Are There Only Demonesses Left in the Cultivation Realm?

"Wait, take me with you! Wait for me!"

Mei Zhaozhao nearly stumbled as she clung to Lu Changyuan’s clothes. "I don’t want to die."

In front of the main gate, the black-robed woman gripped Lu Changyuan’s arm with all her might, refusing to let him leave.

Lu Changyuan said with a sigh, "Miss Mei, men and women should maintain a proper distance."

"You must be strong! You killed that Demon from the Glazed Dynasty back then. Go on, get up there and kill him! I want to go home!"

"Me? Fight him?"

Lu Changyuan looked up at the now-formed throne in the sky. Xiao Qingfeng stood upon it, holding back the entire Nether River with one hand.

’It’s already come to this... Aren’t you two on the same side?’

’This is the Netherworld. If I were just up against someone at the Kai Yang realm, I could probably figure something out—find some Spirits to swarm and kill them.’

’But Xiao Qingfeng has been plotting this for centuries. His time has come, and he’s even reached the Half-Step Yao Guang realm.’

’How am I supposed to fight that?’

’Half-Step Yao Guang is basically Yao Guang. It’s nothing like Kai Yang—it involves the Laws.’

’Besides, we’re in the Netherworld. I can’t just go and borrow another sword from Jian Guyang.’

Mei Zhaozhao shook her head frantically. "No! Does he look like he’s on my side? I knew that bitch Red Robe was up to no good! She gave me this mission just to get me killed here."

Lu Changyuan felt a headache coming on.

’This Hehuan Demoness’s body was impossibly soft. The young woman’s fragrance wafted into his nostrils, and even without seeing her face, he found himself getting a little distracted.’

"Look, Miss Mei, we... don’t really know each other, do we?"

"Nonsense! I gave you a Cultivation Technique. Aren’t we friends?"

Lu Changyuan sighed. "Is your master’s name Bu Bailian?"

"How did you know?"

"You’re just like her."

Seizing the opportunity, Mei Zhaozhao pressed, "So you know my master?"

And Lu Changyuan really did.

’Bu Bailian was the last disciple taken in by the Hehuan Sect Master before the sect was... reformed. If I remember correctly, she later became the Hehuan Sect Master herself.’

"Save me! *Sob*!"

Lu Changyuan tapped Mei Zhaozhao on the head. "Speak properly."

’It was surprisingly bouncy.’

Only then did Mei Zhaozhao straighten up, her tone changing abruptly. "I just think Physician Lu is quite formidable. You see, I’m just a weak woman with no special skills, and I want to live. Isn’t it only natural for me to rely on a powerful man like you, Physician Lu?"

It had only been a moment.

In that instant, Mei Zhaozhao had switched her tone and her entire persona, transforming from a naive damsel in distress into a pragmatic Demoness.

That’s how the Demonesses of the Hehuan Sect were.

You could never know their true personalities.

Lu Changyuan said nothing, turning to look up at Xiao Qingfeng. For a moment, he felt a strange sense of admiration.

The man was already more than halfway to success.

Lu Changyuan didn’t know what he had done before, but he understood perfectly well what Xiao Qingfeng was doing now.

It was actually quite simple.

He was usurping the Nether Monarch’s authority and kingdom. Once Xiao Qingfeng killed all the Netherworld’s old retainers, all the subjects in this city who belonged to the Nether Monarch would disappear.

A monarch without subjects is no monarch at all. At that point, Xiao Qingfeng would have pulled off the ultimate deception. With the Netherworld’s inhabitants as his subjects, it would naturally become his kingdom.

He had already reversed his fate from the very brink of death.

Now, all he lacked was the Dao Foundation.

And once he completely controlled the Netherworld—by devouring what the Nether Monarch had left behind—he could use it to ascend to the Yao Guang realm.

In other words, the current Xiao Qingfeng was already at the Half-Step Yao Guang realm.

[You are about to die]

Oh.

’So I’m destined to die at Xiao Qingfeng’s hands, is that it?’

Lu Changyuan grit his teeth. "Why didn’t you say Xiao Qingfeng was here from the start?"

As the killing intent in the air grew heavier, dark figures began to emerge from the blackness one by one.

Mei Zhaozhao cried out in alarm, "Run!"

He saw her leave the room.

Lu Changyuan paused and frowned. "How can you leave the room at night without anything happening to you?"

Mei Zhaozhao looked at herself, then up at the sky. "Maybe he changed the Laws of the Netherworld."

There was no time to think. Black Spirits were already charging out of the thick fog.

Unlike the true Spirits that now had faces, these black Spirits, created by Xiao Qingfeng’s power of Transformed Life, remained faceless, like executioners in the night.

An axe fell, chopping straight toward Mei Zhaozhao’s face.

"See? I told you he wants to kill me!"

Though her voice was coquettish and aggrieved, the power in Mei Zhaozhao’s hands was considerable. A flash of black light shot out, and the Spirit before her instantly dispersed.

The Hehuan Demoness might talk a soft game, but when the fighting started, this Sect Saintess was viciously ruthless.

Lu Changyuan couldn’t see her face, hidden as it was under black cloth, but he imagined it was radiating a cold, grim killing intent. After all, her master was the same way—fond of speaking to people in a cloyingly sweet tone with a stone-cold face, only to strike a fatal blow without warning.

Oh.

’Her grand-master was like that too.’

Mei Zhaozhao killed three or four black Spirits in quick succession. "This is not going to work. Think of something, quick!"

Killing more Spirits was useless.

As long as Xiao Qingfeng was alive, he could use the Sun and Moon Gnomon and the Nether River to create an endless supply of black Spirits.

Mei Zhaozhao looked off into the distance. "The exit from the Netherworld should be... where’s the exit?!"

"It’s not going to appear."

The exit from the Netherworld was supposed to appear along with the Nether River. Now that the river couldn’t flow properly, the exit naturally wouldn’t show up.

"Then what do we do?"

Lu Changyuan, however, did know another way out.

Taking the path of death was also a direct way out of the Netherworld.

’Back when he’d snatched the Three-Life Fruit, he had been cornered by a group of Major Disciples and was forced to stay in the Netherworld for a hundred years. In the end, he had escaped by taking the path of death.’