Feng Fuming released the little girl. Having been forcibly soul-searched, she collapsed limply, unconscious.

A palace maid immediately stepped forward, took the little girl in her arms, and with lowered head, carried her out of the hall.

The immortal attendants who witnessed this scene felt deeply troubled. The two men—that ghost cultivator who had destroyed the sect and Feng Fuming before them—were like two psychopaths.

One annihilated an entire clan yet was arrogant enough to leave a survivor to announce it to the Eight Wildernesses.

The other wouldn’t even spare an orphan. Everyone knew that after being forcibly soul-searched, it was difficult to survive. Even if one lived, they would become a mindless fool.

An immortal lord hesitantly asked: “Your Majesty, the Heavenly Lord, shall we continue our attack on Kun Lun?”

That ghost cultivator was too arrogant, just like what they had done to those little demons, forcing them into homelessness. Now that he had appeared, he left no way for the immortal clans to survive.

Feng Fuming said coldly, “Attack, why not? Let me think.”

His fingers tapped on the armrest. After a brief shock, extreme calm washed over him.

People with weaknesses never live long. He had managed to scheme and kill him once, so there could be a second and third time. He just didn’t know what Yan Chaosheng now thought of his former weakness, Liu Shuang.

Feng Fuming’s eyes curved slightly as he smiled softly.

No rush, let’s see. He was not the same person he once was. Even if the Xiangyou royal clan had returned, what could they do to him?

The Eight Wildernesses were in his hands. Just a little bastard!

Yan Chaosheng returned at Chen hour. Su Lun, Fu Hang, and others waited for him at the ghost gate.

From a distance, someone said in a deep, eerie tone: “The Demon Lord returns. Open the gate.”

Fu Hang, upon seeing him, sighed in relief. Earlier, the Mountain Lord—no, he should now be called the Demon Lord—when he decided to level the Thousand Blades Sect alone, they had all been quite worried.

Having just recovered his body, could he manage?

All of them had witnessed how Yan Chaosheng had come back to life.

Three years ago, not even his aura could be found in the world. Then, suddenly, one day, as if guided by soul fire, Qing Luan found a faint trace of his aura and used the heart meridian within its body to forcibly bind a strand of his remnant soul with its blood.

Fate was unpredictable. Who would have thought that what killed him was his love for Liu Shuang, and what gave him a chance at life was still his love for her?

If not for a demon foolish enough to split off a heart meridian for a demon bird, he would certainly have had no chance of revival under such circumstances.

A group of people, under Su Lun’s planning, hid at the old site of Penglai, waiting for this tiny soul fragment—so weak that a wind could scatter it—to condense.

They waited and waited.

At that time, Yan Chaosheng was like an extremely fragile infant. When the weather turned cold, his remnant soul would cry softly. A group of burly men, surrounding their weakened lord, were truly worried sick.

Later, they secretly went to You Mountain and received help from Zhan Xueyang, which improved things somewhat, allowing them to breathe easier.

When Zhan Xueyang first saw Yan Chaosheng, he widened his eyes, murmuring: “How can it be so severe? She really went all out! A soul shredded by divine artifacts still having a path to life—it sounds like a fantasy.”

Fortunately, amid uncertainty, there was always a force sustaining Yan Chaosheng’s fragile soul.

The demons tried every method but had to admit it.

Alas, Yan Chaosheng had truly died thoroughly this time. Not to mention anything else, for his remnant soul to gather, it would take at least a thousand years. A thousand years! By then, that bastard Feng Fuming’s children might already be leading armies. Where would there be a place for their demon race?

Everyone was disheartened. Even Zhan Xueyang and Su Lun were about to give up. Unexpectedly, one night, lightning flashed and thunder roared. Eighty-one tribulation lightning bolts descended from nowhere, shaking You Mountain to its foundations.

The demons stared in shock at the waist-thick purple lightning, unable to hold back a curse: “Who the hell is undergoing tribulation?”

It was like becoming a god—such thick lightning. This must be the Heavenly Way’s punishment, divine lightning against those who defied Heaven. The Heavenly Way itself was hunting to kill.

Looking at the direction of the tribulation lightning, their hearts sank halfway. It was precisely where they were nurturing the remnant soul in despair.

Speaking of Yan Chaosheng’s remnant soul, fragile as an infant’s—normally, when it rained, startling this innocent soul, it would cry directly. With such a barrage of lightning striking, it was probably finished.

This time, even Su Lun turned pale, his eyes revealing despair: “He’s dead.”

No one dared approach. They waited for the tribulation lightning to finish, planning to collect Yan Chaosheng’s remains.

Their Xiangyou royal clan’s dream, maintained for tens of thousands of years, finally died in that moment. The entire You Mountain was battered by wind and rain. After the last bolt fell, You Mountain was leveled.

Zhan Xueyang crawled trembling from the ruins, looking at his hands in disbelief, then at the magnificent landscape before him. This deeply calculating man, for the first time, looked like a dazed child: “You Mountain is gone? I… I’m out?”

What promise had his ancestors made? On the day the Xiangyou royal clan returned, pacifying the four seas, stabilizing the Eight Wildernesses, becoming true kings leading the demon race to rise, only then could You Mountain break.

Yet now, after a meal’s worth of mysterious lightning, the prison that had confined his ancestors for generations was just… broken!

Why? Zhan Xueyang stared wide-eyed at where they had been nurturing the remnant soul. They saw that what had been, in their eyes, a soul dead beyond death, had somehow transformed into a thick, gloomy black mist. Within the mist, a figure was faintly coalescing.

That face was achingly familiar—clearly Yan Chaosheng!

Under the shocked gazes of everyone, he slowly opened his eyes. With silver irises tinged red, he raised his hand to grip the throat of the person nearest to him, saying coldly: “Where is my wife?”

The great demon, nearly choked to death, gasped: “You… you haven’t yet married or soul-bound. You have no wife…”

Yan Chaosheng, seemingly without reason, tightened his fingers. Just as the great demon was about to be choked to death, Yan Chaosheng gradually closed his eyes again.

From then on, every half month, he would wake once on the first and fifteenth days. Each time he awoke, he would go mad like a lunatic, speaking words others couldn’t understand.

“I no longer wish to take your heart. Where have you gone?”

“I’ve searched high and low, why do you never appear to me?”

“Shuang Shuang, I’ve tried everything. I have no other methods left.”

“I know I was wrong, but I don’t regret it. If you still hate me, come back, come back and kill me with your own hands. Vent your hatred.”

Towards the end, his eyes would occasionally shed tears of blood, yet his face remained twisted to a terrifying degree: “I don’t regret it. I will never regret it…”

…

At first, everyone racked their brains to analyze what he was saying. Later, they realized these were things that had never happened. Perhaps his mind was confused, and in his dreams, he had soul-bound with that Immortal Liu Shuang whom he loved to the depths of his heart, then broken the bond, leading him to say such strange things.

Once they grew accustomed to it, no one paid attention, treating it as if their Demon Lord was having nightmares with a ferocious expression.

Thus, day after day, they kept this deranged lord at the now-uninhabited and spiritually depleted old site of Penglai, capturing small evil ghosts for him to kill and vent on. They feared he might kill his people, so they let him conveniently babble nonsense at the little ghosts.

This madness continued for quite a long time. Until one day, when Fu Hang captured ghosts for his cultivation.

He stood by the window, wearing a silver robe embroidered with gold threads, his features cold and clear as he gazed outside, as quiet as a figure in a painting.

While Fu Hang hesitated, Yan Chaosheng had already turned around.

This time, he didn’t grab anyone demanding directions to find his “Demon Lord’s wife.” Instead, his eyes flashed with many complex emotions, and he smiled: “Thank you for your hard work.”

The corners of his eyes were adorned with delicate, beautiful silver scales, making him look not like a demon but an incomparably handsome ancient deity. He seemed somewhat disgusted as he brushed the corner of his eye, smiling gloomily: “The Heavenly Way’s retribution?”

Fu Hang fell to his knees with a thud. After a full three years, he felt the urge to cry for the first time.

He knew that the Mountain Lord, who had once rescued him from peril, had finally returned.

Yan Chaosheng recuperated in Penglai for another half year. One day, he suddenly said calmly: “Let’s go back and kill some people, shall we?”

His tone was as casual as commenting on nice weather.

Upon returning, they encountered the little butterfly spirit, Cong Xia, trailing a squad of heavenly soldiers.

From killing heavenly soldiers to destroying the Thousand Blades Sect, throughout the entire process, only Yan Chaosheng acted. Everyone finally had a tangible feeling that their lord had truly returned.

He had gone to the Thousand Blades Sect alone last night. In everyone’s minds, they still had the image of Yan Chaosheng’s weak, tear-prone remnant soul, fearing the Demon Lord’s soul hadn’t fully recovered and might be killed again.

It’s worth noting that he was now different from his formerly resilient original body—he was a ghost cultivator!

A ghost cultivator permeated with yin energy and cold all over. Once dead, everything would be gone, not even entering reincarnation.

They were anxious as Yan Chaosheng left at the Zi hour, but unexpectedly, he returned by the Chen hour.

His body emanated dense killing intent, having slain countless people.

Su Lun looked at him. He had changed, truly changed. Previously, that youth had appeared fierce but was quite easy to fool. Most of the time, unless someone offended him, he wasn’t eager to kill.

Now, however he was treated, he would coldly and unhesitatingly return it twofold.

This spirit was exactly what the now-lifeless demon race needed. Su Lun lowered his head, eyes filling with smiles. After all his efforts, wasn’t this the ruler he had been seeking?

The butterfly spirit, Cong Xia, had also followed today.

She was still the same as before, eager to curry favor with Yan Chaosheng, her eyes filled with seduction.

Yan Chaosheng glanced at her, recalling everything from this life.

Without this butterfly spirit, the demon race would likely have been completely wiped out by Feng Fuming. Yan Chaosheng never stinted in rewarding meritorious service—a principle he had followed throughout his hundreds of years as Demon Lord. Thus, unusually, he didn’t tell her to leave but asked her many questions about the demon race.

She could answer them all: “Everyone’s fine, everyone’s doing well. I rescued them in time, brought them back, and no one in the Ghost Realm has suffered much. They’re just waiting for your return, my lord, to command everyone and fight against Feng Fuming.”

“Mmm,” Yan Chaosheng said, “thank you for your hard work.”

“It wasn’t hard,” Cong Xia said pleasantly. This happiness came too wonderfully. The returned Demon Lord, though more profound, had an attitude toward her that was incomparably better.

Her eyes were full of charm, her heart blooming with joy. She knew this was all due to her “protecting the demon race” single-handedly. Now she was beloved in the demon race, and even the Demon Lord looked at her differently. Thankfully, before the Demon Lord returned, she hadn’t abandoned these demons and fled.

Thinking of the woman who had rescued demons through rain or shine for three years, a flash of guilt passed through her heart. The Demon Lord must not know.

Now, in the Demon Lord’s heart, that person was an enemy who had killed him, while she was his benefactor!

Thinking of her future glory and the adoration she had enjoyed for three years, her heart hardened, and she put on a concerned expression: “Now that the Demon Lord has returned, you must seek revenge on the woman who took your life!” She couldn’t be blamed for this—it was the demon nature. If one doesn’t look out for oneself, heaven and earth will destroy them.

Rushing across mountains and rivers with a heart full of sincerity and a wedding garment, only to be killed by Liu Shuang with divine artifacts, unable to find peace, forever excluded from reincarnation.

He lowered his eyes, his voice soft, strangely peaceful. He was looking at his hands—hands that had accumulated enough sin and killed countless beings. These were no longer a young man’s hands; they had distinct joints, permeated with the scent of blood.

He had once pushed her into hell with his own hands. Even now, he would not repent to her. He had always walked a path of no return that allowed no regrets. His timing in meeting Liu Shuang was wrong, but given another chance, he would still do the same. In his madness, he had given her the worst of everything, including love.

Fortunately, his younger self, still pure and clean, had been worthy to die for her with dignity. That love wasn’t too tainted.

Yan Chaosheng said softly: “Yes, revenge is due.”

Cong Xia perked up: “How do you plan to torture her?”

He said nothing, only smiled. To torture and take revenge on his beloved? That would be to become her husband-a, a beast like him—and have her bear several children. That would truly be cruel.