Inner Demons

Chapter 148: The First Step to Becoming Dregs

The beggar lay horizontally in the ruined street. The blood flowing from his chest soon formed a small pool, making one marvel at how much blood he had.

But he still raised his head, staring at Li Yunxin with his one remaining eye, his words spewing out along with his blood. "I don't believe it... How is this possible?! You are... you are clearly human! Even if you die, you should become a Ghost Cultivator! How could you have turned into a demon?!"

Li Yunxin, having revealed his Dharma Body, bent down and lifted the beggar into the air with one hand. The scales on his body clanked, producing a long, clear sound under the moonlight.

This demon god looked at the beggar with his slit pupils, and with every word he spoke, hot steam billowed from his mouth. "I know you have many questions. But I have questions too. Since you're about to die soon, you wouldn't want to be an ignorant ghost."

"So, you ask me a question, and I'll ask you a question. I'll let you go with a clear understanding, how about it?"

Even in such a state, his heart filled with astonishment and terror, upon hearing Li Yunxin's words, Qingliangzi still sneered inwardly.

The beggar's body would certainly die.

But he, Qingliangzi... was not so easy to kill!

So he spat out a mouthful of blood and said weakly with his last breath, "Fine. To figure these things out... I'm willing to have my soul scattered and dispersed!"

Li Yunxin stared at him with those slit pupils for a good while before revealing a ferocious and ambiguous smile. "Then let me ask you, did you personally kill Li Chunfeng and Shangguan Yue?""...No."

"Then it was... Oh. It's your turn to ask." Li Yunxin looked at him. "Please ask."

"Why did the restriction three steps in front of me have no effect on you?!" The beggar spat out more blood, which splattered on Li Yunxin's scales but quickly evaporated.

The Dragon's Son laughed loudly. "You, on the verge of death, don't ask me anything else, but only want to know why you lost to me—you'll never achieve anything great!"

"But I can tell you. I am now the Dragon's Son Chiwen, innately severed from the karma of this world. Your Daoist Orthodoxy restriction works by invoking the power of heaven and earth—since I have no karma with this world, of course I can break all laws!"

"And here's another fact for you—that night, the Dragon's Son Chiwen broke Liu Ling's three-step barrier in the same way!"

"What do you mean? Aren't you the Dragon's Son?" the beggar frowned.

"That's the next question, friend." Li Yunxin shook his head. "So let me ask you, if you didn't kill them personally, how do you know they're dead?"

"I heavily injured them, and then the Divine Lord acted. From a thousand li away, one strike, and they were dead!" As the beggar said this, a triumphant smile appeared on his face.

But Li Yunxin was not angered, only shaking his head slightly. "You do like to play mind games. Guessing my next question will be who the Divine Lord is. But it doesn't matter... I have enough secrets."

The beggar grunted vaguely, spitting out more blood. "Fine. Then I won't ask you why there was another Dragon's Son before, and how you became the Dragon's Son. I'll only ask you, if you really are Li Yunxin, what do you plan to do lurking in this Weicheng?! Do you dare tell me!"

"What's there to not dare?" Li Yunxin laughed, the sound like metal grinding on metal. The hot steam from his mouth quickly dried the beggar's blood-soaked, messy hair. Gradually, blisters began to form on that half of his face. "Now that I am the Dragon's Son, I am the Wei River Dragon King. My plan is, of course, to be a proper Dragon King and make all you eyesores get the hell out of my territory."

"Such big words." The beggar seemed to be growing weaker, and before Li Yunxin could even ask, he said, "That Divine Lord is a great being of my Mutual Aid Society, with heaven-defying abilities. You want to ask me who he is? Heh, I've never seen him! Let me ask you again. Do you dare to explain in detail what relationship the Divine Dragon Cult has with you?!"

Li Yunxin smiled and threw the beggar's body to the ground.

The mangled body had lost too much blood and was long dead. It was only because Qingliangzi's soul refused to leave, clinging to a breath of life. Now this dead but not stiff corpse lay wretchedly on the ground, staring at Li Yunxin with its one gradually clouding eye, hissing, "Do you dare to explain in detail?!"

Li Yunxin looked at him with pity. He walked over and stood beside him. "Alright. I'll explain it to you in detail."

"Right now, in the vicinity of the Wei River, there are actually three factions."

"You and that Yue Yunzi are one side, the Lord of Dongting from Dongting Lake is another side, and Bai Yunxin is also a side."

"Yue Yunzi wants to avenge Lingkongzi, or perhaps he knows that Liu Ling isn't dead and is in the hands of the Lord of Dongting. However, he is a cultivator, naturally an enemy of demons, and he knows that Liu Ling died at the hands of Bai Yunxin."

"So Yue Yunzi hopes that both those demons die. But they are two great demons. If I were a clever person like Yue Yunzi, I would try to make the two demons fight, resulting in both sides being heavily injured, and I would reap the benefits."

"The Lord of Dongting, on the other hand, wants to avenge the Dragon's Son. I made the Lord of Dongting believe that it was Liu Ling and Bai Yunxin who joined forces to kill the Dragon's Son—he might not be completely convinced, but it doesn't matter. He will definitely hold a grudge against the Daoist Orthodoxy and want the people of the Daoist Orthodoxy dead. But the Lord of Dongting is also a clever person and knows that doing this is too risky, so... he will try to make the Daoist Orthodoxy and Bai Yunxin fight, resulting in both sides being heavily injured, and he will reap the benefits—so whether he believes it or not is unimportant."

"As for Bai Yunxin... if I'm not mistaken about her, she only wants the Feather Robe. To snatch the Feather Robe back from the Lord of Dongting. Of course, it was people from the Daoist Orthodoxy who took her Feather Robe in the first place, so both the Lord of Dongting and the Daoist Orthodoxy have reason to believe that Bai Yunxin wants the people of the Daoist Orthodoxy dead."

"But in my opinion... she doesn't care about all that crap."

"So, now you know. In the eyes of Yue Yunzi and the Lord of Dongting, the three factions currently near the Wei River all hope the other two factions die, all hope to see the other two fight until both are heavily injured. And they all know that the other two parties, besides themselves, can never truly cooperate."

Li Yunxin looked down at the beggar at this point and laughed loudly. "Oh, looking at your expression, I was right. That Yue Yunzi really thinks so."

"Then the next thing is easy. Because none of those three could have imagined... there is a fourth faction."

"And that's me."

"I didn't die, and I became stronger. The Lord of Dongting and Yue Yunzi are cautiously waiting for the other to make the first move, to see where there are weaknesses... this won't do. One is a three-thousand-year-old great demon, the other is a Master who can sit in meditation for days without moving... I don't have the patience to be a coward for long."

"To be honest, both the Lord of Dongting and Yue Yunzi are quite smart, and what they're doing is reasonable. The only unreasonable thing is me. It's not that they're too stupid, it's just that this world is too wonderful."

"So I created a Divine Dragon Cult. On one hand, to absorb the faith power of believers and slowly become stronger. On the other hand... hahaha, this is where it gets interesting."

"Yue Yunzi will naturally think, 'My god, this Divine Dragon Cult is developing so rapidly and using the name of the Dragon's Son, there must be someone supporting it—it must be the Lord of Dongting!' And now that you've told Yue Yunzi what I said before, he will be even more certain—'Hmm, it really is the Lord of Dongting and Bai Yunxin who created it.'"

"But the incense faith power of so many believers has to go somewhere—both the Lord of Dongting and Bai Yunxin are demons and will covet this power. Internal conflict is inevitable. So Yue Yunzi will think, 'Haha, I'll just wait. When this Divine Dragon Cult truly becomes powerful, and that faith power can no longer be ignored, I'll watch you two tigers fight!'"

"And the Lord of Dongting... thinks the same way. He will think, 'This Divine Dragon Cult must have been created by the Daoist Orthodoxy and Bai Yunxin—the Daoist Orthodoxy can't absorb incense faith power, it will only benefit Bai Yunxin. Once that Bai Yunxin becomes stronger and stronger, how can the Daoist Orthodoxy sit still? There will be internal conflict!'"

"For them to think this way is quite correct. And my running around these past few days... was precisely to deepen their impressions and strengthen their beliefs. As for Bai Yunxin... I'm not worried about her either. But as for why, I won't tell you."

"So, like this, they watch each other with suspicion, calculating... and they will all watch with their own eyes as the Divine Dragon Cult becomes powerful."

"And they will feel that things are developing more and more in the direction they predicted."

"Haha, this bunch of idiots. They don't know that all that faith power has been enjoyed by me." Li Yunxin grinned ferociously and looked down at the beggar. "Tell me, isn't my plan brilliant?"

The beggar's breath was like a thread, and Li Yunxin had to listen carefully to hear his words. "Hehe... your plan is brilliant. But it's not foolproof... you rely on too many people. It's impossible for everyone to act according to your thoughts. Once something goes wrong somewhere... hehe, you little brat. You're clever, but your experience is still lacking..."

The beggar's breath grew weaker, but his tone became more and more cheerful. "But for you to be able to think of such a plan... you can be considered to have a subtle mind. If given time and more tempering, perhaps you could really become our enemy, but... cough cough... hehe, you little brat, getting carried away and spilling all your secrets... have you ever thought what you'll do if you can't control me... and I escape?"

"Let me ask you again," the beggar's eyes glinted with an even more triumphant light. "If you—"

"Noisy." Li Yunxin suddenly threw a punch, interrupting the beggar's words without warning and hitting his body.

With a loud bang, the ground of the street trembled violently! The buildings on both sides, already damaged and teetering from the fight, now collapsed with a crash.

And the beggar's corpse, under this punch... was gone.

It had turned into a bloody paste that covered almost half the street!

After the dust settled, Li Yunxin straightened up. Now, he stood in a huge, deep pit. The pit was covered in a spiderweb of cracks, but strangely, the pit itself was clean, without a trace of blood—because the violent shockwave and high temperature generated by the immense force and friction with the ground had swept away all other debris in the pit.

He let out a long breath and said as if to himself, "No wonder Liu Ling kills people like this. It's really... so satisfying."

When cultivators and demons fight, no one believes that destroying the opponent's physical body is the end of it. Because if the physical body is destroyed, there is still the soul. And for an unusual person like Qingliangzi, his soul was even more unique—in fact, he was already like a Ghost Cultivator.

Now, this Qingliangzi had revealed his short-statured true form, glowing with a green light in the darkness, looking at Li Yunxin with a face full of anger. "Why did you suddenly attack and kill me?!"

"I said, I would honorably blast you into dregs." Li Yunxin looked at him calmly. "Forgot?"

"Or do you think I should wait for you to triumphantly state a bunch of your opinions and deductions, then use your ridiculously shallow knowledge to infer my plan, and finally, after you've had your fill of satisfaction... I can kill you? Oh, I just don't want you to be triumphant."

Qingliangzi pointed at him angrily and once again laughed out of extreme anger. "Good, hehe... hahaha... hehehehe! Good, you think that by blasting my physical body, I'm at your mercy? Arrogant brat, your grandfather was just tricking you! I was waiting for you to triumphantly reveal your plan, then I shed that physical body and revealed this true form!"

"Now your grandfather is going to escape a thousand li away and tell that Yue Yunzi everything you just said... hehe, let's see how you regret it!"

As he finished speaking, Li Yunxin suddenly threw a punch!

However... the punch that had just turned the beggar's physical body into a bloody paste now passed through Qingliangzi's body—as if it were just an illusion.

Qingliangzi laughed wildly. "This punch of yours can scatter souls, can scatter Ghost Cultivators, but it can't scatter me! Do you know that I am—"

"An Underworld Emissary," Li Yunxin yawned, standing two steps away from Qingliangzi, calmly watching him. "An unofficial employee of Senluo Hall. Not a ghost, nor a Ghost Cultivator. Ordinary mortal Daoist Arts can't harm your soul—because you're part of the Underworld's establishment, considered to have a divine position, right..."

"What else? Tell me?"

Qingliangzi was stunned for a moment. "You—how do you know about this?!"

Li Yunxin shrugged, and there was another clanking sound. "There's one more thing. We both know that physical pain is meaningless to a cultivator—who hasn't endured unbearable suffering during cultivation? The pain of the body and skin is not pain, the pain deep in the soul is the most painful."

"I said I would blast you into dregs, the specific process is like this—first, blast this body of yours into dregs; then blast your confidence and self-esteem into dregs; then next, blast this, uh, Spiritual Soul or soul of yours into dregs—this way, it's called honorably blasting into dregs."

"So you think you tricked me into saying so much, but actually, even if you didn't ask, I would have told you anyway. Little by little, telling you all my plans. This way, you feel triumphant first, thinking you've succeeded. After being triumphant, you want to go back and tell Yue Yunzi my plan, then you'll launch a thunderous attack, and I will surely... uh, you said 'regret it deeply,' right?"

The corners of Li Yunxin's mouth slowly curled up, revealing a dangerous and pleased smile. "Tell me, when you're thinking this, and I shatter your fantasy. Making you think in your last moments—'Ah, if only I could have left earlier and not listened to him, and brought all these words back, how wonderful that would be'—wouldn't that be a joyful thing?!"

Hearing his words, Qingliangzi's heart screamed 'not good'!

He turned and fled!!

But at that moment, an iron chain shot out from Li Yunxin's palm like lightning—"Got you!!"

With a clattering sound, the soul of Qingliangzi, which even Spiritual Power and demonic energy couldn't touch, was now locked by the neck with this iron chain!

Then the chain tightened... and Qingliangzi, like the countless lonely souls and wild ghosts this chain had locked before, was lightly pulled before Li Yunxin!

Li Yunxin looked down, smiling at the bound and immobilized Qingliangzi. "Friend, you are an Underworld Emissary. But I... am the Judge of the Mortal World."

"What a delightful coincidence and timing, isn't it?"

As he spoke, he took out a thin booklet hidden under his scales with his other hand, opened it, and said, "Look, it says here... hmm... that this iron chain can bind souls, but it can't bind the soul of a Master. Ha... you're just a Manifestation Realm peak now."

"It also says... hmm, it also talks about the ranking system of Senluo Hall, let me see about this Underworld Emissary of yours... hmm, you need to be struck by the Nine Heavens Thunder True Fire, forty-nine times, to be destroyed?"

"But it also says that anyone who kills an underworld official without authorization will have their soul claimed by Yama King for their grave sin." Li Yunxin frowned and looked at the speechless Qingliangzi, thought seriously for a good while, and suddenly giggled. "Just kidding, friend. What's there to think about—I never believe in coincidences. For example, why did I just happen to become a Judge of the Mortal World a few days ago and be given this booklet and chain? And why did it just so happen to let me understand what kind of thing you are?"

"So... now let's do the final step." Li Yunxin's smile vanished, and he looked at Qingliangzi calmly. "—Let's blast you into dregs."

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