The world felt wrong, like a mirror bent out of shape. Her life shouldn’t twist this way either. She sees Ouyang’s lost look, and pain pricks Xi’s heart like a buried thorn.

"This isn’t what we agreed. You seized my body. I can’t accept that."

She can’t tell if it’s the control she loathes or something deeper. Her mind is a muddled sea. Lian had held the reins, yet Xi saw everything outside, clear as winter air.

It’s the first time she’s seen that face on Ouyang—sadness draining him, loss carving him like rain on stone.

"In everything I do, I serve this world. I save," says white‑haired Lian in a black void, her voice cold as frost and her will unmoving granite.

Right now, Xi is a storming teenager kicking against the gate. "Enough. What’s the world to me? I just want the people beside me safe, living in peace."

"So from now on, I decide." She declares it like striking a gong. Red lightning rolls overhead like a tide of fire.

Lian sighs, a helpless wind, as if realizing something. Her figure thins in the dark and fades like smoke.

Elsewhere, Ouyang’s wild laughter snaps back on him like a spring. Mid‑laugh, that familiar red lightning pours down, a scarlet net closing fast.

"This makes no sense. This lightning makes no damn sense." He can’t believe it’s after him. With charred, exploded hair, he finally spots the true source.

Xi—the girl he used to sweet‑talk everywhere—stands wreathed in red lightning. In her wine‑red eyes, a mysterious magic circle turns like a clock of stars.

Behind her, auroras flicker in and out, as if a dream‑kingdom opens like a silk screen. So dreamlike. So sharp it hurts.

"Dammit, I knew it. That girl would be a calamity sooner or later. Didn’t think it’d arrive this early." Ouyang rubs his temples, a man out of moves.

Others don’t get it, but Ouyang knows how frightening Xi is. In some ways she’s strong as iron; in others, she’s breakable glass.

He’s felt her strength firsthand. She can turn vows into reality, like the contract between them. Yet she’s weak anywhere outside vows. If Ouyang hadn’t been stupid enough to fake a contract back then, Xi would be just an oddity to him.

Because of that suicidal stunt, Xi’s binding power on Ouyang now is heavy as chains.

"Girl, try zapping me again. If I don’t teach you a lesson, do you really think I’m a harmless kitten?"

He feels wronged, truly. If Xi were striking him for some unforgivable sin, fine. But what did he do?

He just saved the world, didn’t he? He’s the savior—fresh off saving the world! It’s self‑styled, sure, but even so, his blundering bought this scarred land a breath of peace.

So when Xi aims lightning at him, Ouyang bristles. You don’t kneel in gratitude—fine. But you’re going to fry me?

Sporting a scorched, punk‑rock mess of hair, Ouyang grips his sword one‑handed. "So what if the girl’s strong? I’ll sever her power."

He pictures himself climbing, step by step, to the peak of life. He swings the Divine Sword without mercy toward Xi’s direction. "Begone, damn ability."

Seconds pass. He holds the sword mid‑arc, unmoving. A wind slips by; he’s still a statue. Xi watches his swagger freeze; she started uneasy, but he swings once—and then turns to stone.

Maybe she’s worried for him. Xi drifts closer and tries, "Ouyang? You okay?"

She waves a small hand in front of his face.

"I…" He finally responds, but his expression is wrong, skewed like a cracked mask. "Hell, this is ridiculous. Why is it like this?"

Ouyang feels his faith collapse like a temple under quake. The Divine Sword in his hand tops the pantheon of artifacts. And what just happened? The legendary supreme artifact did nothing to Xi.

"This isn’t scientific. None of this makes sense." He mutters as his thoughts scatter like dropped beads. He tries the method he used in the Mist Labyrinth, sword ready—but still nothing. Watching his weird reactions, Xi worries he’s about to lose it. She’s not afraid of him acting crazy; she fears he’ll go berserk and butcher the whole town.

The Divine Sword flops in his hand, waving like a blade without a soul. That’s when Xi catches something sharp in the blur.

"Noise, noise—shut up." Xi shouts at Ouyang, and red lightning blooms in her palm like scarlet flowers. He sees the red and clamps his mouth shut at once, silence dropping like a curtain.

"Little punk, daring to threaten me? Just you wait."

His mouth protests, but his feet keep retreating, leaf by leaf. Xi can smell the guilt on him.

She studies Ouyang, then the toppled houses nearby, then Ouyang again. Finally, an insidious smile curls like a fox at her lips.

"Ouyang, last time in that Demon King’s palace, you nabbed Kooson’s treasure, right? Now the town’s in a crucial rebuild. You aren’t going to contribute?"

At her words, Ouyang swallows. He strokes the storage ring on his finger, face blanching. "The treasure is my life. Don’t you even—"

He doesn’t finish. Thunder rolls; red clouds boil across the sky like blood in water.

Xi’s power turns oaths into reality. By their past contract, Ouyang is the servant. His resistance is oath‑breaking. So the sky’s upheaval is the punishment made visible.

His mood feels like a thousand horses stampeding across a desert, tearing up everything. Those glittering things may be mundane—but he loves collecting them.

Back then, with a dragon’s hoarder’s heart, he killed a dragon and roasted a dragon god for treasure. That’s how deep his love for gold runs.

After long grinding thought, Ouyang bends to Xi’s lightning at last.

Xi counts the gold coins scattered like sunlight, her pupils brightening. Ouyang can see it: inside, she’s a little money‑gremlin.

"All that gold, shining everywhere—how is it? You like it?" Ouyang somehow ends up close beside her. He murmurs in her ear, "They say in a dragon’s lair, even the floor is solid gold."

His words spark something. Xi closes her eyes, bites her lip, and seems to wrestle with a hard choice.

"Dragons aren’t half as rich as you Demon Kings, are they?" One line shatters his plan like glass. Ouyang looks at her anew. Why’s this girl blurting harsh truths?

He coughs, awkward, not sure where to take the talk. Luckily, Xi speaks first, eyes flashing like coins.

"Ouyang, your fellow Demon Kings should be filthy rich, right?" Her eyes spin with schemes. Ouyang never expected her to target the Demon Kings themselves.

For a second, he wants to clap her shoulder and say, My path isn’t lonely.

Calming down, he sees it. Xi looks like a little miser, sure, but compared to before, she’s grown. She has her own ideas now.

"That stuff? Easy, easy." Ouyang smiles, butter‑soft. "But look at me. Aren’t I way too weak right now?"

"Hmph. Bargaining already? You want me to undo your seal? Dream on."

"Huh? Then how am I supposed to hunt treasure? You have no idea. Not long ago, my ex‑underlings teamed up to assassinate me. Without real strength, I wouldn’t go near that kind of dirty job."

He vows it, tone solid as iron. Xi doesn’t see any cracks on his face. He’s telling the truth; she can’t call him out.

"How about this. If breaking my seal would cost your life, I won’t force it. But…" Ouyang rubs his hands, eyes heating like coals.

That hungry look makes Xi stiff. Is he about to go beast‑mode and demand she sleep with him? Sure, she’s broke—but she’d never sell her body for coin.

Thinking that, she guards her chest with both hands, reflex fast as a shutter.

"Hey, what’s that supposed to mean? With a chest barely bigger than an egg, what’s there to cover? You think I’m that desperate?"

He’s exaggerating, and Xi isn’t that flat. Still, her reaction stings him. Is Ouyang that kind of creep?

Xi bristles, ready to snap, but Ouyang wisely shifts the topic like turning a boat before a storm.

"Alright, enough nonsense. Business."

He straightens his shamate hair, a charred face under the soot. "Simple. I need your ability. We split any treasure fifty‑fifty. How’s that? You won’t lose."

"Uh?"