After passing through the Inheritance Gate, Qian Renxue stood in that golden void without immediately moving.
Her gaze swept her surroundings. There were no walls, no ground, no points of reference-only a golden radiance flowing endlessly.
She waited a moment, and an ethereal voice came from the void, as though drifting from somewhere unimaginably distant, yet also sounding directly in the depths of her mind: "The angel ninth trial begins."
Her surroundings gradually blurred, and her consciousness grew hazy along with them. Suddenly, a figure in long robes appeared. It was Bibi Dong.
Bibi Dong said nothing, merely standing there and watching her. Her gaze was exactly as Qian Renxue remembered: cold, appraising, without a trace of warmth.
She did not know why her mother looked at her that way, why she had never received a hug or a gentle word throughout her childhood, why, even when she stood right before her mother, an entire unbridgeable distance seemed to separate them.
"What do you want from me? A word of approval? A hug?"
"Do you think that if you do well enough, I'll spare you a glance? Everything you've done since you were little has been to make me look at you, hasn't it?"
"But I've never wanted to see you."
"The moment you were born, I wanted to kill you. Every minute, every second you've lived since then has been something I never wanted to see."
Qian Renxue's eyes reddened slightly. She lowered her head and remained silent for two or three breaths before raising it again. "Bibi Dong, I hate you. I hate you. You don't deserve to be my mother.
"But I won't kill you. I'll take away the power you desire most and make you taste suffering too."
The moment the words left her mouth, even