Inner Demons

"Your cave dwelling?" Ya Zi seemed to have heard something amusing. "You've been imprisoned here for two thousand years, and you still want to stay in your cave dwelling after that?"

He reached into his sleeve, touched it, and tossed it aside: "Look what this is!"

Lord Dongting cannot leave Dongting, but others can enter. Yazi threw out a small, golden plaque—its shape was irregular.

The sign then fell directly into his hands.

Li Yunxin, Dongting Jun, and Kunwuzi all focused their attention on the sign.

But it's more like "fragments" than a brand.

It's like a small shard that fell from a very thick, large piece of glass, without any special carving. It's about half the size of a palm, thick on one side and thin on the other, with rounded edges.

Golden yellow. A brilliant golden yellow. This brand doesn't emit light, but it seems to absorb light—drawing in all the brilliant gold in the world, making it dazzling and impossible to ignore.

This is a brilliance that is never dazzling.

Li Yunxin wasn't quite sure what this thing was, but Kunwuzi and Dongting Jun both looked at Yazi simultaneously. The peace that Dongting Jun had managed to maintain earlier vanished; his round eyes widened, and his voice trembled slightly: "This...is...could it be..."

“Yes.” Ya Zi nodded solemnly. “The Divine Dragon Token.”

"With this decree, you may travel freely throughout the world. Go wherever you wish—no one will dare to stop you." Yazi gave Dongting Jun a deep look. "I know you have places you wish to go. So, what use is your cave dwelling to you?"

"Unimpeded passage? What a joke." Kunwuzi immediately snorted. "Not everyone buys into this stuff—do you think you're going to see a real dragon? If that real dragon hadn't appeared, how many demons in the world would actually give you face for this broken scale? You may be a great demon of the Xuan Realm, but it's precisely because you're a great demon of the Xuan Realm that no one dares to let you pass through their territory!"

But Lord Dongting... didn't seem to care about Kunwuzi's words.

He ran his hand over the dragon scales for a while, ignoring Kunwuzi's words. Kunwuzi then fell silent—for seeing Dongting Jun beside him…

A thick layer of moisture was generated, almost completely obscuring his entire body.

Li Yunxin blinked. He had seen this scene before—when he was informing Dongting Jun Chiwen of his death.

It took a full quarter of an hour for the fog to dissipate.

Lord Dongting straightened up; he had already put away the Divine Dragon Token. He looked at Ya Zi, his voice becoming calm and steady: "How do you break the seal? What do you need me to do?"

Upon hearing this, Kunwuzi flew away without saying a word!

This departure was different from before. The endlessly spinning yin-yang symbol behind him shattered with a crash, transforming into a stream of gray light. This light enveloped his body, and he vanished into the horizon in the blink of an eye, like a gray arrow, moving at a speed far exceeding his previous speed!

Ya Zi only had time to raise his hand and scatter a golden light. But the golden light was immediately pierced by Kun Wu Zi, only tinged with starlight.

The dragon prince scoffed, "You stinking Taoist priest, you're quite afraid of death. Is that thing his magic weapon?"

"Your natal magic weapon," Dongting Jun said in a deep voice. "If this magic weapon is shattered, it will absorb spiritual energy and escape, and you certainly won't be able to catch up with him. But it will also damage his cultivation—not to the point of falling from his cultivation level, but it will still be easier to deal with than before."

"They've already escaped. Hmph, what a pity about such a great opportunity."

But Lord Dongting chuckled: "Escaped? Where could he possibly escape to? My lifespan is three thousand years... If he really wanted to, he couldn't escape Dongting Lake. Look at this."

Dongting Jun flipped his hand, and another small mirror appeared in his palm. It was neither metal nor wood, nor was it a regular shape.

The surface of this small mirror was hazy and indistinct, as if covered by a layer of moisture. It didn't look clear or smooth, and there were even some small black spots on its surface.

And the shape of this mirror...

Li Yunxin looked at it for a while and realized what it resembled.

Like this Dongting Lake.

The next moment, he realized he had guessed correctly.

With a flick of his wrist, the mirror flew into the air. It grew larger with the wind, expanding to five or six times its original size. At this point, it became clear that this was indeed a miniature Dongting Lake—the islands and hills in the lake were the previously visible dark spots. The "layer of mist" on the mirror's surface was indeed mist from Dongting Lake.

And beside this "small lake"... there was a tiny black dot flying around.

The reason it was visible was because a long gray shadow trailed behind the black dot—that was Kunwuzi.

"You actually have this treasure?" Ya Zi looked at the mirror with great interest, pointed at it, and said, "You haven't been able to leave Dongting Lake for two thousand years, where did you get this thing?"

"Ah... an old object, an old object." Dongting Jun didn't answer, only murmured to himself with emotion. Li Yunxin noticed that his gaze towards the "small mirror" was filled with complex emotions—he had seen quite a few demons in this world. But Dongting Jun was the first person whose eyes held such complex emotions.

Even he couldn't describe it in detail.

"The name of this treasure is... 'The Misty Dongting Lake Painting'." Dongting Jun's tone returned to how it had been when Li Yunxin first met him—unhurried and composed. It seemed that with the "Misty Dongting Lake Painting," the world was at his fingertips. Or perhaps this treasure had stirred some memory within him...

Li Yunxin knew that people who were immersed in the past always had a calm and sorrowful air about them.

“With this map here, no matter how far he escapes—” Dongting Jun said, then stretched out a finger and inserted it into the mirror—and it really was as if it were inserted into water, the entire finger went in, “but he will be pulled back.”

As soon as he finished speaking, he stirred his fingers in the water.

A column of water suddenly shot up from the small lake surface—about the thickness and length of a chopstick—and caught up with the small black dot in the air in the blink of an eye.

At that very moment, a deafening sound rang out again—

From the Dongting Lake behind him, a massive column of water, reaching to the sky and resembling a wall, truly shot up! However, the water column did not rush out of Dongting at an angle, but went straight into the sky, only to mysteriously disappear at a certain point in the sky—as if there was a visible section there!

In the painting "Dongting Lake in Misty Waves," the small black dot is enveloped by a column of water and slowly pulled backward. And in the real world, the Kunwuzi… though Li Yunxin cannot see it, she knows it is likely in the same situation.

Seeing this, Ya Zi let out a low murmur of admiration. Pointing to the lifelike drawing, he exclaimed, "This is...this is..."

"This is a sacred map," sighed Lord Dongting. "This... is my treasure."

Ya Zi wasn't quite clear on what the "spiritual diagram" was, and thus only marveled at its wondrous transformations. As for Kun Wu Zi, he must have heard of it, but whether he had seen it or not was another matter.

Only Li Yunxin truly understood what this thing represented.

When a Daoist painter of the painting school creates a painting, the highest level of artistry can produce a "precious scroll," while the peak of artistry, a moment of inspiration, can produce a "rare scroll." The painting he jokingly created at Qionghua Tower, titled "Perverted Eating Picture," is a rare scroll. Ling Kongzi, who is surrounded by precious magical treasures, also cherished his rare scroll after seeing it.

Once one enters the true realm, the Taoist painter can create "spiritual paintings".

The reason why Lingtu is called "spiritual" is because it allows one to interact with the real world through the painting.

Is the painting on his folding fan, "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains," which depicts Weicheng, considered a sacred image? Yes, it is.

He sealed Yue Yunzi's soul into the painting, and he could still see Long Erzi Ya Zi coming towards this place in the painting—some things that happened in the real world could already be reflected in this painting.

But... Dongting Jun's magical painting, "Dongting Lake in Misty Waves," can accomplish even more.

It can already affect this real world—just like before, it entangled and pulled back Yue Yunzi's soul clone, who had ruthlessly shattered her natal magic weapon!

This must be the work of a Taoist master of the Xuan Realm.

A Taoist painter at the Xuanjing level—or at least the Xuanjing level—created this spiritual painting, which was then acquired by the Lord of Dongting.

Li Yunxin realized that this should contain some stories that would interest him.

Now, Lord Dongting used this magical diagram to entangle Kunwuzi, then turned to Yazi and asked, "So, how do I escape now?"

By this time, it was completely dark.

The sun finally set behind the mountains, while the moon was still partially hidden in the west. Kunwuzi had previously turned Dongting Lake upside down, pouring a massive amount of water from the sky. The lingering moisture from that water vapor had obscured the moonlight.

In this dim light, Li Yunxin saw Ya Zi smile: "It's called confinement, but in reality, it's to make you guard a great treasure."

"You have guarded this Dongting Lake for two thousand years... Well, today is the time. Do you know who sent me to release you?" Ya Zi smiled, revealing his teeth that gleamed in the moonlight.

For some reason, Li Yunxin felt a sudden tightness in his heart when he saw him like this. He thought of the Ninth Prince from back then.

He is now a great demon in the True Realm, while the Ninth Prince is only at the peak of the Transformation Realm.

But he... only he had ever brought me such intense pressure.

That's the pressure of survival versus death.

At that moment, when Li Yunxin saw his teeth and his smile, she was reminded of the Ninth Prince of the Dragon.

He inexplicably felt that the atmosphere was a bit strange, so he tightened his grip on the folding fan in his hand.

Dongting Jun remained silent, but Ya Zi smiled and continued, "It is a true dragon. A true dragon has appeared in the world. Right now, the true dragon wants to see you, and says that once you are freed, you will not want this cave dwelling anyway, so you will give it to me—this young master...this lord, and then you can cultivate in peace and recover your realm."

"Before you leave, you must hand over that great treasure to me, so that I may continue to guard it. Then you can retire successfully."

Li Yunxin frowned.

He wasn't sure if it was just his imagination, or if being between two powerful demons in the Mystic Realm made him nervous.

He felt that Ya Zi's slip of the tongue, "this young master," sounded extremely familiar.

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