Chapter 53: I Killed Princess Lana?
Chapter 53: I Killed Princess Lana?
The kiss was a torrential downpour of heat and ancient magic. As Baihu’s lips pressed passionately against mine, a dizzying surge of realization fractured my thoughts. Yggi’s awakening memories pulsed in tandem with the frantic rhythm of my heart.
She was one of them.
She was one of the three Goddesses who had orchestrated my past life's execution and sacrifice. Shade and Sylvia were the first two, and now, the fox vixen before me completed the triad. Strange, twisted threads of cosmic coincidence had pulled us together. With this encounter, all five souls tethered to my past incarnations had finally been gathered. The grand, inscrutable design of the Goddesses was unfolding exactly as they had planned.
Through our shared spiritual bond, a wave of biting, icy jealousy stabbed at my mind. Shehuang was approaching, and her mood was lethal.
With their superhuman senses, the newcomers had caught every breathless word—including the vixen’s blatant command for them to scram.
"Senior Sister Baihu!" Shehuang’s voice hissed through the clearing, sharp enough to draw blood. "Let go of my husband at once, you shameless, slutty Fox Spirit!"
Baihu reluctantly parted from my face, leaving me gasping for air. A smug, teasing purr vibrated in her throat as she waved off the slander. "Junior Sister Shehuang, do you truly believe our Master would summon a common slut? If that is your metric, you are an even greater degenerate than I am! Master, look at me—I am completely untouched, no matter what nonsense that Little Snake whispers in your ear."
"Wait, freeze," I interrupted, raising my hands to halt the brewing catfight. The insults were background noise, but two words had caught my attention.
"Junior and Senior Sisters? Are you two members of one of the Eight Immortal Sects?"
Shehuang’s smug demeanor instantly evaporated into an embarrassed flush. Beside me, Baihu’s spiritual presence radiated sheer amusement.
"Master... I did mention we were mortal enemies with the Purple Cloud Sword Sect," Shehuang mumbled, twirling a strand of hair and avoiding my eyes. "And, well, that enmity stems from us belonging to the Demonic Sect... Um, teehee! I suppose I forgot to mention that minor detail. My apologies~!"
Baihu crossed her arms beneath the heavy, generous curves of her chest. Before I could even think of backing away, one of her plush, white fox tails whipped around my waist, locking me firmly against her hip.
"What our dear Junior Sister left out," Baihu whispered directly into my ear, her breath hot and teasing, "is that I happen to be the Demonic Sect’s Holy Maiden. Surprise!"
Every single tropes-heavy Xianxia NovelFire I had ever read on Earth flashed before my eyes, culminating in one terrifying, absolute conclusion.
"I’m so incredibly screwed, aren't I?" I groaned.
The pale, horrified look on my face was met with immediate, unified amusement. All four women cracked matching, ruthless smiles before bursting into a chorus of melodic laughter.
""""Pfft, Hahaha~!""""
Enjoying my misery for a moment longer, Baihu finally took pity on my ghostly complexion and patted my cheek. "Calm yourself, Master. Aside from a few arrogant suitors who objectify our bodies, the Sect itself has no reason to be your enemy. We are primarily a Beast Mastery and Demonic Beast Sect... though we do harbor quite a few human cultivators within our ranks."
Her expression softened, shifting into something more serious. "Furthermore, Loki, after I felt your initial call, I consulted with Sect Master Long Aotian and our Guardian Beast, Qinglong. I informed them of your existence. They decreed that if you managed to summon me again, I would be permitted to stay by your side... under one condition."
She leaned in closer, her eyes flashing with a dangerous, possessive light. "You must formally accept the title of Holy Son of the Demonic Sect. After all, the Holy Maiden can only ever be wed to the Holy Son, hehe~"
Though her giggles sounded light, the crushing force of the tail wrapped around my waist and the heavy gravity of her emotions left zero room for negotiation. This wasn't an invitation; it was an ultimatum.
"Baihu, I still owe you a debt for guiding me safely to Myst," I sighed, adjusting to the sudden weight of my new reality. "If this is the path you require, I will accept the honor. However, I will not abandon my position in my homeland. You both understand that relations between the West and the East are incredibly strained right now, correct?"
A pair of bright, approving smiles flashed across both she-demons' faces. Baihu reached into her spatial storage and pulled out a magnificent, pitch-black cultivator's robe, intricately embroidered with a sprawling sect crest across the back.
"That is perfectly acceptable," Baihu stated proudly. "Just refrain from targeting the Demonic Sect without just cause, and extend a saving hand if our members are ambushed by those self-righteous hypocrites from the Eastern Wastelands. We are a Demonic Sect, after all—might makes right is our core doctrine."
She handed me a thick, pristine white jade slip, roughly the dimensions of a modern smartphone and an inch thick. Carved into its polished surface was a coiling Azure Dragon, its scales shimmering with a pale, ethereal blue-green light.
"This magic item serves as your official Sect Identification token and a specialized Beast Storage device—essentially a spatial ring designed exclusively for living creatures. Any beast you conquer, tame, or knock unconscious can be safely housed inside. It responds solely to mana; it is entirely useless to aura users."
The token was designed to hang prominently from a cultivator's belt to signal their affiliation, allowing other sect members to sense its resonance from a distance. Fortunately, it featured a concealed "silent mode" to mask its presence when stealth was required.
Before Baihu could do it herself, Shehuang swiftly snatched the token, tying it to my belt with a smug, competitive smirk directed at her Senior Sister.
Baihu merely shrugged, amused by the petty display.
Rumble—!
A third violent tremor tore through the fabric of the pocket dimension, throwing us off balance. Baihu’s playful demeanor vanished. She reached out, flicking Shehuang’s forehead with a stern look. "Alright, Loki. Holy Son. It is time to send me back into the internal realm. You should head inside too, Junior Sister, or I will personally thrash you when I break out. Humph~!"
With a tight, strained smile—one that the legendary Kyuubi evidently found utterly charming—I channeled my mana, stabilizing the fluctuating boundaries of the realm as I sent her back inside.
"Taki Tsuki, clean up the vile mess that woman left on our Master, humph!" Shehuang commanded, her nose wrinkling in disgust.
Taki offered no complaints, immediately conjuring a localized stream of pristine water magic to wash away the stubborn, dried fluids left behind by the fox spirit’s explosive climax.
Once the Kyuubi's scent was thoroughly erased, Shehuang launched herself into my arms, sealing her lips over mine in a fierce, possessive kiss meant to purge any lingering lust Baihu had planted in my mind.
"Senior Brother, I will leave Mamba behind in the realm to guard the area," Shehuang murmured breathlessly against my lips. "I’ll take Taki and Yin back inside with me while I reluctantly go endure that otherworldly music of yours... Mind you, make sure you actually miss me, hehe!"
Yet, just as Shehuang began weaving the dismissal spell to send the ladies back into the pocket space, her mana stalled. Her eyes widened, freezing in absolute shock.
"My Summons Space spell... it failed because of Yin!" Shehuang gasped, whirling around to face the rabbit-spirit. "Are you pregnant, Yin Meng?!"
Yin Meng’s mind raced back to the unbridled, heavy pounding she had received earlier—the sheer volume of the release, and the utterly conquered, satisfied look on my face. A deep, crimson blush painted her cheeks.
"Master Shehuang... if I am, it must have occurred today," she whispered shyly, cradling her stomach. "I... I truly hope so."
It was a closely guarded secret, known only to legendary figures like Owen, Leandra, Lisa, Shade, Sylvia, and a handful of ancient, high-level beings: individuals who engaged in intercourse within a Life Secret Realm experienced a exponentially higher rate of conception. The very atmosphere of the Plane of Life acted as a cosmic fertility catalyst.
Centuries ago, the First Hero and the Elven Princess had fallen victim to this exact environmental anomaly, resulting in the unexpected conception of King Balder I. The historical truth was intentionally suppressed, hidden away to prevent reckless, aristocratic young men like Thorin—or, evidently, myself—from exploiting it.
While ordinary knights entered these realms solo based on vague rumors of luck, and rogue cultivators hunted for unsuspecting women to trap, the Elves intentionally utilized the realms' properties to combat their abysmal, stagnant birthrates.
Yin Meng’s pregnancy was an mathematical certainty. Not only was the realm's environmental influence working against our restraint, but my recent magical advancements had supercharged my physical vitality, driving my libido into an uncontrollable, primal frenzy.
Had either Thorin or I possessed even a shred of proper Myst health education, we would have kept our proverbial beasts locked away until crossing the exit portal. Regrettably, due to the severe lack of local sexual education, Yin Meng would not be the last unexpected pregnancy I would have to account for.
Taki stepped forward, pointing toward a shimmering, stable exit portal located near our original point of entry. "We can escort Yin back to the academy grounds through this exit. Our Lord can then re-enter the Secret Realm from the outside, which will trigger a randomized re-entry location. The King is already aware of our presence, so our sudden emergence won't cause a diplomatic incident. Plus, Lisa and Ayala are waiting right outside."
Shehuang considered the tactical shift, her analytical eyes turning to me for the final verdict.
"Let's do it," I agreed. "The tracking leaf is pointing toward the extreme north, and traversing that terrain on foot would waste weeks of valuable time. A randomized re-entry is actually a massive shortcut. Furthermore, I can briefly manifest Baihu in the outside world so she can return to our Sect to file her report. I can always summon her back to my side later. Let's move."
With a sudden, swift motion, I scooped Yin Meng up into a textbook princess-carry. She let out a soft gasp, her ears twitching as her face burned crimson.
"M-Master? Why?"
"You've just conceived," I replied firmly, refusing to let her down. "I won't have you walking, fighting, or exerting yourself unnecessarily. I am carrying you out of here, wife."
Surprisingly, Shehuang’s typical jealousy was nowhere to be found. In fact, a calculating, victorious glimmer shone in her slitted eyes. With her personal handmaiden, Yin, carrying the First Prince of my bloodline, that arrogant fox spirit’s immediate leverage within the household had just plummeted.
Everything was proceeding precisely according to her designs.
A short distance away, deep within the subterranean abyss...
Lana curled into a tight, shivering ball against the damp rockface. Thanks to her status as a Third Circle magic user, her physical constitution mirrored that of a Second Circle Knight, shielding her from the lethal, biting chill of the cavern air.
Chew. Chew.
She methodically gnawed on a stale crust of bread and a strip of tough jerky, her mind racing as she evaluated every conceivable escape route. She cursed her shortsightedness; she hadn't yet mastered the Third Circle spell Cure Mental Fatigue, and a heavy, suffocating lethality was beginning to settle behind her eyes.
When choosing her spell list, prioritizing Buff Summons had seemed like the tactically sound decision. Who could have predicted a catastrophic fall into the bowels of the earth?
Though she had managed a brief, two-hour respite, and a Second Circle Knight could theoretically push through days of sleep deprivation, a solid week of absolute, psychological terror had pushed her cognitive reserves to the absolute brink. Mental exhaustion was a physical weight crushing her down.
If her eyelids slipped shut on this narrow, slick precipice, she was dead.
"Jump? Just jump?" Lana muttered to the darkness, her laughter sounding hollow, brittle, and unhinged. "Is that what I'm telling myself to do now? Have I become a masochist? Ah... now I'm having full conversations with the void. I’ve finally gone mad. Haha..."
Rumble—!
A sudden, violent shockwave tore through the foundations of the pocket dimension. The air pressure spiked, the water below churned into a white froth, and the very stone beneath her hands groaned under immense, artificial gravity.
Crash! Splash! Slosh!
Massive boulder fragments, dislodged from the ceiling miles above, rained down like artillery fire, vaporizing into the violent currents below.
"Ah—! No—!"
Lana threw herself flat against the vertical rock face, a jagged stone shaving past her shoulder. But as she pressed away from the impact, her boots lost traction on the wet moss. Her foot slipped over the void.
Clap!
Adrenaline overriding her exhaustion, Lana lunged forward, her fingers clawing frantically at the edge of the outcropping. She held on with both hands, watching helplessly as her remaining rations tumbled into the black depths.
"What... what is happening?!" she screamed into the roaring cavern, her voice cracking with terror. "Is anyone there?! Help me!"
Steeling her resolve, she swung her right leg upward, hooking her knee over the stone ledge. She began to pull her torso up, the muscles in her arms screaming under the strain. Safety was inches away.
Rumble—!
A second cosmic tremor rippled through the space, localized and intensely violent. The abrupt shift in spatial density violently tore her right hand and leg completely off the ledge. She was left dangling by her left fingertips alone.
"Sniff... Loki..." Tears finally spilled over her dirt-streaked cheeks, burning against her skin. "I can't hold on much longer... I just wanted to see you one last time... I'm so scared..."
Rumble—!
Exerting every ounce of her remaining life force, she threw her right hand back up, securing a double grip on the stone. But as her eyes lifted, her pupils instantly dilated in absolute, paralyzing horror.
The climax of her story was roaring down from the darkness.
Whoosh—Bang—Splash!
A massive, rectangular block of solid granite—the size of an iron mailbox and accelerated by the final spatial quake—shat down from the ceiling. It struck the ledge and Lana’s skull simultaneously in a single, devastating impact. The stone shelf shattered into dust, sending her broken, unmoving form plummeting silently into the freezing, bottomless currents below.
Lana’s consciousness ceased before she even hit the water.
Had Loki known that his lingering desire to flirt, his delay in dismissing Baihu, and his failure to stabilize the realm's spatial pressure faster would culminate in a three-stage tectonic execution of Princess Lana... the guilt would have haunted his soul until the day he died.
Buzz—!
An hour later, the localized teleportation arrays within the Royal Academy erupted with blinding, chaotic mana. The entire senior teaching faculty, alongside the King himself, stood frozen as the tracking metrics indicated an immediate, forced breakthrough from within the restricted zone.
Dozens of high-level battle summons materialized instantly, weapons drawn and spells primed to incinerate whatever threat was breaching the perimeter.
Emerging from the blinding light with Shehuang flanking my left, Taki Tsuki on my right, and a thoroughly blushing Yin cradled in my arms, my heart nearly stopped. Facing a firing squad of the kingdom's most powerful entities, my modern, media-poisoned brain completely short-circuited.
Before I could stop myself, an old Earth meme slipped past my lips.
"We come in peace!" I blurted out.
The absolute absurdity of the statement shattered the life-or-death tension in the room. Several battle summons lowered their weapons in sheer confusion, staring at the two powerful women who had inexplicably shifted into pristine maid uniforms to match Taki’s summoning status.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Owen desperately biting his lip, the old rogue forcing down a massive surge of inappropriate laughter to maintain his professional decorum.
"Loki! By the Gods, are you unharmed?!" Lisa cried out, breaking from the ranks and throwing her arms around me, burying her face in my chest before unleashing a relentless barrage of questions that the entire room was dying to ask. "Why have you emerged on the mere second day? Has the structural integrity of the Secret Realm collapsed?!"
"Um... not exactly," I muttered, carefully setting a trembling Yin down onto her feet while gently reciprocating Lisa's embrace. I looked up to meet the King's piercing, demanding gaze. "My newest summon possessed a spiritual pressure that drastically threatened the structural stability of the pocket dimension. To prevent a total spatial collapse, I had to immediately extract her from the environment. The situation went down like this..."
Carefully omitting the highly classified details—such as Yin’s miraculous, instantaneous conception, my acquisition of the Demonic Sect’s Holy Son title, and the presence of the Primordial Fire—I began spinning a highly sanitized, thoroughly redacted version of the truth to the masters of the kingdom.
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