Chapter 221: The Scam of the Longevity Pill

But this step will absolutely not be without meaning.

This is a scam that has spanned several thousand years.

If it were only to earn Spirit Stones, why would Xie Yao bear the pain of parting with so many vines?

She must have other goals, it is just that Ruan Xing cannot know them for the time being.

However, Wanbao Tower is her main channel for selling the Longevity Pill; how could she suspect that people from the Hidden Sect are in Wanbao Tower?

Ruan Xing immediately asked this question aloud.

Xie Yao sneered, "Hidden Sect, that sounds nice."

"They are elusive, the Immortal Sect calls the Hidden Sect one of the three great immortal gates, but does the Hidden Sect itself admit it? Do you think that under the Heavenly Dao, only one type of cultivator, the Immortal Cultivator, is allowed to exist? Then how can the Dao that we Demon Cultivators practice allow us to ascend to the Spirit Realm!?"

Ruan Xing was startled, "You mean, the Hidden Sect does not stand entirely on the side of the Immortal Cultivators?"

"The Hidden Sect stands on neither side; they only listen to the Heavenly Dao," Xie Yao said. "If they wanted to support the Immortal Cultivators, the Hidden Sect could have had more and better methods; why would they self-destruct during the Immortal-Demon War? Self-destruction does not distinguish between friend and foe; besides the Saint Demon Lord at the time and a pile of Demon Cultivators, many great Immortal Cultivators also died. But I saw their true purpose; the Hidden Sect was not at all for the so-called fairness and justice of the Heavenly Dao, but just to reshuffle the deck!"

Every time the Hidden Sect appears, both Immortal Cultivators and Demon Cultivators on the Xianyuan Continent suffer major trauma and losses, remaining listless for many years.

This is the Hidden Sect's true purpose.

This is also one of the reasons why Xie Yao wants to communicate and negotiate with the Heavenly Dao.

Xie Yao believes that the people of the Hidden Sect hiding in Wanbao Tower to help her sell the Longevity Pill is intended to give Demon Cultivators a chance to breathe; they will not let Demon Cultivators be completely annihilated by the hands of the Immortal Cultivators.

Ups and downs, growth and decline, the cycle of cause and effect—this is what the Heavenly Dao wants to see.

Hearing this, Ruan Xing lowered her eyes and thought that although the Nether Ghost Record was passed to Cui Yurong by the Xian Tai Tree, it was not impossible that the will of the Heavenly Dao was at work within it.

In other words, the Immortal Cultivators have flourished for thousands of years, and the next step should be the turn of the Demon Cultivators.

"So that's how it is; what you said also makes some sense upon reflection," Ruan Xing murmured.

Xie Yao snorted, the vines dispersed and reassembled, turning back into a green soft couch; she let the thin gauze flutter and lay back down herself.

"Matters regarding the Small World are fully handled by Xizui; you can discuss it with him. This seat is tired and needs to rest."

Ruan Xing had basically asked what she wanted to ask, so she bowed her head in agreement and took Xie Feng out.

At the door, she said to Shui Linglong, "The Saint Demon Lord told us to find Elder Xizui."

"Follow me," Shui Linglong said.

Inside a cave more than a dozen winding passages away.

Xie Huai was sitting in front of a table in a daze when the gray-robed old man walked in, looked at him, and said, "Give the Sui Spirit Pearl to me."

Xie Huai took out a round bead the size of an egg and asked, "Can I go together?"

"What do you think?" Xizui asked in return, "Do not defy the Saint Demon Lord, and do not make things difficult for me."

"I am already at the Nascent Soul stage; can I still not leave the Underground Palace? This is very different from what I imagined before I came," Xie Huai said, feeling stifled.

He was like a porcelain doll raised in the palm of a hand.

If bringing him to the Northern Territory meant treating him like this, why create so many setbacks and difficulties for him in Nanzhou back then? Xizui could only relay Xie Yao's meaning, "You have suffered outside; when you return, you will cherish a peaceful life and will no longer think about going outside to suffer."

Xie Yao's thoughts and requirements for Xie Huai were very simple.

Since his mother was deceived and taken away because she had never seen the outside world and was curious.

Then she would let Xie Huai see the dangers of the outside world first.

"Be obedient, child. The Saint Demon Lord has been good enough to you; you should be content," Xizui patted his shoulder.

"My life has been planned out by you step by step; you have never given me the power to choose. What is the point of me living like this?" Xie Huai smiled bitterly.

Xizui was silent for a moment before slowly saying, "The Saint Demon Lord has her own hidden difficulties. You only need to believe that in this world, there will not be a second person who cares about you, protects you, and keeps your safety in mind unconditionally."

"No, the Saint Demon Lord has conditions," Xie Huai said.

"……Wait for another period of time. Perhaps in a few years, when both I and the Saint Demon Lord are dead, you will be free. For now, just cultivate well and strive to have enough self-preservation power before that day arrives."

Xie Huai asked urgently, "Then what about you? Is everything you have done for me also conditional?"

Xizui looked at the somewhat familiar brows and eyes on his face, lowered his head, did not answer, and turned to leave.

He was a sinner, living until now only to atone for his sins.

Before that incident happened, Xie Yao was not yet so cruel. There were many Demon Lords of various sizes in the Northern Territory; whether they were Nascent Soul or Spirit Severing, they could all mark out a piece of land to be their own mountain king, ruling over many small Demon Cultivators and mortals, only needing to offer tribute and obey the Saint Demon Lord at regular intervals.

At that time, Xizui was not yet called Xizui; he had just reached Spirit Severing, but he refused to leave the Underground Palace, only willing to do the things the Saint Demon Lord ordered him to do.

The task the Saint Demon Lord gave him was very simple: protect the Palace Prince and make the Palace Prince happy.

It was just that he had not even done such a simple task well. Not only did he fail to protect the Palace Prince, letting her be deceived and taken to Nanzhou, but even when he finally knew her location, he rushed over and still failed to save her in time.

He could only watch the other party shed tears in his arms as her Divine Soul dissipated; she grabbed his collar and begged him, "Find my child."

He still had not done this matter well.

By the time he found the little Palace Prince born to the Palace Prince, it was already several years later. The little Palace Prince was covered in dirt, being driven away and shunned by a group of mortal children, his pair of similar black pupils full of strangeness and vigilance.

After he transmitted this happy news to Xie Yao, he received a one-sentence reply.

"Xie Huai." The gray-robed old man looked at the frail boy in front of him, "This will be your name from now on."

After Xizui took the Sui Spirit Pearl back, he met with Shui Linglong.

Ruan Xing curiously examined the Spirit Tool in his hand and asked, "What is this thing?"

"The Sui Spirit Pearl," Xizui said indifferently, "A pearl covered in dust, it was previously treated as a storage treasure by others, and only in recent years did it come into our hands to exert its original function."

The Spirit Tool of the Qintai Family of Xizhou, the Sui Spirit Pearl...

I did not expect to see it so soon.

A look of surprise flashed across Ruan Xing's eyes.

"Then what is its function?"

Xizui introduced, "This object can be combined with any item from a Secret Realm to open the gate to the Secret Realm anywhere, and it requires no conditions; one can leave the Secret Realm at any time. Even if one encounters irresistible danger, I can use the Sui Spirit Pearl to bring everyone out together. With such a precious and safe treasure, is the Envoy reassured?"

"It is actually so magical; then naturally I am not worried. Let us set off now and go to the Secret Realm," Ruan Xing exclaimed and said with a smile. Xizui said in surprise, "Is the Envoy not going to make some preparations?"

Ruan Xing waved her hand, "There is nothing to prepare. Since we know nothing about the situation inside, what targeted preparations could we have? Let's go directly; the sooner we set off, the sooner we will obtain the Hongmeng Purple Qi. Time waits for no one!"

Since Ruan Xing requested it, Xizui no longer demurred; he reached out to lift the Sui Spirit Pearl and slowly channeled his Spiritual Power into it. Wisps of mist flew rapidly out of the Sui Spirit Pearl, and as Xizui brought his hands together, the mist condensed in front of them into a ring of light as tall as a person.

Xizui walked into the ring of light first.

Ruan Xing pulled Xie Feng in after him, but for the sake of caution, she grabbed a handful of air before entering, snatching the Sword that had been hiding by her side into her Storage Bag.

Lest he fail to pass through the ring of light.

Although it turned out that Ruan Xing had overthought it.

After experiencing that familiar sensation of spatial compression, when Ruan Xing opened her eyes again, she found herself in an unfamiliar space.

Having been forewarned by Xie Yao, Ruan Xing was already mentally prepared that this place should be quite dangerous, so after entering, she immediately held the Sumeru Mirror in her hand, and a protective shield maintained by Spiritual Power appeared around her body.

However, everything she saw before her eyes somewhat exceeded her expectations.

In the quaint little town, Cultivators and mortals lived together in harmony; waiters holding signs in front of shops solicited customers energetically, street vendors shouted loudly with beaming smiles, and some children darted through the crowd, playing and bickering, the sounds of bustle and noise filling her ears.

A Cultivator squeezed through the three of them, "Excuse me, excuse me, sorry, let me pass."

He wore a smile, radiated joy, and hurried away very politely.

However, Ruan Xing caught a scent of bloodlust on him.

There was still a hideous scar on his face.

That person should be a Demon Cultivator of the Dao of Slaughter.

"What is going on?" Ruan Xing was completely bewildered; even in the outside world, she had never seen such a harmonious scene between mortals and Cultivators.

"Can't figure it out." Xie Feng curled his lips.

Xizui glanced at the two of them and said, "It doesn't look like an illusion; they can see us and communicate with us, so they should be living people. Since they are living people, why not ask them?"

Ruan Xing spread her Divine Sense out, extending to a distance of several hundred miles.

The scope of this Secret Realm was quite large; a rough estimate suggested there were five or six thousand Cultivators and mortals combined. She wondered where the Secret Realm had gotten so many living people—could they all have wandered in by mistake? Besides this town in the center, there were mountains, rivers, and towering ridges outside, among which there was no lack of Monster Beasts.

There were all kinds of people in the town, and each of them seemed to be perfectly integrated, having their own missions and duties.

"Do you remember what the people we sent in before looked like?" Ruan Xing asked.

"I remember; those people were all sent by me personally," Xizui said, reaching out to brush away a scene before her, on which were a few slightly blurry faces.

Ruan Xing then used her Divine Sense to search for these people.

She soon found one of the female Cultivators; coincidentally, the Demon Cultivator who had just passed by was at her location, not far from them.

The image quickly dissipated, and Xizui frowned in surprise.

Ruan Xing withdrew her Divine Sense and said to Xizui, "I found one, so let's go ask her first. She has stayed here longer than we have, so she might have some clues."

The group then hurried in the direction Ruan Xing had found.

The people they met on the road did not find them strange at all.

Some even greeted them warmly.

Out of caution, none of them responded.

When they arrived in front of that alley, the scarred Demon Cultivator looked at them with a face full of surprise, "Oh my, why have you come?"

Ruan Xing slowly produced a question mark.

?

She turned her head and quietly whispered to Xizui, "Did something happen just now that I forgot? Why does he act like he knows us?"

Xizui said with a straight face, "Nothing happened, I don't know."

The scarred Demon Cultivator had already enthusiastically pulled them into the house, "Thank you so much for earlier. My wife suddenly wanted to eat Peach Preserved Apricot Cake, so I rushed to buy it for her, fearing that if I returned slowly, she wouldn't want to eat it anymore. I didn't expect it to be such a coincidence; are you here to visit my wife too?"

"'Too'?" Ruan Xing keenly seized on this word, "Has someone else come to visit her before?"

"Yes, it seems they were relatives from her hometown. They knew she was about to give birth, so they came to see her, but they were in a hurry to leave and didn't even stay for a day," the scarred Demon Cultivator laughed.

Ruan Xing turned to look at Xizui, and Xizui nodded slightly, saying, "This female cultivator was in the first batch to enter, sixteen days ago."

Those who came to see her might have been the second batch of Demon Cultivators who found her to ask about the situation.

"She's about to give birth and you still sent her in?" Ruan Xing condemned, "You Demon Cultivators are truly inhumane."

Xizui said speechlessly, "She is not married, has no male concubines, and is not pregnant. I could not possibly have sent a subordinate with limited mobility to complete a difficult task."

"……Oh, right." Ruan Xing felt a chill after her realization, "She got pregnant only after entering? Sixteen days and she's about to give birth—is the flow of time in the Secret Realm different from the outside world!?"

What she was most worried about was not that when she went out, the Immortal-Demon War or something would be over.

It was the points!! Did the Simulator calculate one day based on the outside world or the Secret Realm? If the time flow was truly different, and sixteen days outside equaled more than a year inside the Secret Realm, then her remaining three million-plus points wouldn't last many days……

Ruan Xing felt as if the sky had collapsed in an instant.

Her complexion became unsightly.

Xie Feng stepped forward and asked, "How long have those people been gone? What a pity, we actually missed them; we were planning to get together!"

He wore a look of regret.

The scarred Demon Cultivator said happily, "Not long, just four or five days. If you run fast, you might be able to find them and catch up."

Xie Feng turned his head and asked Xizui, "How many days has the second batch been in?"

"Seven days," Xizui replied.

Xie Feng immediately rolled his eyes at Ruan Xing, "The flow is the same, the time matches up. Why do I feel like you've been affected by something in the Secret Realm? You've only been in for half a day and you've become much dumber."

"You're the one who's been affected!" Ruan Xing retorted angrily, "Before you came in, you were like a gourd with a sewn mouth; how come you've become so talkative after being in here for half a day?"

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