Chapter 40

Chapter 40: Lin Zhao Takes First Place

Lin Zhao drove punch after punch into Lin Yuan until the Nether Python Lingering Soul inside him howled in agony, teetering on the edge of madness.

It felt, truly, like this woman would kill it.

It couldn’t die here.

Panic took over. The soul tore free, bursting out of Lin Yuan’s body.

The instant it appeared, a jade-green phoenix silhouette speared straight through it.

Lin Zhao recalled her Phoenix Fortune and watched the Nether Python Lingering Soul break apart, dissolving into nothing. Only then did she lower her fist.

Lin Yuan collapsed in the shattered arena, barely clinging to breath. When he forced his eyes open, blood poured from his mouth in spasms. Yet the hatred that had twisted his gaze earlier was gone—washed clean, as if something filthy had finally been scraped out of him.

Without the lingering soul’s influence, Lin Yuan understood with a clarity that made his stomach turn: if Lin Zhao hadn’t destroyed it, he would have spent the rest of his life as a half-human snake monster, a beast that lived only to tear flesh and drink blood.

In a way… she had saved him.

“Don’t celebrate too early.” Lin Zhao strode up to him and extended her palm.

Green flames sank into Lin Yuan’s body, burrowing through his meridians and scorching his organs from the inside out. His Foundation Establishment Great Perfection cultivation shattered under that relentless heat, crushed until nothing remained.

The Seventh Elder’s lips moved, as if to speak—then stopped. What could he say?

Lin Yuan had used killing moves on the arena floor. Lin Zhao sparing his life was already mercy.

Lin Mang finally let out the breath he’d been holding. He’d truly feared Lin Zhao would kill Lin Yuan outright. That would have offended the Seventh Elder beyond repair, and the Lin Family needed every usable blade they had. Making an enemy of Old Seven brought no benefit.

“Crippling Lin Yuan’s cultivation is also a lesson,” Lin Mang said, nodding once.

Lin Zhao withdrew her spirit qi. When the referee announced the result, she hauled Lin Yuan—hanging on by a thread—down from the stage and tossed him to the Seventh Elder.

“His cultivation was contaminated by Nether Python Lingering Soul. I shattered the soul, but inherited Spirit Beast lingering souls are strange things. Stay cautious.” Lin Zhao’s voice was cold, controlled. “With Cousin Lin Yuan’s aptitude, he can start over.”

The Seventh Elder was just about to speak when Lin Zhao added, flat as a blade, “His death can be spared, but he still has to pay. Leave the rest to Father.”

The Seventh Elder hurriedly checked his grandson. Lin Yuan’s inner core was still intact—empty, but intact. Relief flickered… and then his expression went stiff.

Lin Yuan’s bones were shattered throughout his body.

Now he had no cultivation at all. With broken bones like this, even hiring a Fifth Grade alchemist-healer would mean three to five years of recovery before he could move like a person again.

Lin Mang’s tone turned formal, carrying across the arena. “Lin Yuan repeatedly tried to harm his own clan and showed no respect to the Young Lord. Strip him of direct-line status and demote him to a collateral branch. Only after major contributions may he return to the main line.”

The Seventh Elder lifted his grandson, the weight in his arms suddenly heavier than flesh. He bowed to Lin Mang, voice rough with regret. “This old man is willing to step down as an elder and return to properly teach my grandson.”

Lin Yuan ending up like this was partly his fault.

Lin Mang didn’t answer immediately. He looked to the six other great elders. They exchanged glances, faces tight, caught between duty and unease.

Then an aged voice sounded, slow and steady, as if spoken from the roots of the earth itself.

“In that case, I will decide.”

The moment the voice appeared, every elder bowed without hesitation.

“Old Ancestor!” Lin Mang’s spine went straight as he hurriedly bowed. “Are you well these days?”

The Old Ancestor of the Lin Family—Old Ancestor Lin Feng—waved a hand. “All is well. I’ve been watching this match in secret.” His gaze settled on Lin Zhao, warm in a way that startled people who had forgotten what warmth from him looked like. “Zhao Zhao is very good. Given time, she will become someone great.”

Lin Mang finally felt his chest loosen.

With Old Ancestor Lin Feng saying that aloud, Lin Zhao’s position as the Young Lord was no longer something anyone could shake. Even back then, when his two sons Lin Yu and Lin Yi had been in the spotlight, the Old Ancestor had never spoken of them this way.

Lin Feng’s voice continued, unhurried. “Remove Old Seven from his seat. The vacant position of Seventh Elder will be taken by Lin Mang’s wife.”

The elders’ expressions shifted—some sour, some wary, some outright grim. Lin Mang could already stand against the elder council by virtue of being family head. Now his wife held an elder seat as well. From this day forward, the Lin Family would be steered by that household’s hands.

Years ago, when Lin Mang’s twins were struck down and his youngest daughter’s Phoenix Fortune was stolen, everyone had thought that branch was finished.

No one had expected a reversal like this—a comeback from the edge of despair.

But no one dared speak. As the only Spirit Transformation cultivator in the Lin Family, Old Ancestor Lin Feng held the right to appoint and dismiss elders.

And Yao Yun’s cultivation was more than sufficient for an elder seat.

“What a fine daughter to have.” The Second Elder glanced at his own granddaughter, his voice sour with envy.

Lin Ya rolled her eyes at him without a hint of respect.

With Old Ancestor Lin Feng present, the matter ended cleanly. The Seventh Elder stepped down, Lin Yuan lay crippled, and that branch would never dare stir up trouble again.

Afterward, the remaining matches were almost anticlimactic.

Lin Zhao crushed every opponent in her path. Against her Heavenly Phoenix Bone Sword, the other Foundation Establishment Great Perfection cultivators had almost no ability to resist; most fell within ten moves.

Only the final opponent forced her to show anything new—revealing a hidden Sixth Grade spirit technique that dragged the match out long enough to draw gasps. Lin Zhao answered with Thousand Spirit Slash, and the fight ended the instant she struck.

When the dust settled, Old Ancestor Lin Feng rose and announced the result himself.

“Today’s grand champion is Lin Zhao of the Lin Family.”

Lin Zhao exhaled, the tension in her ribs finally easing.

She had secured the admission spot to the South Sea Academy.

Now it was time to go to Yun Ding Peak—and find Chen Luo Luo, the one she had been “thinking about day and night.”

—

Ten Thousand Swords Sect — Yun Ding Peak.

A beautiful maiden in a pale goose-yellow dress clenched a jade pendant so hard her knuckles whitened. She called for System again and again, getting nothing but silence.

Rage boiled up in her throat.

“I must have had eight lifetimes of bad luck to run into a useless System like you!” Chen Luo Luo hissed, then forced herself to breathe. “That bitch already got a spot at the South Sea Academy. Before she enters, she might come looking for me…”

She refused to admit she was afraid.

A high-quality modern talent like her—privileged, chosen—how could she be afraid of Lin Zhao? Lin Zhao was nothing but a stray dog that had learned to bite for scraps on a battlefield.

“Forget it.”

She urged Phoenix Fortune and activated the jade pendant in her hand. The dragon-shaped pendant floated into the air, radiating a vast, pure spiritual force. Triumph lit Chen Luo Luo’s eyes as her lips curled.

“Lin Zhao, you never would’ve guessed I’d use the thing your brother left for you to deal with you.” Her laugh turned sharp, breathless. “All the spirit qi in this spirit jade is mine now!”

Normally, going from Foundation Establishment Great Perfection to the Enlightenment realm would have taken her three or four years of hoarding resources and swallowing pills.

But she couldn’t wait.

With her current strength, facing Lin Zhao would be suicide.

Her Cheat Power was exhausted. System no longer responded. Immortal Venerable Yun Ding’s attitude toward her had grown stranger by the day, and only a few bootlicking disciples still clung to her.

Trash.

None of them satisfied her.

She wanted what she’d had before—she wanted to steal the remaining Phoenix Fortune from Lin Zhao and become the beloved little junior sister of the Ten Thousand Swords Sect again.

As the pendant’s spirit qi poured into her, Chen Luo Luo closed her eyes in bliss. The power climbed higher and higher, and she laughed, almost giddy.

“Lin Zhao, no matter how many times you come, everything you worked for is mine—Chen Luo Luo’s! Your things feel so good when I use them!”

—

Beyond the endless starry sky, cosmos wheeled in cold silence.

In a pitch-black region where even light seemed to rot, a massive palace complex lay like a sleeping beast.

A shadow as dark as ink appeared before the gates. Sensing something, a faint glint flashed in blood-red eyes.

“The spirit qi I left with that Fox was used?” The shadow’s voice was low, edged with amusement. “This aura isn’t Little Sister’s.”

A soft, dangerous chuckle followed.

“Heh. Which fool is courting death, daring to steal what that Fox left behind?”

—

“You’re saying my brothers left me a dragon-shaped jade pendant?”

At the Lin Family Ancestral Shrine, Lin Zhao had come to collect her reward. Now she stared at her parents and Old Ancestor Lin Feng, disbelief tightening her throat.

She had no memory of any such pendant. Growing up on Yun Ding Peak, she had never seen it.

Then, like a knife sliding into place, she remembered.

Chen Luo Luo had a dragon-shaped pendant she treasured like her own life.

Lin Zhao had once felt something eerily familiar about its aura and asked to borrow it for a look. Chen Luo Luo had burst into tears and accused her of coveting it before Immortal Venerable Yun Ding. Lin Zhao had been punished with confinement.

Now she finally understood.

That pendant had been hers all along.

“Besides the memory of Phoenix Fortune being stolen…” Lin Zhao’s fists clenched until her nails bit skin. “Did I lose other memories too?”

And for those missing memories—those blank, wrong spaces in her past—only Chen Luo Luo could explain.