Chapter 63: I Knew She Was Unhinged, But Not This Unhinged

At the very moment of death, countless memories flash through a person's mind. Honglian was no exception. She thought of the very beginning of her existence—what was it like?

It was a young boy named Kevan who picked up her bones, sealed them in the earth, and pieced them back into the shape of a human. Day and night, he knelt and prayed to her. She saw a faint wisp of white aura rising from his soul, and only later did she learn that it was faith, the power of aspiration. Such a force was what allowed her to linger in this mortal realm.

Before long, her location was changed to a mountain cave. The boy revered her as the mountain deity, and gradually, more people came to kneel and worship her. That white aura of aspiration grew increasingly abundant, making her stronger. Yet, she grew somewhat unsatisfied; she wanted even more.

Thus, Kevan brought another boy of similar age, claiming he was an offering to the Goddess of the Mountain to serve her. The vital essence and life-blood of a man were considered supreme nourishment.

That was the first time she experienced both the power of aspiration and dark, evil energy. The intersection of the two brought her immense pleasure, for her power grew all the greater.

Eventually, someone discovered that the boy's disappearance was linked to Kevan, and they sought to arrest and punish him, hindered only by a lack of evidence. Terrified, the boy fled blindly, tumbling over a steep cliff and landing on a tree, awaiting his doom.

She saved him. After all, he was her first devotee and the most devout one; she was willing to spare a shred of aspiration to prolong his life.

Indeed, her rescue had not been misplaced. The boy grew even more pious, extracting people from the village every year to offer as sacrifices to her. It was said that those individuals had harmed her in the past and thus deserved to atone for their sins, an assertion she naturally raised no objection to.

Kevan became her high priest, while she responded by protecting him, extending his life, and shielding the village. Yet, year after year, the young men of the village dwindled, while her appetite expanded endlessly.

Because of this, the Mountain Deity Temple and Red Maple Village gained widespread notoriety, attracting even more outsiders, especially during the annual Mountain Deity Festival, which yielded her an even greater harvest of offerings.

Greed knows no bounds.

Indulging in the ecstasy of acquiring power, she had harmed no one knew how many young men and even women, reducing them to neither male nor female freaks, until two noble young gentlemen arrived, drawing the attention of the imperial officials who governed the mortal realm.

And ultimately, they had lured in this lunatic of a woman!

Excessive desire costs one's life.

As the very last thread of aspiration was stripped away, Honglian knew she was about to vanish.

Boom!

The final bolt of heavenly lightning struck down mercilessly. Honglian could not even emit a single scream as the overbearing and righteous force of the lightning completely devoured her power.

The Mountain Deity Temple reverted to its original appearance, sinking into peace. All those mountains of corpses and seas of blood were merely an illusion.

The crowd remained shaken, still gripped by a sense of unreality.

Shen Qinghe gripped his official seal, took a deep breath, and turned his gaze toward Lang Jiuchuan. He saw her kneeling on the ground, her hands clenched into fists pressed against the earth, covered entirely in blood.

"Miss Jiu!" Shen Qinghe cried out in alarm, wanting to step forward and support her, but a weak voice rang out in his ear.

"Do not come over. She is fine."

Shen Qinghe's steps halted. He looked at her with a worried expression, while the rest of the onlookers stared in terror, their hearts nearly stopping from fright.

Whose blood was this, exactly?

Jiang Che huddled weakly within the spiritual platform, looking at Lang Jiuchuan with utter speechlessness.

It knew she was mad, but it hadn't known she was truly *this* mad.

She genuinely disregarded her own life.

When such a nine-fold heavenly tribulation struck down, how could one avoid being torn to shreds? Furthermore, her meridians—although that fierce and overbearing lightning power would devour the evil energy within her body, it would simultaneously sweep through her entire skeletal frame and meridians.

This was equivalent to undergoing a tribulation to level up; her meridians would expand, but if she failed to endure it, she would be reduced to a cripple.

Look at her now—was she not drenched in blood, her breath failing her? And this was merely the physical torment.

As for her soul, it had been split apart by the heavenly thunder, and now she was using the aspiration stripped from the evil deity Honglian to patch it back together.

Jiang Che felt a complex mix of emotions, unsure how to evaluate Lang Jiuchuan.

To call her insane would be inaccurate, for while fighting, she simultaneously managed to strip the enemy's best treasures and keep them for herself. Such scheming went far beyond eight hundred tricks.

To say she feared death was equally false, given her madness in using herself as bait and embracing the enemy in mutual destruction.

Jiang Che suddenly recalled the battle it had once fought against her and felt a lingering dread. Could that woman have been holding back during their fight?

Staring at Lang Jiuchuan, a trace of relief welled up in its heart, along with a sense of awe it hadn't even consciously realized.

She was truly a person not to be provoked.

Unaware of Jiang Che's inner monologues, Lang Jiuchuan was currently gritting her teeth to repair her soul while guiding the rampaging lightning force to course through her meridians.

It was true that she specialized in slaying evils, but she was not genuinely seeking her own death. Since she had summoned the lightning power, she refused to let it go to waste. Her current body was frail, and her meridians were weak—especially since her hand and foot tendons had been extracted, forcing her to rely entirely on sorcery. Now that she possessed the power of thunder and lightning, she would undoubtedly use it to expand her meridians, allowing this body to be forged into a healthier state in the future.

After completing a full major circulation, Lang Jiuchuan felt all the lightning power transform into the essence of Dao and return to her spiritual platform. Only then did she let out a breath, slump sideways onto the ground, and tremblingly open her eyes.

"Child..." Seeing her collapse and open her eyes, Shen Qinghe felt a piercing ache in his heart. He lunged forward, kneeling beside her, wanting to support her yet not daring to touch her.

Truly, the girl's current appearance could only be described as horrifyingly battered.

There was nowhere to grab her, and he dared not make contact, fearing she would shatter!

Lang Jiuchuan cracked a grin. "Sir, is my proud bone still intact?"

Shen Qinghe: "!"

When on earth is it, and you're still worrying about some bone!

Lang Jiuchuan shifted her gaze away and looked at the statue of Honglian behind him, her eyes carrying a haughty and triumphant glint. *I won!*

Crack.

The statue of Honglian, which had stood so securely upon the lotus platform, was struck by some immense force and shattered into pieces. A skeleton rolled out from within, the skull coming to a stop right in front of Lang Jiuchuan.

Lang Jiuchuan's large eyes locked gazes with the empty sockets of the skull.

With an expression of disgust, she looked away and touched her own eyes, feeling thoroughly nauseated.

No other reason—she had remembered that her own body was just as hollow as this.

She needed to find a pair of eyes as soon as possible.

Seeing the pile of white bones, Shen Qinghe pressed his lips into a thin line.

Thus, Lang Jiuchuan had not been wrong at all. What Mountain Deity Honglian? It was clearly an evil entity artificially manufactured through human worship—no, what kind of deity could it possibly be? It was nothing more than an evil monstrosity!

"Mountain Deity!" A hoarse, shrill, and terrified voice echoed through the temple. Someone crawled over laboriously, opening their arms in an attempt to gather the human bones scattered on the ground.

It was Elder Ke, who was gradually losing his vitality now that he lacked the support of the aspiration power.

"Seize him!" Shen Qinghe commanded, looking toward Qian Cheng and the others.

Qian Cheng and his men snapped out of their shock and stepped forward to apprehend the aged Elder Ke.

"There's no need. He is dying."

Elder Ke paid no heed to their words. He only persisted in arranging the bones back into a human shape piece by piece, murmuring vaguely, "It's all right. Little Wan will forge a golden body for you again. It's all right."

He looked around wildly, spotted the skull near Lang Jiuchuan's feet, and reached out to pick it up. Yet, his life force entirely spent, he collapsed onto the ground. His hand trembled as it stretched toward the skull, missing by just a hair's breadth, falling short by only a little...

Lang Jiuchuan squatted down in front of him and said, "What you forged was never a deity, but an evil entity born from your own selfish desires. Your merits and sins shall be judged by the underworld. Go to your death!"

Elder Ke's throat emitted a gurgling sound. His eyes bulged wide, filled entirely with reluctance, before his breath finally ceased altogether.

Well, after overthrowing the original setting, the writing flowed quite smoothly. The sheer pleasure of storytelling is nothing less than this! Hehe.

Happy Minor New Year~