Li Jiangying hooked her foot around a nearby privacy screen and pulled it to block herself. Since she’d already proven it, there was no need to continue with someone watching. She had no special fetish for that sort of thing.
It was already night, and the room was lit. After lying in bed for half the day, her whole body ached. She didn’t want to be staring eye-to-eye with this madwoman anymore. She wanted to go outside and get some fresh air.
After tidying herself up, Li Jiangying put her hands on her hips, twisted casually twice, and strutted out, exceptionally arrogant. “Well? I told you I was telling the truth!”
The coldly alluring woman before her was shocked speechless, silently staring at her.
Li Jiangying smugly brushed past her, only to be grabbed by the arm and yanked back. Forced to stop, she paused for a moment, then suddenly remembered this woman had told her earlier… something about inspecting.
Li Jiangying’s mouth twitched. “No way, you really want to inspect? What’s there to inspect? You just refuse to give up, unwilling to face the facts!”
The woman holding her arm remained silent, dragging her straight to the bedside. Strong and unreasonably domineering, Li Jiangying had no choice but to stumble along as she was pulled, then flung onto the bed.
At that moment, two large characters filled Li Jiangying’s mind: Holy shit.
She thought, This madwoman couldn’t possibly be so infatuated with Li Jiangying that she can’t resist wanting to sleep with me, regardless of whether I’m real or fake?
Suddenly, she felt a jolt of fear at the prospect of her chastity being endangered. Li Jiangying immediately rolled across the bed, wrapping herself in the blanket and rolling to the innermost corner, leaving only her head peeking out. Warily, she watched Li Yueying. “I’d advise you to calm down. Our generational gap is too huge. I can’t betray my ancestor!”
Li Yueying was so angry she laughed. Bending one knee onto the bed, she grabbed her in one swoop and pinned her down. “What are you thinking? That a bit of looks like yours could catch This Venerable One’s eye?”
Li Jiangying thought for a moment, then reached up and removed the mask from her face, revealing Li Jiangying’s features. As expected, Li Yueying suddenly froze.
Li Jiangying looked at her with contempt. “Pervert.”
Li Yueying was trembling with rage. She suddenly raised her hand. At that instant, Li Jiangying instinctively shut her eyes, thinking this woman was about to go crazy again. She had already braced for a slap. But the pain never landed on her face.
Hesitantly, Li Jiangying cracked an eye open. She saw Li Yueying biting her lower lip hard, her chest heaving violently. The raised hand was trembling, yet it lingered, refusing to fall.
“Are you going to hit me or not?” Li Jiangying tested. “If not, put it down. Holding it up must be tiring.”
Li Yueying: “…”
She finally snorted angrily. Her hand dropped abruptly, but not onto Li Jiangying’s face. Instead, she grabbed the blanket wrapped around Li Jiangying and flipped her over with a sudden move.
Li Jiangying, like a giant caterpillar manipulated by a human, suddenly experienced the world turning upside down—face down, back to the sky.
Then… Smack! A slap landed on her pert rear.
Li Jiangying: “?!!”
While ruthlessly beating her backside, Li Yueying said majestically, “Daring to offend This Venerable One, this is the consequence!”
Smack! Smack! Smack! Her strength was immense. Even through the blanket, Li Jiangying felt a searing, burning pain.
Li Jiangying was about to explode with fury. She struggled fiercely, but unfortunately, what she’d used to protect herself had become her bindings, a trap of her own making. She couldn’t break free.
A flush of mortified heat crept up her cheeks. Struggling and twisting like a caterpillar, Li Jiangying cursed, “Li Yueying, let me go!”
Li Yueying was completely unmoved.
“Li Yueying!!!” Li Jiangying shrieked. “You’re retaliating! You’re just getting back at me for spanking you before, aren’t you! Just you wait! You better never turn back into that other you!!!”
Li Yueying’s brow twitched, but the expression on her face only grew colder. Her strikes showed no mercy. In no time, Li Jiangying’s face was flushed red, unable to squeeze out a sound. She felt the area below her waist was burning, aching, and numb all at once.
“This is… blatant… retaliation and persecution…” Li Jiangying said, voice trembling. “You…win!”
She hadn’t even spanked her this badly back then. This crazy woman… absolutely detestable!
After fiercely venting all her anger on the person who was the subject of her Heart Devil, Li Yueying finally stopped. At this point, Li Jiangying was like a dying fish, flopped on the bed motionless. Her face was completely red, her eyes glistening with moisture. Yet she clenched her jaw, neither crying nor begging for mercy.
Maybe I hit a bit hard. Li Yueying flexed her hand secretly. Actually… she hadn’t used that much force. It was just that the current Li Jiangying was far too frail!
Why had she become so frail…
Li Yueying pressed her lips. She reached out again. Li Jiangying caught the movement from the corner of her eye and was frightened. Thinking she hadn’t finished her retaliation and was ready for a second wave after resting.
“I suggest you stop while you’re ahead!” Li Jiangying’s face was contorted in fear. But this time, Li Yueying didn’t hit her again. She grabbed a corner of the blanket and yanked hard.
Li Jiangying was sent rolling uncontrollably. The swollen injury came into repeated contact with the bed. Finally, two streaks of hot tears slid from the corners of her eyes. Lying flat on her back, she felt her dignity and face draining away along with her tears.
She stared at the ceiling beam in utter hopelessness, shakily bracing her arms to turn over. But she was pressed down again by that unreasonable madwoman.
“I want to inspect,” she said, voice low and brooking no refusal.
Before Li Jiangying could figure out how she planned to inspect, she felt a chill at her front. She froze, instinctively following the source toward Li Yueying. She saw Li Yueying looking down at her, having just yanked open her lapels.
Li Jiangying: “…So this is your inspection?”
Li Yueying noticed her look and said unhappily, “What else? What did you think This Venerable One would do to you?”
Li Jiangying silently raised her hands and covered her chest.
“Move them!” Li Yueying commanded. “This Venerable One wants to see your heart.”
Li Jiangying cursed, “Dead pervert!”
By this time, Li Yueying seemed to have passed the initial phase of being provoked and stimulated. She was considerably calmer. Faced with the insult, the Moon Shadow Devil Venerable’s expression didn’t change. “Shameless woman. You were already like that just now, and now you pretend to be modest?”
Li Jiangying stared coldly up at her, an image of inviolable dignity. “Initiative and passivity are different. Does even the Moon Shadow Devil Venerable not understand this principle?”
Li Yueying: “Heh.” She smirked contemptuously, then forcibly pulled Li Jiangying’s hands away.
Furious, Li Jiangying lifted a leg to kick her. Li Yueying was as immovable as a boulder. The kick landed… Oh, ow! The other party hadn’t moved a single hair, but her own foot hurt terribly.
Gritting her teeth, Li Jiangying aggrievedly clutched her foot. Then, in that window of opportunity, the madwoman ripped open her inner garment and saw the area over her heart.
One look, and she froze. “How… how can there be nothing…”
“What nothing!” Li Jiangying snapped.
“The mark… why isn’t it there? No, this isn’t right!”
Li Jiangying quickly pulled her clothes back together. Just now angered to death by her, seeing her now in disbelief and deeply shaken, Li Jiangying couldn’t help but gloat. “What, Lord Moon Shadow Devil Venerable? Finished inspecting now? Finally willing to believe I’m not Li Jiangying?”
Li Yueying trembled slightly, then suddenly looked at her viciously. “No, you must have tricked me!”
Li Jiangying: “???! Are you even being reasonable!”
Madwomen indeed weren’t reasonable. After inspecting her heart for the mark and not getting the answer she wanted, she started going berserk, hands reaching out as if wanting to search the rest of her body.
Those blood-colored vertical pupils grew darker and deeper, as if possessed, frantic and terrifying. Looking at her own reflection in those blood-red eyes, Li Jiangying felt like a chicken with its neck cleaned, ready to be butchered any second!
Having endured one humiliation already, she had no desire to suffer an even greater one that might follow. Angrily, she raised both hands to resist.
Unfortunately, her strength was no match for Li Yueying’s. The same Li Yueying who had just been crying like a helpless infant was now personally demonstrating how she could overpower Li Jiangying, this mere chick.
Just as she was about to be stripped bare, in desperation, Li Jiangying instinctively used her most powerful move at the moment—Star Absorption Great Art!
Pure, vast Wood Element Devil Qi poured from Li Yueying’s body into Li Jiangying’s. As she absorbed it, Li Jiangying suddenly sensed something wasn’t quite right.
She had already been exposed to two Transformation Realm powerhouses, Li Xiangshui and Tao Sanyu. Logically, Li Yueying was stronger than both. The Devil Qi within her should have been even more vast and torrential.
But once she actually made contact, she realized the Devil Qi inside her was disordered. Though pure, it was nowhere near as abundant. The absorption felt sluggish and hindered, completely different from the endless torrent of Qi flooding from a Dantian.
Suddenly, she recalled what Gu Qinglin had said about the Moon Shadow Devil Venerable’s Dantian being damaged. Right, her Dantian was injured. An injury like this simply couldn’t be healed by external means and might follow her for life. Moreover, she was a Demon Cultivator. So, the Devil Qi she was absorbing now… most of it was coming from her physical body.
Although absorbing it was somewhat difficult, Li Jiangying’s resolve was firm. She was determined to show her she wasn’t so easy to bully!
The Wood Element Devil Qi entering her body quickly flowed through her meridians to her Dantian and vanished. Li Jiangying’s lips curled into a cold smile. Just as she was preparing to ramp up the power and teach her a lesson, her Dantian violently convulsed.
Horrified, Li Jiangying realized something within her Dantian was reacting with Li Yueying’s Devil Qi, throbbing and pulsing, as if coming alive.
An overwhelming vitality spread from her Dantian, connecting with Li Yueying, trembling frantically, as if it was about to break free and escape from Li Jiangying’s Dantian at any moment. She looked at the person above her in astonishment and saw Li Yueying staring back at her in equal shock.
“You!” they cried out simultaneously.
“What did you do?” Li Jiangying asked, horrified.
But Li Yueying showed a sorrowful expression. Her face twisted with anguish, carrying the pain of being hurt. She shrieked mournfully, again and again, “It’s you, Li Jiangying, it’s you! Don’t try to lie to me again! How could you be so heartless… Li Jiangying, how could you…”
The tremors in her Dantian grew more and more intense, even starting to affect Li Jiangying’s Divine Sense. She felt dizzy and lightheaded, as if something was about to burst out of her body the next second!
She hurriedly cut off the Star Absorption Great Art. Slowly, that trembling, surging sensation threatening to burst free began to subside.
Li Yueying’s eyes were rimmed red. Tears splattered onto Li Jiangying’s face. Gritting her teeth, she reached out and gripped Li Jiangying’s throat, her expression twisting further, pupils dilating with madness, her sanity clearly on the verge of abnormality, about to devolve into a frenzied lunatic consumed by hatred.
“Li Jiangying… I’m going to kill you…”
Thump!
Li Yueying paused in her strangling. Her lips parted slightly. Before the next “kill you” could leave her mouth, she collapsed headfirst onto Li Jiangying.
Cough, cough, cough, cough! Li Jiangying pried the hands off her neck, shoved the heavy Snake Demon off with effort, and sat up, coughing violently.
Her heart was pounding with terror. Holy hell, Li Yueying had truly wanted to kill her just then! She had been completely consumed by hatred, lost all reason. It was fortunate Li Jiangying reacted fast, otherwise she would have genuinely been strangled to death.
Li Jiangying didn’t need a mirror to know there were definitely two deep handprints on her neck.
Covering her throat and coughing, she looked toward the bedside. There stood a teary-eyed Li Xiangshui holding a large rock.
Li Xiangshui’s eyes were filled with accusatory tears as she glared at Li Jiangying. “This is going too far! Making me do something like this!”
Using the contract to forcibly manipulate her for the first time, and she had to make her personally knock out the woman she liked! Li Jiangying, you weren’t human!
Li Jiangying smiled bitterly and staggered to her feet. Her throat and her butt both burned with fiery pain. Hoarsely, she said, “Enough. If I’d really been strangled to death by her, you wouldn’t survive either. Cut the crap, let’s go!”
While this madwoman was unconscious, escaping was the priority!
She had figured it out. Compared to her own life, everything else was meaningless! Whatever love-hate entanglements Li Yueying and the original Li Jiangying had, whatever stand-in drama—she wanted no part of it anymore!
Heartbroken, Li Xiangshui glanced at the unconscious Li Yueying sprawled on the bed, a rustic little bundle still strapped to her own back. As a slave, she couldn’t defy her master. All she could do was toss the rock aside and run out the door with Li Jiangying.
They fled outside, and Li Xiangshui noticed Li Jiangying walking with a limp. Puzzled, she asked, “What happened to you? Did she break your leg?”
