After Transmigrating, I Died of Depression Without My Phone - Chapter 91.2
Hua Lanye smirked but said nothing, his eyes gleaming with mockery.
Long Xiang hadn’t expected him to answer. After asking, she summoned an ice spike in her hand and drove it mercilessly into his body.
Hua Lanye coughed up blood, his eyes flashing with a strange, unreadable expression as he stared at her.
“What are you and the Monster Lord up to? Where did Bai Qingyin go?” Long Xiang demanded, her voice cold and deliberate. “What other tricks are waiting for me? How will Bai Fusheng and Bai Qingyin return?”
If she could figure out their plans and how Bai Qingyin was planning to come back, then she might be able to find clues leading to Beiting Xue’s whereabouts.
The Bai mother and son had someone working for them in the mortal realm, and Beiting Xue had her.
She wouldn’t lose to the Monster Lord.
Asking the Monster Lord directly might’ve been the simpler route—he was easier to fool—but now he was on guard, and she doubted he’d be forthcoming. Besides, if he were still loyal to Bai Qingyin, the real key likely lay in Hua Lanye’s hands. That was why the Monster Lord had remained so humble before him.
No, tormenting Hua Lanye was still the best course of action.
However, despite her attempts to extract information, Hua Lanye remained defiant. The more she pressed, the more he smiled, his expression increasingly filled with derision. His mocking laughter infuriated Long Xiang.
His laughter was like noise, grating on her nerves.
She didn’t want to hear it anymore.
If her methods weren’t painful enough to break him, she would have to try something else.
Long Xiang remembered the tortures Beiting Xue had inflicted on Beiting Changyuan and Changqin Yin in the original story. Drawing inspiration from them, she began to meticulously flay Hua Lanye’s skin and break his bones with the ice spike in her hand.
She wasn’t skilled at this, having never cooked before, so her method lacked the artistic touch Beiting Xue might’ve applied.
Her hands were covered in blood—demon blood, which, to her surprise, was as red as human blood. It reminded her of the scene inside Hua Lanye’s heart space. The surroundings there had been black, and she had assumed his blood would be black too.
Looking up, she noticed that her eyelashes were flecked with his blood, blurring her vision slightly. She could vaguely make out Hua Lanye’s face, drenched in sweat. Despite the agony, he was still smiling, teetering on the edge of collapse, yet somehow… enjoying himself.
Ah.
Is that so?
Long Xiang thought for a moment before slapping him across the face with her bloodstained hand.
Hua Lanye’s head snapped to the side, and he spat out another mouthful of blood. Yet even then, he still looked… pleased.
She finally understood.
He was a masochist.
How was she rewarding him?
Long Xiang felt Hua Lanye’s gaze fix on her again, and she tossed the ice spike aside, standing up straight. “If physical pain excites you so much, let’s try something else.”
Hua Lanye was about to taunt her again, to dare her to bring out something new, when suddenly he felt a sharp pain in his chest. The scar on his heart, still not fully healed, was pierced once more. Before he could react, Long Xiang’s figure shimmered and vanished, diving into the depths of his heart space.
Before entering, Long Xiang took the opportunity to do something else—something she had once intended to do to Yue Zhou, but had been stopped by Lin Ziru.
It seemed that regardless of the man, there was always some strange attachment to a certain area. When Hua Lanye realized what Long Xiang was about to destroy, he instinctively focused on protecting his lower half. That left his heart space unguarded, allowing her to slip inside.
The Monster Lord, who had been trying not to watch, couldn’t help but glance over.
The bloodshed was far beyond what he had expected from Long Xiang. And as for Hua Lanye’s bottomless tolerance for pain—it left the Monster Lord both shocked and in awe.
He hoped they would move on to something else soon. Otherwise, even though he disliked Hua Lanye, watching him endure this was too much.
The Monster Lord didn’t want Hua Lanye to die—not yet. Once the Monster Queen and Bai Fusheng returned, Hua Lanye could die however he pleased. But until then, even someone as repulsive as him needed to be kept alive.
Inside the pitch-black space of Hua Lanye’s heart, Long Xiang found his core.
Long Xiang had never forgotten that the shards of the Celestial Ladder once pointed her to attack Hua Lanye’s weak spot—three inches below his navel.
At that time, she had chosen to strike his heart instead. Hua Lanye had been gravely injured but hadn’t died. Even after attacking his heart again later, he still lived.
She had wondered if perhaps she should have followed the Celestial Ladder’s guidance. Yet, when she looked at the towering divine pillar, it felt righteous on the surface but gave her a sense of something deeply wrong. There was no way she would rely on its instructions.
After all, 4897 had gone up the Celestial Ladder too. That treacherous thing. If she ever saw it again…
Long Xiang shook the blood off her hands as she stepped toward Hua Lanye’s trembling soul.
“Why aren’t you laughing now?” she asked slowly. “Weren’t you having such a good time earlier?”
Hua Lanye’s soul, still infused with demonic fire, clashed with Long Xiang’s energy, their encounter lasting hundreds of moves in an instant.
When the black mist cleared, his soul was pinned to the pitch-black ground beneath her. The darkness was so overwhelming that Long Xiang couldn’t even see her own hand in front of her face. Yet, somehow, she knew exactly where he was.
Her spiritual energy was so gentle and responsive, almost obedient. The ice spike she conjured at will reminded her of Beiting Xue.
Was this his power?
He had probably shared it with her, even in his worst moments. Dividing his strength between them must have worsened his condition.
Looking down at Hua Lanye’s soul, Long Xiang couldn’t help but think about her plan to advance her cultivation.
After being transported into this world, she had often browsed the books in Northern Court’s library. One of them had mentioned an ancient cultivation method called Soul Sacrifice.
By refining and absorbing a powerful soul, one could gain its willpower and strength.
Beiting Xue had learned his technique for controlling souls from the same ancient text.
If he could use it, then even though Soul Sacrifice seemed like an ominous method, it had to be a reliable path of cultivation, right?
After all, the paths cultivators took varied widely, and Long Xiang had never fully understood the deeper meaning of her own journey. She had always just completed the tasks at hand, never really focusing on introspection. As a result, she had never found her true path.
The only thing she had been attached to was her desire to go home.
Bai Fusheng was supposed to be dead, yet the Monster Lord insisted he could come back to life. Bai Qingyin had disappeared, but the Monster Lord wasn’t worried about her return.
And Hua Lanye didn’t seem to care much about his body, but he fiercely guarded this soul within his heart.
So, it wasn’t his heart or the space three inches below his navel that was his true weakness.
It was this soul inside his heart, something seemingly insignificant but incredibly vital.
The Celestial Ladder’s shard had directed her to strike there, probably because it had been misled by Hua Lanye’s instinctive act of protecting his lower body.
Long Xiang had vented much of her anger by now, and covered in blood and chaos, she came to an understanding of her own path within the dark confines of Hua Lanye’s heart.
Fate weaves life and death like threads, souls are eternal, and the breath of life never ceases.
She had crossed the boundaries of worlds, lived through near-death experiences, and come out alive each time. Compared to Beiting Xue, wasn’t she even more suited to mastering the art of soul manipulation?
To revive the dead and master the art of resurrection was inherently tied to the summoning and guiding of souls.
A smile spread across Long Xiang’s lips, and Hua Lanye saw that stubborn, cold smile and felt his defenses falter for a moment. He was momentarily mesmerized.
And then he saw something even more terrifying: the girl who had always seemed so out of place, disconnected from their world, had finally found her path.
In the void, dim and ghostly, her slender form was pierced by countless spirits. Spectral figures swirled around her body, entangling her essence. It seemed as though she was being consumed, yet through the darkness, her eyes glowed bright and clear.
Hua Lanye’s soul felt like it was drowning in the depths of those eyes.
“Even if you wanted to say something now, I wouldn’t care to listen.” Long Xiang’s voice was raspy and tired, but the weight behind her words was unmistakable.
“When I sacrifice you, I’ll see for myself.”