In the Valley of Eight Sufferings, Liu Shuang completely transformed into the original Liu Shuang of the Chi Shui Clan.

She experienced the growth from the original owner’s memories.

The original Liu Shuang always understood what kind of Young Lord her father needed, and she was undoubtedly a daughter who brought them shame.

She had heard that the Feng clan’s Crown Prince Fu Ming was born accompanied by dragon songs from the nine heavens, and that the Young Lord of Kun Lun in the north caused the mountain spring water to transform into a spiritual spring at his birth.

These favored children of ancient bloodlines all possessed extraordinary divine powers.

Only she had been born ordinary, even with an incomplete soul. Lady Purple had even spent a long time awakening her spiritual consciousness, teaching her to speak, patiently teaching her to form immortal gestures, teaching her to fly through the air.

Yet she always caused trouble, and now she had even harmed Lady Purple like this.

Liu Shuang felt the original owner’s deep depression and pain, the helpless feeling of defeat and self-blame, like a fledgling eagle repeatedly trying to fly, falling bruised and battered, only to realize it was merely a swallow with broken wings among eagles.

After that night, the original owner began to change.

Unable to distinguish truth from falsehood or the good and evil intentions of others, afraid of hurting Lady Purple and Chi Shui Chong again, she transformed herself into someone who trusted no one. She became suspicious and prone to angry outbursts.

This small body spent most of its time secretly practicing cultivation day and night, though the little girl’s cultivation efforts bore no results.

In the original owner’s memories, Liu Shuang also saw Mi Chu.

After the Chi Shui spiritual vein began to slowly dry up and started to crumble inch by inch, requiring constant guarding and repair, the Lou clan’s patriarch voluntarily offered to go guard the heavenly spiritual vein in the Southern Immortal Realm. His only request was for the Realm Lord and his wife to help look after his daughter, Mi Chu.

After Mi Chu arrived at the Heavenly Palace of Kung Sang, she was loved by almost everyone. She was intelligent and thoughtful, gentle and generous, and very diligent and hardworking.

When Liu Shuang first saw Mi Chu in the original owner’s memory, she thought she had mistaken the person!

Mi Chu at this time was completely different from the Mi Chu that Liu Shuang later encountered. Although she could still be described as divinely beautiful, she bore no resemblance to Liu Shuang herself.

Liu Shuang vaguely recalled Feng Fuming saying that Mi Chu didn’t initially look like that.

Now, before her eyes, Mi Chu actively showed goodwill toward the original owner. The little immortal was both afraid and longing for friendship, repeatedly driving Mi Chu away, yet Mi Chu wasn’t bothered at all. She repeatedly taught the original owner many interesting techniques. Eventually, after many interactions, the little immortal finally accepted this friend.

Unfortunately, no matter how hard the original owner tried to learn, she couldn’t master the techniques. Seeing her disappointment, Mi Chu softly speculated: “One must pass through the lightning tribulation to improve cultivation. Could Double’s stagnant cultivation be related to the delayed lightning tribulation?”

The little immortal looked at her.

Mi Chu smiled gently.

That night, the original owner walked out, tremblingly holding a heavenly lightning banner in her hands.

Liu Shuang wanted desperately to stop her, to tell her that Mi Chu’s words were malicious, but Liu Shuang feared that if she intervened, she would no longer be able to witness the original owner’s experiences. She strongly resisted taking control of this body.

Sure enough, the little immortal went to the Nine Thoughts Pond, shut herself in the lotus platform, and waved the heavenly lightning banner in her hand.

As lightning struck down one after another, Liu Shuang, inside this body, felt fragmented pain.

The little immortal collapsed, powerless, on the lotus platform, looking at her reflection in the calm pond water. Her body was covered in blood, her gaze hollow: “I will get better. I won’t harm Mother again. I’ll try my best to protect Kung Sang. I can do it…”

Or else… she thought with dimming eyes, someone else could do it instead.

Father was right. The spiritual vein of Kung Sang was about to dry up. It didn’t matter who the Young Lord was—whether it was Brother Zhuixu, Yuxiao, or even Mi Chu. As long as they could protect Kung Sang, prevent Father from worrying and being disappointed, and prevent Mother from suffering such injuries again, anyone could be the Young Lord.

She was willing to extract the spiritual essence of the Chi Shui lineage from her body to give to that person, in exchange for them protecting her home.

Liu Shuang sighed. Fortunately, the heavenly lightning banner didn’t contain true heavenly lightning, just mortal lightning. She watched as the little Young Lord endured the injuries on the lotus platform, then watched her grow day by day.

Everything seemed peaceful, but Liu Shuang secretly became alert. She remembered she was in the Valley of Eight Sufferings—such a place couldn’t possibly be kind enough to let her live a peaceful life.

Sure enough, soon came the day when the original owner and Shao You were betrothed.

Liu Shuang thought, here it comes, this is the moment. What follows should be familiar to her.

But the scene before her was not what she expected—

In the Valley of Eight Sufferings, the original owner was full of hope as she married Shao You.

After learning of the betrothal, the original owner thought that if she couldn’t protect Kung Sang herself, it would be good to let someone powerful protect it.

What was happening contradicted Liu Shuang’s memories completely.

They had even successfully conducted the spirit union ceremony.

Red filled her vision. Liu Shuang felt uneasy despite the smiling faces of the immortals offering blessings.

Beside her was the familiar Shao You.

According to the spirit union ceremony, the original owner took out blood from her heart.

Liu Shuang’s unease grew heavier.

She saw Shao You beside the original owner smile coldly, suddenly reaching out to grab her, forcibly extracting her spiritual essence!

Shao You thrust his sword backward.

No one had expected this. The original owner had no strength to resist and looked at Shao You in fear. The sword pierced through, yet didn’t harm the original owner at all.

Liu Shuang stared blankly, her heart sinking.

Blood spread as the sword pierced Lady Purple’s body—the original owner’s mother had shielded her at the last moment.

Shao You stroked his sword and smiled lightly: “Who would marry a foolish immortal with an incomplete soul just to suppress the depletion of spiritual power? Occupying the Kung Sang spiritual vein will make Kun Lun even better.”

Behind him, countless soldiers from the Kun Lun Immortal Realm invaded. The immortal lords wore battle armor; an internal battle in the immortal realm was about to erupt.

Shao You crouched down, gripped the original owner’s chin, and smiled: “Thank you, Young Lord of Kung Sang.”

He bit off the last few words with extreme sarcasm.

Before Liu Shuang could react, the original owner’s heart ached terribly, almost as painful as having her soul torn apart.

Something was forcibly separated from within her body. The helpless defeat and pain were like a mountain range, pressing down until she could barely breathe.

Liu Shuang struggled to maintain consciousness but could only watch as the souls of Sorrow and Fear separated from the body…

This process was both long and brief. After Liu Shuang fainted from the pain, she opened her eyes again.

Rain was still dripping steadily from the sky. The wind blew the gauze curtains as she suddenly sat up in bed, finding herself back at the initial scene. Looking down, she still had tiny hands and a tiny body.

Sure enough, the immortal maids began gossiping again.

“Is the Young Lord still sleeping?”

Liu Shuang was covered in cold sweat, finally realizing the horror of the Valley of Eight Sufferings. This was bad—at this rate, not just the souls of Sorrow and Fear, but also Joy, Anger, Love, Hate, and Desire would separate one by one. She wouldn’t even be able to protect her three hun souls and would die in the Valley of Eight Sufferings due to the original owner’s fears.

The original owner feared that her incompetence would cause Kung Sang’s destruction, just as in her youth when she had injured her mother and nearly caused her death.

In the Valley of Eight Sufferings, everything became real. The nightmare repeated endlessly until one’s soul was scattered completely.

As she watched this body heading again toward Lady Purple’s door…

Liu Shuang bit her lip until it bled, trying to actively control her body. This was all false. Shao You was still waiting for her in the Valley of Eight Sufferings! He would never do something like stealing someone’s spiritual essence and spiritual veins.

Liu Shuang suddenly understood why the original owner had wanted to break off the engagement with Shao You. It wasn’t because of any affection for Feng Fuming, but because someone had used methods to make the original owner have dreams like this.

So after waking up, the original owner had desperately gone to break off the engagement. Liu Shuang gritted her teeth—Mi Chu!

Unfortunately, now that she had entered the Valley of Eight Sufferings, the body Liu Shuang had thought she could control completely disobeyed her.

She was like a puppet being manipulated, repeating the original owner’s nightmares over and over.

Liu Shuang’s red and blue soul fragments floated away, but before they could disperse completely, they were gathered into the arms of Yan Chaosheng, who had angrily returned.

When Yan Chaosheng came back, he thought that even if she had to die, she shouldn’t die here. Being a descendant of Chi Shui, he wouldn’t lose by consuming her. Since she wanted to follow that hypocrite Ji Mo Shao You to her death, she might as well die meaningfully, contributing to him, compensating for the cultivation he had lost because of her.

Unexpectedly, as soon as he arrived, Liu Shuang’s scattered souls of Sorrow and Fear, pitiful and frightened like children seeking shelter, afraid of the surrounding ghosts, crashed straight into his arms.

Soul fragments know neither cold nor warmth and have no memories; they only understand kindness and malice. In the Ghost Realm, they only sensed that the person before them had no intention of harming them, so they desperately burrowed into his embrace.

They happened to crash right into Yan Chaosheng’s chest, where his heart was located.

Soul fragments are light and faint, but Yan Chaosheng’s special demon eyes could see them. That gentle touch, though causing no physical harm, dissipated his cold anger.

He grabbed them to look: good, these two scattered souls—one whimpering, tearfully in his palm, one trembling with fear.

Yan Chaosheng laughed coldly and gathered them into his arms, heading toward the Ghost King’s Tomb.

Now she knew that a hypocrite wasn’t reliable. With her soul already scattered, she came crying to his embrace. Why hadn’t she known to yield earlier, when she had so resolutely chosen Ji Mo Shao You?

He found it ironic. Was this how Ji Mo Shao You had taken her into the Valley of Eight Sufferings?

When Yan Chaosheng brought the souls of Sorrow and Fear to the Ghost King’s Tomb, his eyes had turned silver. What others saw as emptiness appeared to him as ridiculous stages with performers singing.

He patted the two restless, pitiful, scattered souls in his embrace and said irritably, “Behave yourselves.”

Under the stages, in the pitch-black place, lay the burial ground for countless people—the Valley of Eight Sufferings.

The so-called Eight Sufferings were none other than birth, aging, sickness, death, unfulfilled desires, meeting with the hateful, separation from the beloved, and the flourishing of the five skandhas.

No one could experience all of these completely, whether mortal or immortal. Everyone had weaknesses.

Yan Chaosheng’s face was grim.

Naturally, he dared not enter such a place. His ambition and desire were too great; he couldn’t possibly withstand the pain of the Valley of Eight Sufferings.

He frowned tightly. He shouldn’t go in; only a madman would enter.

Turning back hadn’t been without gain. Now that he had these two scattered souls, consuming them would be better than nothing. Why bother entering the Valley of Eight Sufferings to rescue her?

But the floating souls were those of Sorrow and Fear, certainly bitter and astringent, without any sweetness.

Yan Chaosheng stood outside the Ghost King’s Tomb, covering the whimpering scattered souls in his embrace. What were they crying about? So annoying. No matter how much they urged him, he wouldn’t go in. He wasn’t a fool.

At that moment, a pink scattered soul floated out.

Yan Chaosheng instinctively reached out, wanting to hold it in his hand.

Unexpectedly, the confused, scattered soul, carrying warmth, darted straight to his face. Like a flirtatious woman, it recklessly planted a kiss on his face—a brief, dragonfly-skimming-water warmth on his cheek.

Yan Chaosheng gritted his teeth and quickly pulled it away.

This was… her soul of Love.

Among the three scattered souls, this one was the most annoying! The pink scattered soul couldn’t understand his disgust and dissatisfaction at all. While the other two conveyed suppression and fear, this one was like a child, nuzzling against his lapel.

Several times it touched his cold scales.

Yan Chaosheng was nearly driven mad. He pulled it out and said fiercely, “Believe it or not, I’ll consume you first!”

The pink scattered soul didn’t understand and wrapped around his finger, still acting coquettishly.

He stared at it. There wasn’t much to see—just a scattered soul, barely discernible as a tiny human form. After a while, Yan Chaosheng finally felt there really wasn’t anything worth looking at and stuffed it back into his embrace.

“Only for the sake of those other two scattered souls,” he pressed his lips together. “Definitely not for you.”

He stepped into the Ghost King’s Tomb. The howling ghostly energy whipped his robes about. Yan Chaosheng didn’t resist, allowing it to carry him into the Valley of Eight Sufferings.

He steadied himself as he landed, his demon eyes fully open, their brilliant silver appearing eerie and cold.

The scene before him, as it entered Yan Chaosheng’s demon eyes, was entirely white, resentful energy that separated souls. Once this energy touched a soul, it would forcibly tear off soul fragments.

The Valley of Eight Sufferings, he pondered, meant that people would suffer all kinds of torments, forever tortured inside.

If so, wasn’t the best way to avoid falling into the killing formation to hurt oneself faster and more severely than it could, so it wouldn’t inflict pain upon one’s body?

Yan Chaosheng closed his eyes briefly. A dagger appeared in his palm, and he fiercely sliced into the flesh of his arm.

Large patches of black snake scales fell off as he moved through the Valley of Eight Sufferings without making a sound.

This method indeed worked. The Valley of Eight Sufferings remained unchanged in his eyes. Every so often, Yan Chaosheng would slice off another scale.

He moved swiftly, finally spotting the young woman lying on the ground.

She was wrapped in an invisible white cocoon, her breathing barely perceptible. Having lost three souls, her consciousness was likely muddled.

Yan Chaosheng flew over, trying to break open the cocoon with his dagger. The cocoon showed no reaction, but the dagger’s edge became dull.

Yan Chaosheng frowned. Unlike those deeply rooted immortal lords who could immediately produce all sorts of heavenly treasures, tough and unbreakable, as a gate-keeping disciple after going to Kung Sang to learn skills, he didn’t even have a proper immortal sword.

He silently looked at her.

The soul of Love seemed to be restlessly nuzzling in his embrace. Yan Chaosheng wanted to kill it: “Stop fidgeting.”

It truly wasn’t working.

Seeing an orange scattered soul floating out from the young woman’s body—the soul of Joy—Yan Chaosheng coldly pulled off the heart-protecting scale from his chest.

Forcibly removing his scale, he trembled with pain.

This was perhaps the most beautiful scale on his body. Unlike other small, slimy snake scales, it had a faint black-gold luster.

With a ghastly pale face, he took the heart-protecting scale and sliced at the white cocoon around Liu Shuang.

Blood dripped down. Indeed, the most precious heart-protecting scale from a demon body was sharper than most immortal swords in the world.

Taking the young woman out of the cocoon almost exhausted his strength.

Yan Chaosheng held her, barely able to stand. He half-knelt, gasping for breath, his mind buzzing with pain. He knew they couldn’t stay long. The path back was too long; he wasn’t confident he could carry her all the way. If he couldn’t remain conscious, they would both die in the Valley of Eight Sufferings.

That left only one path. Yan Chaosheng looked up, his cold silver eyes gazing at the realm behind her. With ghastly ghost energy, it was the Ghost Kings’ Tomb hidden within the Valley of Eight Sufferings.

Gritting his teeth, he carried her inside.

Under the vast ghostly energy, finally free from the control of the Valley of Eight Sufferings, Yan Chaosheng groaned and collapsed to the ground.

The unconscious young woman fell with him, pressing against his wounds, making Yan Chaosheng tremble.

He had no strength to push her away. Thinking of the corrosive ghost energy surrounding them, he simply turned over, pressing her beneath him.

After all, he had already stayed in the Tomb of Ten Thousand Souls; this place was similar. She couldn’t withstand the ghost energy due to her missing souls, but he could shield her.

In all his life, Yan Chaosheng had never done anything so foolish.

She lay beneath him, breathing softly, her face veiled, her eyelashes long and curled. Viewed this way, she wasn’t unpleasant to look at.

He should have been in pain, injured as he was. He should also have been angry, angry at himself for losing his senses today.

But as he protected her, emerging from the Eight Wilderness killing formation, blood flowing from his chest, her image reflected in his silver eyes, four scattered souls restless in his embrace, he strangely felt no regret.

Yan Chaosheng laboriously released the four scattered souls.

As the souls returned to their owner and entered Liu Shuang’s body, her deathly pale complexion finally improved somewhat. Her fingers clenched tightly, as if she were having a nightmare.

Under her veil, she unconsciously murmured something. Yan Chaosheng collapsed powerlessly on top of her. Pressed so close together, he almost immediately heard Liu Shuang’s unclear murmurs.

A demon without its heart-protecting scale is extremely vulnerable; its chest still bled. Behind them were layers of bone-chilling ghost energy. He heard her softly call someone’s name in her dream.

“Shao You…”

Yan Chaosheng’s expression instantly turned cold and pale.