After I stopped trying, a rich woman trained me into a demon emperor.

The master bedroom is on the second floor.

The solid wood door closes from the inside.

Zhou Ran did not turn around, but instead formed a hand seal and slapped it backward.

The black and gold energy flowed into the four walls and ceiling like mercury spilling onto the ground.

A soundproof barrier is thus formed, tightly sealing off all noise and activity within the small space.

Then, he turned and looked towards the center of the room.

Li Zhiyao stood with her feet together, about three feet away from the edge of the bed.

The blue and white porcelain cheongsam cascaded down her figure, the silky fabric outlining an irresistible curve.

The high slit in her dress revealed her long, slender legs, which swayed back and forth with her gentle breathing.

She lowered her head slightly, her gaze falling on the dark red carpet, her eyelashes casting two shadows under the overhead light.

"Why are you looking for me?"

Li Zhiyao held her high heels up to her toes and said playfully.

Zhou Ran didn't speak, but instead reached out his right hand and forcefully pinched her jawbone with four fingers.

He pressed his head down, and their lips met.

There was no room for maneuver; it was a completely direct and aggressive intrusion.

Li Zhiyao hadn't expected him to be so direct.

"Hmm..."

Instead of refusing, she raised her arms, overlapped her hands, and locked them tightly behind Zhou Ran's neck.

She had long since figured out this man's violent and straightforward style of doing things.

And she wasn't a pretentious woman.

Zhou Ran gripped the neckline of the cheongsam with her left hand and pulled hard with her fingers. The fabric couldn't withstand such brute force and tore open with a ripping sound.

Her clothes slipped down her shoulders and back to her waist.

The Taihuang totem under the skin of his left arm was burning red, and his blood vessels seemed to be surging like magma.

The most yang and vigorous qi and blood flowed outwards along his meridians, adhering to the front without reservation.

The Yin energy accumulated within Li Zhiyao's body over two thousand years was agitated by the heat source, spontaneously surging out to counterattack.

Their center of gravity shifted, and they both fell onto the large bed.

Yin and Yang energies intertwined and swirled between the bed, forming two visible red and white mists.

The intense heat of the Primordial Overlord Body forcefully entered Li Zhiyao's newly formed meridian network, forcibly suppressing the bone-chilling cold that had accumulated for thousands of years.

...

Halfway through their exchange, the cultivation path of the Yin-Yang Technique spontaneously formed a grand cycle within their bodies.

With his powerful cultivation at the mid-stage of the Golden Core realm, Zhou Ran dominated the entire cycle, drawing upon the Yin energy in Li Zhiyao's meridians that had not yet fully adapted to her new body, helping her solidify this physical form.

Li Zhiyao clenched her teeth, silently enduring the throbbing pain of her meridians being forcibly widened and the comfort of her internal energy merging with it.

Fine beads of sweat seeped from her temples, gathered at the tip of her nose, and finally dripped onto the pillow.

This was the first time in thousands of years that she had shed "bodily fluids".

The only sounds in the room were heavy breathing and the rustling of fabric.

......

After an unknown amount of time, Zhou Ran leaned against the headboard of the mahogany bed and lit a cigarette.

"Is that all you've got?"

Li Zhiyao curled up beside Zhou Ran's legs like a lazy cat, one hand still wandering around restlessly.

A thin black blanket was pulled down from her waist to her thighs, exposing her smooth back to the air.

Zhou Ran was so angry that he laughed, and he used his right hand to slap that plump mound hard.

This woman is really stubborn.

As a mid-stage Golden Core cultivator, I had already exercised considerable restraint earlier.

He could clearly see that her body and even her soul were trembling, obviously unable to bear it.

Now they're turning around and mocking themselves.

"Again!"

I'm not going to let you win this round!

Zhou Ran mounted the tiger's back like Wu Song.

"No, no, no..."

Li Zhiyao exclaimed in surprise.

......

Li Zhiyao could no longer straighten her back.

Her bra strap slid down her skin to her arm, and she casually pushed it aside, resting her chin on her hand as she looked at Zhou Ran.

Zhou Ran tapped his fingers on the wooden edge of the bedside table, completely entering a state of sage-like tranquility.

"Let's get down to business."

"The appetite of the rebel army in the underworld is far greater than we anticipated."

He flicked a piece of cigarette ash with his finger.

"Those wandering ghosts are trying to carve out a corridor between the living and the dead that allows passage in both directions."

"Unfortunately, I've already seen through their true nature and their playing style."

Li Zhiyao's two arched eyebrows stood up straight, and her posture became even more upright.

"My lord, the chaos within the underworld is a thousand times more complex than what we see on the surface of the mortal realm."

She casually tucked her hair back, her expression extremely serious.

"The Ten Kings of Hell are nominally responsible for suppressing all factions in the underworld, governing the reincarnation of countless souls, and managing the Book of Life and Death."

However, in recent years, the barriers of the Blue Star realm have been weakening, and the ancient evil spirits that were once suppressed have resurfaced.

Such creatures as drought demons, blood corpses, and evil spirits from the Nine Netherworlds have shown signs of resurgence, breaking free from their shackles.

There must be an extremely terrifying entity backing them up.

"Their plan is to drag the entire mortal realm into the underworld, using the flesh and blood and yang energy of the living to forcibly fill the gaps in the rules of the underworld that are about to collapse."

Zhou Ran scoffed coldly, his tone devoid of any apprehension.

"You want to use living beings to fill the hole?"

We'll see if this bunch of good-for-nothings can bear the consequences of their transgression.

He turned his head to look into Li Zhiyao's eyes.

"My cultivation has now officially entered the middle stage of the Golden Core realm."

With such strength and resources, they could easily confront the Song emperor and discuss the ownership of the territory face-to-face.

He pressed the cigarette, now only a butt remaining, into the glass ashtray and crushed it out.

This matter gave him a major headache.

In the underworld, Emperor Song promised him that he would send someone to contact him after he formed his core.

But there has been no news since.

The crack at the foot of Mangshan Mountain has been temporarily repaired, but he cannot cross it.

He also sent Ah Ning to find Xu Changsheng, but even he couldn't enter the underworld.

"Back when you were serving in the underworld, did you know of any channels that could directly deliver a proposal for cooperation to Emperor Song?"

Li Zhiyao leaned against the mattress, carefully considering possible countermeasures in her mind.

"If I were still in my previous divine soul form, I would still be able to enter the underworld."

But having reconstructed my physical body, I absorbed the impure energy of the mortal realm and became tainted by worldly karma. Now, I can no longer cross the gate of the Bridge of Helplessness.

Li Zhiyao's thoughts raced, and her eyes suddenly lit up.

"Phoenix."

"Feng Xi is in charge of the lonely boat on the River of Oblivion, guiding the souls of the dead. If you can find her, ask her to pass on a message to the Tenth Prince."

"It might work if she relays the message."

"Phoenix..."

"Okay, I'll leave this to you."

The spacious reception hall on the first floor.

Li Zhiyao was still wearing a blue and white porcelain cheongsam, but the two broken buttons on the collar were missing.

Instead, a large pearl brooch was used to temporarily fasten the tear.

A few strands of long hair fell around her ears, and her cheeks and the corners of her eyes still retained a radiant glow from the blood and energy she had absorbed.

Upon hearing footsteps, the three women on the sofa all looked up at the stairs.

Zhou Ran sat down on the sofa in the center.

"Where did Su Qingling and Su Qingwu go?"

He spoke up to question them.