With these words uttered, the expressions of everyone present shifted dramatically.
Yan Zhu was left in absolute shock; she truly lived up to her reputation as the number one demon king of the novel.
Song Wenqing cast a sidelong glance at her, the corners of her mouth twitching downward.
Ling Jue was the most terrified of all. He frantically gripped the life-saving magical artifact capable of summoning his father’s divine soul, terrified that the “big shot” might lose her temper and deal with his younger sister first.
The person who had sparked this entire panic, however, remained the calmest of anyone. She seemed entirely oblivious to anything inappropriate about what she had just said, her facial expression completely unchanged.
Having finished speaking, Ling Shi turned her gaze toward Song Wenqing, earnestly contemplating how to achieve her objective.
This exact scene happened to fall into the eyes of Yan Zhu, who, being quite familiar with the little one, instantly understood what the little demon king was plotting.
To prevent the young girl from running into any real danger, she hurriedly grabbed the small hand before her, attempting to draw the other’s attention away.
Children have tender skin, soft to the touch like boneless silk. Yan Zhu did not dare exert any force, terrified of puncturing the soft little dumpling.
Ling Shi’s gaze successfully shifted to her, and no accidental outbursts or severed limbs occurred along the way.
Yan Zhu let out a sigh of relief, gazing deep into those clear black eyes as she pondered how to speak. Just as she was gathering her thoughts, a sudden violent tremor beneath her feet instantly shattered her nearly formed train of thought.
The scenery warped in an instant, the air rippling outward in massive, overlapping circles like water.
Continuous shockwaves battered the tall trees, bending them wildly until some snapped straight down the middle, crashing to the ground and kicking up billows of smoke and dust.
Crouched low with a lower center of gravity, Yan Zhu managed to steady herself only by planting one hand firmly on the ground.
The others possessed cultivation bases and did not shift an inch from their spots. Growing up in the dog-eat-dog environment of the cultivation world, they immediately assumed defensive postures and turned their heads simultaneously in a single direction.
A colossal beam of light, over a hundred meters wide, erupted from the ground and soared straight into the sky. The space surrounding it appeared to be grasped and torn apart by a pair of giant hands, distorting and blurring the naked eye.
Yan Zhu caught sight of the scene as well, her mind instantly going blank as an unreal sense that the world was entirely fabricated surged into her heart.
The secret realm had opened.
At the center of the beam of light, space was ripped ruthlessly open by the immense shockwave like a piece of cloth, revealing a dreamlike, ever-shifting landscape of flashing scenery within the tear.
The opening grew larger and larger, soon expanding into a passageway wide enough for a person to enter.
Of everyone present, Ling Jue was the first to react. He had once heard from his father and the elders of his sect that there was a secret realm in the Western Continent that opened at unpredictable times, a place filled with countless dangers, yet brimming with great opportunities.
Without pausing to think, he immediately used a thousand-mile sound transmission to relay the news to the higher-ups of his sect, demanding that they bring disciples as quickly as possible.
After all, the quotas for entering a secret realm were always limited; seizing even a single step of initiative meant gaining a ten-step advantage.
Song Wenqing’s vision had yet to fully recover, allowing her to see only a hazy blur of white light. The excessively turbulent surges of ambient energy made her realize that some extraordinary artifact had likely manifested. Subconsciously, she turned her head to search for that single figure.
Yan Zhu remained trapped in shock, staring with wide eyes at the dying storm in the distance.
The secret realm she had longed for in the previous second had abruptly manifested in the next, so coincidental that it forced one to question whether this world was real or merely a dream.
Try as she might, she could find no explanation.
Yan Zhu looked toward Ling Shi standing right before her, the very first possessor of the Seven-Orificed Exquisite Heart to appear in the cultivation world following the Age of Dharma Ending.
She was also the sole and most probable cause for this upheaval that she could conceive.
Utterly genuine, utterly sincere, and utterly pure, resembling an innocent child.
Her heart was like a bright mirror platform, unstained and immaculate.
Thus she was free of evil, free of obsession, and free of inner demons.
Her possessor was profoundly favored by the laws of heaven and earth, naturally possessing an affinity for spiritual herbs and sacred beasts, encountering endless opportunities, truly deserving of the title “Child of Fortune.”
These were sentences Yan Zhu had typed with her own hands. While they had felt exhilarating at the time, she now fully realized just how overpowered a cheat she had handed to the little demon king.
Opportunities that others begged for in vain came knocking on her door of their own accord, throwing themselves directly into her arms.
It was cheating, far too much of a cheat…
For the very first time, Yan Zhu directly experienced the impact she, as the author, had inflicted upon this world.
All rules were forged by her pen, the fates of characters written by her hand, the lives and deaths of sentient beings determined by her decree… it felt terrifyingly akin to being a “god.”
Yet she felt no joy whatsoever.
Yan Zhu lowered her eyelids, even the chaotic voices within her mind falling strangely silent.
Up until now, she had always viewed this merely as an entertaining story. She had rejoiced at the chance to witness how a few thin names in a book might steer toward a conclusion.
Yet, how did the brief few lines she had casually tapped out turn into the living, breathing life of an actual human being?
Was the instrument she held in her hand not a pen after all, but a butcher’s blade?
Little Ling Shi ought to have been the person least interested in that pillar of light across the entire scene. She merely glanced at it with idle curiosity before quickly shifting her gaze back to the young girl standing before her.
This person… she was deeply captivating.
She could not articulate the sensation in her heart. From the very first glance, she had a compulsive desire to draw closer, to rely upon her, and ideally to remain by her side for all eternity.
Never before had Ling Shi experienced such a feeling.
Unable to decipher the emotion or trace its origin, she simply chose not to overthink it, following her inner instincts to act upon her desires.
And so, she grabbed the pretty older sister’s hand, earnestly vocalizing the demands currently clamouring inside her heart.
“Come home with me.”
She was always thus; her Dao resided entirely within her heart.
“Come home with me.”
As her words faded, her gaze shifted toward the hateful-looking masked person nearby, her fingertips beginning to brew a lethal killing blow.
However, Song Wenqing’s speed proved far swifter than anticipated. With a flash of movement, she dodged the incoming assault, reappearing directly beside her with a drawn sword.
Ling Shi’s pupils dilated slightly, reflecting the tip of the sword rushing ever closer toward her. Without suspense, the sharp edge would press against her neck in the next second.
Despite finding herself in such perilous peril, not a trace of panic marred her childish face. Her feet remained firmly rooted to the ground, her posture utterly motionless.
She merely raised one hand, splaying her five fingers before her to forcibly block the sword light with a barrier of pure radiance.
With her other hand, she formed a hand seal behind her back, directing a long-ambushed killing strike with pinpoint precision straight down upon Song Wenqing’s head, loaded and ready to strike.
Yet, just as the blow was about to connect with her target, the opponent anticipated the move entirely, swinging her blade to shatter the assault while retaining surplus strength. Right before her very eyes, the woman snatched away the pretty older sister she intended to bring home.
Watching the two figures vanish directly into the beam of light, Ling Shi’s face wrinkled in pure annoyance, and without a second thought, she flashed inward to give chase.
Witnessing his younger sister leap right down, Ling Jue felt half his soul frightened completely out of his body. All caution and wariness instantly flew out the window as he followed right after them, plunging inward.
“Monster! Monster! Monster!”
“A baleful monster, a bastard without a father or mother!”
“Hey, let’s throw this thing at her, hehe, it should be a lot of fun!”
Yan Zhu furrowed her brow, startled awake by the excessively noisy clamor surrounding her. Opening her eyes, she was first greeted by an unbroken expanse of azure sky devoid of clouds.
Memories slowly resurfaced, transmigration, the Western Continent, the little demon king… the weightless sensation of plummeting from midair, ultimately halting upon a dilapidated shrine lingering in her vision just before unconsciousness claimed her.
So, exactly where was she now?
“Hit her! Hit her! Beat her to death!”
Her question went unanswered, her train of thought violently interrupted by an obnoxious chorus of voices.
A gray parabolic arc hurtled in from the distance, and a stone the size of a child’s fist smashed heavily into the ground with a dull thud.
Yan Zhu narrowed her eyes, setting aside the tangled mess of her thoughts as she stood up and walked toward the source of the noise.
This area resembled a seldom-visited wilderness, choked with exceptionally lush trees and overgrown wild grass.
“Let’s see how you run this time!”
The ringleader, a boy of eight or nine years old, stared with malicious glee at the slender, diminutive girl standing opposite him, immensely proud of having tracked down such a convenient location to torment someone.
Behind him stood five or six boys of roughly the same age. Hearing his words, they broke out into cheers, grinning as they weighed the stones in their hands.
“That’s right! Let’s see how she runs now!” they chimed in.
The girl cowered beneath a tree, her frame rendered even tinier by the thick trunk. She wore patched, tattered rags, and her hair hung in disarray, presenting a truly pitiful sight.
Hearing the jeers of that group of boys, her body trembled with tension as she clutched a wooden stick even tighter, resembling a drowning person clutching a final straw of hope.
This display only provoked another round of mocking laughter from the opposing party.
The ringleader was the tallest among them. Seeing her fear seemed to fill him with a grandiose sense of dominance; grinning smugly, he waved the hand clutching the stone in a threatening manner and advanced slowly toward her.
“Little bastard with no father or mother, hurry up and get lost!”
“Get out of our village!”
The boys behind him followed closely in his footsteps, their verbal taunts serving to pump up their comrades.
“Get lost! Get lost! Get lost, or we’ll beat you to death!”
Before anyone could identify who threw the first stone, a blurry grayish-brown object soared through the air, narrowly missing the girl’s foot.
Emboldened as if encouraged by this, the others grew even more frantic, hurling the stones from their hands in succession.
Arriving just in time to witness this scene, Yan Zhu felt a wave of heart-wrenching palpitations, her breathing temporarily halting altogether.
“Stop right there!”
Strangely enough, no one appeared to hear this shout of reprimand; the movements of their hands continued unabated, pelting the girl with stones of all sizes.
“What are you doing? Stop this immediately!”
Noticing a stone that nearly struck the girl right between the eyes, Yan Zhu shouted anxiously while running toward the person she intended to protect.
She planted herself directly in front of the girl, glaring furiously at the group of wicked children opposite her.
“Why are you picking on her again?!”
A voice that did not belong to her rang out from nearby. Emerging from a path half-concealed by bushes came a woman dressed in coarse homespun clothes with her hair pinned in a bun.
Akimbo, she glared fiercely at the ringleader before suddenly reaching out to grab him by the ear.
Seeing this, the remaining boys abandoned all notions of “loyalty” and scattered instantly in every direction.
“How many times do I have to tell you not to bully people! Get your ass home right now!”
Granted a reprieve, the boy fled, clutching his crimson ear.
The woman let out a sigh as she watched her son’s retreating figure, then walked directly toward the girl as if completely oblivious to Yan Zhu’s presence.
Finding this rather strange, yet genuinely terrified of colliding with the woman, Yan Zhu stepped aside to clear a path.
“Oh dear… are you alright? I’m so sorry.”
Looking down at the girl, the woman nervously twisted her rough, calloused hands together. The expression on her face conveyed far less genuine apology than it did sheer embarrassment at being forced to apologize to a mere child.
Sure enough, faced with the dirt-and-scar-covered girl, she uttered merely a single brief sentence, as though that alone sufficed to wipe away her son’s misdeeds.
However, seeing the child before her remain utterly unresponsive, the woman apparently felt her previous words lacked sufficient impact and continued to ramble on:
“Boys will be boys… they’re just mischievous, you’ll just have to bear with it!”
“Besides, he only bullies you because he likes you…”
“Boys at this age are just like that; the more they like you, the more they’ll pick on you…”
Utterly appalled by such preposterous logic, Yan Zhu widened her eyes in disbelief, fury surging within her chest. When she opened her mouth to speak, no words emerged, she had been struck completely mute by sheer rage.
Meanwhile, the girl, whose face remained half-concealed by a mess of unkempt hair, raised her head at these words. Her hair fell away to the sides of her cheeks, revealing a pair of stunning amber eyes.
Ignoring the woman entirely, her gaze fell softly upon Yan Zhu like a timid butterfly.