Life is a series of choices.
Wang Sandong once again stood at the crossroads of fate.
‘Should I take the risk and attack Yuan Di now, or continue lying low and wait for a better opportunity to turn things around?’
‘Compared to last time, my cultivation has improved a bit, and my primordial spirit is stronger. The shadow created by Soul Snatching will also be stronger. Last time, after using Soul Snatching to kill Chen Youde, I used it on Yuan Di again while already weakened. The speed and force would have been inferior.’
‘If I strike Yuan Di first this time…’
‘Compared to Chen Youde, the on-guard demon disciple A Yong is stronger, so Yuan Di should be more seriously injured than last time.’
‘No matter how I calculate it, my chances are considerable.’
‘Even without full certainty, how can everything be a sure thing in this world? Risk and benefit always involve trade-offs.’
‘Opportunity knocks but once—time waits for no one!’
‘A Yong is right.’
‘But…’
‘Being cautious isn’t wrong either.’
‘So…’
A flash of inspiration struck Wang Sandong.
Looking at Yuan Di, she asked A Yong, “A Yong, you said she… has no power to resist at all?”
As she spoke, her eyes narrowed slightly.
“Yes.”
A Yong replied, only then noticing something odd about Wang Sandong’s expression.
“I see…”
Wang Sandong got off the bed and slowly approached Yuan Di barefoot.
Yuan Di still sat on the soft chair, chin raised as she looked at Wang Sandong.
The faint, enigmatic smile on her face grew more pronounced, and the fingers hidden in her sleeves trembled slightly.
“In other words…”
Wang Sandong reached out and cupped Yuan Di’s face, her tone teasing.
“I can do anything to her, and she can’t fight back?”
Yuan Di’s right eyelid twitched twice.
As the saying goes: left eye twitches for fortune, right eye twitches for disaster…
‘The hand hidden in the sleeve—fingers together, ready to unleash a Soul Severing Slash at any moment.’
‘A blade formed by a hand strike—that is the Soul Severing Slash.’
‘It can attack the primordial spirit and is also the bane of all primordial spirit attacks.’
‘Yuan Di knew she was already at the end of her rope.’
‘If she were to attack Wang Sandong, she would have to go all out in one blow.’
‘With the two of them so close right now, if she struck, the Soul Severing Slash would not only destroy the shadow but also kill Wang Sandong!’
‘She would have to kill Wang Sandong along with it.’
‘Otherwise…’
‘If Wang Sandong didn’t pass out from pain like last time and used Soul Snatching again, she really would have no strength to resist.’
‘But if she killed Wang Sandong, her sixteen years of waiting would be wasted.’
‘So, unless absolutely necessary, she cannot strike.’
‘Once she does, it must be a killing blow!’
“Dong’er… you need to be decisive in killing.”
A Yong, standing by the bed, warned Wang Sandong cautiously.
He sensed the ambiguity in Wang Sandong’s tone and wanted to look back, but couldn’t.
Everything below his head was sealed by demonic qi, making it impossible to turn around.
A Yong heard Wang Sandong’s soft laugh.
Then there was no more sound.
Involuntarily, all sorts of inappropriate images surfaced in A Yong’s mind.
His mouth twitched, and his expression turned strange.
Although both Yuan Di and Wang Sandong were stunningly beautiful, they were still two men.
The image of two handsome men entwined made A Yong extremely uncomfortable—even if it was just his imagination.
Suddenly, a soft moan came.
No one knew who made the sound.
‘Though disgusting, it was also very alluring…’
‘Just that single sound made my bones feel like jelly.’
‘The less I see, the more my mind wanders.’
All kinds of outrageous images filled his mind.
A Yong found himself feeling a bit dry-mouthed.
‘This isn’t right.’
‘I’m not a lecher, and I have no interest in a scene with two men. Why am I getting so aroused?’
‘How strange!’
‘And besides…’
‘At a life-or-death moment like this, how can I let my mind wander!’
A Yong immediately became alert and rationally drove away those chaotic thoughts.
Once calm, he realized the danger.
‘If Wang Sandong and Yuan Di take their relationship a step further, how can I survive today?’
“Yuan Di is nearly two hundred years old, yet has no family or friends. Do you know why, Dong’er…”
A Yong suddenly spoke, his tone trying to sound sincere.
At this critical moment, he asked a seemingly irrelevant question.
When he paused and Wang Sandong didn’t press for an answer, A Yong’s heart tightened, and he quickly answered himself:
“Because Yuan Di is cold-hearted and isolated.”
He believed Wang Sandong was smart enough to understand the implication.
But…
What if Wang Sandong wasn’t smart enough?
A Yong felt uneasy and added:
“A cold-hearted and isolated person will never develop feelings for anyone. If you don’t kill her today, you will fall victim to her hand someday…”
The moment he finished speaking, A Yong’s expression changed.
He felt something pierce through his back.
Lowering his gaze, A Yong looked at his chest.
A black hand, formed from demonic qi, seemed to be growing out of his chest.
A Yong’s lips trembled.
He wanted to turn back but still couldn’t.
He struggled to inhale, forced open his mouth, and let out his final question:
“Why?”
Behind him, the shadow expressionlessly began to drain his primordial spirit power.
Wang Sandong closed her eyes in pain and determination, as if she had made a difficult decision.
When the shadow returned to her body, the demonic qi on A Yong dissipated, and his tall frame collapsed softly.
Wang Sandong looked exhausted.
She pulled her hand back from inside Yuan Di’s clothes, crouched beside A Yong’s corpse, looked at his still-shocked face, and reached out to close his eyes.
‘So tired.’
‘Using Soul Snatching took a heavy toll, and with the influx of memories, it weighed on my spirit, making the fatigue even greater.’
‘And I’m still a little shaken.’
‘Good thing I was cautious enough to carefully check and analyze before making a move on Yuan Di.’
‘I confirmed Yuan Di was male, and also that he wasn’t completely powerless.’
‘A man truly weakened to the extreme wouldn’t have a physical “reaction”; his pulse, though weak, was steady; his pupils showed no signs of dilation…’
‘That was enough to prove Yuan Di wasn’t defenseless.’
‘He should have at least one more Soul Severing Slash left.’
‘If it’s only one…’
‘Then I can’t take it.’
‘Wang Sandong believed that Yuan Di would definitely seize the chance to strike when she let her guard down.’
‘Opportunities are sometimes just bait on a hook.’
‘Life is a series of choices.’
‘Last time, Wang Sandong chose wrong.’
‘This time, she cannot choose wrong.’
Lying back down on the bed, Wang Sandong closed her eyes, sighed slowly, and said softly,
“Boring…”
As if she had lost interest in life, looking dejected and lazy.
‘To survive, I had to kill the man I “loved”…’
‘With that kind of mental state, is this act passable?’
‘Wang Sandong wasn’t sure.’
‘She didn’t know if her acting was too obvious or exaggerated, or if she needed some sorrowful words as “annotation.”‘
‘Forget it.’
‘Too many words lead to mistakes.’
‘This is just right.’
‘As for her own mental state and why she did this…’
‘Let Yuan Di figure it out herself.’
‘Dealing with a smart person, excessive “annotations” only reveal what you’re trying to hide.’
A moment later, after Yuan Di left and used the Corpse Driving technique to take A Yong away, Wang Sandong opened her eyes and gasped heavily.
‘That was so close!’
‘I almost couldn’t hold back and attacked.’
‘The result would have been disastrous.’
She reached for the straw paper on the bedside and vigorously wiped her hands.
‘I feel like my hands are dirty.’
‘Dirty hands are a small matter. In the coming days, I still have to act out the sorrow and loneliness of “having no choice but to kill the one I love” — that’s crucial.’
‘Luckily, Wang Sandong’s acting skills aren’t bad, and pretending to be despondent isn’t hard.’
‘I absolutely cannot fail when I’m ninety percent of the way there.’
‘If Yuan Di becomes suspicious, everything I’ve done so far will be wasted.’
However, acting wasn’t as simple as Wang Sandong had imagined.
Because pretending to be despondent for too long is also mentally draining.
As Wang Sandong’s mood grew worse, she happened to hear a rumor:
The song girl Yuan Yuan from Anzhi Courtyard said that on the night the new cook disappeared, a lot of gold and silver went missing from the courtyard.
The words seemed ordinary, but were actually extremely vicious!
After carefully pondering, Wang Sandong became furious.
She pointed at Yuan Di’s nose, running through a list of profanities in her mind, but in the end, she just snapped,
“You kill him and tarnish his name. And now you’re ruining my reputation? Is that interesting?”
Yuan Di looked indifferent and asked,
“What do you mean by that?”
“What do I mean…”
Annoyed by Yuan Di’s feigned ignorance, Wang Sandong didn’t even want to say half a word.
“Fine, give me another dose of that secret medicine you gave me last time.”
“What secret medicine?”
“The one you gave me at Fengyue Tower last time.”
Thinking back to when she took the medicine and only then discovered she had transformed, and failed to take down Xing Luo, Wang Sandong felt full of regret.
Yuan Di thought for a moment, then suddenly understood.
As she scrutinized Wang Sandong, she recalled the ordeal of that night she was severely injured, and couldn’t help but wonder:
‘Does Wang Sandong plan to do something to me?’
“What are you up to?”
Yuan Di asked warily.
“What do you think?”
Wang Sandong looked at Yuan Di with a flirtatious gaze, then reached out to pinch her cheek.
Suddenly, Yuan Di moved, precisely catching Wang Sandong’s wrist.
A hint of demonic qi flickered on her fingers, and Wang Sandong’s face instantly turned pale as she cried out in pain.
“Ow ow ow! I was wrong, wrong, wrong!”
Perhaps by instinct, Yuan Di felt Wang Sandong was up to no good, but still asked curiously,
“What?”
Yuan Di snorted and released Wang Sandong’s wrist.
Wang Sandong rubbed her arm with a pained expression.
An idea struck her, and she said,
“Oh right, there’s something I forgot to tell you.”
“What?”
Wang Sandong glanced toward Zheng Xiao’s room, then leaned in close to Yuan Di’s face mysteriously.
“Tonight…”
Suddenly, she gave Yuan Di a big kiss right on the cheek.
Then, before she even straightened up, she shouted,
“Xiao Xiao!”
Though her voice was weak, it was loud enough for Zheng Xiao to hear.
Zheng Xiao pushed open her door, looked over, and asked,
“What is it?”
“Come, walk with me to the back garden.”
Wang Sandong clasped her hands behind her back and walked toward Zheng Xiao.
Yuan Di watched their retreating figures with a calm expression.
Once they were out of sight, she muttered softly,
“Immature.”
Yuan Di had already foreseen Wang Sandong’s “ambush” and could have dodged.
She hadn’t dodged because she simply didn’t care.
Anyway, her lips had already been kissed twice; a kiss on the cheek was no big deal.
‘Ambushing me like that…’
‘How childish!’
Thinking of Wang Sandong’s childish behavior, Yuan Di couldn’t help but let out a mocking smile.
But then she remembered the outrageous things Wang Sandong had done that night, and the smile vanished.
‘She knew that back then, Wang Sandong must have been considering whether to ambush her.’
‘That attack had been completely different from this “ambush.”‘
‘That one would have been lethal.’
‘That little wretch!’
‘Though she seems harmless, she’s actually a ruthless person.’
‘I must be extremely cautious.’
‘Especially when she kisses me.’
‘Truly: honey in the mouth, a dagger in the belly.’