Chapter 100: Five-Eyed Xiao Xian (Part 2): My Wish to Slay Gods Has Never Changed Part 1

Shang Shan took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. She raised her palm to her chest, concentrated her energy, and slammed it onto the eggshell. Fine cracks spread from the point of impact toward the surroundings, gradually peeling away, falling, and shattering.

The seemingly thick eggshell was actually only a thin layer, with a large empty space inside. As the breach grew larger, the light from the formation entered it, outlining the woman seated primly within using cold, slick strokes.

Fragments fell to the ground. The woman kept her head slightly lowered, eyes closed, hands folded on her lap, dressed in a gray, worn robe with frayed elbows. Her forehead bore the familiar Godslaying inscription, but there were no extra eyes at her brow or under her eyes. Compared to Xiao Xian, whom they had seen in the Heavenly Palace earlier that day, she looked several years younger. Compared to Little Baldy in the bottle, she was much older.

Was she also Qi Xiaoxiao? Judging by her age, she should have been around the time she first broke into the Heavenly Palace. Why was she here?

This time, without the Clay Little Demons to remind her, Shang Shan pulled out the bottle containing Little Baldy. The fine porcelain surface was also marred by spiderweb-like cracks from impacts, similar to the eggshell’s initial fracturing. She was about to call Little Baldy out when the cracks suddenly widened and shattered. Little Baldy floated out of the bottle’s mouth in a panic. “What happened?”

Penguin Tan’s gaze sharpened as she seized the moment. She moved her claws, hopped onto the head of a Clay Little Demon for leverage, flipped over, and landed on the sleeping Qi Xiaoxiao’s shoulder. With one claw, she kicked off and plopped her butt right down on top of her head.

Although she couldn’t speak, Mu Qian Tan’s sign language was masterful. She waved at Little Baldy, both wingtips pointing emphatically at the woman under her butt, signaling her to hurry over and wake this woman up.

Push the plot forward! Speed it up!

Shang Shan paled in shock and hurriedly picked her up. “Master, you can’t sit on someone else’s head! It’s too rude!”

Can’t? Why not? Dissatisfied, Mu Qian Tan slapped her hand away, stepped on her foot, climbed back up along her shoulder, and planted herself on top of her head again. With a fluffy, heavy weight perched there, Shang Shan fell silent for a moment before reaching up to steady her. She decided not to nod or shake her head for the time being.

Little Baldy had just arrived in this place and saw gloomy light filling the room, dark red hues everywhere. She felt a bit timid. But when she turned her head and spotted the girl standing nearby—dressed in ragged beggar clothes, covered in bloodstains, yet smiling brightly—she felt somewhat reassured.

Clasping her hands over her mouth, Little Baldy cautiously approached the woman with closed eyes, who bore a striking resemblance to herself. Her eyeballs shifted slightly as she examined the woman’s face inch by inch. Her lips moved. “Could it be…”

Little Baldy reached out a hand and gently touched the woman’s forehead with her fingertip, tracing the Godslaying inscription. “Could you be that friend who made a promise with me to go to the Heavenly Palace and slay gods?”

Her words drifted down, and the woman abruptly opened her eyes!

The sudden movement didn’t scare Little Baldy away. Instead, those eyes drew her in. One eye swiveled normally, but the other socket was empty, exposing a bloody red hollow laced with veins, as if it had been cruelly gouged out.

Shang Shan grew slightly wary, fearing a sudden attack. But the woman made no move. She simply stared at Little Baldy, now floating right in front of her, with her remaining eye. Her voice was hoarse, as if she hadn’t spoken in many years. “Are you here… to fulfill the promise?”

Little Baldy said, “Yes.”

No further words passed between them, yet their gazes conveyed everything. The woman lowered her eyes and smiled, her voice trembling. “Finally, you’re here.”

She had watched her family perish under the Three Venerables’ heavenly punishment lightning. Qi Xiaoxiao was in agony and tried several times to join them in death.

She tried poison but vomited all night without dying. She tried hanging, but the rope snapped. She wanted to slit her wrists, but the only knife in her charred home was rusted. One night, she climbed to the riverbank, washed her face clean, and prepared to drown herself. But in the river’s reflection, she saw the dome enclosing Pot City.

Stars twinkled, the night sky so beautiful, just like the countless nights before when Pot City’s people and the Qi family could simply look up and see it.

They lived on land passed down from their ancestors, yet the gods they themselves had invited drove them to this point—living in constant fear. Meanwhile, the Three Venerables reveled in luxury and wielded absolute power over life and death. Why?

Qi Xiaoxiao washed her face again and staggered back home. The house struck by heavenly lightning was already rubble. She could only dig out the family’s mixed, shattered ashes.

She dug barehanded for two days, borrowed money, and gave them a proper burial. Then she sharpened the knife she had meant for suicide on a riverside stone. Facing the Starry Night River, she shaved off all her hair and carved the Godslaying inscription stroke by stroke into her forehead.

Tears and blood mingled as they slid down her cheeks and dripped into the water, sending ripples spreading outward. From then on, the starry night was forever marred.

After the wound on her forehead healed, she threw herself into brutal cultivation with no guidance from predecessors—everything by trial and error. Her hands grew calluses from gripping the knife. In the depths of winter, she trained in the snow. Her meals were dry, rock-hard buns stuffed in her clothes along with a couple of pickled vegetables. She still had to repay the debt for burying her family’s bones.

Under the Three Venerables’ rule, many couldn’t survive, but most ordinary folk could grit their teeth and get by. They couldn’t empathize with her and didn’t believe a little girl like her could accomplish anything. The other cultivators who also wanted to ascend to the heavens lacked her exact experiences—their fury wasn’t fierce enough to risk their lives. They couldn’t keep pace with her.

Under prolonged pressure and isolation, Qi Xiaoxiao vented her hatred and resentment by talking to her reflection in the river water.

Day after day, that reflection grew more unfamiliar—gaunt, savage, farther and farther from the child she remembered. She couldn’t stand it and would shatter the surface with a palm strike, then lose herself in dreams where her family still lived.

One time, after breaking the surface, the calmed water reflected a new shadow: innocent, lively, pure, and cheerful. It was her before the family tragedy—the carefree girl who also bore the Godslaying inscription but was shielded by her family.

She missed that time so much that she no longer cared if it was an illusion. She lay on the bank and spoke to the girl in the water with utter sincerity. Unexpectedly, the girl responded.

Qi Xiaoxiao felt deeply comforted and wept into her hands. In the silent nights, she finally had someone who understood her feelings.

When cultivation exhausted her, she would come and chat with the girl, sometimes all night. Her mind gradually blurred; she came to believe the reflection was another person. The girl chattered about childhood hobbies, like drinking pepper soup from the Chen Family stall when her stomach hurt. She spoke of her loving mother and kind father. It all sounded so enviable, steeling Qi Xiaoxiao’s resolve to slay the gods.

She had to protect this child’s innocence, ensuring the Three Venerables never had a chance to harm her or her family.

One day, she noticed the Godslaying inscription on the girl’s forehead and realized they shared the same wish. Under the starry sky, they made a promise to go to the Heavenly Palace together.

And so, with her reflection’s companionship, Qi Xiaoxiao endured ten years and completed that arduous path.

Throughout those ten years, thunder never ceased. How many more victims? Her gaze pierced through the layered rock toward the Three Venerables. The scar on her forehead throbbed at night. Killing them was her lifelong wish—and now, the moment to fulfill it had arrived.

Unlike the hundreds of cultivators marching in grand formation, Qi Xiaoxiao planned to go only with her friend. She sharpened her knife all night, then sought the riverbank, but the girl was gone from the reflection.

The clear water now showed only a mature woman gripping a knife, her face full of malice.

Ten years later, she barely recognized her own face.

Even without the promise fulfilled, Qi Xiaoxiao scaled the Heavenly Palace and caught the Three Venerables off guard. The battle was still brutally fierce, lasting three full days and nights. In an unknown corner of the dome, blood and spiritual light splashed together. In the end, she collapsed heavily wounded, having paid with one eye and one arm for victory.

A gentle breeze blew. Covered in wounds, Qi Xiaoxiao knelt on the ground, a river of blood flowing beneath her. With her remaining eye, she peered through a circular hole at the full view of Pot City below.

In that instant, she suddenly understood the Three Venerables. From such a vantage, looking down on ant-like mortals whose lives were entirely in your hands, whose possessions you could seize at will—how could one not grow arrogant?

Also, she didn’t want to die.

Her cultivation path was self-forged, far from any orthodox way. On the brink of death, raw survival instinct drew her gaze to the corpses of those cultivators, their spiritual power not yet dispersed.

When consciousness returned, she stood once more, hands and body drenched in blood, a sticky taste in her mouth. She reached in with a finger and felt shreds of flesh between her teeth, along with chunks she hadn’t yet swallowed.

She had survived.

At her brow and under her eyes, three eyes not her own opened. Greed welled up in her heart, along with insatiable desires. She loved the feeling of standing high and overlooking the mortal world. She craved worship and offerings.