Su Su chased into the ghost willow, her vision blurring momentarily. She shielded her eyes as candlelight flickered on the stone walls. Soaring forward, she transformed the True Fire at her fingertips into a sharp blade, pinning the three-headed demon against the stone wall.
The three-headed demon, having reverted to its Original Form, writhed in agony, seething with resentment.
At the other end, a young man restrained the demon's claws. Su Su asked, "Tantai Jin?"
The youth turned his head and nodded at her. "Are you alright?" Tantai Jin's white robes were spotless, his eyes carrying a trace of concern.
Su Su said, "You came in too? What about Senior Brother Cang Hai and Senior Sister Yaoguang?"
Tantai Jin replied, "Senior Brother followed into the ghost willow. I'm not sure about Fairy Yaoguang."
As he spoke, he raised his hand, a dagger slicing through the three-headed demon's throat.
"What are you doing!" Su Su tried to stop him, but it was too late. The three-headed demon dissolved into a cloud of Demonic Energy and vanished on the spot.
Su Su couldn't help feeling somewhat angry. "The three-headed demon is dead. Where will we find the token now?"
Tantai Jin said, "No matter. I know where the token is. When I came through, I saw the three-headed demon trying to take away a wooden box containing the token."
He turned first. "Follow me."
Though there was no wind in the stone chamber, Su Su felt a chill. Hugging her arms, she followed behind Tantai Jin.
The shimmering fish-scale patterns swirling around the young man's waist glimmered faintly in the stone room.
She suddenly halted, eyeing him suspiciously. "Tantai Jin."
"What is it?" He turned back.
"Where is Senior Brother Cang Hai?"
Tantai Jin said indifferently, "Probably got separated."
Seeing the girl's hesitant expression, he pressed his lips together and said, "After all, this stone chamber is the three-headed demon's lair. It's dangerous here. We shouldn't delay - let's retrieve the token and leave quickly."
Su Su moved closer to him. Something felt off to her - had they really defeated the three-headed demon so easily and found the token?
As she drew near, she caught the faint scent of pine and cypress from the youth. His aura was clean, without a trace of Demonic Aura.
Su Su reached out and grabbed Tantai Jin's sleeve, looking up at him.
He seemed somewhat surprised, a restrained smile appearing in his eyes. "What's wrong?"
Su Su withdrew her hand. "Nothing. The stone walls are too dark. I'm afraid I'll get separated like Senior Brother Cang Hai."
No, still no Demonic Aura. Whether it was his voice, appearance, or even his aura, the person before her was undoubtedly Tantai Jin.
Was she overthinking things?
The two continued through the stone chamber. Sure enough, before long, they found a wooden box placed on a jade bed inside.
Tantai Jin opened the wooden box and handed her the token inside. "Found it."
Su Su didn't reach for it. She stared at the youth's slender, pale fingers and the pitch-black token in his hand.
"Since we've found what we were looking for, can you return the phoenix tree wood I gave you earlier?"
Tantai Jin looked at her without speaking.
The stone chamber fell silent. Suddenly, the youth before her gave an eerie smile and threw the token toward Su Su. Mid-air, the token transformed into a cloud of bluish-brown smoke that surged toward her.
Already on guard, Su Su sensed something wrong and immediately waved her sleeve to disperse the smoke.
A cluster of burning Karmic Fire appeared in her palm. "You're not Tantai Jin. Who are you?"
"Tantai Jin" attempted to flee, but Su Su formed a hand seal.
"Fire spirits, form the array."
Karmic Fire erupted around them, instantly connecting to form a hexagram pattern that trapped "Tantai Jin" within. Su Su struck his shoulder with her palm, sending him crashing to the ground."Don't kill me, don't kill me!" the youth pleaded.
The Karmic Fire illuminated Su Su's face as she asked, "Who are you? Where are Tantai Jin and Cang Hai? And where is the three-headed demon?"
The Fiend on the ground lifted its head, and several weapons as thin as cicada wings appeared behind Su Su.
Without even turning her head, scattered Karmic Fire transformed into fireflies that collided with the cicada armor weapons behind her.
Seeing the sneak attack had failed, the Fiend glared at her resentfully before rolling into the Karmic Fire without hesitation, transforming into a cloud of Demonic Energy and disappearing.
Chongyu said, "Su Su, something's wrong!"
Su Su turned around and saw that the token the demon had thrown out earlier had transformed into black energy, already spreading throughout the stone chamber.
Tantai Jin appeared beside Su Su at some point: "Let's go!"
But it was already too late. The heavy stone chamber door slammed shut right before their eyes.
They couldn't escape in time and were trapped inside the stone chamber.
In the candlelight, Su Su took a step back: "Tantai Jin?"
The young man in white slowly turned his head. Seeing her wary gaze, he frowned and said, "The three-headed demon must have obtained some kind of Divine Artifact. Though his Cultivation isn't high, he can control demonic transformations. But I'm not a demonic illusion - believe it or not."After explaining, the thought-burning circle in his hand transformed into countless golden threads, attempting to lift the stone chamber door."
Unfortunately, the stone door didn't budge at all. When Tantai Jin cast an immortal spell at it, he suddenly clutched his chest, a trickle of blood flowing from the corner of his mouth.
With a grim expression, he said, "It's a Devouring Array." Now that the array had activated, using the stone chamber as its core, they were trapped inside.
The Chongyu zither flew down from Su Su's neck: "Let Chongyu try."
But before the resonating sound waves could form, Tantai Jin grabbed it.
"Stop making things worse," Tantai Jin said coldly. "The Devouring Array means backlash - whatever you do to it will rebound on yourself. If you destroy the stone chamber, the Devouring Array will only make us die faster."
But if they couldn't find a way out, when the time came, they would turn into pools of pus and blood.
Chongyu flew back to Su Su's embrace dejectedly.
Since leaving the Cangyuan Secret Realm, it had always wanted to protect Su Su and demonstrate its power. But as a Divine Artifact that hadn't yet been revealed to the world, though it had gained its own consciousness, there were still many things it didn't understand.
Realizing it was useless here and couldn't help, it dejectedly transformed back into a pendant.
Su Su comfortingly patted it.
The moment she heard it was a Devouring Array, Su Su knew it was troublesome. They couldn't force their way through the array - any immortal spells cast on it would rebound on themselves.
Tantai Jin turned and walked to Su Su's side, his dark eyes appearing innocent and naive: "Do you know how to break the Devouring Array?"
"Since you know this is a Devouring Array, didn't Immortal Lord Zhao You teach you?"
Tantai Jin shook his head: "No."
"Oh," Su Su replied with a stern face.
She was quite suspicious - who studies arrays without learning how to break them?
But since they were trapped together, and apparently because she had triggered the array, Su Su had to say: "The Devouring Array is an evil formation. There are two ways to break it. First, someone outside attacks the array to reveal the exit. Second..."
She paused, then said clearly: "Someone sacrifices their life soul to make the Devouring Array open by itself. It's fine - Cang Hai and Senior Sister Yaoguang are outside. When they notice something's wrong, they'll break the array."Tantai Jin's pitch-black eyes watched her. Five hundred years later, she rarely spoke to him so calmly like this—without disgust, but with encouragement, as if giving him confidence that they could escape this place.
How long had it been since he last saw such a resilient and tenacious Su Su?
In truth, she had always been this way—unwilling to yield to any circumstance, always finding a better solution. So, five hundred years ago, how desperate must she have been to choose to leap from the city tower?
He whispered softly, "Yes, senior brother will come."
Yet even as he said this, demonic energy began to spread toward Su Su and Tantai Jin within the stone chamber.
This was the three-headed demon's trump card—it had nearly turned its lair into a death trap. Like a cunning rabbit with multiple burrows, it had captured so many infants, likely anticipating this day long ago.
The Devouring Array acted like a mirror; casting spells against it would rebound the effects. And if one tried to use a barrier to block the demonic energy, the backlash would only allow the energy to penetrate the immortal body faster.
No barrier could be set up; they could only let the demonic energy invade their bodies.
Gradually, Su Su's face turned pale.
Back during the demonic descent in the Cangyuan Secret Realm, Yue Fuya had suffered immensely from demonic energy invading her body.
Now, Su Su was experiencing the same agony.
Every strand of demonic energy entering her meridians felt like a blunt knife slowly tearing through flesh. She gritted her teeth, making no sound.
Su Su sat cross-legged in the corner, praying that Cang Hai and Yaoguang would soon arrive to break the Devouring Array.
Tantai Jin's gaze fell upon Su Su. The young girl had her eyes closed, a fine layer of sweat beading on her forehead, like an Epiphyllum quietly blooming in the night.
Yet the cinnabar between her brows was strikingly vivid, a stark contrast to her innate demeanor. Her lips were as red as cinnabar, breathtakingly so.
After a long wait, Cang Hai and Yaoguang still had not arrived. The demonic energy in the stone chamber grew denser. No one knew what the shattered token truly was, but it carried an astonishingly heavy concentration of demonic energy.
Su Su felt utterly miserable, as if an invisible mountain were pressing down on her soul.
If demonic energy entered an immortal body for a short time, it could be expelled in time. But if it lingered, not only would the pure spiritual root be damaged, cultivation would stagnate at a bottleneck, and there was even a risk of qi deviation.
Trembling slightly from the pain, she struggled to focus her mind, silently reciting the Heart-Cleansing Mantra in an attempt to forget the piercing agony.
The next moment, a clear, cool aura suddenly appeared beside her.
A slightly cold hand gently touched her cheek.
The youth's icy lips brushed against her forehead.
Su Su's eyes snapped open. With a sharp "smack," she slapped his face and retreated two steps.
"What are you doing?"
The soft, cool sensation on her forehead was impossible to ignore. For a moment, her heart skipped a beat, and she glared at the youth in flustered anger.
Hadn't they agreed to have no further ties? What was he doing now?
Tantai Jin's face turned aside, his eyes fixed on the ground.
Slowly, he raised a hand and wiped the corner of his lips, showing no trace of shame as he calmly said, "Helping you transfer the demonic energy. Weren't you... about to reach your limit?"
Su Su froze. Only then did she realize that, after Tantai Jin's touch, a portion of the demonic energy within her had indeed been transferred.
The youth lifted his gaze, his dark eyes looking at her frankly. "What? What did you think I was going to do?"
A hint of self-mockery tinged his expression.
His voice was soft, almost a whisper, as he murmured, "In your heart, am I really that despicable?"A flicker of fragility crossed his face. For a moment, Su Su also felt uncomfortable. She hadn’t expected Tantai Jin to help her transfer the Demonic Energy.
She lowered her eyes. Long ago, inside the Peach Tree Demon, she had done the same thing—helping him transfer the residual power of the World-Toppling Flower.
Human essence gathers in the head and dissipates from the head.
Ears, nose, mouth, and eyes—back then, she had pressed her lips to his to cleanse the power of the World-Toppling Flower, as it was the least strenuous method. But to transfer Demonic Energy from the forehead required expending a great deal of Spiritual Power.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know,” Su Su said. “You didn’t have to do this.”
Tantai Jin said coldly, “Cang Hai and Yaoguang haven’t arrived yet. If we wait for them, your Spiritual Root would already be ruined.”
Su Su understood this as well. They had been trapped in the stone chamber for nearly two hours.
Cang Hai and Yaoguang must have been held up by something; otherwise, they would have noticed something amiss and rushed over long ago.
The worst possibility was that something had also happened to Cang Hai and Yaoguang, making it difficult for them to break free.
Both Su Su and Tantai Jin had achieved the state of fasting, so surviving in the stone chamber wasn’t a problem. However, the Demonic Energy inside her body would continue to torment her and erode her Spiritual Root.
After a moment of silence, Su Su still shook her head.
Tantai Jin also cultivated immortality. He was one in ten thousand in the cultivation world, possessing a pure Heavenly Spiritual Root.
She truly aspired to the supreme path of the Gods, but she didn’t need others to sacrifice themselves for her—especially when that person was Tantai Jin.
The young man sneered, “Did you think I would sacrifice myself to save you?”
Su Su looked up. Wasn’t that the case?
Tantai Jin spoke indifferently, “My constitution is special. Demonic Energy has no effect on me.”
Could it be that his innate Evil Bone constitution truly remained unaffected by Demonic Energy? Su Su was about to say more.
The back of her head was gripped firmly, and she abruptly met the young man’s eyes, filled with seven parts defiance and three parts impatience: “Li Susu, do you want to become a God or be destroyed? Is your Dao Heart so laughable?”
The girl’s eyes shimmered like misty waves, her brows furrowed as if still hesitating.
Tantai Jin tightened his grip on her left hand, his lips pressing against the speck of Cinnabar he had long coveted.
God or demon, right or wrong, truth or lies—who cared?
He closed his eyes.
The one who was laughable had never been Li Susu. It was him.
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