When Destiny Brings the Demon

Sima Jiao crafted a new defensive magic treasure for Liao Tingyan, still using a beaded necklace as the base. This time, it was an even more exquisite beaded necklace collar from Shi Yuxiang's treasury. He also fused the Thunderstone Heart into it, making it impervious even to lightning strikes.

In Sima Jiao's own words: "If you encounter a cultivator like Shi Qianlv and can't escape, just lie down and let them hit you. Even if they go all out, it’ll take them half a day to break through the defense."

Liao Tingyan believed him. After all, this time, Sima Jiao had spent a full half-month crafting the defensive treasure, tweaking it intermittently. Anything he invested that much time into was bound to be formidable.

After hearing his remark, Liao Tingyan weighed the beaded necklace collar in her hand and asked, "What happens after the defense is broken?"

Sima Jiao scoffed. She saw his chin tilt slightly as he rested his still-healing fingers beneath it and said, "I’ll be there before that happens. You can keep lying there."

The "towering" ancestor’s actual height was estimated at 188 cm—the rest of his imposing stature was entirely built upon his sheer confidence.

But he had every reason to be confident. His comprehension was absurdly high, his strength defied the heavens, and as Cizang Daojun, he was truly one of a kind—the undisputed number one in existence.

The Sima Shi lineage had dwindled to just him. Even when he was imprisoned in Three Sage Mountain, the great figures of the cultivation world had to be on high alert. After his escape, he turned the entire Gengchen Immortal Mansion upside down and walked away unscathed. He left even the righteous leader, Sect Master Shi Qianlv, helpless and even tore through heavenly lightning with his bare hands.

Yet, for someone so formidable, why were his occasional actions so childish?

Like when he waited until she was asleep at night, erased the faces of her spirit-summoning dolls, and drew horrifically bizarre new ones in their place—then had the audacity to declare, "They look much more natural and prettier now."

Pah! Waking up in the middle of the night to see three mutilated spirit dolls standing by the bed instantly turned a slice-of-life moment into a horror scene!

For a brief moment, Liao Tingyan questioned his taste. But then she remembered he had chosen her, so his aesthetic sense couldn’t possibly be flawed. No, he was just being mischievous.

"Here, take these to play with. Draw whatever you want on them—just stop ruining my Xiao Yi, Xiao Er, and Xiao San," she said, handing him a stack of blank wooden dolls. She had carved them herself from wood during her free time, making plenty to spare.

Sima Jiao didn’t even glance at the wooden pieces, only pointing out, "The Xiao San you mentioned was animated by me."

Liao Tingyan: "...Let’s not discuss Xiao San anymore. Too much talk about it might lead to arguments."

Sima Jiao: "What do you mean?"

He added, "You’d actually argue with me?"

Liao Tingyan: "Why wouldn’t I argue with you?" All couples argued at some point. The only reason they hadn’t yet was that no major issue had come up.

Sima Jiao: "Then argue with me right now. Let’s see." His expression and demeanor mirrored the time he’d been curious about her swearing and asked her to demonstrate.

Liao Tingyan: "...The mood isn’t right now. Let’s save it for next time."

She had said it offhandedly, never expecting that "next time" would arrive so soon.

They had been staying in Shi Yuxiang’s Wind Flower City, where many of her young lovers resided. Every few days, a new batch would come offering themselves to her. Shi Yuxiang indulged in pleasure with them, her private life utterly chaotic—after all, it was all just fun and games.Among them was one of her secret lovers, a young master from the Mu family's outer branch, also notorious for his philandering. Every time he passed through Wind Flower City, he would come to dally with Shi Yuxiang for a few days. This time was no exception. Coincidentally, on this particular day, Liao Tingyan was taking an afternoon nap in Shi Yuxiang's flower garden. When she woke up, she found a strange man sitting beside her, caressing her face suggestively before leaning in with a lewd remark.

"I heard you haven't been seeing anyone lately. What, couldn't those men satisfy your lustful body?" His tone was smug and familiar, and he even tried to grope her chest.

Liao Tingyan cursed under her breath and kicked him flying, finally fully awake. Normally, with Sima Jiao around, no one else would dare approach without permission, so she hadn't been on guard at all. How was she to know that this man never needed the guards to announce his arrival when he visited? After all, his affair with Shi Yuxiang was illicit—he had a wife of equal social standing at home, a rather fierce one at that.

Sima Jiao had just stepped away for a moment, and by sheer bad luck, this man had stumbled into that gap.

"Ouch—what the hell are you doing?!" The young master Mu's cultivation was inferior to hers, and her kick sent him howling in pain. He sat up angrily, cursing.

His luck was truly terrible, because at that moment, Sima Jiao returned.

What happened next was something Liao Tingyan would recall with a headache and nausea. Sima Jiao had laughed coldly, forcibly gripping her hand and ignoring her protests, making her crush the man's skull.

The sensation of a human head bursting apart beneath her fingers left an indelible mark on Liao Tingyan's memory.

She vomited on the spot, retching for a long time afterward.

Sima Jiao didn't understand why she reacted so strongly. "It's just killing someone," he said.

Liao Tingyan knew he wouldn't understand.

They came from different worlds. To Sima Jiao, killing was inconsequential, just as to her, killing was unthinkable. Their beliefs were shaped by the prevailing norms of their respective worlds, and neither could likely ever accept the other's perspective.

She understood that Sima Jiao had been raised in an environment where killing was a matter of survival, so she refrained from judging his bloodthirsty nature. She simply held fast to her own principle: never kill unless pushed to the absolute brink.

This time, Sima Jiao wasn't as furious as he had been with Yue Chu Hui, so he hadn't bothered with torture. It was more like swatting an annoying insect—quick and efficient, leaving no time for Liao Tingyan to intervene before the man was dead.

Seeing her reaction, Sima Jiao sat beside her, frowning. "He offended you, so I made you deal with him yourself. It's just a trivial matter. I've never seen anyone react this way to killing."

He knew Liao Tingyan disliked killing, but he assumed it was no different from her dislike of, say, sticky caramel—something she'd grimace at, wash down with water, and silently curse him for forcing on her.

Having been raised in a den of demons, how could he possibly grasp how difficult it was for a girl raised in peace to reconcile with having taken a life? How could he understand that, for Liao Tingyan, disliking killing was nothing like disliking a certain food?

Liao Tingyan barely registered his words. Her mind was still fixated on the brain matter that had splattered onto her hands earlier. The visceral disgust lingered, and she scrubbed her hands over and over.In her world, those who killed were ultimately few, and ordinary people had little to do with murder. Even in war, many soldiers developed psychological disorders from killing on the battlefield, unable to find relief. How could Liao Tingyan remain unaffected?

She retched for a long while, wiped her mouth, then stood up and went straight inside to lie down. Sima Jiao followed her into the room and saw her lying with her back to him—a posture that rejected his approach.

Liao Tingyan was feeling terrible, physically unwell and emotionally furious, so she didn’t want to talk to anyone. If Sima Jiao were still that murderous Patriarch, she wouldn’t dare be angry with him over something like this. But he wasn’t that person anymore. She now regarded him as the closest person in this world to her, so she couldn’t help but direct her anger at him.

Sima Jiao tried to pull her arm, but Liao Tingyan slapped his hand away without even turning her head, saying listlessly, "Don’t talk to me. I don’t want to speak to you right now."

Sima Jiao didn’t realize how serious the issue was. Staring at her back, he was baffled. "What’s wrong with you? Just because I made you do it?"

After a moment of silence, Liao Tingyan sighed and said, "You can’t do this. I’ve never stopped or forced you to do anything, so you can’t do this to me either."

In all his life, no one had ever told Sima Jiao he couldn’t do something—no, some had, but he’d never cared. To him, there were only things he wanted to do and things he didn’t. Nothing was off-limits. In this world, there was nothing he couldn’t do.

If it weren’t Liao Tingyan before him, Sima Jiao wouldn’t have bothered with a single word of explanation. But after a long, dark-faced pause, he still said, "I know you don’t like killing. You don’t have to like it, but you can’t not know how. Sooner or later, you’ll have to kill. What difference does it make?"

Liao Tingyan stared blankly at the floral and bird patterns on the bed canopy. Deep down, she knew. She had thought about it—perhaps one day, she would kill for the person behind her. But not like this. Not so casually, as if it were a game.

She was just unhappy and didn’t want to talk to him for now.

Her unhappiness made Sima Jiao unhappy too. He had never been a patient man, and the way he treated Liao Tingyan was already the most care and tolerance he had ever shown in his life.

Sima Jiao turned and left.

Liao Tingyan paid him no mind. She fell asleep but had a nightmare and woke up without any appetite, skipping even her usual two meals a day. The little spirit servant approached with its tiny wooden mallet, offering to massage her back, but she waved it away. The Little Black Snake slithered over to play, but she didn’t move.

Sima Jiao stayed away for three days, cooling off most of his anger before returning. He didn’t want to lose his temper with Liao Tingyan, but even after venting, he remained agitated, as if he’d reverted to his state before he met her.

With a dark expression, he walked along the flower garden corridor of Shi Yuxiang’s estate, his robes and sleeves billowing with suppressed fury. Pausing briefly at the entrance, he finally stepped inside.

She wasn’t there. He quickly exited and searched for her presence but couldn’t sense her anywhere nearby.

Had she left? Because she was afraid? Because of something so trivial?

With a sweep of his sleeve, the entire flower garden collapsed into ruins. Without a second glance, his lips pressed into a tight line, he followed a chilling trail in a certain direction. The Beaded Necklace Collar had Spells that allowed him to track her.He chased all the way to the banks of Cloud River, where he spotted that familiar figure.

Liao Tingyan sat there holding a fishing rod, angling for flying rays. These rays were a type of demon beast found in Cloud River, notoriously difficult to catch. Sima Jiao noticed the large bucket beside her already contained several rays, and the bait she used were those long worms they'd caught earlier in Thunderclap Valley.

So she'd collected those worms to catch flying rays. How had she known Thunderclap Valley's worms could lure them?

Realizing she hadn't been trying to run away, some of his anger dissipated. He stood beneath a tree some distance away, watching Liao Tingyan's back without approaching.

He still didn't think he'd done anything wrong, yet he could feel Liao Tingyan's distress. For the first time since knowing her, he sensed this heavy mood emanating from her.

From behind the tree, he watched as she successfully caught the elusive rays, her face gloomy and dejected as she built a fire on the spot to grill them.

The aroma of roasting meat filled the air, yet she didn't eat any herself. She seemed to recall something unpleasant, glanced at her hands, then took a few gulps of water.

Sima Jiao felt increasingly agitated, his hand stripping off a large piece of bark from the tree beside him.

"I don't want to eat," Liao Tingyan murmured as if to herself. "When you mentioned going to Thunderclap Valley earlier, I found a travelogue saying its worms could catch flying rays. Ray meat is delicious... I wanted to try it with you."

Sima Jiao: "..."

He walked over and sat opposite her, picking up a grilled ray and taking a bite. Expressionless, he finished the entire fish.

Liao Tingyan remained despondent, her face downcast as she wordlessly handed him another. Sima Jiao didn't want to accept it, but seeing her expression, he reluctantly took it.

"You can't do this anymore," she said.

Sima Jiao tossed the ray aside. "You're angry over such a small thing?"

Liao Tingyan wiped her tears with a sniffle.

Picking up the discarded ray, Sima Jiao muttered, "...I understand."

"I didn't scold or hit you. I already agreed," he said.

Liao Tingyan's tears fell. "I had nightmares."

Sima Jiao lost his appetite, discomfort crawling through him. Discarding the ray, he hooked a hand behind Liao Tingyan's neck and pulled her close, roughly wiping her tears with his thumb. "Stop crying."

Noticing the wounds on his fingers, Liao Tingyan blinked, another tear landing in his palm. She leaned her cheek against his hand, meeting his gaze. "If there's anything in the future... when I say I don't want to do something, I really mean it. Don't force me."

Sima Jiao studied her before pressing his forehead to hers. "I understand." His voice dropped lower, tinged with remorse. "Don't cry."

He brushed his lips against her eyelids in an awkward, unpracticed gesture of comfort.