After I stopped trying, a rich woman trained me into a demon emperor.

Zhou Ran's breath hitched for a second.

Bluish-white.

The light that burst forth when the rune pressed against the ice stone was this color.

How is she now?

"He was leaning back in his chair, unable to recognize anything, and kept repeating a sound that I couldn't understand."

Li Zhiyao lowered her voice, "Her hair roots started to turn silver, one strand after another, turning from black to white."

Zhou Ran squatted down and placed his palms back on the ice.

The demonic eye probed inside.

That tiny wisp of life within the ice danced very steadily.

He matched the rhythm with Lin Qingxue's condition in the bone fragments.

Both sides are on the same beat.

"Zhiyao, listen carefully."

Zhou Ran lowered his voice very much.

"There is a block of ice in front of me, and inside the ice is a woman."

Silver hair, eyes closed, curled up in a ball.

Her brow bone, nose bridge, and lip shape are exactly like Qingxue's.

The other end of the bone fragment fell silent.

"...What did you say?"

"She looks just like Qingxue."

Zhou Ran spoke slowly and deliberately.

"The only difference is in the hair."

Her hair was entirely silver, while Qingxue's was black.

But now, even Qingxue's hair roots are turning silver.

Li Zhiyao didn't respond for a long time.

Zhou Ran could imagine what kind of expression she had on her face.

"Use ancient runes."

Zhou Ran said,

"The one in my hand, as soon as it was placed on the ice stone, emitted a bluish-white light and two ancient characters appeared."

I can't recognize all of them, so I'll read them to you and you can interpret them.

He took out the still-hot rune and stuck it back onto the ice.

A bluish-white light rose again, and two ancient characters emerged, slowly rotating.

Zhou Ran traced the characters stroke by stroke for Li Zhiyao.

On the other end of the bone fragment, Li Zhiyao's breathing became heavier and heavier.

The first character... is 'moon'.

The most revered form of writing in ancient law is only used for the Lord of the Void Realm.

"And the second one?"

"'Zhao'".

Li Zhiyao paused, her voice almost disappearing into the background noise.

"Yue Zhao.

This is a name.

"who."

"It was only mentioned once in the ancient law surviving scrolls."

Moon Emperor...

I have a younger sister named Yue Zhao.

Zhou Ran's pupils contracted.

The Moon Emperor's younger sister.

It was sealed deep within the heart of the Heavenly Corpse.

A face just like Lin Qingxue's.

Suddenly, a dull thud came from the other end of the bone fragment, like a heavy object hitting the ground.

"Clear the snow!"

Li Zhiyao's voice rose in pitch.

"She heard it, she heard the words 'Yuezhao' and immediately collapsed!"

Half of his hair was completely white!

Zhou Ran stood up, holding the Taihuang Black Blade horizontally in front of his chest.

Within the ice and stone, that glimmer of life leaped forward.

"Zhiyao, hold on."

He lowered his voice.

"Take a drop of her blood."

"What?"

"Take a drop of that bluish-white liquid from her fingertip and stick it to the bone fragment on your head."

Zhou Ran stared at the ice stone,

"I want to try something."

There was a rustling sound from the other end of the bone fragment. After a moment, Li Zhiyao said:

"It's done."

A bluish-white tinge seeped from the surface of the bone fragment in Zhou Ran's hand.

The drop of blood did not fall.

It followed the texture of the bone fragment and penetrated the true essence that Zhou Ran had poured in.

Following his finger, his true essence, and the intermittent communication node, they climbed all the way towards the ice stone.

Zhou Ran opened his eyes and watched as the drop of bluish-white blood seeped out from the bone fragment, floated three inches in the air, and landed on the surface of the ice stone.

A pattern formed on the ice surface. It was bluish-white, sharing the same origin as the light bursting from the runes and the wisp of life within the ice.

The pattern slowly spread outwards, growing into a tiny flower on the surface of the ice stone.

Red spider lily.

Zhou Ran activated his Purple-Gold Demonic Eyes, staring intently.

Three things were dancing in unison before his eyes.

The faint glimmer of life in the moonlit ice.

The blood seeping from Lin Qingxue's bone fragment. And the six gray lines in his own dantian.

And then there's the beating of the heart of that hundred-foot-tall celestial corpse underground.

Four things, one beat, not a fraction off.

Zhou Ran slowly withdrew her hand.

Lin Qingxue's eyesight couldn't see through the three underground levels of the East City.

Her blood is hiding in that place, and that place is calling to her.

Zhou Ran's heart sank.

In the bone fragments, Li Zhiyao's voice trembled uncontrollably.

"Who exactly is Qingxue?"

Zhou Ran did not answer.

He stared at the silver-haired face in the ice stone and spoke.

"She is nobody."

His voice was very soft.

"It's Bingli; we need to use her."

The person on the other end of the bone fragment fell silent.

Inside the laboratory, the screens were completely black, the alarms were all off, and two puddles of ash lay at the base of the cracked wall.

Only that piece of ice stone, with its shimmering seven colors, shone quietly.

Inside the ice, Yue Zhao, who had slept for thirty thousand years, slid a tear down her cheek beneath her tightly closed eyelids.

At the same moment, Lin Qingxue, who had fainted on the other side of the bone fragment, also shed a tear that was exactly the same.

Zhou Ran did not touch the ice stone.

The image of that drop of blood crawling across three inches of empty space and condensing into a spider lily on the ice surface is still etched in his mind.

Blood vessels connect blood vessels.

Even separated by the realms of Yin and Yang, and by thousands of miles of earth's veins, they can still be connected.

He needs to figure out what exactly is happening inside this ice.

"Zhiyao, move Qingxue to the basement, away from the edge of the barrier."

Zhou Ran said to the bone fragment,

"Don't let her touch anything that carries any yin energy or the aura of the void."

Before I got back, she was safer asleep than awake.

"I'll stay by her side."

Li Zhiyao responded.

Be very careful over there.

Zhou Ran cut off the communication.

He took out the ancient rune and reattached it to the ice stone.

This time it wasn't just placed right in the center.

He walked around the ice stone, inching closer to it inch by inch.

Each time the rune touched a spot, it emitted a burst of bluish-white light, revealing several ancient characters before dissipating again.

Zhou Ran memorized the shapes of the characters and spelled them out in his mind.

The remaining text beside the seal is fragmented and discontinuous.

"To prolong life with the blood of his younger sister."

"Borrowing life from the blue planet to nourish the body."

It happened 30,000 years ago. Old Xu talked about it, and Emperor Song also talked about it.

The Moon Emperor's divine consciousness underwent tribulation, his physical body shattered into pieces under the tribulation lightning, and his remains fell to Blue Star, transforming into this Heavenly Corpse, while his will remained in the Void Realm.

But what about Yue Zhao?

Why is the Moon Emperor's own sister sealed deep within the heart of the Heavenly Corpse?

Zhou Ran stared at the faint yet steady glimmer of life within the ice.

It wasn't a burial offering; it was a scheme personally orchestrated by the Moon Emperor.

The physical body may be shattered, but the will remains.

She lacks a body that can support the will of someone in the Tribulation Transcending stage without incurring rejection from the Heavenly Dao of Blue Star.

Yue Zhao is her blood relative, of the same origin and species, the most suitable vessel.

But simply sealing the soul is not enough.

Sealed inside the heart for 30,000 years, it's no different from a dead object.

To bring this body back to life, it needs to be fed with life-giving nutrients.

Zhou Ran's gaze fell back on the blue and white spider lily.

That was formed from Lin Qingxue's blood.

His throat bobbed.

The Moon Emperor dispersed his second wisp of soul.

They are cast into the cycle of reincarnation on Earth, reincarnating life after life, accumulating the fortune of the living, nurturing, and waiting.

Waiting for this life, waiting for Lin Qingxue.

The life force that the Heavenly Corpse absorbed over the past 30,000 years was used to nourish this crippled body in the ice.

What it was waiting for was for the divided soul to return to its place, for Lin Qingxue's living soul to return to the heart of the Heavenly Corpse and merge with Yue Zhao in the ice.

The original soul returns to its rightful place, the divided soul is infused, and life force is fully replenished.

At that time, the body will be fully brought to life.

Zhou Ran's knuckles were clenched so tightly they turned white.