Penglai was supposed to be a paradise.
Floating mountains.
Whispering waterfalls.
The air itself was supposed to taste like magic and serenity.
It wasn't.
It was a prison.
The sky was a bruised, sickly purple. The waterfalls were frozen mid-cascade.
And coiled around the central, magnificent palace, was a snake.
A very, very big snake.
**
Bai Suzhen, the gentle literature professor, was gone.
In her place was a serpent the size of a skyscraper.
Her scales were the color of polished jade, her eyes twin lanterns of cold, ancient power.
She was beautiful.
And she was terrifying.
Li Wei stood at the gates of the immortal realm, his heart a lead weight in his stomach.
He was alone.
Just as the exam paper had demanded.
And in the courtyard, in front of the palace, were his friends.
They were in cages.
Cages woven from pure, crackling energy, glowing with a malevolent green light.
**
Long Bo, the dragon of order, was desperately trying to find a structural weakness in his cage, his face a mask of frustrated logic.
Xiao Qian, the fox spirit, was pulling at the bars, her nine tails lashing in a panic, her usual sass replaced by raw fear.
Jiang, the reformed jiangshi, was just standing there, utterly still, a single, dry tear tracing a path down his gray cheek.
And in a fourth cage, larger than the others, was Feng Yue.
She wasn't fighting.
She was just kneeling, her head bowed, her fiery spirit seemingly extinguished.
Defeated.
**
"You came," a voice hissed, echoing from the heavens.
It was Bai Suzhen. Her voice, no longer soft and gentle, was the sound of scales sliding over stone.
"I knew you would. Your chaotic nature is so predictably... heroic."
The massive serpent's head lowered, its glowing eyes fixing on Li Wei.
"Welcome to my collection."
"Collection?" Li Wei whispered, his voice trembling.
"Oh, yes," Bai Suzhen hissed. "Did you really think you were the first? The only one?"
She laughed, a dry, rattling sound that shook the very foundations of Penglai.
"I have been collecting Chaos Cultivator candidates for centuries. Every time a new anomaly like you appears, I guide them. I test them. And when they fail, I preserve them."
She gestured with her massive head to the palace behind her.
"This entire realm is a battery. And your predecessors are the fuel."
"My plan," she announced, her voice ringing with the force of a true believer, "is to absorb your combined power. The chaos of a thousand failed gods, all focused into a single point. Me."
"I will have the power to tear down the Jade Emperor. To shatter the celestial bureaucracy. To create a new, better, more logical divine order."
**
The friends in the cages reacted.
"You're insane!" Xiao Qian shrieked, her voice raw with terror.
Long Bo slammed a fist against the energy bars. "This is a gross misuse of spiritual energy! The cosmic auditors will hear about this!"
They tried to use their powers.
Long Bo summoned a water dragon, but it sizzled and evaporated the moment it touched the cage.
Xiao Qian's illusions flickered and died.
Jiang just stood there, his power completely inert.
"Your abilities are useless here," Bai Suzhen explained with a bored sigh. "These cages are designed to neutralize your specific qi signatures. They are perfectly tailored prisons."
She turned her gaze back to Li Wei.
"This was always the final test, you see. To isolate you. To strip you of your support network. To see what you would do when you were truly, completely, alone."
It was a trap, a cold voice echoed in Li Wei's mind. Yang Mode, analytical even in the face of doom. Every step was calculated. The study group. The bonding. The creation of an emotional support system. All designed to create a vulnerability that could be exploited.
She took our friends, Yin Mode whimpered, his voice cracking with despair. This is my fault. All my fault.
**
He looked at their faces.
At Long Bo's desperate struggle.
At Xiao Qian's terrified tears.
At Jiang's silent despair.
At Feng Yue's broken, empty form.
They were here because of him.
They were trapped, tortured, and about to be used as fuel... because they had been foolish enough to be his friends.
The guilt was a physical thing.
A crushing weight that buckled his knees.
He fell to the ground, the cold stone of Penglai pressing against his cheek.
It was too much.
The tests. The gods. The prophecies.
He had tried. He had really, really tried.
But he wasn't a hero.
He was a curse. A walking disaster that brought ruin to everyone he cared about.
And for the first time, the two warring voices in his head, the terrified idiot and the cold genius, fell silent.
They were replaced by a single, unified, and utterly heartbreaking thought.
A thought of pure, selfless love.
I would rather die.
I would rather be erased from existence.
Than let them suffer for my power.
**
He pushed himself to his feet.
The trembling was gone.
The fear was gone.
All that was left was a quiet, terrible resolve.
He looked up at the massive, terrifying serpent goddess.
"You win," he said, his voice clear and steady.
"Take me. Take my power. Do whatever you want."
"Just let them go."
He closed his eyes, ready for the end.
Ready for the pain.
Ready for the oblivion.
He waited.
And waited.
But nothing happened.
He opened his eyes.
Bai Suzhen was staring, not at him, but at the cage holding Feng Yue.
Her serene, confident expression was gone.
Replaced by... confusion?
**
CRACK.
A sound like shattering glass.
A single, hairline fracture appeared on the surface of Feng Yue's energy cage.
She was still kneeling, her head bowed.
But her hands... her hands were glowing.
Not with the wild, chaotic fire he was used to.
This was different.
It was a cold, white, impossibly bright flame.
The fire of a phoenix at its absolute peak.
CRACK. CRACKLE. SHATTER.
The energy cage exploded into a million shards of green light.
Feng Yue rose to her feet.
Slowly.
The defeated, broken look was gone.
Her eyes were open, and they were not the eyes of a victim.
They were the eyes of a queen.
A queen who was very, very pissed off.
"Pretending to be weak," she said, her voice a low, dangerous growl that promised nothing but pain, "is exhausting."
She looked at Li Wei, and a flicker of her old, fiery, exasperated affection broke through the cold fury.
"Did you really think," she said, a small, dangerous smile playing on her lips as her phoenix flames roared to life around her, burning with a power he had never seen before, "I'd let you face this alone, you magnificent idiot?"
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