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"Bastard!" Zhao Xing seemed to have recovered from his shock and charged at me with a roar. I instinctively swung my longsword! But I didn't expect Zhao Xing to be so fast in his shock. He had already flashed in front of me and was about to grab my wrist with a grappling-like gesture.

At that moment, I deeply regretted not having properly learned self-defense techniques like karate. In my desperation, I didn't care about appearance anymore and rolled off the ground in a lazy doll-like motion! Because I was really not used to using a sword, I accidentally dropped it on the ground. When I tried to pick it up again, Zhao Xing had already attacked aggressively. Helpless, I had no choice but to use my clumsiest karate technique, which I had learned from Zhao Xing, to fight him.

No time to look at Fang Lei, but Fang Lei wasn't at ease either, because the Emei Sect's treasure seemed to have no effect on Bai Ling at all. Under the black claw shadows, the purple ribbon had been torn to shreds, and a pungent stench gradually wafted from Bai Ling's claw shadows—corpse poison…! Although Fang Lei could hold her breath, this distraction was too much! Fang Lei couldn't help but wonder if this was what the so-called Nine Yin White Bone Claw was like?

Fang Lei had been forced back several steps by Bai Ling. Because it was close combat, Fang Lei didn't even have a chance to chant incantations! Was there no other way? Sweat beaded on Fang Lei's forehead. If she failed in this battle, it would probably implicate more than just herself!

Thinking of this, Fang Lei gripped the purple ribbon in her hand, and instantly the ribbon transformed into a purple sword, stabbing towards the center of the black claw shadow. At the same time, she also cast a talisman with her left hand!

A yellow talisman swept past Bai Ling's shoulder, causing her to pause. Fang Lei seized the opportunity to slash downwards with her blade, and a black streak of blood splattered out!

Without pausing, Fang Lei raised several more talismans with her left hand, forming a circle above Bai Ling's head, which immediately created a golden light shield that descended upon Bai Ling.

Seeing this, Bai Ling immediately disregarded her hand injury and unleashed a burst of black light from both hands, blocking the golden halo that was pressing down on her. With a cracking sound like shattering glass, the halo and the black light collided! Fang Lei and Bai Ling both took a step back almost simultaneously.

Just as Fang Lei was suppressing the taste of blood in her throat and was about to step forward again, a red light suddenly pierced through Bai Ling's body like an arrow!

"Ah...!" With a heart-wrenching scream, Bai Ling collapsed, her entire body immediately becoming transparent and blurry!

"Who?" This sudden turn of events made Zhao Xing and me stop at the same time. I quickly jumped out of Zhao Xing's attack range, having already taken several punches and kicks from him.

"Are you alright?" Fang Lei had already run up to me and reached out to wipe the blood from the corner of my mouth.

"Ugh...! It's okay!" I noticed that Fang Lei wasn't doing well either; her face was a little pale.

"Ouch!" Abao finally spoke, and Fang Lei and I turned around. We saw her slowly climbing up from the stone platform. It was probably because Bai Ling's injury had caused the magic that had been holding Abao in place to disappear.

"It's...it's you!" Zhao Xing stared incredulously at the red light, at the little girl in red, whose face was beaming with a triumphant smile, her completely black eyes with no whites constantly darting back and forth in their sockets.

Fang Lei and I exchanged surprised glances. Could it be infighting among them? I didn't expect that the little girl in red could so easily injure Bai Ling. Judging from her current state, she was almost about to be annihilated.

"You...you?" Bai Ling looked at the little girl in red with resentment, but couldn't finish a sentence.

"You...you don't want to be resurrected anymore?" Zhao Xing said to the little girl in red, "Don't forget, we promised you that you would be resurrected after this was done, isn't that what you wanted most?"

"Resurrection...? Heh..." The little girl in red's body gradually blurred, then became clearer, but within the clarity, it seemed as if two figures appeared simultaneously, one tall and one short!

"Su Qiao!" I saw Su Qiao standing behind the little girl in red, but her eyes were a bit vacant. She didn't seem to be fully awake!

"I don't want to be resurrected! This is enough, I just want to be with my sister!" The little girl in red turned around and hugged Su Qiao's leg like a spoiled child, her face showing a strange expression: dependence? jealousy? or... hatred?

"But... betrayal..." The little girl in red slowly turned around and said, "I'm going to another world!"

As she spoke, I felt a huge black shadow pressing down on me from above. Looking up, I saw a massive black door slowly appearing in the blue water.

"The Gate of Hell!" Fang Lei and Bai Ling exclaimed simultaneously. Judging from Bai Ling's genuine surprise, it seemed she wasn't faking it. Therefore... the one who opened the Gate of Hell must be...

I looked at the little girl in red. Why was she opening the gates of hell?

"Turn it off quickly!" Fang Lei said.

"Betrayal... leads to another world!" The little girl in red looked at Bai Ling and said, "You betrayed your faith, didn't you?"

"Faith? What do you know?" Bai Ling suddenly regained her strength and struggled, saying, "Why seal me away? I wasn't the one who betrayed the Goddess!" After saying that, Bai Ling glared at me fiercely and said, "Does the sins of the Spirit Race have to be borne by our Yana race?"

"What? Aren't you the guardian of the seal?" I asked in surprise.

"Guardian? Heh..." Bai Ling laughed loudly. Black blood flowed from her mouth. "That Bai Yun is the one! I am the princess of the Yana tribe!"

"You...? Princess?" I looked at her in confusion.

“What? Only young and beautiful women can be princesses? In our Yana tribe, the title of princess lasts a lifetime!” Bai Ling replied.

"Then...then why is it Baiyun who's sealed away now?" I asked.

“Because…because of Baiyun’s previous body, the true guardian, Yun’er, she betrayed her faith, betrayed the promise she made to the goddess! Haha…! She was just like that goddess, blinded by so-called love! Wasn’t she?” Bai Ling glanced at Zhao Xing beside her and said, “The mistake was that she fell in love with a man! Thousands of years of loneliness can easily make a woman fall for a man.”

"Is it you?" I asked Zhao Xing, but then I felt something was off. Bai Yun's graduation photo should be 50 years old now, so Zhao Xing should have been just a child back then.

“He is my father,” Zhao Xing said. “It’s a pity she doesn’t know that my father is one of the few Yana people who have retained some ancient memories.”

"So you, being low-yielding, tried to seal away your love for her, but you didn't expect that if you didn't seal her away completely, the alien entity Baiyun would be born!" I continued.

“That’s right. Although he released me, white clouds appeared on the ground, and my seal was not completely broken! So I simply spared Baiyun’s life, because killing her would not break the seal! I had no choice but to place my hopes on the Big Dipper Formation!” Bai Ling said, “As long as the Spirit Clan kills another race within the Gate of Life and Death of the Big Dipper Formation, we can use that person’s blood to break the final seal!”

So that's how it is! So all the murders happened just for this day, so I could kill Ah Bao through this gate of life and death!

Volume Three: Delicacies of Hell, Chapter Seventy: Love and Hate

Volume Three: Delicacies of Hell, Chapter Seventy: Love and Hate

But why? Why did Jiang Hua, the corpse in the water vat, and the heartless female student die more than twenty years ago? The Big Dipper Formation was only halfway through, but it wasn't fully implemented; not all seven people were gathered! And if the Big Dipper Formation required the Spirit Clan to kill another race, who was that Spirit Clan member from twenty years ago? Was the formation abandoned halfway because of the lack of this crucial person?

Probably not. This formation is so difficult to execute; how could it be carried out without all the personnel being properly selected? Perhaps the Spirit Clan member from over twenty years ago withdrew midway? I have no answer.

Looking up, the black gate above became increasingly clear. Bai Ling seemed to be appearing and disappearing intermittently. It seemed that this little devil was the one who was going to open the gate to the underworld!

"What do you want?" Zhao Xing asked the little girl in red.

"Go to hell! Hehe...hehe..." The little girl in red hugged Su Qiao, and slowly her whole body embedded itself into hers, as if they had merged into one.

"Bastard!" Zhao Xing asked, "You planned this all along, didn't you? Did you secretly help Lin Xiao prevent him from stabbing that woman?"

"Using the Big Dipper Formation in reverse will open the Gates of Hell! Didn't she tell you that?" The speakers were now the little girl in red and Su Qiao, their thoughts seemingly intertwined due to their overlapping souls. Their voices were peculiar, a blend of the little girl's sharp, piercing voice and Su Qiao's deep, hoarse voice, like a duet.

She? Who is she? Fang Lei and I exchanged glances. This formation is so complex that it definitely needs someone to guide us, just like the Ten Thousand Souls Locking Formation.

"She clearly said that this formation could break the final seal of the Yana tribe!" Zhao Xing shouted.

"Idiot! Do you think the goddess's curse is so easy to break? Even if there is a way, it's not this!" The little girl in red looked at the man in front of her with disdain and said, "This formation can only open the gates of hell! At the seven positions of the Big Dipper formation, use the souls of those with missing organs as catalysts! Finally, in the gates of life and death, use the souls of traitors as the keys to open the gates of hell!" The little girl in red explained.

It turns out someone had deceived Zhao Xing and Bai Ling, making their scheming go to waste, only to end up sending them to their doom. It's both laughable and tragic; how could they have imagined they'd be sending themselves to their deaths? Truly, they brought this upon themselves!

"You can't open the gates of hell!" Fang Lei suddenly stepped forward. I frowned. Anyway, the wicked will be dealt with by the wicked. Why bother meddling in this?

"Once it's opened, the entire human realm will revert to a situation where humans coexist with ghosts and monsters. Do you know how many people will die then?" Fang Lei seemed to sense my indifference and spoke to me with a slightly reproachful tone.

"You don't care, do you?" the little girl in red suddenly looked at me and asked.

I was at a loss for words. I opened my mouth, but no words came out. Perhaps deep down, I wasn't afraid of this situation; I was even a little curious and expectant.

"She really does look like her," the little girl in red said calmly.

Like her? Like whom? Who is she? Tian Niang? That's the only person I can think of, but I feel like Ning Chan's words wouldn't do her any good!

"If you don't remove the magic array quickly, don't blame me for taking action!" Fang Lei said.

"Make a move? Heh... How much magic power do you still have in this place?" The little girl in red said disdainfully, "The Gate of Hell is about to open. Under its influence, all magic will fail."

"What?" Fang Lei exclaimed inwardly, realizing that as soon as she tried to gather her energy, all her magical power seemed to have been drained, leaving her completely unresponsive. It seemed that she had already started to feel powerless when she fought Bai Ling earlier, but she hadn't expected that under the Ghost Gate, she would become a completely ordinary person.

"Besides, you are all traitors!" the little girl in red laughed sinisterly. "You are destined for hell!"

"I didn't betray you!" Ah Bao finally spoke up after catching his breath!

"No? Weren't you expelled from your Moro tribe because of betrayal?" The little girl in red then turned to Fang Lei and said, "Can you guarantee that you have never betrayed anyone?"

Her questions silenced both A Bao and Fang Lei. Humans are the ultimate betrayers. Children can betray their parents, friends can betray their friends, lovers can betray those who love them! Even humanity as a whole is slowly betraying this world, this Earth!

"Of course, and you too!" The little girl in red stared at me and said, "You betrayed your family first, and then you betrayed your lover!"

"And what about you?" I didn't know how to explain, so I could only ask in return, "Haven't you ever betrayed anyone?"

"Of course not!" To my surprise, my words immediately elicited a scream. Her mouth opened wide, taking up most of her face, and her small hands shot up. At that moment, her hands transformed: a bluish-gray color, the skin clumped together. Water began to drip, drop by drop! This was clearly a sign of drowning; she must be Jiang Xiaohui, who had drowned!

"Jiang Xiaohui?" I called out boldly.

"No! Don't leave me, Grandma! Come save me!" Jiang Xiaohui suddenly reached out and grabbed at the air, then grabbed Su Qiao's—no, it should be said now that it's Jiang Xiaoqiao's arm—and cried out, "Why did you betray me? Why? You said you would be with me forever, that we would never be apart!"

Perhaps Jiang Xiaoqiao still had a shred of consciousness left in her soul at this moment, because after listening to Jiang Xiaohui's sobbing, a single tear slowly fell from her eyes. Was it because she was heartbroken at not keeping her promise?

"Why? Why?" Jiang Xiaohui suddenly grabbed Jiang Xiaoqiao's arm like a madwoman, her sharp nails easily leaving several bloody marks on Jiang Xiaoqiao's arm.

"Why do you still want to forget me?" Jiang Xiaohui finally plopped down on the ground, like a spoiled, unruly child. Jiang Xiaoqiao's body seemed to move slightly.

Forget? Could it be that Jiang Xiaoqiao has forgotten Jiang Xiaohui after that accident? Forgot that she ever had a younger sister, a twin sister who looks exactly like her! However, this isn't impossible. After experiencing a major upheaval, a person can develop a pathological memory blockage, because they are subconsciously trying to forget the event. This is even more likely to happen with children, whose minds are most easily tempted or hypnotized.

Just then, a loud noise came from above. We looked up and saw that the huge black door had begun to open slowly. As the gap in the door widened, many dark figures poured out from inside, like a flood bursting through a valve.

We felt a tingling sensation from the top of our heads, and then it felt like some external force was pulling us outwards, as if it was trying to rip our entire souls out of our bodies! To us, the opening of this door was like a giant vacuum cleaner, trying to suck our souls into this enormous door.

With a scream, Zhao Xing collapsed to the ground.

What should I do? I don't want Fang Lei, A Bao, and me to be sucked into this giant door. Who knows what kind of scene lies behind it? But is there any way to close the gate to hell?

The key? I suddenly remembered Jiang Xiaohui saying earlier that the soul of a traitor is the final key to opening the gates of hell! So it must be Zhao Xing and Bai Ling!

Thinking of this, I looked down at the black jade ring on my hand. I hadn't used it in a long time, and I wondered if it would still be useful. It had once contained Song Tian's soul! If I were to put both of their souls into this ring, wouldn't I lose the final key?

Although I haven't practiced those soul refining techniques much since then, I still vaguely remember them. Chanting the incantation, as my hand gestures shifted, blue light particles gradually flew from my hands, like countless blue fireflies, towards Zhao Xing and Bai Ling!

"Trying to capture them?" Jiang Xiaohui got up from the ground, reached out and grabbed, and the red light beam spread out like a net over the blue light particles. Although it did not cover all the blue light particles, it captured almost half of them.

"Ah...ah...ah!" Jiang Xiaoqiao suddenly opened her mouth and made a few sounds, then placed her hand on Jiang Xiaohui's hand.

"You want to stop me too?" Jiang Xiaohui slapped Jiang Xiaoqiao's hand away in disgust, her face contorted with rage, as if all her features had shifted, making her look like a clay doll with a distorted face.

"Xiao Hui! It's Xiao Hui!" An old but unusually excited voice came from above. Jiang Xiao Hui's expression immediately froze, revealing a peculiar look.

Looking up, I could actually see an old lady and Li Yang from behind the door! But to be more precise, they were probably right where Fang Lei and I had been, by the swimming pool, peering down into the water! Perhaps it was because of the location of the Ghost Gate that they could see us!

"Don't be afraid! Grandma will come to save you right away!" After saying that, she actually jumped down!

"Grandma Su!" Li Yang exclaimed, then muttered a curse under his breath and jumped down as well.

Unexpectedly, they actually passed through us and fell directly towards us. However, it seemed that Grandma Su was slightly dragged down by Jiang Xiaohui's magic, so she only stumbled slightly before landing. Li Yang, on the other hand, fared much worse. Fang Lei had already lost her magic, and I was busy performing a soul refining technique and had no time to pay attention to him. As a result, he aimed directly at A Bao, and poor A Bao immediately rolled on the ground with him!

"Did you jump at me on purpose?" Abao shouted in frustration as he was pinned down by Li Yang.

"Hehe...hehe...who are you?" It seems that the hypnosis spell on Li Yang has not been completely broken. As a result, with a slap, a five-finger mark appeared on Li Yang's face.

"You!" Li Yang jumped up from the ground and said, "You damned Bao, why did you hit me?"

"You...you remember me?" Abao asked happily, and then, not caring about the occasion, she excitedly hugged Li Yang!

Could a slap really wake someone from hypnosis? Looks like I need to get Fang Lei to slap me too! Lost in thought, Grandma Su, completely oblivious to Jiang Xiaohui's strange behavior, stepped forward and hugged her tightly!

"Grandma's here to save you! Grandma's here to save you! Xiao Hui, don't be afraid, don't be afraid!" Grandma Su hugged Jiang Xiao Hui tightly as if she were holding a treasure.

Jiang Xiaoqiao, standing beside her, suddenly moved and spoke, "Little sister, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to forget you! But do you know? Although I survived, Grandma only remembers you, she forgot me! She forgot that you're not the only granddaughter she has! I'm her granddaughter too! Do you know what kind of life I've lived since Mom and Dad died? I feel like I still have a relative alive, but this only relative never even glances at me. Grandma only remembers you, and even put your body in my room! How can I live? I can only force myself to forget your existence, to think that Grandma is just sick, just imagining things. I will always be her only granddaughter! Do you know, Xiaohui? Sometimes I think, if only I had died back then, how much better it would have been! Then Grandma would have remembered me!"

One forgets another, and then the other tries to forget as well! What kind of state of mind is this? Pain and sorrow cannot be truly forgotten. Even if you pretend to forget, try to forget, it will eventually linger in a corner of your heart, waiting, until one day, it will suddenly jump out and scare you and others.

"No! Stop talking!" Jiang Xiaohui pushed Grandma Su away forcefully, saying, "You betrayed me back then and didn't save me! It's too late now!"

"Little sister, don't be like this!" Jiang Xiaoqiao squatted down in front of Xiaohui, pulled her aside, and said, "What do you want Grandma to do? No matter what Grandma did, she could only save one person. She did nothing wrong! So, if you want to blame someone, blame me, okay? Don't torture Grandma anymore. Look at Grandma!"