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

Chen Ya turned off the screen.

"However, the broken hairpin is 70% damaged, and the silver markings on the palm bone have spread by 11%. The next time it can be opened, it cannot be opened for more than 30 breaths."

Xu Youwei frowned slightly.

"You even count this?"

"All high-risk skills must be registered."

Chen Ya turned off the screen.

"Especially Zhou Ran's bone pen."

Zhou Ran looked at his cracked fingers and did not refute.

Xu Youwei pulled the broken hairpin from the platform and firmly nailed it back into her palm.

She paused briefly as she passed Lin Qingxue.

See you on White Pagoda Island.

Lin Qingxue nodded gently.

"Stop letting that eye speak for you."

"Won't."

After Xu Youwei left, Lin Qingxue also turned around and returned to the center of the formation.

She didn't look at Zhou Ran again, nor did she mention what had just happened.

Only when night completely enveloped the manor did a black magic eye talisman appear outside Zhou Ran's door.

There are only two characters on the talisman.

【come over.】

Zhou Ran glanced at the time.

One o'clock in the morning.

He pushed open the door to the array chamber and walked along the underground corridor to the deepest part of the manor.

Lin Qingxue sat alone in the center of the formation.

There were no lights on around.

The light from the tidal array flowed slowly across the ground, serving as the only source of light and outlining her figure with a cool, detached silhouette.

There was a pot of tea and two cups in front of her.

"sit."

Zhou Ran sat down opposite her.

Lin Qingxue poured him a cup of tea.

The tea was only half full.

Zhou Ran picked up the cup.

"Chen Ya's rules?"

"The water produced by the bone pen is only half a cup; this is real tea."

Lin Qingxue put the teapot down.

"Finish it."

Zhou Ran glanced at her, then tilted his head back and drank it all.

Lin Qingxue extended her hand.

"Unbutton your clothes."

Zhou Ran paused.

"You called me here in the middle of the night just for this?"

"Check the door pattern."

Lin Qingxue's voice was calm, "Otherwise, what did you think it was?"

Zhou Ran didn't respond to that.

He knew that any answer to this question could easily lead to trouble.

He unbuttoned his shirt, revealing his chest.

The black and gold door pattern is no longer as flamboyant as it was originally.

After being suppressed in seclusion, he forcibly folded the six gray patterns and imperial patterns onto the outside of his nascent soul, transforming them into a bolt-shaped rune.

The surface appears stable.

Yet, within, the aura of the ethereal realm still surged like an undercurrent.

Lin Qingxue raised her right hand, its coolness carrying the night air, and pressed it against Zhou Ran's warm chest.

Fa opened his eyes beneath the black silk.

Beneath her fingertips, the skin, flesh, and veins were all transparent. The Primordial Bone, the Nascent Soul, the Heart Imprint of the River of Oblivion... everything was no longer concealed.

But her gaze was fixed on the black-gold bolt that had been pressed deep into the Nascent Soul.

Her fingertips tightened slightly.

"You're not telling the truth."

Which sentence?

"You told us that the door pattern has been pressed into a bolt."

"Indeed."

"But you didn't say that the other end of the bolt is still connected to your life."

Lin Qingxue raised her head, and the black silk was directly in front of his eyes.

"If the Emperor's Bone of White Tower Island is forcibly awakened, the bolt will first lock the Void Realm, and then... lock your Nascent Soul."

"What's the worst possible outcome?"

"I will temporarily lose my cultivation."

Lin Qingxue's fingertips suddenly pressed down, and a sharp pain came from Zhou Ran's chest.

"We'll see."

"The Nascent Soul stage may be sealed."

"We'll see."

Zhou Ran's breathing stopped for a moment.

"I might... become the new seal."

Only the faint sound of the tidal array's light flowing within the array chamber remained.

Lin Qingxue did not withdraw her hand.

When are you going to tell me?

"After confirming the situation on White Pagoda Island."

"and then?"

"Solve the problem."

"How do we solve this?"

Zhou Ran again avoided answering.

Lin Qingxue nodded gently.

"See, you do it again."

Her voice wasn't loud; it didn't question or show anger, yet it left Zhou Ran speechless for the first time.

Lin Qingxue's hand moved upwards from his chest, stopping at the very core of the door pattern.

"I'm not afraid that you'll go to White Tower Island."

"I have no right to stop you."

"Xu Youwei can risk her life to suppress Yin Yan, Chen Ya can sit in front of her computer and wage war against the entire White Tower Council, and I can do the same to protect my principles."

She paused for a moment.

"But I'm afraid you'll make yourself the price to pay again."

Zhou Ran looked at her.

Her eyes were covered with black silk, blocking her vision, but it couldn't block the weight of her words.

She pressed her hand to his chest, not allowing him to avoid the question.

"When you close the door, prepare to forge yourself into the door."

"When dealing with the Moon Emperor, you swallowed the Imperial Mark into your Nascent Soul."

"If White Tower Island had to have a seal left, would you still choose yourself?"

Zhou Ran grasped her wrist.

"I will not die."

I wasn't asking about death.

Lin Qingxue did not pull her hand away.

"What I'm asking is, will you stay behind again?"

A long silence followed.

Zhou Ran finally spoke.

"Won't."

"Look at me and say that."

"You're blindfolded."

"The Dharma Eye can see."

Zhou Ran moved forward half an inch, their breaths almost touching.

"I will not leave myself on White Tower Island."

"Lin Qingxue, Xu Youwei, Chen Ya, Yue Zhao, and I, we all have to come back."

Lin Qingxue's fingertips finally relaxed.

"I'll remember that."

"Should this be recorded in the White Bone Pen's filing?"

"I'll keep track of your accounts myself."

She withdrew her hand, and the tips of her ears glowed faintly red in the light of the tidal array.

Zhou Ran fastened her clothes again.

"Let's get down to business now."

Lin Qingxue tilted her head slightly.

"Wasn't that important business?"

"Settling personal scores."

"Private debts also need to be paid off."

Zhou Ran looked at her and wisely refrained from continuing the conversation.

Lin Qingxue raised her hand and removed the black silk.

His eyes, now seventy percent restored, slowly opened.

Her eyes were no longer blind, but the depths of her pupils were not the color of a normal person, but a pure black.

In the darkness, faint golden lines moved like a galaxy; these were the new patterns forged by her will after she reclaimed the source of the Dharma Eye.

"Retrieve the footage that Hsu Yu-Wei has kept sealed away."

Zhou Ran took out the talisman.

The images of twelve cryogenic chambers were displayed in front of the two men.

Lin Qingxue reached out and touched the talisman.

"Shared vision".

Zhou Ran separated a line from the Heart Seal of the River of Oblivion and connected it to her Dharma Eye.

Their vision simultaneously passed over the talisman and returned to White Tower Island.

This time, instead of using the Silver Eye, they followed the reverse gaze that Zhou Ran had sealed off, looking back towards the basement of the Black Tower.

The freezer compartment remains the same.

All twelve samples had their eyes closed.

Lin Qingxue didn't look at their faces, but instead observed the Imperial Bone Pattern inside the cryogenic chamber.

"Not the Moon Emperor."

"It's not a celestial corpse either."

"This power... is colder than the Moon Emperor's."

Zhou Ran asked:

"Where is it cold?"

"The Moon Emperor wants to return, so all her commands are imbued with desire."

Welcoming her home, mending the door, stealing her eyes, returning her to the womb—all she wanted was to come back alive.

Lin Qingxue's understanding of the Dharma gradually narrowed.

"These imperial bone patterns have no desires."

"They only make judgments."

"Those that comply with the rules will be kept, and those that do not comply will be eliminated."

Zhou Ran remembered the code name of the ninth seat of the White Tower Council.

Judge.

The so-called disciples of the Old Gods may not worship a specific god.

It is a set of trial rules that no living person is allowed to defy.