Rong Huanxuan spat out a mouthful of vital essence blood. Immediately, a foul, putrid stench spread through the air. That mouthful of blood did not fall to the ground — instead, it twisted and ignited in midair, grotesque as a blood-red serpent.

In an instant, the crimson serpent transformed into a massive blood talisman. Its lines and runes writhed and squirmed, like maggots wriggling across a corpse, exuding an air of profound ill omen. With the speed of thunder, it shot directly for Lang Jiuchuan.

She had only one target: the person who had exposed her deepest secret, who had destroyed her every hope. She would obliterate her entirely — body and soul, leaving nothing behind.

Gong Tinglan’s face went cold as frost. He recalled the purple bone flute to his hand, his fingers forming rapid seals. He summoned a righteously powerful five-thunder talisman and struck it toward the blood talisman.

“Utterly incorrigible,” Kong Xu Zi snapped, his voice cold and sharp. He flicked his horsetail whisk and sent a bolt of golden light arcing toward her.

The Rong Huanxuan before them — displaying this degree of demonic madness, utterly unrepentant, and now attempting to kill someone — where was there any trace left of a righteous root within her?

They had discarded every last shred of wishful thinking. They had seen it with their own eyes and heard it with their own ears. Not even Black Impermanence had said a single word to suggest the Mirror of Karmic Iniquity was false — so everything that mirror had reflected was real, had truly happened.

Rong Huanxuan had cultivated a heaven-defying forbidden technique. She was of the demonic path, in league with evil forces. She was not worth even a moment’s mercy.

The blood talisman was shattered by the combined assault of Gong Tinglan and the others. Her first strike having failed, Rong Huanxuan’s ferocity surged. A roaring gale howled around her body as she lunged for Lang Jiuchuan again.

Kill her.

That was the only thought remaining in her mind.

Lang Jiuchuan gave a cold laugh. Perfect timing.

She raised the talisman brush in her hand, and with a single movement of her mind, the brush traced several golden talisman lines through the air. With a sweep of her sleeve, the talismans locked together into a Nine-Palace Demon-Suppressing Array. Golden light blazed like lightning as it crashed down over Rong Huanxuan.

A tremendous boom.

The golden light collided violently with the thick, dark crimson blood energy surrounding Rong Huanxuan. The talisman array shuddered under the impact, and where the blood energy touched it, a hissing, corrosive sound rang out, as though the golden array itself was being eaten away.

Every face in the room changed.

Rong Huanxuan had cultivated this for how short a time, and yet it already possessed such power. If she were allowed to continue cultivating indefinitely, would she not eventually become a great demon?

“This woman has descended into the demonic path and risks becoming a catastrophic threat. Fellow Daoists, combine your strength and bring her down.” Gong Tinglan’s voice rang out sharply. He bit the tip of his own tongue and sprayed the vital blood onto the purple bone flute he had called back to his hand. In an instant, a blaze of purple light erupted from the flute, stirring the righteous yang energy of the nine heavens and transforming it into searing white thunderbolts that bore down upon Rong Huanxuan’s crown: “The True Rite of the Five Thunders — strike down evil!”

The other elders acted in turn — some deploying talismans, some drawing out their spiritual treasures, some casting incantations. The bedchamber blazed and flickered with crossing streams of light.

Lang Jiuchuan: “…”

Well, that saved some effort.

But when she saw the thunderbolts bearing down on Rong Huanxuan, she felt a sudden, sharp chill. A clan heir of that standing — would she truly carry no life-preserving treasure?

Impossible!

Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes went glacial. The talisman brush drove directly toward the spirit root within Rong Huanxuan’s body.

The brush transformed into a stream of light and plunged into her, forcibly severing that spirit root. The vast, earth-stabilizing power within it ground it into ruin.

It didn’t matter whether she had a life-preserving treasure or not. What was taken from this body — must be returned!

At that same moment, the white thunderbolts struck.

Rong Huanxuan shrieked and howled, holding out against the combined assault of the Daoists on one side while splitting off demonic energy to fight back against the thunderblades descending on her crown. Just as she believed she was going to die here, a deep, resonant, intricate golden talisman-script suddenly burst forth from her brow, and the enormously powerful force within it intercepted the lethal strike.

Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes darkened. Just as she had suspected — that must be the bloodline protection seal of the Rong clan.

But what did it matter?

Her spirit root had been severed. With the earth-stabilizing power of righteousness now at work, there was absolutely no possibility it could ever be mended again.

Rong Huanxuan too sensed the disaster that had befallen her spirit root. Beyond her terror, she descended into even greater madness. How could this be — how could this possibly happen?

Her inner demon exploded in full, completely consuming what remained of her reason. Everyone in this room was against her, everyone was targeting her — let them die, every last one of them!

She forcibly drove power through her shattered spirit root, rousing the demonic energy within her body, drawing out her own vital blood and transforming it into a storm of bone-eroding demonic energy like a rain of needles, shooting toward everyone present.

She was courting death.

She had abandoned even the pretense of defending herself!

Just as Rong Huanxuan was about to self-detonate her spirit root and drag everyone down with her, Lang Jiuchuan was reaching for Dizhong — when the empty air suddenly shifted. Someone tore through the void and charged out, hurling a jade ruyi scepter toward Rong Huanxuan: “Wretch, stand down!”

The jade ruyi scepter, radiating righteousness and a suppressive calming power, slammed down hard upon Rong Huanxuan. She cried out in a wretched gasp as her own power reflected back upon her. A great mouthful of vital blood sprayed from her lips, and she was sent flying backward.

Lang Jiuchuan looked at this new arrival, and something erupted within her chest — a fierce, bone-deep, all-consuming venom and hatred, utterly beyond her control. She felt the impulse to throw herself forward without a second thought and destroy him utterly.

Gong Tinglan caught her arm in one swift motion, his eyes carrying a trace of inquiry.

The icy chill of his grip jolted Lang Jiuchuan back to herself. She forcibly crushed the impulse surging inside her and fixed her gaze, rigid and unyielding, on the man robed in purple-gold Eight-Trigrams Daoist attire. The Rong clan leader — this was surely the chief culprit behind everything that had been done to her!

The Rong clan leader swept his sleeve out and gathered Rong Huanxuan toward him, pressing his large palm against her spirit palace. He drove a cultivation technique imbued with mind-clearing, soul-stabilizing power directly into her, forcibly suppressing her rampaging spirit soul, and used a rope of righteous law to bind her.

Struck and suppressed by this cultivation technique, Rong Huanxuan’s frenzy ebbed somewhat. But the searing agony of her shattered spirit root and the wild backlash of demonic energy crashed into her without mercy. Unable to hold on, she let out a wretched retch and vomited a great mouthful of oily black, foul-smelling polluted blood. The strength drained from her body like a receding tide, and she reverted to her normal appearance — but like a flower on the verge of wilting, swaying and on the brink of collapse, utterly spent.

She gazed blankly around at her surroundings. Every pair of eyes that met hers was guarded and revolted, fixed upon her with undisguised contempt, loathing, and accusation. Those eyes were laden with disgust and condemnation. It brought back, unbidden, the memory of what she had just done.

Yes — she had lost her reason. Her inner demon had erupted. She had fallen into demonic delusion and become a half-demon.

Her secret was exposed. She was finished.

She was no longer the Rong clan’s exalted heir. In the eyes of everyone here, she was now one of the demonic and the profane.

It was Lang Jiuchuan who had destroyed her.

She turned her head and looked sharply at Lang Jiuchuan. The other woman wore an expression that hovered somewhere between mockery and contempt, and her lips moved silently: You’re done.

Rong Huanxuan trembled violently. A scream tore out of her, and the agonizing pain of body and spirit, together with the irreversible wounds from the backlash, and the bone-marrow-deep terror, sent her plummeting straight down into a dark abyss. Her eyes rolled back, and she fell into unconsciousness.

The bedchamber was left in utter ruin.

The Rong clan leader cradled Rong Huanxuan in his arms, his gaze moving over her form — and when it landed upon her spirit root, which should have been intact but had once again been severed and destroyed, with a vast righteous power still at work dissolving the residual demonic energy clinging to it, he could not help but let his pupils contract slightly. His grip tightened. Deep within his eyes, a flicker of pained grief and furious shock crossed his face — but more than that, there was cold dread and bitter regret.

If only he had known — if only he had known, he would have defied the imperial edict and kept her confined within the clan. She would not have ended up ruined like this!

One misstep, and every step thereafter became a misstep. The more he had tried to account for everything, the more constrained he had become, until the Rong clan had been maneuvered into a position from which there was no recovery.

How he wished he could go back!

“Rong clan leader,” Gong Tinglan said, his voice cool and measured. “Rong Huanxuan cultivated evil arts and willingly aligned herself with the demonic path, acting in direct opposition to the righteous way. How do you intend to answer for this?”

The Rong clan leader raised his head — but it was not Gong Tinglan he looked at. His gaze went to Lang Jiuchuan, standing at Gong Tinglan’s side, and his eyes were blanketed in cold frost.

It was she. She had destroyed Xuaner — and destroyed the Rong clan’s peace!