Chapter 98: Heavenly Demon Tomb

It was an absolutely insane scene.

An old man cradling a young girl’s corpse in his arms.
And right next to him?
A woman holding a deadly weapon high over her head, mid-swing.

Any sane person walking in would assume a murder was about to happen and leap to stop it.

Now add this to the mix:

The old man? One of the most infamous demonic cultivators alive.
The woman? A highly ranked Daoist elder.

With that setup, even a rain of blades falling on Qing’s head would’ve felt justified.

Except—plot twist—Qing was the Daoist elder.

Which just goes to show… you really shouldn’t judge people by appearances.

Qing stood frozen, holding her sacred weapon—a one-handed cudgel forged from Ten-Thousand-Year Cold Iron—high in the air, caught in a deeply serious dilemma.

Shit. How hard am I supposed to hit him?

The old man was wide open, completely unguarded.

But the problem was… she had no idea how much force it would take to knock him out without cracking his skull open.

Would the “nuke” option be too much?

She decided to dial it down a little. Go for “brick destroyer” tier.

The attack she launched was a so-called act of kindness—an aerial precision strike, powered by a famously generous amount of gunpowder. This was a technique known for blowing entire city blocks off the map.

But Qing was being nice about it.

Crack!

The sound of bone meeting reinforced metal.

His thinning hair and old-man scalp did absolutely nothing to cushion the blow.

Technically, the crown of the head was the Heaven’s Gate Acupoint, one of the body’s deadliest pressure points.

Hit there with full force while your guard’s down?

Yeah. Lights out.

Choi Leeong’s eyes rolled back in his head.
He slumped forward without a word.
His forehead thunked against the ground, and he collapsed in a full-body bow at his daughter’s feet.

“Oops. Sorry, Grandpa. Might’ve gone a little overboard. But hey—after all you’ve lived through, isn’t this kind of a good ending?”

It was supposed to be one of those old-school folk remedies—wake the mind by shocking the body.

She may have shocked it a little too hard.

This was why unlicensed physical therapy could be dangerous.

That’s when the sound of the rain cut off. Just—gone.

And the fake illusion melted away, revealing the inside of a large stone chamber.

Wide. Empty. Nothing blocking the view.

Dozens of Demon Cult elites were walking in slow, dumb circles around the room, holding torches and staring straight ahead like sleepwalkers.

Their eyes were locked forward—expressionless. Not quite alive.

Only one person moved differently:
Ji Seungju, the little brat.

He was pacing the space between two of the concentric rings, whipping his head around like mad.

This… was what the formation looked like from the outside.

Usually, if the dreamer passed out inside the illusion, the entire world just went black—empty void until something else got loaded in.

But thanks to the Great Tranquil Zen Art, Qing’s Right View had sliced through the illusion and shown the raw, unfiltered reality.

Buddhist teachings respected others’ visions. If someone was still trapped in their dream, it didn’t interfere.

But if nothing was being dreamed?

No illusions. Just the truth.

Not even Ban Chi, the genius who designed this whole nightmare formation, had accounted for that.

So this is what a formation looks like from the outside?

Kind of… stupid-looking, actually.

And that’s when Qing saw the treasure.

Dead center of the tomb chamber—there it was.
A prism glowing with five shifting colors, gently radiating sacred energy.

It wasn’t just saying it was a treasure.

It was practically screaming, “I am the treasure!”.

A self-illuminating triangular prism.

It glowed on its own. Of course it did.

And the pressure coming off it… yeah, this was no ordinary object.

That intense sense of presence—it practically slapped her across the face.

Qing just knew. No doubt in her mind.

That was the Heavenly Demon Soul.

Wait a second… this is it. This is the opening!

She took one step toward the center—

—and the world shifted again.

Suddenly, she was standing in front of a stranger’s house.

One of the Demon Cult elites was at the door, face full of raw emotion, pounding on it like he was home from war.

“Darling! I’ve returned! I’m home at last!”

—Honey? Is that you?

“Yes, it’s me!”

—My love!

Soft footsteps hurried from inside.

The elite’s face lit up with joy. He smiled wide, face flushed with hope and happiness.

Click—the sound of the door unlocking.
Creaaaak—it began to open—

CRACK!

Qing calmly smacked him in the back of the head with the Bokshinjeok.

“God. Could this illusion be any more cliché?”

The world shattered.

Back to the Heavenly Demon Tomb.

She was back in the outermost ring.

Last time she wasted too much time just looking around.

This time? Efficiency.

Qing stomped the ground—and the illusion changed again.

Surrounded. All sides. Naked women.

One guy, shirtless and sweaty, smack in the center.

SMACK!

Now there were no guys left.

Back to the tomb. Back to the edge.

Qing had now knocked out seven Demon Cult elites and completely caved in the skull of one—for safety reasons, of course.

And now she had a working theory.

“Goddamn it. That’s not gonna cut it.”

Killing someone? Doesn’t help.
You can’t peek into the illusion from the outside if they’re dead.

Knocking them out? Works. Temporarily.

But if you take even one step after that, the formation pulls you back in.
So it’s not a viable escape route.

Still—this was enough.

Because now?

She knew exactly where the Heavenly Demon Soul was.

Once the formation broke, all she had to do was sprint in and grab it.

No one would be faster.

Maybe pull a hostage stunt to get outside, maintain distance, then destroy it and run?

Her master always said—there weren’t many who could keep up with her lightness arts.

She could escape.

Now she just had to predict the exact moment the formation would collapse.

And for that?

She needed to stick close to the guy dismantling it.

Find the brat. Offer to help. Act helpful. Easy.

Qing’s brain spun into motion and snapped into place.

She took another step back into the formation, now with a clear plan locked and loaded.

The plan had been solid.

Only problem?

She had no idea where the brat was.

So Qing did what she always did—wandered around the illusion and hoped for the best.

She was trudging through someone’s vision of a sunny courtyard when a familiar voice snapped at her.

“You rotten girl—do you not even recognize your father anymore? There’s not a soul in this world that beats their own father! What kind of vicious monster are you?”

Choi Leeong, fully awake.

Apparently, a single bonk wasn’t enough to kill someone in the Profound Realm.
That level of martial artist wasn’t going down from one half-hearted hit—especially when it wasn’t charged with qi.

Still, he was rubbing the top of his skull and glaring daggers at her.

Clearly, it hurt.

But… father?

Qing squinted.
Wait. Is this man really awake?

“Seriously? Still not all there? Who’s your daughter, old man? Snap out of it before I have to hit you again.”

Choi Leeong blinked. Flinched. Rubbed his eyes like he was trying to clear up a hallucination. Then looked straight at her and… sighed.

“What, you just gonna sigh in my face? That how it is? You want another smack?”

“To think there’d come a day I’d be assaulted by a young girl. I knew you were ruthless, but this?”

“That’s why dementia is dangerous, you know. ‘Respect the elderly’ quickly turns into ‘attack the elderly’. Isn’t there a saying? Even saints lose their patience with crazy people.”

“…Is there such a saying?”

“Yeah. Ximen Qing said it.”

Choi Leeong winced.

But even he had to admit—there was some logic to it. So he let it slide.

“To think you were just a mentally broken cripple caught in a deviation… Turns out you’re a goddamn con artist.”

“Well, to be fair, I was a cripple. And technically, I was in a deviation.
Ah! That was a deviation, huh?
Anyway—I overcame it. Everyone acts like it's some huge terrifying thing, but it wasn’t that big a deal.”

That… was incredibly insulting to mental deviation as a whole.

If not for the absurdity of this legendary formation getting randomly interfered with by an ancient Buddhist meditation technique, Qing would’ve absolutely become a spiritual corpse.

Even then, she only pulled out of it after binge-eating her way through the memory of her hometown.

The only reason she survived was sheer food-motivated stubbornness.

And honestly?
Even the other Demon Cult elites deserved better.

Now that he thought about it… Choi Leeong could kind of see it.

This formation—yes, it was brutal.
But for someone who had a reason to endure, even longing became something that could be overcome.

He turned back to the present.

“Seems like we’re inside a particularly nasty formation. But you—how the hell are you still walking around like it’s nothing?”

“I figured something was off from the start. This kind of illusion trap? It only works on weak-willed chumps. No grit. That’s the real problem—no grit.”

And now the formation itself should feel personally attacked.

The truth was, Qing hadn’t resisted anything on her own.

The Great Tranquil Zen Art, with all its Buddhist serenity, had kept stabbing her dantian until it flushed the illusion out of her brain.
And even then, she resisted it because she wanted to finish her damn meal first.

As for the Demon Cult warriors she’d knocked out?
Yeah—they had every right to feel wronged.

Because come to think of it…

Qing’s greatest superpower wasn’t strength, speed, or talent.

It was the fact that everyone around her ended up feeling incredibly, deeply wronged—just by interacting with her.

“Anyway, good thing I ran into you, Grandpa. You know that brat? Said he’s trying to dismantle the formation—or dispel it or whatever. Point is, he asked me to help, but I didn’t know shit, so I told him to do it himself.”

Choi Leeong’s face lit up.

“Well, that’s the best news I’ve heard all day. Where is Vice Pavilion Lord now? I’ll lend him a hand.”

“Problem is… I don’t know.”

“…What?”

“I figured I’d run into him while wandering around. Still waiting on that part.”

“Tsk. You really never finish what you start, do you?”

“Oh, that’s rich—coming from the guy I found sitting in the rain crying for half a day.
Pretty sure you don’t get to lecture me about follow-through when you couldn’t even start moving.”

“Ahem.”

Looks like he didn’t have a comeback for that one.
He fake-coughed, trying to save face.

“Alright. Let’s go then.”

“Yes, let’s.”

Choi Leeong nodded and… didn’t move.

He just stood there, staring at Qing.

“…Well?”

“Yes, we should get going.”

“Then why aren’t you moving?”

“Ahem.”

Another fake cough.

Qing stared at him.

What the hell is this old man’s problem now?

Then, in a small, awkward voice, he asked:

“You’ve been walking around the formation all this time…
Even if you were only pretending to limp, you hadn’t used those muscles in a while.
Are your legs okay? No pain?”

Qing burst out laughing.

“If that’s your wish, Gramps.”

She spread her arms.

Choi Leeong, with the casual efficiency of someone who’d done this many times, gently lifted her and settled her into his arms.

And just like that, Qing—who’d already been outed to the entire martial world as a total fraud of a cripple—was right back to playing the part of a passenger.
Blatantly, unapologetically, and comfortably.

The two of them passed through the main gates of the courtyard.

And suddenly, Qing had a thought.

Wait. Whose illusion is this, anyway?

The world was still stable. No signs of fading or collapsing.

Whoever it is, they’re still conscious… Huh.

Whatever. Doesn’t matter.