Song Ciwan locked eyes with a pair of beastly eyes weeping tears of blood.

The gray mist churned, but the massive figure within was slightly hunched. Though filled with boundless resentment and possessing an unnatural Undying Body, he seemed like nothing more than a lost lamb, unable to find its way forward or back.

Beyond hatred, he was also filled with desolate terror.

Song Ciwan’s voice took on a firm strength, like the deep current of a quiet river. She said, "Because your hatred is muddled with confusion, while hers had a clear target."

"She knew who her enemies were, so she killed them all. She also hated herself, so she killed herself as well."

"With death, all troubles end and all grievances are settled. There was nothing left for her to cling to here, so why would she linger as a wraith? If anything, she wished she would never have to see you again, not in this life or any other!"

The beastly form in the gray mist trembled. Though the thunder in the sky had yet to strike, he looked as if he had been hit by a colossal bolt.

"Why question the heavens? And why blame them?"

"Heaven and Earth let nature take its course; they neither act nor create. What do the joys and sorrows of the Mortal World have to do with the heavens?"

"You just don’t dare to admit it. It was your mistake that let wolves into your home; your indulgence that emboldened a petty villain; your indifference that allowed your own daughter to be humiliated; your foolish piety that drove you and your wife apart... You dare question the heavens, you dare question ghosts, but do you dare question yourself?"

"You don’t dare. You’re afraid. So all you can do is blame heaven and earth, blame all the injustice!"

"There may be injustice in this world, and wicked people should be punished. Taking revenge is not wrong. But the thing that traps you here, that prevents you from finding release—was it ever the heavens and the earth?"

"It was you!"

It was you, it was you—

Song Ciwan hadn’t actually repeated herself much, but her final words, "It was you," seemed to spontaneously generate countless echoes. The echoes reverberated between heaven and earth, causing the great beast in the gray mist to clutch its head with its forelimbs and let out another mournful howl.

"AHHH—"

It was not the roar of a beast, but the cry of a man.

In this battle of hearts, that Void Illusion Demon Sword pierced heart and soul, shattering the ancient spirit that lingered here and scattering the deep-seated obsession that refused to fade.

"Is it my fault? Was it my fault?" From within the beast’s head, a muffled human voice began to sob. "Xiaoya, Daddy failed you. Lady Su, I failed you too... Great-Uncle, Uncle, Sanzhuang, all the elders and folks of the village, I failed you... Mother, I failed you too..."

"But Celestial Lord, you gave us no way to live!"

"First came the natural disaster, then the man-made one! The officials refused to provide relief, yet they still demanded we pay our dues! Why? Why?!"

"I still hate. I hate so, so much..."

Even as his obsession faded, his indignation could not be quelled.

High in the sky, the bolt of lightning that had been brewing for so long finally CRACKED down!

BOOM!

A serpent of lightning tore across the sky, and the thunderbolt lit up the heavens.

The Giant Village Chief in the gray mist roared at the sky, dancing with the serpent of lightning.

Wherever the lightning struck, raging flames erupted.

This time, the great beast in the flames did not regenerate. Roaring, whimpering, and weeping bitterly, he clutched his head and curled up in the fire, where he was finally burned to ash.

Though his indignation remained, in the end, he had to let himself go, and let others go as well.

The band of refugees who had caused Wealth Village’s disaster years ago had truly deserved their fate. But the ordinary residents of Su Yang City who had fallen into the Deceitful Realm, their memories blurred as they were transformed into refugees, were in fact innocent.

A wraith’s revenge is not wrong, but if it leads to endless killing, who can claim to be blameless?

As the Giant Village Chief turned to ash, flames gradually began to rise from the feet of the other Wealth Village villagers.

This Deceitful Realm must have been centered on the Giant Village Chief. With his dissipation, the other villager-wraiths were naturally freed from their bonds. The spectral flames ignited spontaneously, gradually merging into a single sheet of fire.

In the flames, some faces were peaceful, some were twisted in agony, and others streamed with tears, weeping in silence...

The faint notes of a simple mountain ballad seemed to drift from the flames: "Warm is the spring breeze in the third month, as poplar catkins fall and bamboo shoots grow. My love poles the raft as I set our boat afloat, unafraid of the hard journey on the rivers and lakes..."

The song, melodious and ethereal, seemed to echo from the other side of time and space.

Back then, the sky was clear and the sun was warm. Back then, faces were full of smiles. Back then, the spring flowers were brilliant. Back then, the days were long...

A tiny droplet of water, holding within it a tiny village, splashed up for a moment from the long river of time, only to vanish instantly back into the merciless torrent.

The flames burned out, and at some point, the thunder had ceased. The heavens were still the same expanse of ashen-blue, yet something felt vaguely different.

But the sight of Wealth Village before her had clearly undergone a drastic transformation.

What had previously been a peaceful, prosperous, and beautiful mountain village in Song Ciwan’s eyes was now, after the fire, nothing but a stretch of scorched, sallow earth.

The mountain was the same mountain, but now it was only jagged, grotesque rocks, long stripped of any verdant life.

The river was the same river, but its bed had long since dried and cracked, its gentle burble nowhere to be heard.

Of the small village nestled by the mountain and river, only broken walls and ruined foundations remained, along with the scattered frames of houses, weathered by the long erosion of time.

The wraiths of Wealth Village had all been burned into nothingness, but the ground was now littered with the swollen bodies of humans—

These were, of course, the residents of Su Yang City who had been inexplicably trapped here during the great change at Bibo Lake.

As the wraithly presence dissipated, some people’s memories began to return.

The ones whose memories returned the fastest were precisely the group who had eaten the meat slowly and consumed little of it.

Take Aunt Zhou, for example. She hadn’t eaten a single bite. The very instant the wraithly presence vanished, she cried out, "Where is this? H-How did I get here? No, that’s not right, isn’t this Wealth Village? I..."

She hadn’t forgotten her experience in Wealth Village, but her memories were a jumbled mess, and Aunt Zhou couldn’t immediately make sense of it all.

Following her cry, more people got to their feet one after another, also crying out in alarm.

Unlike Aunt Zhou, the memories of those who had eaten the meat had started to blur the moment they began. Thus, the memories that returned to them were from before they entered the Deceitful Realm.

Most of them only knew they had been mysteriously swept into this place from the shores of Bibo Lake. As for what happened after that, they were completely bewildered.

One man, clutching his bloated stomach, cried out in shock, "Why am I here? I... UGH!"

As he spoke, a foreign sensation surged up his throat. He opened his mouth, and a torrent came SPLASHING out.

With that single retch, a pile of glistening white things spilled from his mouth.

Upon closer inspection, the plump, white things on the ground were still writhing in a pile, emanating an indescribably putrid stench.

Someone shrieked in panic, "Ah! Maggots! Y-You actually threw up maggots... UGH!"

The person who had shrieked didn’t get to say another word of disgust before they, too, began to vomit.

SPLASH. An identical pile of plump, white things poured from their mouth.

Then, more and more cries of alarm rang out, accompanied by waves of vomiting and ever-increasing piles of plump, white things.

Aunt Zhou’s scalp prickled with horror, and she hastily shuffled away from the crowd.

There, outside the crowd, a young woman with a plain face had appeared, standing there quietly.

This young woman was none other than Song Ciwan. She had taken advantage of the chaos to retreat behind the crowd and quickly mold herself a new face.

When Aunt Zhou approached, she was examining the multiple rewards the Heaven and Earth Scale had just collected.

And among them, a speck of Demon Flame that had shot out from the gray smoke as the Giant Village Chief was reduced to ashes!