Chapter 18

Chapter 18: Jade-Tempered Body

Stripped of cultivation, Bai Chong An aged rapidly.

His black hair turned white. Smooth skin wrinkled. Eyes went cloudy. Teeth loosened. Hair fell in clumps.

He became an old man in the span of a breath.

His mind struggled, slow and failing: Bai… Meng Jin… wasn’t that the second daughter?

That kind of name wasn’t easy to duplicate.

And when had Sect Master Cen Mu Liang ever taken such a disciple? Betrayal? How had he never—

His thoughts cut off.

When the last trace of cultivation was taken, his gaze went dull.

He collapsed.

Bai Meng Jin pulled her hand free and inhaled slowly, tasting the shape of Golden Core power.

It was still unstable—stolen, not tempered by her own years. But it was real.

Many of her old techniques were usable again. Next time she faced something like this, she wouldn’t need to play helpless.

[But… Great-Uncle is dead. By rights, I should be able to leave now.]

[Why doesn’t this world feel like it’s loosening at all?]

As she searched for the missing thread, voices came from outside.

“It… it stopped?” Yue Yun Qiao sounded dazed.

“Look!” Bai Meng Lian cried.

The four at the doorway stared at Guan Mo Wen.

His eyes went blank. He staggered, then collapsed. The devil qi around him scattered, leaving behind a dried, brittle skeleton.

“Aaaah!” Bai Meng Xing shrieked, nearly stumbling over it.

“A puppet,” Huo Chong Xiao said. “He was already fully devilized long ago. Senior Brother Bai was controlling him.”

Bai Meng Lian froze, then her breath hitched. “So Great-Uncle is dead?”

Huo Chong Xiao nodded. “Most likely.”

All four turned toward the small house.

It was quiet. The whirlpool was gone. Hardly any devil qi remained.

“Sister!” Bai Meng Lian pounded the door. “How are you? Are you okay? Answer me!”

Fear packed itself into her chest. If Great-Uncle was dead, it meant Bai Meng Jin’s backflow had worked.

How could a Qi Refining cultivator endure that much devil qi?

Inside, Bai Meng Jin opened her mouth to answer—

—and suddenly sensed something.

Now that Bai Chong An was gone, Bai Meng Jin had inherited his place as the strongest cultivator in Azure Cloud City.

Her divine sense stretched outward through the thinning formation and brushed the world beyond.

Someone was coming.

And their cultivation was terrifyingly deep.

Bai Meng Jin’s blood ran cold.

By rights, this was a small world formed by the Reincarnation Mirror. Bai Chong An, the strongest person here, should have been the foundation. Everything should have been built around him.

[So how can someone even stronger appear?]

In all her years, she had never seen a small world patch itself like this.

[Where are the laws?]

[Where are the rules?]

“Master!” Yue Yun Qiao cried, sudden and overjoyed. “It has to be Master!”

Perfected Chang Ling.

Bai Meng Jin didn’t have time to think.

Devil qi churned inside her, and this young body still couldn’t truly bear a devilized Golden Core without cracking apart.

She brought her palms together, spread the leftover devil qi into the maze formation—

and detonated it.

The Bai Manor shook as the formation collapsed. The blood-ink circles Bai Meng Jin had drawn earlier were shredded in the backlash.

The strain hit her all at once.

Before that terrifying presence arrived, she let herself fall into sleep.

…

“Master, how is Junior Sister Bai?”

“Junior Sister?” A gentle male voice carried a soft laugh. “You were quick to start calling her that.”

“Come on,” Yue Yun Qiao said, breathy with relief. “With Junior Sister Bai’s talent, joining the sect is only a matter of time. I’m just calling her that a few days early.”

“Mm. Her talent truly is good.” Perfected Chang Ling’s voice turned thoughtful. “She’s born with a Jade-Tempered Body—something you see once in a hundred years.

“Bai Chong An couldn’t see gold in a pile of jade. If he’d put effort into the family, he would’ve noticed her constitution long ago. He wouldn’t have needed crooked methods.”

“Jade-Tempered Body?” Yue Yun Qiao gasped. “Master, what is that?”

Huo Chong Xiao’s voice cut in, strained but steady. “Yes. What does it mean?”

“Jade-Tempered Body—born to refine spiritual qi, tempering the body like jade,” Perfected Chang Ling said. “Someone with that constitution is a naturally pure vessel.

“When we absorb spiritual qi, we must expel impurities. She doesn’t. Her body automatically refines only the cleanest qi.”

“Ah!” Yue Yun Qiao brightened in the middle of tragedy, as if she couldn’t help it. “No wonder I always thought Junior Sister Bai’s skin looked amazing. It really is like jade.”

Huo Chong Xiao made a sound that might have been a cough. “That’s what you took from that?”

Perfected Chang Ling chuckled. “I spoke about cultivation for so long, and you only heard ‘skin.’”

“Master!” Yue Yun Qiao whined.

Huo Chong Xiao asked quietly, “Miss Bai survived because of her Jade-Tempered Body too?”

“Yes.” Perfected Chang Ling’s tone turned serious. “A Jade-Tempered Body is immune to a hundred poisons. That’s why she could endure devil qi flooding her body without being corroded.”

“Then… can Junior Sister Bai return to normal?” Yue Yun Qiao asked, voice small.

“What is ‘normal’?” Perfected Chang Ling replied. “Return to being a spell cultivator? Not necessary. Her devil heart has already formed. Forcing out devil qi now would be like shattering her core again—painful, and extremely dangerous.”

Yue Yun Qiao’s voice trembled. “So Junior Sister Bai can only be a devil cultivator from now on… That’s too pitiful…”

“Don’t worry,” Perfected Chang Ling said. “She’s not pitiful. Devil cultivators are hunted because years of corrosion twist their minds, making them cold and stubborn. She won’t be affected. Spiritual qi and devil qi are the same to her.”

“A Jade-Tempered Body is that powerful?” Yue Yun Qiao breathed. “Then we can still take her into the sect, right?”

“She was flooded with devil qi to save you.” Perfected Chang Ling’s voice softened. “I’ll vouch for her.”

A sigh. Regret threaded through it. “If only we’d found her earlier. A Jade-Tempered Body might have been a great help. What a pity…”

The words sank into Bai Meng Jin’s sleeping mind and twisted.

Voices followed—old voices, familiar voices, voices she’d tried to bury.

“Meng Jin, I need you to help with something…”

“Whether your Senior Brother can pass this trial depends on you.”

“The sect has treated you well. Today is the day you repay it.”

“Sacrificing for the greater good is only right!”

“This concerns the peace of the world. How can you be so selfish?”

“Are you really going to watch the world fall into chaos, with living beings suffering?”

“Traitorous disciple!”

The accusations piled up until her skull felt packed with stones.

Bai Meng Jin frowned, trapped in the nightmare again.

No.

She wasn’t wrong.

Even if everyone hunted her, even if the world called her a great devil fiend—she had a clear conscience.

“Sister! Sister!”

Hands shook her hard, yanking her upward.

Bai Meng Jin jerked awake, drenched in cold sweat, staring at the faces in front of her.

“Elder Sister… Brother…”

Their young faces hit her like a blade to the heart.

Longing surged, fierce enough to make her throat burn.

[If only all of this were real.]