"Now I understand! I'd heard rumors long ago that the Mysterious Sky Sect was once the greatest sect in this world. Its downfall seemed to be connected to the legendary Devil Race. Looking at things now, that may well be true! The Mysterious Sky Palace is likely suppressing some terrifying Demonic Beast!"
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Leng Weiyue said slowly, her expression grave.
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"The Devil Race?!"
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Li Qingshan's expression changed. According to legend, the Devil Race fed on humans, and in ancient times, they had fought a great war against humanity.
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Was the surging Devil Qi inside the Mysterious Sky Palace connected to the Devil Race?
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Li Qingshan immediately thought of the Purple Gold Gourd. From the looks of it, the gourd might have been a treasure used to suppress a Demonic Beast. After he took it, the Devil Qi had erupted and the beast had emerged.
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Though he was the one who had caused all this, Li Qingshan didn't regret it in the slightest.
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"Fairy Ye, how about we put our grievances aside for now? With the Devil Qi erupting, I doubt any of us will get away!"
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Leng Weiyue smiled faintly at Ye Lingshuang.
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"Fine."
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Ye Lingshuang replied coolly.
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She glanced at Li Qingshan with some wariness and puzzlement. The man before her gave her an oddly familiar feeling.
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But she didn't think she had ever met him.
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After speaking, the three of them tacitly took up positions at separate corners, forming a triangle. They kept an eye on each other while jointly watching the Devil Qi slowly seeping in.
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At that moment, the overwhelming demonic calamity outside was the greatest threat. Their personal grievances would have to wait.
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An eerie silence fell over the treasury. Only the distant rumbling and demonic howls from outside broke it, along with the faint hissing of wisps of black Devil Qi seeping in.
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But the Devil Qi was far more terrifying than they had imagined!
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Though the Devil Qi seeping in was thin, it was unbelievably pure. It seemed able to ignore the defenses of the flesh and directly corrupt a cultivator's soul and mind!
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It also carried a terrifying power that bewitched the heart and magnified every negative emotion!
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All three of them turned pale almost at once. They immediately sat cross-legged, circulated their techniques, and guarded their minds against the Devil Qi's corruption.
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Li Qingshan felt illusions spring up in his mind: regret over wasting a century, longing for the immortal path, fear over possessing precious treasures, the bloodlust left by killing... Every inner demon he had buried deep inside was stirred and magnified, battering at his Dao heart!
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He hurriedly circulated the Longevity True Art. His emerald-green Longevity True Essence, brimming with vitality, flowed through his body as he tried to dispel the Devil Qi. At the same time, he swallowed a top-grade spirit pill that cleared the mind and steadied the spirit.
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But his cultivation was only at the Foundation Establishment Early Stage. Faced with this terrifying Devil Qi, which seemed to have been left behind since ancient times, even the finest technique and pills were barely enough.
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His face quickly turned pale, veins bulged across his forehead, and his body trembled faintly. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth again. The combined assault of inner demons and Devil Qi had clearly injured him internally.
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Ye Lingshuang and Leng Weiyue were faring somewhat better. Their cultivation was profound and their foundations solid, but even they were struggling.
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Cold Sword Qi swirled around Ye Lingshuang as she tried to cut down her inner demons. Yet her brows were knitted tight, and a look of struggle appeared on her icy face, as if she were wrestling with some intense emotion within. The aura around her fluctuated unsteadily.
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Leng Weiyue's Heavenly Devil Art seemed to make her somewhat resistant to the Devil Qi. But instead, it stirred up her inner demons on an even deeper level.
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Her body trembled faintly. Beneath her black veil, her cheeks flushed an unnatural red, and her breathing grew ragged. Her usually icy eyes shimmered with tears, their expression impossibly complex—pain, struggle, and an irrepressible stirring of desire.
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The thin Devil Qi seemed like invisible tentacles. It not only corrupted their Dao hearts but also strangely teased their most primal instincts, magnifying the desires hidden deep within.
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Gradually, the spiritual energy around all three of them grew chaotic, and an unusual atmosphere filled the air.
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Suddenly, Leng Weiyue let out a stifled, quavering moan. She snapped her eyes open, now misty and unfocused, stripped of her usual coldness and reason.
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Almost instinctively, she looked toward Li Qingshan, who was closest to her and struggling just as desperately.
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At nearly the same moment, Ye Lingshuang opened her eyes too. The coolness was gone from them, replaced by a bewilderment and panic she had never felt before. A flush spread across her snowy skin, and she instinctively looked toward the only man present, her expression impossible to read.
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Devil Qi swirled, inner demons ran rampant, and the levee of reason seemed so fragile before primal instinct.
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The next moment, with the Devil Qi spurring them on and their inner demons in control, the two graceful figures staggered almost involuntarily toward Li Qingshan, who sat in the middle, his consciousness already growing hazy.
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The sound of fabric ripping rang sharply through the silent ruins.
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In his daze, Li Qingshan felt two burning, supple bodies entwine with him. Cool and warm sensations mingled, while a rich fragrance mixed with the faint smell of blood, assailing the last of his reason.
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He wanted to resist, but his grievous injuries and the Devil Qi left his limbs weak and powerless.
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Worse still, the pure, surging Yin Essence within them, along with a strange energy originating from the Heavenly Devil Art and a special sword-body constitution, flowed uncontrollably into him through their physical contact.
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This foreign energy abruptly met the pure Supreme Yang Longevity True Essence produced by his cultivation of the Longevity True Art!
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Yin and Yang converged, dragon and tiger joined!
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An unexpected change occurred!
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Under the influence of the Devil Qi, that bizarre "catalyst," the three utterly different energies—which should have clashed—began to meld and circulate in a miraculous way, forming a brief, perfect balance!
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This newly formed energy, gentle yet powerful, quickly swept through the three of them. Wherever it passed, the raging Devil Qi melted like snow, their restless inner demons gradually quieted, and their injuries healed at an astonishing rate.
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At the same time, the auras of all three began to surge.
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Li Qingshan benefited the most. His cultivation began rising from the Foundation Establishment Early Stage toward the Foundation Establishment Middle Stage!
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In the ruins, their auras intertwined beneath a hazy play of light and shadow.
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An accident born of a demonic calamity and driven by instinct had, through sheer happenstance, turned into a rare and extraordinary dual cultivation perfectly attuned to the Yin-Yang Great Dao.
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Time seemed to lose all meaning.
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After an unknown while, the Devil Qi seeping in gradually weakened, and the chaos outside seemed to fade. The three in the treasury came to their senses almost at the same time.
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The circulation of energy slowly subsided.
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Li Qingshan was the first to fully wake. Feeling that his injuries had completely healed and his Longevity True Essence had grown even purer and more abundant—and that his cultivation had even broken through to the Foundation Establishment Middle Stage—he was overcome with excitement!
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But the next moment, when he felt two naked, warm, soft bodies in his arms, he froze as if struck by lightning, his mind going blank.
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Then Ye Lingshuang and Leng Weiyue snapped awake as well, immediately realizing what had happened.
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"Ah!"
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Two short cries, filled with mingled shock and embarrassment, rang out at once!
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The next moment, a mighty spiritual pressure erupted!
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Ye Lingshuang's face turned crimson. Her eyes brimmed with unprecedented anger, panic, and a trace of murderous intent. She shoved Li Qingshan away in a flash, and her green robes instantly wrapped around her shapely figure. The Autumn Water Longsword was already in her hand, its tip trembling as she pointed it at Li Qingshan, too furious to speak.
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Leng Weiyue moved just as swiftly. Her black veil once again covered her face, though her exposed earlobes and neck remained bright red.
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Her eyes had regained their coldness, and she fixed them on Li Qingshan, brimming with fury, humiliation, and an extremely complicated uncertainty that seemed almost tangible.
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Devil Qi surged around her. She was clearly on the verge of erupting too.
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"Fairies, it was a misunderstanding! All of it was a misunderstanding..."
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Li Qingshan hurriedly pulled out spare clothes and threw them on. Facing two women far more powerful than him, both clearly enraged, he could only suffer in silence as cold sweat instantly soaked his back.
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He tried to explain, but realized that anything he said would sound utterly feeble at that moment.
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The atmosphere in the treasury plunged from its earlier eerie, suggestive warmth to freezing cold in an instant, thick with unbearable awkwardness and humiliation.
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