Your Conscience

Faced with Nan Feng's shamelessness, Bibi Dong fell silent.

Regardless of Nan Feng's true motives, his words had indeed hit the nail on the head.

She truly lacked loyal confidants within Martial Soul Hall. If she were to encounter resistance, she could not personally step in to kill everyone; that would be beneath her station and easily incite public outrage.

"But..."

Bibi Dong still felt something was amiss. "Two of me appearing at the same time—this is too inconceivable. How am I to explain this to the Elder Hall? How can I make the world believe it?"

"Explain?"

Nan Feng looked at Bibi Dong with an innocent expression.

"Why would you need to explain?"

"You are the Pope! Who do you need to answer to?"

"When the time comes and people ask, you just spread your hands and say with a helpless look—"

Nan Feng instantly channeled his inner actor, adopting the same cold and helpless expression as Bibi Dong, and said:

"Alas, The Emperor is also in despair. Ever since that last incident of cultivation deviation, this Eighth Soul Skill has mutated. This clone has a mind of its own and runs around everywhere; The Emperor cannot control her either!"

"She is she, and I am I. What she does is her own business—how does it concern The Emperor? The Emperor is a victim as well!"

Having said that, Nan Feng returned to his own voice and chuckled:

"See? Isn't that a perfect excuse?"

"Since it is a mutated soul skill, it is an act of God. Since it is uncontrollable, what does her going mad, beating people, or even killing them have to do with you, the benevolent Pope?"

"..."

Bibi Dong looked at the guy before her, who wore her own face yet smiled like an old fox, and felt a chill run down her spine.

This tactic of "I can't control myself" was the absolute pinnacle of rascality.

It allowed her to use the clone to get things done while keeping her true self completely clean.

She could even use this "uncontrollable" clone to probe and purge the factions that opposed her.

If anyone dared to strike the clone, it would be an attack on the Pope.

If the clone beat someone up, it would simply be "soul skill malfunction, a pure accident."

"Nan Feng..."

Bibi Dong looked at the man before her, wearing her face but filled with malice. The faint pleasure she had felt from her successful revenge was rapidly receding, replaced by a bone-chilling coldness.

This plan was too perfect.

But it was precisely because it was so perfect that it terrified her.

"What? Are you conquered by The Emperor's wisdom?" Seeing Bibi Dong staring at him in a daze, Nan Feng couldn't help but raise an eyebrow. "Do you suddenly feel that having a strategist like me by your side is the greatest fortune of your life?"

"Fortune?" Bibi Dong sneered. "Perhaps. But I feel more like it is some kind of slow-acting poison."

She slowly stood up, her gaze locked firmly onto Nan Feng's eyes.

"Nan Feng, can you tell me, was this truly an impromptu idea of yours?"

"What do you mean?" Nan Feng blinked.

"From the very beginning..."

Bibi Dong stepped closer, her tone icy. "From the moment you took the initiative to offer yourself for sacrifice in Death Canyon, was all of this within your calculations?"

"At that time, I thought you were just trying to survive. I thought I was the hunter in control of everything, and you were merely my prey, my soul ring."

"And the result?"

Bibi Dong pointed at her own chest. "You didn't just survive; you merged into my Death Spider Emperor martial soul and seized half of my body's control. That was the first step."

"Back in Martial Soul City, you used the matter of Qian Xunji to create panic, even going so far as to provoke me, forcing me to agree to sign the Soul Blood Pact with you for the sake of revenge, completely merging your soul origin into mine. That was the second step."

"Now, you have proposed this so-called clone plan, allowing yourself to appear openly in the light, even possessing the power to enforce the law."

"Martial soul, soul, and now identity..."

"You are eroding my defenses step by step, dragging me into your rhythm."

"I truly feel like a butterfly caught in a spider's web; no matter how I struggle, I am only sinking deeper along the threads you have woven!"

"The first time was the martial soul, the second was the soul, so what comes next?"

Bibi Dong leaned in close to Nan Feng's face, her eyes filled with wariness and interrogation. "What else do you want? To completely possess me? Or to turn me into your puppet?"

"Although I hate to admit it, I must say..."

"Nan Feng, I am afraid of you."

Faced with Bibi Dong's rapid-fire questioning and her undisguised fear and hostility, the playful look on Nan Feng's face finally faded a little.

He sighed, putting on an expression of deep heartbreak.

"Dong'er, the things you say are truly like stabbing a knife into my heart!"

Nan Feng controlled the Spider Emperor Avatar, his face full of grievance as he said, "We are partners of one mind and one body, sharing life and death! How could you think of me so darkly?"

"I admit, I used some methods, and I did have a few little schemes. But what was all that for?"

"To survive!"

"I want to live, and you want to live. You want revenge, and I want to become a god. Our goals are aligned, and our interests are bound together!"

"Every calculation I made before, wasn't it for our safety? Wasn't it to clean up your messes?"

"Everything I have done, heaven and earth can bear witness, the sun and moon can attest!"

As he spoke with rising emotion, Nan Feng's expression turned solemn, his tone ringing with conviction, "My loyalty to you is as clear as the sun and moon! I can place my hand on my conscience and swear that I have never once thought of harming you!"

Saying this, to demonstrate his sincerity, he reached out and placed his hand solemnly upon "his own" conscience.

However...

Because he was currently an avatar and Bibi Dong was the original body, although their souls were connected, they were still two individuals standing face-to-face.

Consequently, Nan Feng's hand, which was meant to be "touching his conscience," landed naturally and precisely upon that breathtaking softness of Bibi Dong's original body.

Moreover, as if to confirm whether his "conscience" was beating, he subconsciously gave it a squeeze.

"Hmm, warm, and still beating. See? My conscience is red-blooded," Nan Feng said with a face full of righteousness.

The air froze in that instant.

Bibi Dong looked down at the claw that was currently covering her chest and still applying a slight amount of pressure.

The veins on her forehead began to bulge one by one, as if they had a life of their own.

"Nan Feng..."

"Hmm?"

"Take your claw... off me right now!!!"

Saintess Hall, back garden.

"Bang!"

Accompanied by the sound of the bedchamber doors slamming shut, Nan Feng controlled the Spider Emperor Avatar, rubbing his nose at the entrance like a scoundrel who had been kicked out.

"Tsk, so stingy."

Nan Feng curled his lip, showing no self-awareness of having been thrown out, "It was just a touch of the conscience, is it worth getting this angry over? Or does your conscience not grow there?"

However, despite being kicked out, Nan Feng was in quite a good mood.

Bibi Dong had not immediately dispelled the soul skill, nor had she forcibly shoved him back into the Sea of Consciousness, which meant—she had acquiesced.

She had agreed to the plan of "going crazy separately."