Chapter 921: Covert Sabotage

After a while.

Lin Qingli curled up in the corner of the obsidian iron cell, a chain around her wrist engraved with the Soul‑Quelling Curse.

Three hours earlier, that "accident" made her a hero and also a suspect; when she rescued the Inspection Envoy, half of a Demon‑Pattern Secret Order slipped from her sleeve.

"The fairy's self‑sacrificial ruse was performed wonderfully," Yan Buji's voice drifted in through the vent, and a oil‑paper packet smelling of rusted blood landed on her knee.

"Try the Eight‑Treasure Duck from Drunken Immortal Tower; it was just stewed with Demon King's blood."

She stared at the familiar cinnabar seal on the oil paper, the same sealing mud she had seen at noon on the quenching‑oil ledger: "You even bought off the prison guard?"

"He volunteered," the vent suddenly thrust in a half‑blood‑stained obsidian armor order: "His only son has been trapped in the dungeon for three years; I'm just giving him a glimmer of hope."

Lin Qingli suddenly sprang up, yanking the iron chain as the Soul‑Quelling Curse seared her palm black: "How much Chaos are you planning to stir up in the Celestial Alliance?"

"Chaos?" Yan Buji's pupils glowed with a beast‑like dim light in the darkness: "It's only just begun."

He snapped his fingers, shattering the spying talisman in the corner: "Tomorrow the Three Offices will convene; remember to say you saw the Equipment Department Furnace Master dealing with the Demon Race."

The chain suddenly burst with lightning, and Lin Qingli fell to the ground, coughing up blood mixed with ice shards: "…Where's the evidence?"

"The evidence is in the Inspection Envoy's dinner," he chuckled low, tossing a crystal bottle; inside, the pills exuded the same scent as Demon Pill powder.

"Guess whether those old things will sprout demon spots when the poison takes effect?"

Yan Buji's smile was downright demonic, filling Lin Qingli's heart with dread.

He didn't know where Yan Buji's such great malice toward the Celestial Alliance came from, but if he didn't follow his orders now, then surely…

Yan Buji's purpose from start to finish was simple: he merely wanted to reap some benefit within the Celestial Alliance.

Nine Soul‑Illuminating Lanterns hung overhead, Lin Qingli's ice silk entwining three bone‑piercing spikes.

Yan Buji, masquerading as a clerk, scribbled furiously in the corner; the cinnabar‑tipped pen added a blood‑plum to her testimony every three breaths.

"Criminal Lin Qingli, where did you obtain the material evidence of the Equipment Department's collusion with the Demon Race?" the Elder of the Execution Hall's startling wooden gong thundered.

Out of the corner of her eye she glimpsed a purple jade toggle slipping from Yan Buji's cuff, the personal token of the Equipment Department's Grand Elder.

The Heart‑Eating Curse in her throat flared suddenly, and the words that escaped became: "In… in the Mist‑Hidden Gorge water‑demon nest… ah!"

Amid the harrowing scream, black blood surged from her seven orifices.

Yan Buji shouted in alarm, lunging to help: "Sir! She's been caught by the Demon Race's Word‑Spirit Seal!"

Amid Chaos he pretended to take her pulse, and with his fingertip slipped a pill under her tongue.

Lin Qingli convulsed all over, about to collapse, and heard his mournful shout: "Quickly summon the Medicine King Hall Master! This seal is identical to the method used by Tan Mo Luo three years ago!"

"Damned it, why are you standing there, hurry and save her, don't let her just die like that!"

The sound of dripping water startled Lin Qingli awake.

Yan Buji crouched at the edge of the obsidian ice bed, looking at her calmly.

"The Celestial Alliance is now sweeping the city for the Equipment Department's remaining scum," he blew off ice shards, revealing an ice figurine carved in the likeness of the Inspection Envoy:

"Thanks to that mouthful of black blood, the Execution Hall retrieved three hundred jin of demon‑blood cinnabar from the Equipment Department's storeroom."

Just as Lin Qingli's fingertips formed an ice blade, he pinched her wrist bone and pressed it against the headboard:

He lifted the secret compartment of the bed, inside neatly stacked twelve ice coffins, and asked, "Guess who prepared this generous gift for the Celestial Alliance?"

The faces sleeping within the ice coffins were unmistakably the Elders of various sects, each forehead embedded with fake soul pearls forged from Demon Pills.

"These are… the Demon‑Eradication Office Elders who were stationed in the gorge before? You killed them all!"

"That's not what I said; they drowned in that massive wave before," Yan Buji smiled faintly.

Lin Qingli suddenly dry‑vomited, spitting out the Life‑Extending Pill Yan Buji had fed her, which contained a poison sac.

"Don't worry, once they 'revive' as Demon Race scum…" Yan Buji brushed over the Word‑Spirit Seal spreading from her neck to her clavicle: "You, the demon‑slaying hero, should now head the new Demon‑Eradication Office."

"You… you toward the Celestial Alliance…"

"I bear no grudge against the Celestial Alliance," Yan Buji said calmly, "but I need a place that supplies me with abundant cultivation resources. Do you think it's that easy for me to devise all this? It also requires gathering plenty of information, controlling the whole situation, to push you into a position of power."

"Sounds nice, but… you're treating me as a puppet!" Lin Qingli said resentfully.

Outside, thunder cracked, casting Yan Buji's profile like a ferocious demon.

Yan Buji smiled, "If we cooperate, won't we obtain better resources and no longer have to risk life and death every day? Isn't that wonderful?"

The next day.

The scorching sun heated the obsidian iron execution pillar, and Lin Qingli's ice silk wrapped around the neck of the Equipment Department Furnace Master.

The old man's eyes bulged violently, blue‑purple veins slithering under his skin like living snakes—a sign that the demon poison Yan Buji had buried in the ice coffin was erupting.

"Ladies and gentlemen, look!" she raised her hand, flinging twelve reflective jade slips; the jade slips formed a star‑array diagram in the air.

Within the array's light, scenes of the Elders of various sects mutating inside the ice coffins appeared: the Elder of the Heavenly Sword Pavilion's sword pierced his own disciple, the Medicine King Hall Master thrust a toxin‑coated silver needle into a cultivator's dantian…

A roar erupted among the Seventy‑two Cavern Chairmen. The owner of Ten Thousand Beasts Villa smashed a table leg, shouting, "Demoness! This must be your sorcery!"

Before the words finished, a roar suddenly echoed from the distant sky.

Nine ice coffins burst through the air; as their lids exploded, the twelve "revived" Elders were enveloped in demonic aura, their fake soul pearls flashing the same purple glow as the Equipment Department Furnace Master's.

"Master!" the Junior Hall Master of the Cloud Pavilion staggered up, only to have his hair crown cut off by his own master's compass.

The Cloud Middle Taoist Priest, who should have perished thirty years ago, had blood‑red eyes as the divination slips turned into bone spikes, hurling toward the crowd.

Lin Qingli's Ice Soul Sword glowed at the right moment, its hilt swallowing the Swallow Desire Pot carving and spewing black mist: "Can't you see? These seniors have long been infiltrated by demon poison!"

Within the black mist, Yan Buji's forged secret scrolls materialized, the "Iron Evidence" of each sect's dealings with the Demon Race.

"I don't believe it, damned demoness, I want…"

Bang!

The Junior Hall Master was blasted away by the Inspection Envoy, his face cold as he said, "The evidence is conclusive; what more do you have to say?!"

The people below turned pale.

That night, in the shadow cast by the bronze lantern tree, the Inspection Envoy's python‑pattern sash brushed Lin Qingli's kneeling knee: "Your contribution to today's Demon‑Eradication Platform incident is great."

"Disciple, I am terrified," she pressed her forehead against the cold jade slab, the ice silk in her sleeve winding around the jade slip Yan Buji had given her, "These are the secret records retrieved from the Equipment Department's hidden chamber, concerning thirty‑seven covert strongholds of the Celestial Alliance…"

The Inspector's jade tablet suddenly pressed against her chin: "I am very curious—how did you see through these Lao Gui's disguises?"

"It was a clue bought with his life by Ninth Junior Brother Wang." Lin Qingli lifted her sleeve to wipe her tears, revealing the fabricated soul-devouring wound on her wrist: "He found half a volume of the Yaoguai Record in the water demon's nest, before he died......"

A commotion suddenly came from outside the hall.

A panicked menial worker outside the hall's door, holding in his arms a blood-soaked disciple of the Medicine King Pavilion, shouted: "Sir! The Ten Thousand Poisons Cave... the ice coffin of the Ten Thousand Poisons Cave has also come alive!"