On the Dragon-Slaying Platform, I was executed and became Yang Jian's brother-in-law.

The netherworld, deep within the six realms of reincarnation.

"Buzz—"

As a spatial rift struggled to close, two extremely disheveled figures tumbled out, crashing heavily into the red spider lilies.

It was Su Bai and Consort Pingxin who had escaped death.

At this moment, Su Bai's condition was truly appalling. Although half of his body was slowly solidifying, it still exhibited a strange, semi-transparent state, with countless gray light spots drifting around the wound, as if they might dissolve into nothingness at any moment. These were the Dao wounds left from withstanding the destructive lightning sea of ​​the Lesser Thousand Worlds, and also from the extreme weakness after burning his origin.

In his arms, the ball of dark blue light—the remnant soul of Xuanming—was emitting a faint but steady glow.

"Brother! How are you?!"

Empress Pingxin, disregarding her own weakness from losing thirty percent of her saintly merit, hurriedly helped Su Bai up, anxiously examining his injuries. "Your essence...your physical body..."

"He won't die."

Su Bai was panting heavily, his face as pale as paper, but his eyes shone with a frightening light. He carefully handed the ghostly blue orb in his arms to Pingxin:

"Quickly...send Xuanming into the Samsara Pool. Her essence has just left the Frost Realm and is at its most vulnerable. She needs the purest Yin energy from the Underworld to nourish her."

"good!"

Pingxin dared not delay. Holding the ball of light in both hands, he flew to the core area of ​​the Six Paths of Reincarnation—a mysterious place called the "Soul Nourishing Pool."

She carefully placed Xuanming's remnant soul into the pool.

"Splash—"

The pool water rippled, and the pale blue light was instantly enveloped by countless gentle forces of reincarnation, like an infant returning to its mother's embrace, peacefully falling asleep.

Seeing this, Su Baiping and Ping Xin both breathed a sigh of relief.

It became.

In the end, they won this high-stakes gamble that transcended space and life and death.

"Although my sister's essence is weak, she has completely severed her karmic ties with the Frost Realm." After sensing for a moment, a smile of relief finally appeared on Pingxin's face. "As long as she is nurtured in this Soul Nourishing Pool for three to five hundred years, once her soul is replenished, she can rebuild her physical body and truly return!"

"That's good...that's good..."

Su Bai leaned against the spider lily, feeling the emptiness within him as if his body had been hollowed out, but a satisfied smile appeared on his lips.

"Brother, you're seriously injured this time." Pingxin looked at Su Bai's semi-transparent body, her heart aching and tears streaming down her face. "You burned half of your Time Origin. This... this will probably cause your cultivation to plummet, and you might even fall to the Quasi-Saint realm."

"fall?"

Upon hearing this, Su Bai shook his head, and a kind of unprecedented enlightenment flashed in his gray eyes.

"Girl, you're wrong."

Su Bai raised his translucent right hand, looking at the aura of time flowing through his fingertips, and said softly, "The so-called origin is nothing more than the accumulation of 'quantity.' But the comprehension of the Great Dao is the leap in 'quality.'"

"In the Frost Realm, I burned my origin, forcibly manifested the river of time, and even used the years as a blade to sever cause and effect."

"That one strike showed me another side of the Great Way of Time."

Su Bai closed his eyes, the earth-shattering strike replaying in his mind. That feeling of controlling the past and future, of severing the shackles of fate, brought his understanding of the word "time" to a whole new level.

"Destruction precedes construction, enlightening the new life."

Su Bai suddenly opened his eyes. Although his aura was weak, the Daoist charm around him had become more profound and mysterious. "This serious injury may not be a bad thing for me."

"Give me time to recover, to fully process this realization, and to regain my lost essence..."

Su Bai clenched his fist, and the flow of time around him seemed to freeze in an instant:

"My cultivation will not only not decline, but will actually advance further! Perhaps... I'll even touch the threshold of the Grand Luo Golden Immortal realm!"

Upon hearing this, Consort Pingxin was taken aback for a moment, then burst into laughter through her tears.

"Okay! As long as you're alright, anything is fine!"

"During this time, you should focus on recuperating in the underworld. I will take care of your sister, and I also need to go into seclusion to repair the Golden Wheel of Merit. The three of us siblings will find some peace and quiet here in the underworld!"

"Yeah, I need some peace and quiet."

Su Bai nodded, unaware that the outside world was already brewing an even bigger storm because of his "disappearance" and the "obsession" of some people.

……

Deep within the Holy Mother Palace on Mount Hua.

This is a top-secret stone chamber located deep inside the mountain, surrounded by extremely profound ancient restrictions, so that not even a fly can get in.

There was no sunlight, no sound.

Only a single lotus lantern, suspended in mid-air, emitted a faint blue light, illuminating the entire secret chamber as if it were a ghostly realm.

Yang Chan, dressed in a plain white dress, sat cross-legged in the center of the stone chamber.

At this moment, where was the gentle and dignified Third Holy Mother? Her hair was disheveled, her eyes were bloodshot, and her fingers flew as she frantically cast strange and complicated spells at the Lotus Lantern in the air.

"Rise...rise again..."

Yang Chan muttered incantations, her forehead covered in sweat, and her face was even pale from overdrawing her magical power, but the fervor in her eyes seemed capable of burning everything.

She wasn't just thinking about it.

She's really practicing!

She is refining this innate spiritual treasure bestowed by the goddess Nuwa, which possesses the power of creation!

"Buzz—!!!"

As Yang Chan sprayed her last drop of blood onto the wick of the lamp, the Lotus Lantern suddenly erupted with a violent tremor.

The lamp, originally no bigger than the palm of her hand, now projected a massive screen of light before her. Within this screen, a small world, independent of the primordial wilderness, was beginning to take shape!

It was a tiny world, only a hundred miles in circumference.

But it's so beautiful there.

There are majestic green mountains, shrouded in clouds and mist all year round; there are clear streams that meander through peach groves; there is an exquisite bamboo house, which is a one-to-one replica of the house where Su Bai lived in seclusion at the foot of Mount Hua.

Even the reclining chair in front of the bamboo house and the old locust tree in the yard are exactly the same.

There was no strife, no demons, no heavenly laws, and... no other women.

This is the "Love Nest" that Yang Chan painstakingly built, even at the cost of overdrawing her own essence.

Or rather, a cage.

"It's done...it's finally taking shape..."

Yang Chan looked at the perfect world in the light screen, a near-morbidly obsessive smile on her face.

She reached out her trembling hand and gently stroked the barrier, as if she were stroking the face of a lover.

"My husband, look, do you like it?"

Yang Chan spoke softly to the empty secret room:

"This is a home I specially prepared for you. Here there are only green mountains and clear waters, only bamboo houses and fields, only... you and me."

Her eyes gradually became unfocused, as if she could already see a bright future ahead:

"The teacher said that the Lotus Lantern was transformed from a lotus seed of the Chaos Green Lotus, containing infinite creation power and the ability to create the world."

"As long as I completely stabilize this world and isolate it from the secrets of heaven, even a saint will not be able to find this place."

At this point, Yang Chan's expression suddenly turned somewhat ferocious, and her voice became low, filled with intense hatred and obsession:

"I'll bring you in then."

"I know you're soft-hearted, and I know you can't let go of those karmic ties. It's okay, I'll help you sever them."

"Once you enter here, there will be no more Queen Mother of the West in this world. That old woman will never look at you again!"

"There's no such thing as the Golden Spirit Mother. That fierce woman can forget about using the master-disciple relationship to intimidate you!"

"And there aren't those three loud and boisterous Sanxiao... not a single one!"

Yang Chan became more and more agitated as she spoke, her fingers gripping the base of the Lotus Lantern so tightly that she didn't even notice her nails breaking:

"It's just you and me here! We'll work at sunrise and rest at sunset, have many, many children, and live out this life, the next, and life after life!"

"You'll like it... won't you, my husband?"

"You'll definitely like it!"

The eerie blue flame of the Lotus Lantern flickered, as if trembling or sighing silently.

After venting her emotions, Yang Chan gradually calmed down.

She sat back down on the prayer mat, her eyes becoming calm and sinister. It was the kind of intelligence and ruthlessness that only appeared under extreme circumstances, the kind that belonged to the Yang family.

"However... this cage alone is not enough."

Yang Chan bit her finger, her brows furrowed, and began to mentally rehearse her next plan.

"My husband has been taken to the underworld by Lady Pingxin. That's Pingxin's territory. I can't force my way in, nor can I take him away."

"Moreover, once my husband 'disappears,' those crazy women will definitely turn the whole world upside down. The Queen Mother of the West has the Kunlun Mirror, and the Goddess Nuwa has the divine powers of a sage... If they find out that I've hidden you, they will definitely join forces to attack Mount Hua."

Although Yang Chan was a bit crazy, she wasn't stupid. She knew that with her current strength, she was no match for that terrifying "ex-girlfriend group".

"We must come up with a foolproof plan..."

Yang Chan stood up and paced back and forth in the secret room, her shadow stretching long on the wall, like a demon baring its fangs and claws.

How can I stop them from contacting me? How can I make them give up on me?

"unless……"

Yang Chan stopped abruptly, and a chilling glint flashed in her bloodshot eyes.

"Unless, in this world, 'Su Bai' no longer exists."

"Yes... just make them think you're dead! Even the kind of death where your soul is completely scattered and your spirit is utterly gone!"

"Only the dead are not searched for."

"Only the dead can truly get rid of those annoying women."

Yang Chan's lips slowly parted, revealing a maniacal smile.

"Okay, let's do it that way."

"I'm going to plan a... earth-shattering 'death'."

"I'll make the entire world believe you've perished, and then... right under everyone's noses, I'll steal you away and hide you in my world!"

"My husband, for our future, for our 'peace'..."

"Please...die once first!"

We must plan this carefully!

It would be best if they thought Su Bai was dead!