Xie Guanxin closed his eyes, his long eyelashes casting pale shadows on his excessively young and handsome face.
He sighed softly.
The sound drifted from his lips. Though they were the lips and teeth of a youth, the tone was as deep as an ancient pool that had slumbered for a thousand years. Hoarse and slow, it carried the weariness and desolation of one who had seen through countless cycles of life and death.
His peerless elegance remained, but his voice had grown old.
"I can't even remember how long it has been since I encountered someone so interesting."
Suddenly, an even more unbelievable thing happened—Xie Guanxin actually tore off an arm from that body.
Even though no blood fell, the sickening squelch of flesh separating was enough to make one's scalp tingle.
Cangshu Linfeng exclaimed in shock, "What are you trying to do!"
Xie Guanxin chuckled. The severed arm in his hand turned into a wisp of black mist and vanished without a trace.
Immediately after, the young Daoist's body collapsed silently.
Meanwhile, that body missing an arm—which should have possessed no consciousness—slowly opened its eyes.
Cangshu Linfeng suddenly understood what he was doing. He glanced again at Mu Ran, who was being attacked by evil entities in the water mirror, and said in disbelief, "Xie Guanxin, you're crazy!"
When Xie Guanxin turned his head, his aura had completely changed.
Cold, detached, and devoid of human warmth, he was now exactly the same as the young man trapped in the array.
For ten thousand years, no body could endure his divine soul for long, so he could only continuously devour the disciples he had raised and taught, who shared the exact same lineage of cultivation as him.
At first, he might have felt sorrow.
But as time passed, he forgot what normal human emotions should be like. The only thing he had left was imitation.
Whatever identity he assumed, he could always successfully act out that person's original demeanor. Whether gentle or cold, merciful and benevolent, or ruthless and wicked—to him, they were all nothing more than carefully stitched layers of skin.
Good or evil, it was all just a play performed on a stage.
Xie Guanxin said, "Today's play can still become even more interesting."
He disappeared from where he stood, then appeared within the image of the water mirror, protecting the girl in the green dress amidst the attacks of the evil entities.
Cangshu Linfeng was rendered speechless for a long time.
Others all said he was mad, caring for nothing but swords.
But he felt that Cangshu Bai, who had gone insane for five hundred years to resurrect his wife, was the truly mad one.
And Xie Guanxin, continuously changing bodies and ultimately even using someone else's identity to approach another man's wife, was also mad.
This small cave dwelling was truly a gathering of outstanding talents!
The black mist had wanted to kill Mu Ran but was driven back; its stance was not entirely aligned with Xie Guanxin's.
Looking at the exasperated black mist, Cangshu Linfeng spoke up, "As an inner demon, aren't you a bit too pathetic?"
The black mist glared at him and said viciously, "What did you say!"
"I've only ever heard that once cultivators fall to the demonic path, they are driven by their inner demons. This is the first time I've seen an inner demon trampled under a cultivator's foot," Cangshu Linfeng mocked. "Truly pathetic."
"Shut up!"
More power was injected from the array, and the burning pain endured by Cangshu Linfeng's soul became even more intense, yet he did not utter a single sound.
The black mist darted over and roared, "What does a little thousand-year-old brat like you know? Do you have any idea what a twisted lunatic Xie Guanxin is?"
"Ten thousand years ago, he killed a peak-stage expert who had fallen to the demonic path. Although it stopped a mass slaughter, their battle implicated an entire city, leaving no survivors. That was why he failed to break through to the next realm and gave birth to me!"
"But the moment he sensed my emergence, he forcefully tore his soul in half! He didn't hesitate to risk his own death and the destruction of his cultivation just to force me out!"
"Throughout history, what cultivator has ever torn their own soul apart?"
"If he isn't a lunatic, then what is he!?"
Precisely because of this, the inner demon dared not clash head-on with Xie Guanxin. It wanted to live, to stir up trouble, and to rule the mortal realm.
But if a man like Xie Guanxin truly went mad, he would actually choose mutual destruction, dragging the demon down to die with him!
Cangshu Linfeng endured the burning agony and calmly continued to bait the demon. "According to what you say, Xie Guanxin should be a good person. But then why would he allow you to rear demonic beasts and continuously devour disciples of his own lineage?"
At the mention of this, the inner demon threw its head back and laughed wildly. The shrill, piercing laughter echoed back and forth within the gloomy cave.
"A good person?" It sneered, its tone dripping with mockery and cruelty. "Do you know what it means to fall to the demonic path?"
It slowly approached, speaking word by word, laced with bone-chilling coldness. "Falling to the demonic path is never as simple as a single inner demon or a lingering obsession. It enters your very flesh and blood, invades your spiritual consciousness, entwines with your root bones, and hides within every breath you take, every circulation of your spiritual energy. It is omnipresent and pervasive."
The inner demon paused, watching Cangshu Linfeng's expression as he fought through the pain, and smiled even more triumphantly. "So, even if Xie Guanxin gave it his all, tore his soul apart, and personally drove me out, what then? His spiritual consciousness is already flowing with demonic aura. He could drive me away, but he can never wash away the fact that he has already become a demon."
When he saw his body gradually decaying because of his torn soul, Xie Guanxin—who thought he had seen through life and death—stood atop the great hall of Mount Chongyang, gazing down at the drifting sea of clouds, and suddenly realized that he could not calmly face the end of death.
He allowed the inner demon to rear demonic beasts, attempting to cultivate a powerful vessel capable of housing their souls. But over the years, after experimenting with so many mortals and cultivators, they had only managed to refine flawed products.
Only in recent years were the refined bodies able to maintain human rationality and appearance, but these bodies couldn't last long either. If he didn't seize a new body, they would rot away within a century.
"They're all a bunch of trash!" The inner demon grew angrier as it spoke. "I deliberately leaked the method of rearing demonic beasts, letting those aristocratic families who wanted shortcuts to enhance their cultivation do the same things as me in secret. But none of them could produce any good results either!"
Remembering something, the inner demon laughed. "Oh right, your surname is Cangshu. It seems like a thousand years ago, there was a branch family surnamed Cangshu that also secretly copied my method to rear demonic beasts. Who knows what results they refined, but their entire clan was suddenly wiped out five hundred years ago. You people surnamed Cangshu are all trash as well."
Anger surfaced between Cangshu Linfeng's brows. As he moved his limbs, the iron chains clattered. "You deserve death for looking down on the Cangshu family!"
The inner demon burst into uproarious laughter. "Fine, come and kill me if you have the ability!"
At this moment, the scene in the water mirror changed once more.
Crushed stones fell, and the white-haired young man raised his hand, shielding the top of the girl's head. The stones smashed against his arm, but it seemed as if he felt no pain at all.
He asked her, "Are you alright?"
Mu Ran shook her head. "I'm fine. What about you? Does your arm hurt?"
"It is fine." He met the girl's clear eyes, seeing his own reflection in their depths. After a moment, the corners of his lips moved slightly. His fingertips gently brushed a stray lock of hair by her temple as he called out softly, "Ranran."
The inner demon jumped up and down in a fit of rage. "You're crazy, crazy, absolutely crazy!"
Cangshu Linfeng struggled to lift his gaze toward the other side. "Hey, Cangshu Bai, I've stalled for this long. If you don't come back soon, your wife is going to be snatched away!"
The moment Cangshu Linfeng finished speaking, the deathly silent stone chamber suddenly quaked.
The inner demon was taken aback. "What is happening!?"
A bone-piercing chill swept through without warning, freezing the rock walls until they bloomed with fine ice crystals. Even the sinister miasma drifting in the air instantly froze and stagnated.
On the ground, the faintly glowing, blood-red star chart suddenly began to twist and writhe frantically, as if terrified of some slumbering entity that was now awakening.
The next instant, the white-haired young man trapped in the very center of the formation, who had kept his head bowed and should have been entirely devoid of consciousness, suddenly snapped open a pair of scarlet eyes.
