Lin Yuehua POV
The light was burning me alive from the inside.
I screamed as power exploded through my body—hot and cold at the same time, like swallowing lightning. Every bone felt like it was breaking and rebuilding. My blood turned to fire in my veins.
"Make it stop!" I gasped, clutching Shen's arm. "Please, make it stop!"
"I don't know how!" Shen shouted back, trying to hold me steady. His eyes were wide with panic. "Yuehua, listen to me—you need to breathe! Control it!"
Control what? I didn't understand what was happening. I was just a merchant. I had no spiritual roots. No cultivation power. This couldn't be real.
But the light pouring from my hands said otherwise.
Wei Zichen stared at me like I'd grown a second head. "The Demon Emperor's Seal," he whispered. "It wasn't destroyed. Shen Qinghe, you fool—you sealed it inside her bloodline!"
"I didn't!" Shen yelled. "I destroyed that artifact completely!"
"Clearly not!" Wei Zichen's shock turned to greedy excitement. "Even better than your Golden Core. The seal's power combined with mortal purity? She's worth a hundred cultivators!"
He lunged toward me.
Shen threw himself between us, summoning his fire sword despite his wound. Their blades clashed with a sound like thunder. Spiritual energy exploded outward, knocking everyone backward.
Everyone except me.
I stood frozen in the center, light still pouring from my body. The power felt ancient and angry, like something that had been sleeping too long. It wanted out. It wanted to destroy.
And the worst part? A tiny piece of me wanted to let it.
"Yuehua!" Old Man Chen's voice cut through my panic. "Remember who you are, child! You're Lin Yuehua, merchant and protector! Not this—this thing!"
His words were like cold water on my burning thoughts. I was Yuehua. I ran a trading company. I protected my workers. I fought for fair prices and honest deals.
I wasn't a weapon.
I grabbed the power flowing through me and pulled—not away, but inward. Forcing it back into whatever hole it had crawled out of.
The light flickered.
"That's it!" Shen shouted, still fighting Wei Zichen. "You're stronger than it! Push it down!"
I gritted my teeth and pulled harder. The power fought back, screaming in my mind like a wounded animal. But I'd spent three years building a business in a town that didn't respect women merchants. I'd fought bandits, cheating suppliers, and corrupt officials.
Some ancient artifact thought it could control me?
Not happening.
The light vanished with a sound like breaking glass.
I collapsed, gasping. The power was still there—I could feel it coiled inside my chest like a sleeping snake—but it wasn't in control anymore.
I was.
Shen broke away from Wei Zichen and caught me before I hit the ground. "Are you okay?"
"Define okay," I muttered. Everything hurt. My muscles felt like torn paper. But I was alive. "What was that?"
"Your father's artifact," Shen said grimly. "When I destroyed it three years ago, a piece must have entered your bloodline. It's been dormant until—"
"Until tonight," Wei Zichen finished, looking far too pleased. "Until she touched a cultivator's spiritual energy while emotionally connected to him. Love awakens what power cannot." He laughed. "How poetic. And how convenient for me."
He raised both hands. Ice and wind swirled around him, growing stronger. "I came for one prize tonight. Now I'll leave with two. Your Golden Core and her Demon Seal. My breakthrough to Immortal Ascension is guaranteed."
"Over my dead body," Shen growled.
"That can be arranged." Wei Zichen smiled. "In fact, I insist on it."
He attacked with everything he had.
Shen pushed me behind him and met Wei Zichen's assault head-on. But I could see the truth—Shen was already wounded, already exhausted. Wei Zichen was fresh and twice as powerful.
We were going to lose.
The townspeople knew it too. They watched with horrified faces as their magistrate fought a losing battle against a monster in human skin.
I couldn't just stand there. I couldn't be useless while Shen died protecting me.
The power in my chest stirred, responding to my desperation. It whispered promises—strength, speed, the ability to fight back. All I had to do was let it out again.
But what if I couldn't control it this time? What if it took over completely?
Shen crashed into a building, blood streaming from his mouth. Wei Zichen walked toward him slowly, savoring his victory.
"Any last words, Faceless Sword?"
Shen looked at me, and his eyes said everything his mouth couldn't: Run. Save yourself. Live.
I'd spent three years hating him for not saving my father. Now I understood the truth—he'd been trying to save everyone, all the time, alone.
No more.
I reached inside myself and grabbed that coiled power. "Hey, Wei Zichen!"
He turned, annoyed. "The mortal speaks? How—"
I released the seal's power, but this time differently. Not wild and explosive. Controlled. Focused. Every drop of energy aimed at one single purpose: protecting the man I'd been too stupid to appreciate.
Golden light erupted from my hands—not the same as before, cleaner somehow. It formed a barrier between Shen and Wei Zichen, solid as steel.
Wei Zichen's next attack bounced off harmlessly.
He stared at me with genuine surprise. "Impossible. Mortals can't channel seal energy without—" His eyes widened. "You're not mortal anymore."
"What?" I looked down at my hands. The light wasn't fading this time. It pulsed steadily, in rhythm with my heartbeat.
"The artifact didn't just awaken," Shen whispered, staring at me. "It transformed you. Yuehua, you have spiritual roots now. You're a cultivator."
The words hit me like a physical blow. A cultivator. Me. The woman who'd spent her whole life jealous of people with spiritual power.
I'd finally gotten what I secretly wanted.
And I had no idea what it meant.
Wei Zichen's shock turned to cold calculation. "Even better. A newborn cultivator with demon seal heritage. You'll be easy to capture and mold." He smiled. "Lan Meiying, stop hiding and help me take them both."
Lan Meiying stepped out from the shadows, her ice sword ready. Together, they advanced.
Two powerful cultivators against one wounded fighter and one brand-new cultivator who didn't know what she was doing.
We were dead.
Then Xu Tian groaned and sat up, rubbing his head. "Did I miss something important?"
"Just Yuehua becoming a cultivator and us about to die," Shen said.
"Ah." Xu Tian stood shakily, drawing his sword. "Normal Tuesday, then."
Despite everything, I almost laughed. Then I felt it—a presence approaching from the east. Something massive and dark and wrong.
The air temperature dropped. Shadows grew longer, stretching toward the town square like grasping fingers.
Everyone felt it. Even Wei Zichen paused, frowning.
A voice echoed across Willow Creek, ancient and terrible: "How interesting. The Demon Emperor's Seal has chosen a new host. And she's standing right here, unprotected."
From the darkness beyond the town, a figure emerged.
It was shaped like a man but wrong—too tall, too thin, with eyes that glowed red like burning coals. Its skin looked like shadows made solid.
Shen's face went white. "No. Not him. Anyone but him."
"Who is that?" I whispered.
"Xue Mohan," Shen breathed. "The Demon King of the Northern Wastes. The creature who destroyed my village twenty years ago. The monster who made me into a cultivator."
The Demon King smiled, revealing teeth like broken glass.
"Hello, little student. Did you miss me?"