The Yang Family Ancestral Residence.

Yang Xiuyong had just walked a step away from death’s door. Of the seven lamps of the Seven Star Formation, six had been extinguished. The remaining one — the lamp positioned directly above and before him — had been on the verge of dying out when the spiritual energy emanating from the bone bell that Lang Jiuchuan had temporarily left by Yang Xiuyong’s side enveloped and protected it. Combined with Gong Qi’s desperate efforts to sustain it with his spiritual power, the lamp had barely held on. Otherwise, Yang Xiuyong’s last breath would have been cut off entirely.

When Gong Qi saw Lang Jiuchuan and the others return, the tension in his mind and spirit broke all at once, and with that release of breath, he immediately spat out two mouthfuls of dark blood.

Lang Jiuchuan stepped forward to examine Yang Xiuyong. Seeing how his face was as pale as gold paper, with more breath going out than coming in, she formed hand seals and re-ignited the six extinguished lamps. She also removed the golden needles embedded in his body and used her true qi to unblock the meridians and open the flow of qi through his five organs.

After this round of exhausting effort, she had finally managed to forcibly drag back that half a foot he had stepped through death’s gate.

Having expended her vital energy repeatedly, Lang Jiuchuan’s face turned ashen. She stepped back and nearly collapsed, her eyes half-closing. Suddenly she felt warmth approaching from behind. She turned to look — it was Gong Tinglan channeling his true qi to her.

“No need,” Lang Jiuchuan said with a slight smile. “I just need to regulate my breath. You’ve also depleted your vital energy and suffered the backlash of the counterforce.”

Gong Tinglan shook his head. “My condition is nothing compared to how much you’ve exerted yourself.”

“Then send a strand of your true essence into him,” Lang Jiuchuan said. “It can balance the five elements and harmonize yin and yang. His body will be weakened, but at least his life force will be preserved — and our effort here won’t have been in vain.”

Gong Tinglan listened and followed her instructions, guiding a strand of true essence into Yang Xiuyong’s meridians, then leading it through his five organs to activate the five elemental flows.

Gradually, Yang Xiuyong’s complexion improved. Though still pale, the deathly aura had faded from him.

Seeing this, Lang Jiuchuan said, “He’ll be fine. I’ll regulate my breath first, and then we’ll go to the ancestral graves.”

The soul puppet had proven useful after all. And since it had been destroyed within the formation, it was equivalent to “Yang Xiuyong” having died once — a masterful act of misdirection.

Lang Jiuchuan retrieved the bone bell, found a room, set Jiangche to guard the door, and summoned the Xiaojiu Pagoda. She had the water spirit use the bone bell’s spiritual energy to wrap her physical body, then sent her entire soul into the pagoda.

This was the first time Wooden Fish had seen Lang Jiuchuan with her soul fully intact. Wooden Fish circled around her and knocked a few times, then led her to the very pinnacle of the pagoda’s topmost level.

“This is…?” Lang Jiuchuan looked with some puzzlement at the profound Dao talisman floating in mid-air.

“It is the most profound insight of the Ritual Master’s entire life,” Wooden Fish said. “If your soul is whole, you may comprehend it. Whether you can or not depends on your perception.”

Lang Jiuchuan didn’t ask why a complete soul was required to comprehend it — there was no need. One’s height determines how far one can see; some things can only be reached when one has climbed to a certain elevation.

She stood at the summit, raised her head, and felt countless profound runes surging toward her. She sat cross-legged and sank into a state of formless chaos.

Only after a long while did Wooden Fish slowly strike a single note. That mysterious, low, resonant sound seemed to drive away all restlessness and urgency.

At dawn the next day, when the sky was just beginning to brighten, Lang Jiuchuan and Gong Tinglan worked side by side to arrange a simple yet sturdy feng shui formation over the Yang Family ancestral graves — a formation to nurture essence and solidify the foundation. Though it could not immediately restore the Yang Family to its former glory, the most important thing now was to preserve the last remaining bloodline and then proceed gradually from there.

The two buried the final ritual implement and sealed the formation with the formation incantation. A cold wind swept through, carrying the crisp freshness of a winter’s morning — yet it carried no bone-biting chill.

Gong Tinglan stood beside Lang Jiuchuan, watching the pale glow of dawn pierce through the morning mist and fall across the ancestral graves, dispelling the last trace of cold yin energy and restoring a living vitality. He said with quiet satisfaction, “Life force has flowed in. Though it took tremendous effort, we have preserved the Yang Family’s bloodline from extinction. I am truly grateful for your help.”

“Gratitude would be too formal between us,” Lang Jiuchuan said plainly. “I happened upon this by chance. We broke one scheme of the Grand Preceptor’s — even if the process left something to be desired, wresting back this small measure of fortune and vitality from his grasp means I have won this round. I imagine you’re wondering why, when I was so clearly his disciple, I would so resolutely stand against him?”

Gong Tinglan turned to look at her and gave a gentle nod. “I have indeed wondered. The Grand Preceptor holds an exalted position and his cultivation is unfathomably deep — opposing him is no different from a mantis trying to stop a chariot. I have known you only a short while, but watching how you conduct yourself, I can tell you hold your own inner compass, and that you are never one to act without purpose.”

He paused, then glanced toward the collapsed low mountain in the distance and said with a sardonic tone, “And besides — after what happened here, whether he truly is the revered paragon of righteous virtue that the world believes him to be… that’s no longer so easy to say.”

Stealing the fortune of others — was that something a righteous path cultivator would do?

Lang Jiuchuan gave a faint smile, yet the smile never reached her eyes. With biting scorn she said, “The Grand Preceptor — exalted in station, profound in cultivation, with an immortal bearing as majestic as a heavenly god. That is the impression the world has of him. Yet beneath that brilliant surface, who knows what kind of vicious heart lies hidden, willing to resort to any means to achieve his ends?”

Without waiting for Gong Tinglan to ask, she laid out the cruel truth in unhurried words: “He directed the head of the Rong Family to take me away the moment I was born. The head of the Rong Family, acting on his own selfish motives, placed the child born to Fourth Master Ren Ya of the Rong Family in my parents’ household in my stead — that is the truth of the switching. I was raised at his knee as his direct disciple and taught with great care. Barely past thirteen, I had already passed through the heavenly tribulation of Foundation Establishment. And immediately after — he set a trap for me, sealed me within the imperial mausoleum of the Tantai clan, and used me to nourish the dynastic fortune and the dragon vein. My soul was shattered before I managed to tear free. A benefactor helped me defy the heavens and reconstruct my soul. I then returned to life by borrowing the body of the child born to Fourth Master and the others, and finally, through the cultivation of merit, I achieved true rebirth through nirvana. Quite the dramatic story, isn’t it?”

She recounted the events of her past life in concise and spare words, concealing nothing — not even the matter of Pan City — her voice as calm as if she were narrating someone else’s tale.

Gong Tinglan’s face went pale as he listened, the tips of his fingers trembling beyond his control, his expression filled with disbelief. “As everyone knows, the Grand Preceptor’s disciple is the Holy Maiden herself — this…”

“Indeed. I had no visible presence — whether I lived or died, only he knew. What person in this world would speak up for me, or ever learn of his crimes? And isn’t that precisely his careful cunning?” Lang Jiuchuan laughed at herself bitterly.

“What was his purpose in doing this?”

“He seeks longevity, I imagine,” Lang Jiuchuan said, pressing her lips together briefly. “His years are no longer few. If he cannot survive the heavenly tribulation and solidify his golden core, his lifespan will reach its end. But this is only my personal conjecture — whether it truly is as I believe, only he himself knows.”

Gong Tinglan’s mind was deeply shaken. He looked at her with a complex expression. She spoke of it calmly — but the pain of betrayal, the torment of being sealed, the agony of fighting back to life: was any of that something a child of her age should have had to endure?

He could not fathom it. That Grand Preceptor whom the world revered as a god — what monstrous calculations and cruelties lay concealed behind his façade? To seal and sacrifice the very disciple he had raised with his own hands — how could his heart be so ruthless?

“So, whether it was what happened to you, or the calamity that befell the Qian, Li, and Yang clans — none of it was coincidence. All of it was deliberate, carefully calculated,” Gong Tinglan said, a thread of anger running through his voice.

“Nothing is done without benefit — and every counter-scheme must yield something. That is Tantai Qing.” Lang Jiuchuan’s eyes were ice-cold. “Between him and me, one of us must die. Young Master Gong — are you willing to stand with me?”