Devouring demons, I attain immortality.

"younger sister."

Bai Li threw out seven bone bells to trap the dragon boat.

"Three years ago, your Donghai swindled my sister away under the guise of a marriage alliance, and now you even want to extract her life force?"

Lin An felt a sudden stinging pain in the bronze pattern on his right arm, and the scene of the Coral Palace appeared in his memory fragments: the mermaid dragon girl pressed the fragments into his palm, but she herself turned into bubbles and disappeared.

The border patrolman flicked his sleeve, shattering the bone bell and revealing half of his scaly face: "Bai Tang willingly used her life force to nurture the bell fragment, how could that be considered deception? It's this fellow Daoist Lin who's more deceitful—"

He pointed his flute at Lin Anxin's chest, "The one who stole the fragments of the Void of Return back then was the original owner of this body."

Ye Hongyi suddenly threw out a fragment of the Reverse Scale, which created an illusion in the air: a man in black robes and Bai Tang were playing chess under the moon, and the chessboard was actually a star map of the Chaos Bell.

"Nine Netherworld Remnant Soul Technique!"

The border patrol officer's tone showed a fluctuation for the first time.

"How dare you spy on the Dragon Lord..."

Taking advantage of the moment, Bai Li bit her finger and touched it to Lin An's forehead: "By blood, I will call you by your true name!"

A burst of azure light erupted from Lin An's body, and from the bell-shaped mark on his heart, a dragon maiden sighed softly, "...A-Lang."

The border patrol envoy was struck dumb, his jade flute slipping from his hand and falling to the ground: "Impossible... Princess Longsan died a hundred years ago..."

The ice suddenly shattered, and a mermaid phantom wearing a tattered wedding dress appeared behind Lin An, holding in her hands a complete fragment of the Ruins of Return.

"Brother Huaiqing, no, Brother Lin An!"

The illusory figure gently stroked Lin An's cheek, tears turning into pearls and rolling down his cheek. "Back when Father King extracted your dragon tendons, I hid the bell fragment inside your sword bone."

An ancient dragon's roar echoed through the wind and snow, and all eighteen glass lamps went out at the same time.

An old woman, leaning on a coral cane, came riding the waves, a broken jade pendant hanging from a dragon horn on her forehead: "Third girl, you really have hidden your soul in your lover."

Bai Li suddenly knelt down and performed a grand salute: "The 170th generation priest of the Witch Clan pays respects to Granny Chiwen."

The coral on the old woman's staff suddenly came to life, grabbing the fleeing border patrol officer: "Little Azure Dragon, I entrusted you with guarding the Ruins of Return, and you've instead helped that wretched creature refine a Blood Bell?"

Lin An's head throbbed with pain, and fragmented memories surged back: he was locked on a coral rack, Bai Tang cried as she opened her dantian...

"Remember now?"

Granny Chiwen snapped her finger, shattering the bronze seal on his right arm. "The consort of the Third Princess of the East Sea Dragon is no immortal-killing sinner."

Ye Hongyi suddenly ripped open her clothes, revealing a mermaid scale on her chest that resembled Bai Tang's: "Does Grandma recognize this?"

"The Sirius swallows the moon, the mermaid weeps pearls..."

The old woman's cloudy dragon eyes gleamed with a sharp light.

"So the prophesied boundary-breaking twins were you two!"

Bai Li suddenly lifted the fox fur coat, revealing a blood-red star map on her back: "The shamanic verse left by my elder sister three years ago has finally come true—'When the bell tolls, twins appear, and the moon shines on the Hall of Longevity in the Ruins of Return.'"

She grabbed Lin An's still-demonic right arm, "If you want to save Bai Tang, come with me now to dig up the East Sea Dragon Tomb!"

Granny Chiwen blocked his path with her coral staff: "Wait, little phoenix, doesn't she owe me an explanation?"

She suddenly reached out to Ye Hongyi, "The thing your mother entrusted to you before she died in the massacre of the Tianlang clan three hundred years ago..."

Ye Hongyi's pupils contracted sharply, and she took half a wolf tooth from her hair: "Does Grandma recognize this?"

"It's more than just recognizing them."

The old woman took the broken jade pendant from the dragon's horn and fitted it perfectly with the wolf's tooth.

"This is the key to unlocking the secret realm of Penglai. Back then, your mother..."

An explosion suddenly came from the direction of the dragon boat; the imprisoned patrol envoy had actually detonated his primordial spirit.

A scene of the East Sea Dragon Palace emerges from the blood mist: countless mermaids with iron chains piercing their collarbones are melting down a huge bronze bell blank.

The entrance to the Penglai Secret Realm burst open with a roar the instant the wolf-tooth jade pendant closed, and countless stars hung upside down in a vortex.

Suddenly, Granny Chiwen grabbed Ye Hongyi, who was about to rush inside: "Girl, do you know why your mother was willing to die to hide this half of the key three hundred years ago?"

Dark seawater seeped from the whirlpool, and the ruins of the palace were vaguely visible.

The white glass's witch fire illuminated the mottled carvings on the stone wall—these were actually records of the god-slaying war in the script of the Sirius Clan.

"Because this isn't a secret realm at all."

Lin An felt a sudden burning pain in the bronze pattern on his right arm, and the fragments of the Void Realm trembled in his arms. "It's the prison that imprisoned the first Chaos Spirit!"

A man in black robes stepped out of the star vortex, carrying a lantern made of mermaid skin: "Fellow Daoist Lin has a good memory."

The lantern illuminated the hideous dragon scale scar on his left cheek. "Back then, you trespassed here to save Bai Tang, but Zhong Ling shattered seventy percent of your soul."

Ye Hongyi suddenly swung her sword, severing the shadow of the black-robed man, but silver blood seeped from the ground: "You are not alive!"

"He is the evil thought of the Dragon Lord who has severed his three corpses."

The old woman with the dragon-like spirit inserted her coral staff into the crack in the ground, forcing out nine writhing black shadows.

"The old mudfish sealed its evil thoughts within Penglai Island, cultivating by absorbing the resentment of Zhongling."

The man in black robes chuckled as he transformed into a hundred-foot-long demonic dragon, and eighty-one bronze chains appeared on the dome of the secret realm: "I am indeed not a living person..."

The dragon's claws tore open his chest, revealing a flickering flame of chaos. "But today, you will all become sacrifices to Zhongling!"

Bai Li suddenly bit her tongue and spat it onto the Witchfire Longbow, the blood flames condensing into nine consecutive arrows: "My sister said there's a Three-Life Tree in Penglai—"

As the arrow pierced the air, the sound of coral wind chimes echoed from the depths of the secret realm, "Sever the chains in the southeast (巽) position!"

Lin An's broken blade stirred up fragments of the Void Realm, and a phantom image of Bai Tang appeared on its blade: "The Xun position holds our secrets..."

Before he finished speaking, the black-robed man swept his dragon tail across the sky, and within each cluster of flames was a wailing merman soul.

The wolf mark on Ye Hongyi's forehead suddenly materialized, and the Heavenly Wolf Howled at the Moon shattered the starlight: "Hongyi, hand over the Breaking Army position to me!"

When she turned and called to Lin An, a strange golden light flickered in her eyes, "Use the Tide-Rising Sword Technique that Bai Tang taught you!"

Suddenly, Granny Chiwen plunged her coral staff into her heart, the spurting dragon blood drawing a map of the East Sea in mid-air: "Third Girl has been waiting at the core of the Guixu Formation for three hundred years..."

The map revealed Bai Tang's dragon soul pierced by iron chains. "Sever the soul-locking nail in her heart!"

In its rage, the black-robed dragon smashed through three bronze pillars, and the secret realm began to collapse.

Lin An plunged his broken blade into his dantian, extracting the sword bone he had nurtured for a hundred years: "Bai Tang, this time it's my turn to guard the Ruins of Return for you!"

The moment the sword bone merged into the dome-shaped chains, a distant bell rang out from the seabed.

Bai Li's bone arrow finally struck the chain at the Xun position, and a towering wave surged forth from the broken point.

A dragon maiden warrior spirit, wielding a coral halberd, rose from the waves, bearing a striking resemblance to Bai Tang: "Bai Zhen, a sinful descendant of the East Sea Dragon Clan, has been ordered by the first Zhong Ling..."

The War Soul Halberd pointed at the black-robed demonic dragon, "Slay the evil!"

Ye Hongyi found half a tortoise shell at the Po Jun position, on which was engraved the last prophecy of the Tianlang Clan: "On the day the twins break the boundary, the blood moon will shine on the Ruins of Return..."

She suddenly grabbed Lin An's right arm, which was bleeding golden blood, "You're not a slayer of immortals at all, you were chosen by the first Zhong Ling..."

The black-robed dragon shattered inch by inch amidst the tolling of the bell, revealing the pulsating scales of its primordial dragon lord at its core: "The old man long ago attached half of his primordial spirit to Penglai..."

The scales suddenly self-destructed, accelerating the collapse of the secret realm. "If we die, we die together!"

Suddenly, Granny Chiwen transformed into her true form, a thousand feet tall, using her dragon spine to support the collapsing dome: "Third Girl set up the Reverse Star Formation at the core of the Returning Ruins Formation..."

She spat out a dragon pearl and gave it to Bai Li, "Tell Lin An, the ninth move of the Tide Rising Sword Technique is..."

Before Bai Li could hear clearly, the entire sea suddenly flooded into the secret realm.

In the apocalyptic torrent, Lin An saw Bai Tang's dragon soul forming a hand seal in the direction of Guixu, and the tide-rising song sung in unison by three hundred merfolk transcended time and space:

"When the moon sets, remember to come find me in the coral forest..."