Heart Demon Interrogation

When Lin Xiao's icy voice, devoid of even a trace of warmth, echoed across the deathly silent training ground, the hearts of every loser lying on the ground suddenly clenched. A chill rising from the depths of their souls flooded their limbs and bones like a tidal wave!

A surprise?

Looking at the familiar "kind" smile at the corner of Lin Xiao's mouth that made their scalps tingle, they would rather risk their lives fighting Third-Order Demonic Beasts again than accept this so-called "surprise"!

"Chief Instructor..."

A trainee who had lost an arm in the melee struggled up from the ground. He forced out a smile uglier than tears, his voice trembling as he said, "We... we know we were wrong... Please spare us this once..."

"Spare you?"

The smile on Lin Xiao's face grew even brighter.

He slowly walked up to the one-armed trainee, bent down, and asked softly in an almost gentle tone, "Tell me, when you step onto the battlefield in the future, when the enemy cuts off your arm, tramples you beneath their feet, and is about to take your life, will they spare you because you beg for mercy?"

The trainee's face turned pale as paper in an instant, and he could not utter a single word.

"No."

Lin Xiao answered the question for him.

He slowly straightened up, his blade-like gaze sweeping across every loser present. His voice abruptly turned harsh, like the cold wind of the Nine Netherworlds scraping pain into their bones!

"There is no mercy on the battlefield, only life and death! Mercy toward the enemy is cruelty toward yourself! Likewise, there are no words like 'beg for mercy' on my training ground!"

"You are losers! And losers must accept punishment!"

"This is the second lesson I am teaching you!"

With that, he ignored the looks of despair and terror in everyone's eyes and took item after item from his storage ring.

They were pitch-black formation flags and pieces of jade engraved with intricate runes.

"Bring every one of them to the center of the training ground." Lin Xiao gave the order to Shi Lei, Su Yue, and Monkey, who were still standing.

Though the three of them were filled with reluctance, they understood even more clearly that this was an order! An ironclad rule that could not be defied!

They exchanged glances, then silently stepped forward and dragged their companions, who had long lost all fighting spirit and resembled lambs awaiting slaughter, one by one to the center of the training ground.

Then, beneath everyone's uncertain and suspicious gazes, Lin Xiao began methodically arranging the formation flags and jade stones around them according to some profound and mysterious pattern.

Before long, a simple formation roughly thirty zhang in diameter had taken shape.

"This is... a formation?" Su Yue could not help asking quietly as she looked at the formation flags radiating an ominous aura. She had read some books on formations in the Library Pavilion, but she had never seen one so strange.

"That's right." Lin Xiao nodded, a faint unfathomable smile appearing on his face. "A little gift I specially prepared for them."

He walked to the core of the formation and set the final blood-red jade stone into a groove in the ground.

"Buzz—!"

As the blood-colored jade was embedded, the entire formation activated instantly!

Streams of pitch-black light shot into the sky from the formation flags, weaving together in midair into a massive black curtain. Like an upside-down giant bowl, it sealed all twenty-six losers tightly inside!

"Ah!"

"What is this thing?!"

"My head... it hurts!"

A wave of shrill screams instantly erupted from within the formation!

The trapped trainees clutched their heads and collapsed to the ground in agony, rolling wildly across the dirt! Extreme terror covered their faces, as though they had seen the most horrifying thing in the world!

Some frantically clawed at the ground as if trying to escape an invisible pursuit; some wildly swung their fists and feet at empty air, roaring incoherently; some even wept uncontrollably and curled up on the ground, shivering like abandoned infants!

A dance of demons!

The entire formation had become the most terrifying madhouse imaginable!

"Chief Instructor! They... what is happening to them?!"

Outside the formation, Shi Lei watched the bizarre and horrifying sight before him and felt a chill surge from the soles of his feet straight to the crown of his head!

He simply could not imagine what kind of horrific torment his companions were enduring!

"Nothing much."

Lin Xiao's expression remained terrifyingly calm.

"I merely ignited the deepest fears, weaknesses, and most unbearable parts of their hearts."

"This formation is called the Heart Demon Interrogation Array."

"It will not cause any tangible harm to the body. But it will infinitely magnify the negative emotions buried deep within a person's heart—fear, despair, jealousy, regret..."

Lin Xiao watched the figures struggling painfully within their illusions, his eyes cold.

"Didn't you learn betrayal and sneak attacks in the previous melee?"

"Fine. In this formation, you will personally experience what it feels like to be stabbed in the back by the brother you trusted most!"

"Weren't you afraid of failure, afraid of death?"

"Then in this formation, you will endure the painful cycle of being brutally tortured to death by enemies a thousand times, ten thousand times!"

"Weren't you once ashamed of your weakness and jealous of others' strength?"

"Then you will watch the people you care about most die miserably before your eyes because of your incompetence! And the enemies you hate most will soar to the heavens in a single step, trample you beneath their feet, and humiliate you at will!"

Every word Lin Xiao spoke was like demonic music from hell, making the three outside the formation shiver from head to toe!

How was this punishment?!

This was plainly the most vicious, most cruel slaughter of the mind!

"Pain of the flesh only makes people tougher. But only by overcoming the fear born in the depths of one's soul can a truly fearless heart of the strong be born!"

Lin Xiao's voice echoed clearly beside the three of them.

"This is the third lesson I am teaching them."

"Look closely. This is the fate of the weak! If you do not want to become as pitiful as them one day, then risk your lives becoming stronger!"

The heart demon interrogation continued for an entire night.

Only when the first ray of sunlight the next morning pierced the darkness and fell upon the earth did Lin Xiao slowly wave his hand and dispel the terrifying formation that had operated all night.

The black curtain silently faded away.

Revealing twenty-six figures collapsed on the ground like heaps of mud.

They were not dead.

There was not even the slightest wound on their bodies.

Yet their condition was more miserable than death.

Every face was bloodless, and their eyes were hollow and unfocused, as though every trace of soul had been sucked away, leaving only bodies like walking corpses. Their bodies still shook violently beyond their control, as if they remained trapped in last night's endless nightmare, unable to pull themselves free.

Shi Lei and the other two stared at the hellish scene before them, unable to say a word.

At last, they understood just how much weight Lin Xiao's "surprise" carried.

"Get up, all of you!"

At that moment, Lin Xiao's icy voice rang out again.

Yet this time, no one responded. The losers remained sprawled on the ground like corpses, utterly motionless.

Their spirits had been completely crushed.

"Oh? It seems last night's 'surprise' was not quite enough."

A dangerous curve rose at the corner of Lin Xiao's mouth.

He slowly walked over to the trainee nearest him. This trainee had been the most cowardly in yesterday's melee and the first to be eliminated.

"Smack!"

Without any warning, Lin Xiao viciously slapped the trainee across the face!

The crisp sound of the slap was especially piercing in the silent morning!

The trainee's face instantly swelled high, and a bright red handprint stood out in shocking clarity.

At last, a flicker passed through his hollow eyes. He slowly raised his head and looked at Lin Xiao with a blank, bewildered expression.

"Trash."

Lin Xiao looked down at him from above and lightly spoke those two words.

The trainee's body jolted violently!

"Do you think that after enduring one night of illusions, you understand pain and despair?"

Lin Xiao's voice was filled with disdain.

"Let me tell you, that was nothing more than a child's game of house!"

"True despair is watching your homeland be destroyed and your family massacred before your eyes, while you do not even have the right to avenge them!"

"True pain is having to kneel before your enemy like a dog, wagging your tail and begging for mercy just to survive!"

"True hell is having the chance to change everything, yet because of your own cowardice and laziness, being left to waste the rest of your life in endless regret!"

Every word from Lin Xiao was like the sharpest dagger, stabbing viciously into the hearts of that trainee and every loser present!

"Look at the pathetic state you're in now!"

"One mere night of illusions turned you into trash worse than dogs!"

"And you dare speak of becoming strong?! You dare fight for that illusory glory?!"

"You are nothing but cowards who do not even have the courage to face your own hearts!"

"Go crawl back into your blankets and keep dreaming your unrealistic daydreams!"

With that, Lin Xiao turned around and did not spare them another glance, as though they were nothing more than garbage unworthy of another wasted word.

Silence.

The entire training ground once again sank into a deathly stillness.

Gradually, something else began to appear in the hollow eyes of the losers sprawled on the ground.

Shame.

Anger.

And, even more so, the unwillingness awakened after being viciously slapped across the face by the cruelest reality!

Yes...

In last night's illusions, every one of them had experienced the deepest despair.

They had all watched helplessly as everything they cherished most was ruthlessly crushed!

That pain of helplessness, that regret carved into their bones, was ten thousand times more painful than any torment of the flesh!

And now Lin Xiao was telling them that all of it could become reality!

As long as they remained as cowardly as they were now!

"No..."

A hoarse, beast-like growl was squeezed out with difficulty from the trainee Lin Xiao had slapped first.

Using his uninjured arm to brace himself fiercely against the ground, his body trembling violently from exertion, he struggled up from the earth inch by inch!

His eyes had long since turned blood-red!

Burning within them was a flame called unwillingness, enough to burn everything to ashes!

"I am not trash!!"

With every ounce of strength in his body, he howled hysterically at Lin Xiao's back!

That roar seemed to be a signal.

The second, the third, the fourth...

One figure after another staggered but unwaveringly to their feet from among that field of "corpses"!

Tear streaks still hung on their faces.

Their bodies were still trembling from lingering fear.

But their eyes had changed completely!

They were the eyes of wolves reborn through nirvana after enduring hell's baptism and burying all their weakness with their own hands!

"We are not cowards!!"

Twenty-six hoarse yet resolute roars gathered into a heaven-shaking wave of sound that shot into the skies!

Looking at this group of "evil ghosts" who had finally crawled back from hell, Lin Xiao slowly turned around.

There was still no expression on his face.

Yet deep in his eyes flashed a trace of gratification that even he himself had not noticed.

"Very good."

"Since you still want to be human."

"Then prove it to me with what you do next!"

"The second phase of special training continues!"

"Today's melee begins now!!"

From that day onward, Yellow Class Nine's "hell" truly descended.

Every morning brought extreme weighted runs. Every morning, devilish strength training. Every afternoon, bloody free-for-alls. And every night, a lavish "heart demon interrogation" feast "carefully" prepared for the losers.

This brutal cycle operated day after day like a precise meat grinder, mercilessly turning without end.

And the boys and girls of Yellow Class Nine were smashed apart, reforged, smashed apart again, and reforged again within that meat grinder!

Their bodies grew stronger and stronger under the tempering of Ten Thousand Poisons Hell Soup! Their wills became tougher and tougher under the torment of the Heart Demon Interrogation Array! And their combat skills and killing instincts grew wildly in an almost savage fashion amid those endless internal melees!

They became quieter and quieter. They also became more and more dangerous!

One month later.

When another day's melee came to an end.

There were actually ten figures still standing until the very end across the training ground!

And without even realizing it, their cultivation had collectively broken through to the peak of the Body Refinement Fourth Level! Among them, Shi Lei, Su Yue, Monkey, and several others already had one foot through the gates of the Body Refinement Fifth Level!

An invisible, heart-palpitating iron-blooded Killing Intent began quietly gathering and taking shape within this young team!

They were no longer fledgling eagles.

They were a pack of wolves beginning to bare their fangs!

From atop the high cliff, Lin Xiao took in all of it.

He knew that the second phase of special training had achieved its intended results.

It was time to open the final door leading to the ultimate trial.