Are There Only Demonesses Left in the Cultivation Realm?

Meng Xuanyi stared at Lu Changyuan in disbelief.

“You’re insane! You didn’t have to take the full force of that monstrous wave! What are their lives to you?”

Lu Changyuan had already returned to his original spot, his gaze calm as he looked at Meng Xuanyi.

This round, he had won again.

Because this was indeed what he had done in the past.

Lu Changyuan didn’t want to explain.

There was no need to explain.

After a thousand years of Cultivation, the ultimate truth he had come to realize was that he should do as he pleased, achieving a unity of thought and action.

As long as he wasn’t doing anything evil, he could do whatever he wanted.

Just as he had told Xia Lianxue a year ago.

We Cultivators are like that. We do what we want, and if there’s something we want, we make sure to get it.

But this, too, was a form of obsession.

The stubborn desire to save everyone. Although in the end, he had stopped the great wave and killed the giant whale, only eight of the thirty-eight Cultivators in its stomach had survived.

But this was already the best result he could achieve.

‘I do what I can, giving it my all. Right and wrong? I don’t care about any of it.’

The dreamscape shattered and reformed once more.

“A whole city of people, in exchange for one Sixth Realm Great Demon.”

Atop a massive loess dune.

Someone spoke.

Unlike the shopkeeper and the giant whale from before, this person’s face was indistinct. One could only vaguely make out that it was a woman.

A young man with a sword on his back stood before the woman.

“This method won’t work. You shouldn’t do this!”

“Using the people of this city to execute it is already the best possible outcome! If I hadn’t trapped it with an Array, its Magic would have already been completed. Neither of us would have been able to stop it, and even more people would have suffered.”

The young man murmured, “But the mortals of this city… they’re completely innocent. How could they end up as mere tools for us to slay a Demon?”

“There’s no need to argue further. If you won’t help me, I’ll go slay the Demon myself!” the woman said. “This is already the best outcome. You can’t save the city’s people, and neither can I!”

Lu Changyuan remembered this day. The scene before him had taken place much earlier than the previous two.

At that time, the Chang’an Daoist no longer possessed Broken Thought. Though he was in the Sixth Realm, he was mentally and physically exhausted from constantly rushing to suppress the Demons of the Black Realm. And although he had chosen the path of heartlessness, his Dao was flawed for certain reasons.

The Great Demon he now faced was the most terrifying one the Chang’an Daoist had ever encountered, for this Demon was just a hair’s breadth away from attaining the will of Yao Guang.

Slaying it now, before it could step into Yao Guang, was the best option.

But as luck would have it, the Demon’s life was now linked to the lives of an entire city’s people. If the Demon were to be slain, everyone in the city would die.

But if the Demon wasn’t slain, something even more terrifying would happen once its Magic was complete.

The woman declared, “The sin of taking this city’s lives is mine to bear alone!”

Time froze.

The choice was now before Meng Xuanyi and Lu Changyuan.

Meng Xuanyi was extremely cautious, wanting to see what Lu Changyuan would do.

But Lu Changyuan didn’t move at all.

Whether it was to follow the woman to slay the Demon or to find a solution that saved everyone, Lu Changyuan did neither. He just stood his ground.

“It’s over.”

Lu Changyuan reached out and, with a gentle squeeze of his hand, the dreamscape began to crumble.

He had already gained control of two-thirds of the Chang’an Daoist’s phantom.

‘It’s enough.’

Meng Xuanyi’s expression twisted into a ferocious snarl as it attacked without hesitation. A long spear appeared in its hand, thrusting viciously toward Lu Changyuan. “If I can’t have it, then neither can you!”

Lu Changyuan swung his sword to block. With his current Power, he could easily parry Meng Xuanyi’s killing blow. With two-thirds of the phantom’s Power in his hands, he had enough strength to pin Meng Xuanyi down and flay it alive.

“Hm?”

This phantom of the Chang’an Daoist was actually… dissipating?!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At the border between the Dream Race and the Qingcao Sword Sect.

Li Dashu swung his sword, only to be knocked back by the Ape Lord’s immensely heavy staff.

The clouds exploded, and another expanse of nothingness formed.

Due to the clash between the three, this patch of the Void had been shattered, turning into a sea of nothingness that ordinary people could not approach.

Within the chaotic space, distorted winds of nothingness blew against the three of them impartially.

“Why the long face all of a sudden? Did your little scheme over there get ruined?” Li Dashu was covered in wounds, but his tone carried a lighthearted smile.

For a full day and night, the two Yao Guangs had taken turns fighting Li Dashu.

The Dream Demon’s Magic, combined with the Ape Lord’s staff—not to mention the Dream Demon could also summon phantoms to aid in battle—left Li Dashu truly isolated and helpless. His injuries had accumulated bit by bit.

Li Dashu was almost out of tricks.

He hadn’t expected to get good news at a time like this.

The expression on the Dream Demon’s face, which was that of Xue Mingjing, was several shades colder than ice.

Meng Xuanyi had told it that the Chang’an Daoist had returned, the phantom was out of control, and even the Grand Array had been seized.

‘What kind of joke is this!’

‘The Chang’an Daoist has returned?’

The Dream Demon’s plot at the Qingcao Sword Sect had utterly failed. Meng Xuanyi was no longer a Half-Step Yao Guang.

Even though the eight True Masters were now severely injured, ownership of the Grand Array had been taken by Lu Changyuan. The plan to possess the most talented person in the Cultivation Realm had failed, and what’s more, Jiang Jiayi could now detect any abnormalities in this place at any time.

The Dream Demon could never have imagined that a problem would arise in the easiest, yet most critical, part of its plan.

It took out a brush and drew a horizontal line across the characters on the scroll in its hand. As if destroying the document, all the words upon it were stained with ink, becoming illegible.

The historical phantom had been created by it using Xue Mingjing’s Dao.

Striking out the Chang’an Daoist’s past on the scroll was the method to cancel history. The phantom would naturally fade away bit by bit.

Then, the Dream Demon roared, “Li Dashu!”

It stopped circling Li Dashu and instead lunged forward with the mad desperation of someone trading life for life.

“Yuan Feng! The plan has failed! Although the Demon Race has achieved its goal, at the very least, you and I should take one of the Human Race’s Yao Guangs with us!”

The Ape Lord nodded silently, his body suddenly expanding in size.

His Yao Guang true form descended upon the world. An unimaginably massive Black Ape stood, propping up the heavens and the earth, looking as if it would tear the Celestial Vault asunder.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Lu Changyuan didn’t understand the Magic of history, so he naturally had no way to forcibly keep the phantom from disappearing.

But because of his presence, the phantom was no longer just history; it had become Lu Changyuan’s own past.

And the past is a part of time.

「Miao Yu Palace.」

The Little Fairy in a White Skirt stretched languidly.

“Hm? Who’s tampering with time?”

Xia Lianxue activated her Time Path and peered into the distance.

Because of her connection to Lu Changyuan, she easily detected his aura.

“Is Young Master touching the past? Such incredible Power!”

Xia Lianxue cupped her face in her hands and popped a piece of pastry into her mouth. “Is this Power from the past? Mmm, it’s slowly fading away… I don’t know what Young Master is doing, but he probably has a use for this Power.”

The Little Fairy smiled and clenched her small hand.

The aura of the Time Dao radiated outwards, turning the surroundings into an ocean of time. Through invisible threads of time, leveraging her connection with Lu Changyuan, Xia Lianxue successfully unleashed her own Magic.

“Reverse.”

And so, the phantom of the Chang’an Daoist’s past was temporarily preserved.