuan’s imposing bearing was overwhelming, her Aura of Power fierce and absolute. Before the entire gate of the Marquis’s manor, not a single person dared move, nor dared argue back.
What alarmed Daoren Zhishang and the others even more was that at her age, the depth of her Pressure Aura realm was already so profound. If she truly was a foreign soul possessing this body, then what kind of great master had she been in her previous life?
The two sides seemed locked in a stalemate, the air suddenly freezing solid.
Tantai Cong grew somewhat anxious. Catching a meaningful glance from a middle-aged Daoren beside Zhishang, he called out harshly: “What does it matter that you hold a coin sword? Who doesn’t know that demonic entities excel at disguise? Fellow Daoists—if we do not eliminate her today, are we to wait until she becomes a great threat, shaking the very foundation of our Great Dan? Shall we leave the common people to face calamity?”
The crowd instinctively looked toward Zhishang—their own cultivation was far beneath his.
Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes frosted over with cold as she looked at Tantai Cong’s self-righteous expression and let out a mocking laugh. “Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. So whether I am demon or evil does not matter—what is righteous is that all of you have gathered to surround this manor and bully the weak with your numbers.”
If that was how it was, then she could not be blamed!
Lang Jiuchuan put away her coin sword. Both hands formed the seal gestures as a blazing bolt of thunder light erupted from her fingertips, shooting skyward before scattering outward, transforming into ten thousand electric serpents that hung suspended above everyone’s heads. The intent of that thunder and lightning made every single scalp tingle. Those loose strands of hair not yet fully pinned up stood on end, every strand rising straight upward.
Tantai Cong bore the brunt of it. Whatever his golden crown was made of, it attracted the thunder’s intent, which crackled and spat sparks across its surface before it shattered apart with a crack. The hair it had held in place came tumbling loose. As for the man himself—he was electrocuted into full-body trembling, his eyes rolling back white.
“Do not injure anyone!” Daoren Zhishang snapped his whisk with a grim expression, his face cold as he rapidly formed seals and channeled power into the whisk in his hand, sweeping away the shallow traces of thunder intent from Tantai Cong’s body. He looked toward Lang Jiuchuan with an expression of utter shock.
“She’s no demonic entity—she’s a demonic woman! Everyone, attack!” Seeing this, the assembled Daoists all began forming seals and chanting incantations. Several streams of talismans transformed into fire serpents and launched themselves at Lang Jiuchuan.
“Shameless ingrates. Obstinate and incorrigible.” Lang Jiuchuan’s brow and eyes turned cold and heavy. She pressed her hand seal downward, and the net of electric serpents that had been hovering above them all came crashing down.
Screams rang out one after another. A stench of burning hair drifted through the air, mingled faintly with the strange smell of scorched flesh.
“You can’t even withstand a single bolt of Righteous Thunder—could it be that all of you are the demonic entities?” The corner of Lang Jiuchuan’s mouth curved upward at a slant. She raised her hand and formed the seal once more, the thunder light at her fingertips flaring violently as she prepared to deliver them a heavy blow—when suddenly, a clear shout rang out from the distance.
“Hold your hand!”
A familiar voice. Lang Jiuchuan glanced over. A dark-clad figure was hurtling through the air at tremendous speed, a group of people following behind.
Gong Qi had arrived in a frantic rush.
A trace of regret crossed Lang Jiuchuan’s face. She let out a quiet sound through her nose. He had come at just the right moment—but still…
She flicked the ball of thunder between her fingers down toward the ground. With a thunderous boom, the ground erupted and shattered, and the thunder intent spread outward. Daoren Zhishang and the others lost their footing, their legs going numb and weak beneath them as they tumbled to the ground.
Gong Qi: “…”
He landed before Lang Jiuchuan, gave her a somewhat helpless glare, then looked over at Daoren Zhishang and the others. Seeing that they were merely disheveled and had sustained no life-threatening injuries, he let out a quiet breath of relief.
He had thought Lang Jiuchuan would go completely unhinged and start a massacre. Fortunately, she still had a shred of rationality!
“Move aside, move aside—everyone stop crowding here.” Shen Qinghe arrived as well, leading the officers of the Surveillance Bureau as he ran up breathlessly.
Lang Jiuchuan looked at them and asked: “Gong Daoist friend—has the Surveillance Bureau come under this little imperial prince’s orders to arrest me, this demonic entity?”
Gong Qi heard the mockery in her words and immediately felt a headache coming on. “Lang Daoist friend, this is all a misunderstanding—”
“A misunderstanding?” Lang Jiuchuan cut him off coldly, pointing at Daoren Zhishang. “He publicly declared me to be a nation-destroying demonic entity, claiming I damage the Great Dan’s national fortune and bring chaos upon the common people. His words set market gossip ablaze and caused tremendous harm and defamation to both myself and the Marquis’s manor behind me. And now a single word—’misunderstanding’—is supposed to settle everything? I am merely a young woman, nothing more than someone who cultivates the Dao. How did I become a heretical demonic entity? If I am, then are you not all demonic entities as well? I do not accept this so-called explanation of a misunderstanding!”
Tantai Cong spat out a mouthful of dark blood. “You demonic woman—how dare you compare yourself to us?”
“I won’t compare myself to you—but killing you, would that be acceptable?” Lang Jiuchuan walked toward him, her gaze sharp as a blade. “You might as well call for your fiancée to come rescue you. Let’s see whether she saves you or not, and let everyone see clearly whether she is righteous or evil, human or demon.”
The cold light in her eyes was glacial, so piercing that Tantai Cong’s face went deathly pale, his entire body stiffening. There it was again—that familiar killing intent, appearing on her once more. If not for so many people present, she would probably truly kill him, wouldn’t she?
Tantai Cong’s mind buzzed and rang. How could she dare? Behind him stood the Tantai clan—both a Xuan clan and an imperial clan. He was about to be wed into an alliance with the young master of the Rong Family, another Xuan clan. How could she dare oppose him?
No—how could she dare openly oppose the Xuan Clan!