The two demonic cultivators’ embryonic Minor Cosmoses were unlike any Xu Ziqing had previously seen.
They seemed… incomplete.
The one on the left was hazy and insubstantial. The one on the right looked equally illusory.
Images of men and women floated within both, surrounded by an ambiguous pink radiance.
As soon as they were summoned, the two embryonic domains drew together and merged. The images of men and women within them leaned into one another, kissing and caressing; their bodies entwined as they began having intercourse.
Extreme yin gave birth to yang, and as yang grew stronger yin weakened. Then yin gained strength and yang declined; when yang reached its limit, yin arose once more.
As this alternation repeated, a strange power was born from the men’s and women’s sexual union, almost as though new life were being conceived, gathering the essential energies of heaven and earth.
Xu Ziqing sensed a strangely conflicting aura, somehow both seductive and pure, spreading in every direction.
A faint feverish heat stirred in Xu Ziqing, along with the desire to find someone to sleep with; even his mind threatened to be bewitched.
Within his dantian, his secondary and subordinate Woods stirred as though eager to escape.
Xu Ziqing grew sharply alert.
He removed his bamboo flute and brought it to his lips.
A clear melody rang out, sweeping the oppressive warmth away and stilling his turbulent inner energy.
He steadied his Dao heart and resisted the residual influence of the two domains.
Because he was concentrating on this and worrying about Yun Lie, he never noticed that the two boys behind him were completely unaffected.
The boys, meanwhile, had observed everything that happened.
“That one at least knows how to make a decision.”
“It’s too soon to judge his character. Let’s see what he does next.”
“What a pity. Those men were such experienced hands, and now they’ve all been killed…”
“What’s there to regret? There are countless lechers in the world. Do you really think we two brothers will ever lack people to serve us?”
“That’s true.”
After exchanging these messages by voice transmission, the two boys looked faintly amused and spoke again.
“Do you think the sword cultivator can defeat those two demons?”
“These martial brothers are interesting. If he loses, we’ll simply step in and seize them.”
The two demonic leaders, meanwhile, believed that summoning their paired embryonic Minor Cosmoses guaranteed victory.
Yun Lie was entirely untroubled.
He pointed at his brow. A deep black fissure opened there, and an extraordinarily powerful force emerged and took shape above his head.
The intangible structure resembled a world. Countless trajectories revolved overhead, hinting at profound natural laws.
Below them lay a vortex that drew the surrounding currents inward.
At the bottom, innumerable swords, some illusory and some solid, thrust their blades skyward with tremendous force.
Their sharpness seemed capable of splitting heaven and earth!
The demonic leaders’ faces changed. “You… little brat! You possess an embryonic Minor Cosmos too?”
A full Minor Cosmos of the Purple Palace was ordinarily formed only after the Nascent Soul stage. Even at half-step Nascent Soul, these two men could produce a usable structure only by joining their incomplete individual domains. Yet this white-robed youth, unmistakably at middle Golden Core, had created one by himself!
Worse, his embryonic Minor Cosmos looked more solid and complete than theirs.
How could they believe such a thing?
Yet disbelief could not undo what stood before them.
Yun Lie was always decisive. He had summoned his embryonic Minor Cosmos to answer theirs for one reason.
Collision.
At his thought, the sword domain rushed forward.
Space compressed wherever it went, as though one additional effort might cause it to shatter.
When an embryonic Minor Cosmos matured into a true Minor Cosmos within the Purple Palace, it could establish an entire bounded world governed by its owner’s laws.
Anyone entering that world would have to follow those laws.
Those unable to do so would die, unless they could shatter the domain with a Minor Cosmos of their own.
Thus the greatest answer to one Minor Cosmos was generally another.
And that was what happened here.
The demonic cultivators panicked at Yun Lie’s manifestation. Angered, they nonetheless sent their combined domain forward.
In the next instant the two collided!
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The explosions were tremendous.
Their force split the earth, raised storms of yellow sand, shattered the barren mountain, and sent enormous stones tumbling.
The destruction scarcely seemed possible for a struggle between a middle Golden Core cultivator and two opponents at half-step Nascent Soul.
Although Xu Ziqing had already retreated some distance, the shock wave still reached him.
He immediately gathered up the two boys and withdrew several li with the wind.
The ground was now scored with ravines. The barren mountain had been flattened.
The sight was enough to make anyone draw a sharp breath.
At the same time, the struggle between the embryonic domains reached its conclusion.
As the forces faded, the three combatants came into view.
The two demonic cultivators’ robes were torn, their hair disheveled, their appearance miserable.
Their faces were pale as gold paper, and one suddenly spat black blood.
The combined embryonic Minor Cosmos above them swayed on the verge of collapse. Formerly at least somewhat solid, it was now so indistinct that any further attack might destroy it entirely.
Who knew how many years such damage would take to repair?
But both men were badly injured, and no opportunity for recovery remained.
Yun Lie’s sword domain remained almost entirely intact. Several dozen swords within had been broken, but the rest was extraordinarily sturdy.
His domain had already absorbed the powers of eight Sword Dao Fruits, engraving traces of the Dao into its structure. It was not easily destroyed.
He did not pause. A thought set the domain moving again.
His embryonic Minor Cosmos advanced upon them. In desperation, the two released their true essence and sent out every magical treasure they possessed to block it.
The treasures bought only an instant before their protective light shattered and they fell.
That delay was far too brief to allow escape. Yun Lie’s domain descended straight onto the men.
In that moment, both were annihilated.
Having suppressed the two half-step Nascent Soul leaders, Yun Lie moved forward and recalled his domain.
Their bodies had been crushed beyond recognition, and their life force had been completely extinguished.
Yun Lie waved a hand. Two storage bracelets appeared in his palm, holding the leaders’ possessions.
Xu Ziqing saw the battle end and finally relaxed. With the two boys following him, he approached his senior brother.
Yun Lie looked up slightly.
Xu Ziqing smiled in admiration. “Senior Brother, that was remarkable.”
Yun Lie considered for a moment, then separated one of the bracelets. “This is yours.”
Xu Ziqing was startled and shook his head. “I didn’t contribute to that fight. I can’t accept it.”
He had killed many lesser criminals, but collected none of their belongings. Their stages were not much above his own, and he doubted they possessed anything useful to him. In any case, he had been too repelled by their deeds to think of looting them.
But Yun Lie had defeated these two leaders entirely by himself. How could Xu Ziqing accept one of their bracelets?
Yun Lie remained expressionless. “You should accept what I give you.”
Xu Ziqing flushed. Before he could respond, the bracelet had already settled into his palm.
He stared at it in astonishment. “This…”
Yun Lie continued, “It holds a great deal. Put it to good use.”
Mixed emotions filled Xu Ziqing, but he stopped protesting and fastened the bracelet to his wrist. It had a plain, masculine design and required no alteration.
Then he watched his senior brother put on the other bracelet, and his feelings stirred again.
He had long tried to restrain his impossible hopes, but what they had shared in Tianlan’s Secret Treasury remained difficult to forget.
Sometimes those memories returned without warning.
After storing the bracelets, the two examined what was inside.
One item was a jade slip recording the leaders’ cultivation studies and experiments. Its contents proved startling.
The two demonic leaders were actually blood brothers and trusted each other deeply. They had begun as rogue cultivators of average aptitude, unlikely to advance past Golden Core without a rare opportunity.
But on one expedition, such an opportunity appeared.
They found a cave residence left by a mighty demonic expert. The obvious treasures had already been stripped away. Refusing to give up, the brothers searched carefully and discovered a hidden cultivation manual.
It described a paired cultivation method, accompanied by a separate technique for stealing others’ cultivated essence. By combining the methods, practitioners could advance as far as Nascent Soul.
The technique placed surprisingly few demands on natural aptitude, which delighted the brothers.
Neither wished to trust an outsider. They therefore made a binding vow to become dual-cultivation Dao companions and pursue longevity together.
Their blood kinship and sworn bond reinforced their shared purpose.
Xu Ziqing was profoundly shocked.
These two… had been brothers all along?
He continued reading and gradually understood the full scope of their wrongdoing.
The paired-cultivation method was not inherently evil. As two partners joined together through dual cultivation, they could exchange more than true essence: insights, techniques and even their understanding of divine abilities could pass between them, benefiting them both.
The wickedness lay in the supplementary art of sexually draining other people’s vital essence.
That art seized the accumulated essence of another person’s life. Because the stolen power could not be fully absorbed directly, the brothers used their dual cultivation to circulate it between themselves, refining and purifying it as their own cultivation increased.
At first, each brother preyed on victims through sexual essence extraction, then they cultivated together to refine the stolen power. Once they formed their Golden Cores, they no longer wished to spend time hunting captives themselves. They settled in this barren desert, gathered demonic cultivators to do the work for them, and taught their recruits only the art of stealing essence from others.
Once their subordinates had drained enough victims to reach Golden Core, the brothers planned to turn on them, drain their accumulated essence in turn, and use their paired cultivation to break through to Nascent Soul. That way, they would reap the rewards without spending nearly so much of their own cultivation time.
For that ambition, countless people had suffered and died in the den.