With the catacombs put to rest, Irina recovered, like frost melting under a pale sun. Through it all, Ouyang never appeared; Jelinka’s four were left peering into shadows, the Great Scholar gone like mist at dawn.
As for Kooson’s treasure, Xi and Jelinka’s crew kept their hands clean, like stones washed by a clear stream. Jelinka’s four took the trove and hurried off, footsteps fading like rain on old tiles. Seeing them go, Xi and Irina turned to leave as well—until Kooson halted mid-path, a thorn snagging his memory.
“No… no way!” He blanched and bolted back, like a startled stag through underbrush. Xi and Irina traded wide-eyed looks, their breath snagging like silk on brambles; madman or Demon King, he was still a companion bound by contract, so they chased the echo of his panic.
Nearer, and nearer—until the bone throne loomed, cold as moonlight on ruins. Kooson dropped to his knees with a broken sound. Several floor bricks had been pried open; a dull glow bled from within, like embers losing their heat. There had already been a pit before, but Kooson had filled it; now another yawning hole gaped, clear sign someone still nested here.
Once, the light within had blazed gold, a sun caught in stone; now it flickered weakly, the hoard clearly spirited away. Irina bristled, heat rising like summer thunder. Bound by contract to Kooson, their fortunes rose and fell together; seeing him crumple, her chest tightened, like a drum struck off-beat.
Xi watched Kooson, unsettled; all that Demon King swagger had vanished, like a mask slipped. It felt familiar—Ouyang wore that same split skin. Are all Demon Kings like this? The question fluttered in her, a moth against glass.
From the torn-up floor came a loud clang—then another, iron barking in the dark. “That little thief’s still here? Come on, let’s grab him!” Irina didn’t wait; she dropped into the hole like a hawk stooping.
Xi couldn’t let her go alone; she followed, a red ribbon diving into night. Kooson stood above, wracked with doubt like waves on a cliff. Catching Ouyang—then what? Sealed or not, Ouyang carried trinkets that rewrote battle. That Oil Paper Umbrella wasn’t a toy; it was a supreme artifact, a calm moon hiding tides.
Kooson lacked the courage.
Below, Irina moved by the glow of crystals studding the wall, pale beacons in a vein of stone. She found Ouyang swinging a pickaxe, chips flying like icy sparks. “Kid, you’ve got nerve—stealing a Demon King’s stash!”
Ouyang turned, empty-eyed for a heartbeat, then scoffed, as casual as wind. “Same trade? I was here first. First come, first served. Go play in the mud.”
Arrogant—outrageously arrogant. Irina’s jaw set; she and Kooson were the rightful keepers by pact, two rings forged into one.
Ouyang looked back again, gears clicking; this woman ran with Xi. He spotted Xi behind Irina—like a crimson petal behind a white leaf.
“Ouyang.” Xi smiled, but the curve was twisted, a blade wrapped in silk. “Finally found you.”
Red lightning crawled over Ouyang’s skin, crackling like dry branches in a storm. “M—mistress, wait, this is a misunderstanding, let me expl—ah—”
She’d learned; she cut him off and drew on the contract. The air snapped and spat. In a breath, Ouyang was charcoal, hair blown like thistles, face smoked black, fog of ash curling from his lips.
“You—this woman—you’re dead. You’re so dead. Just wait—your smut book’s hitting the market! I’ll sell it to the whole world!” he roared, fury fizzing like boiling tar. Xi froze, realizing he held a leash around her throat; her gut knotted, a kite yanked by a storm. If those drawings spread, how would she walk beneath the sun?
But he wouldn’t be moved by an apology; words were leaves on a river to him. A single gold coin weighed more than ten ‘sorry’s.
“Maybe—maybe I was wrong to fry you, but I heard you were set on destroying the world last night! If not, why did you run? I have a stance too—letting you rampage is abandoning humanity.” She blurted it in one breath, cheeks flushed, heart pounding like a drum behind silk.
“Destroy the world? Am I that deranged? Ahahaha… that’s rich.” Ouyang smiled, warm as poison.
“You are that deranged,” Irina and Xi shot back together, voices tight as bowstrings.
“From now on, don’t leave my sight. Absolutely. Do not.” Xi clenched her fists, red pupils pinning Ouyang like a butterfly to cork.
He snorted, tossed the pickaxe aside, and planted his hands on his hips, swaggering like a stray cat on a temple roof. “Don’t think that makes me forget the book. When it’s out, you’re first to read.”
Xi’s face fell, a lantern snuffed. He’d derailed her too many times with words, turning spears into noodles. But now the topic held fast—he wouldn’t drop the book.
“Book? What book?” Irina leaned in, eyes bright, smile like a fox. Xi said nothing; some doors stay closed. Let boredom eat curiosity, like moss over a carving.
They climbed out of the little vault to find Kooson sitting hollow-eyed on the floor, as bleak as a winter tree. “My savings… my savings…”
Irina jolted, the missing treasure finally hitting like cold rain. “Ouyang, Kooson’s treasure—where is it?” Xi didn’t need guessing; stealing under a Demon King’s nose—only another Demon King would dare.
Ouyang cinched his backpack tighter, then sauntered for the exit, slow as smoke. “Ouyang! Give back Kooson’s treasure!”
Seeing Kooson broken, Irina’s temper flared, a prairie fire. They stood on the same line now—same shield, same blade.
“Ever since I started, I never leave empty-handed.” He tossed the words over his shoulder and kept walking, shadows swallowing his heels.
Xi sighed, a reed bending to wind. “Let it go. Once something lands in his hands, getting it back is harder than plucking a star.” She knew Ouyang’s habits—if he ever handed something out, it meant a wave was coming. Yesterday he’d given Xi a bag of coins; that very night, they’d nearly ‘destroyed the world.’
Ouyang stopped. He drew a Divine Grace Crystal from his spatial ring, faceted like earth under a furnace. “You think a Demon King won’t bare his fangs? You take me for a housecat with clipped claws?”
Kooson straightened, shedding grief like a cracked carapace. The old arrogance returned, a crown of thorns. “Someone dared curse Boss Ouyang? Looks like their skin’s itching.”
The Divine Grace Crystal in Ouyang’s hand blazed a deep brown, like mountain soil under noon sun. The world around them blurred and twisted; bodies dissolved to feeling, time to fog. They drifted like leaves between heaven and earth, thought hushed.
When the world stitched itself back together, a forest ringed them, trunks dark as pillars. Not far off, White Elves in white ceremonial robes were retreating, step by step, like snow receding from fire.
“White Elves!” Irina and Xi cried—Irina in shock, Xi in first-sight wonder.
Ouyang wasted no breath. He lifted the Divine Grace Crystal high, voice a knell. “Earth. Sky. Hand that rends a thousand-fathom Abyss.”
Brown light surged; the firmament split open like silk cut by steel; a colossal claw tore down from the heavens.
“That’s—Magus-tier, without a doubt…” Irina and Xi fell back, feet skimming like swallows; one Magus could level a city, dusting towers with a flick.
The White Elves grew paler, ivory draining to chalk. No escape—the claw shadowed half the clearing, and the space around them rippled, netted like water under wind.
“Hahahaha… White Elves, still some left. Then your line ends today. Vanish from this world.” Ouyang laughed, wild as stormfire; the brown Divine Grace Crystal turned to powder in his palm.
White Elves. Of course it was them. Rage rose in Ouyang like a black tide. He decided—erase their branch from the tree. If not for them, he wouldn’t have been sealed for so long. He had trusted someone back then; trust had turned to ash.
White Elves—the ones closest to the river of time, so people said. No doubt. Yet they were of the Sin Clan, banished by the Watcher of Time into that current, their whole tribe swept away. For a long age, “White Elf” had vanished from memory and from earth, a name swallowed like a star at dawn.
Not erased as a concept, but banished to the river—almost the same end. And Ouyang had used the Flowing Light Wheel to release one White Elf. For that, the Watcher hurled him to the bottom of the Abyss, locked there for years like a stone at the ocean floor. He’d known the price, and still he did it. He hadn’t regretted.
“Time. Fate. The Watcher’s scale. Black and white entwined. Under the witness of eternal twin eyes… erase.”
The sky dimmed like ink spilled across parchment. Two slits opened in the firmament, swallowing the descending claw before it could strike. The slits widened, slow as lids rising; everyone understood—those were eyes, a gaze unfolding from the vault of heaven.
“Let all debts and grudges end beneath that gaze.”
