Inner Demons

Chapter 201: This Young Master

"This cave of yours?" Yazi sounded as if he had heard something funny. "You've been imprisoned here for two thousand years, and you still want to stay in your cave?"

He reached into his sleeve, then raised his hand and threw something: "Look at what this is!"

The Lord of Dongting couldn't leave Dongting, but others could enter. What Yazi threw was a small, golden-yellow token—it looked irregular in shape.

The token landed directly in his hand.

Li Yunxin, the Lord of Dongting, and Kun Wuzi's gazes all focused on the token.

But rather than a token, it was more like a "fragment."

Like a small shard that had broken off from a very thick, large piece of glass, it hadn't been deliberately carved. It was half the size of a palm, thick on one side and thin on the other, with a rounded edge.

Golden-yellow. A brilliant golden-yellow. The token didn't glow, but it seemed to absorb light—absorbing the brilliant golden light from the heavens and earth, making it too dazzling to ignore.

This was a brilliance that was by no means flashy.

Li Yunxin wasn't very clear about the origin of this thing, but Kun Wuzi and the Lord of Dongting looked at Yazi in unison. The calmness that the Lord of Dongting had finally gained earlier disappeared; his round eyes widened, and his voice was a little shaky: "This... is... could it be...""It is," Yazi nodded solemnly. "The Divine Dragon Token."

"With this token, you can travel anywhere in the world without obstruction. You can go wherever you want—no one will dare to stop you," Yazi looked deeply at the Lord of Dongting. "I know there's a place you want to go. So, what good is a cave to you?"

"Unobstructed travel? That's a joke," Kun Wuzi immediately snorted. "Not everyone respects this thing—do you think you're going to see a real dragon? If a real dragon doesn't appear—how many demons in the world would really give you face because of this broken scale? Although you are a great demon of the Profound Realm, humph, it is precisely because you are a Profound Realm great demon that no one will dare to let you pass through their territory!"

But the Lord of Dongting... didn't seem to care about Kun Wuzi's words.

He rubbed the dragon scale for a while, deaf to Kun Wuzi's words. Kun Wuzi then fell silent—because he saw a thick mist of water vapor rise around the Lord of Dongting, almost completely obscuring him.

Li Yunxin blinked. He had seen this scene before—when he told the Lord of Dongting of Chiwen's death.

A full fifteen minutes passed before the mist dissipated.

The Lord of Dongting stood up straight, having already put away the Divine Dragon Token. He looked at Yazi, his voice becoming calm and steady: "How do I break the auras? What do I need to do?"

Upon hearing this, Kun Wuzi flew away without another word!

This time he left differently. The rotating yin-yang Eight Trigrams behind him shattered with a bang, turning into a piece of gray light. This light enveloped his body, and he himself became like a gray arrow, at a speed far exceeding his previous one—in the blink of an eye, he had disappeared into the horizon!

Yazi only had time to raise his hand and scatter a golden light. But the golden light was immediately pierced by Kun Wuzi, only leaving a few specks of light behind.

The Dragon's Son then sneered: "Stinky Daoist priest, you really value your life. Is that thing his magical treasure?"

"His vital magical treasure," the Lord of Dongting said in a deep voice. "By shattering this magical treasure and absorbing the spiritual energy to escape, you really can't catch him. But it will also damage his cultivation—it won't cause him to fall out of his realm, but it will make him easier to deal with than before."

"He's already escaped. Humph, what a pity for such a great opportunity."

But the Lord of Dongting laughed: "Escaped? Where can he escape to? My lifespan is three thousand years... if I want to, he can't escape from this Dongting. What is this?"

The Lord of Dongting flipped his palm, and a small mirror appeared in his palm. It was neither gold nor wood, nor was it a regular shape.

The mirror's surface was hazy and indistinct, as if covered with a layer of water vapor. It didn't look clear and clean, and there were still some black spots on the surface.

And the shape of this mirror...

Li Yunxin looked at it for a while and realized what it resembled.

It looked like the entire Dongting Lake.

The next moment, he realized he was right.

The Lord of Dongting shook his hand, and the mirror flew into the air. It grew with the wind, expanding to five or six times its original size. At this point, it was clear that it was a miniature of Dongting Lake—the islands and hills in the lake were the black spots from before. The "layer of water vapor" on the mirror was indeed the water vapor from Dongting Lake.

And on the edge of this "small lake"... a very, very small black dot was flying.

The reason it was visible was that the black dot had a long, gray phantom trailing behind it—that was Kun Wuzi.

"You have this treasure?" Yazi looked at the mirror with interest and pointed at it. "You couldn't leave Dongting for two thousand years, where did you get this thing?"

"Ah... it's an old item, an old item," the Lord of Dongting did not answer, only muttering with emotion. Li Yunxin discovered that the look in his eyes as he looked at this "small mirror" was full of complex emotions—he had seen a lot of demons in his life. But the Lord of Dongting was the first one whose eyes held such complex emotions.

Even he couldn't describe it in detail.

"The name of this treasure is... Misty Dongting Lake," the Lord of Dongting's tone returned to the way it was when Li Yunxin first met him—unhurried and calm. It seemed that with the "Misty Dongting Lake" in hand, the world was under his control. Or perhaps this treasure had triggered some memories...

Li Yunxin knew that people who are lost in the past always have a bit of calm and sadness about them.

"With this painting, no matter how far he escapes—" The Lord of Dongting said, then stretched out a finger and plunged it into the mirror's surface—it was as if he was really plunging it into water, his entire finger disappeared inside. "He will be pulled back."

As soon as he finished speaking, he stirred his finger in the water.

A water column immediately shot up from the small lake—as thick and long as a chopstick—and in the blink of an eye, it caught up to the small black dot in the air.

And at the same time, a deafening sound rang out again—

From the Dongting Lake behind him, a huge water column, like a wall, shot up to the heavens! But the water column did not rush out of Dongting at an angle; instead, it went straight into the sky, but in a certain place in the sky, it inexplicably disappeared—as if there was an invisible cut-off!

The small black dot in the Misty Dongting Lake was wrapped by the water column and was slowly being pulled back. And in the real world, Kun Wuzi... although Li Yunxin couldn't see it, he knew it was probably the same situation.

Seeing this, Yazi let out a low sigh of admiration. He pointed at the vivid painting: "This is... this is..."

"This is a Spirit Painting," the Lord of Dongting sighed. "This... is my treasure."

Yazi wasn't very clear about the concept of a "Spirit Painting," so he was only amazed by its magic. As for Kun Wuzi, he had probably heard of this thing, but whether he had seen it was another matter.

The only one who truly understood what this thing represented was Li Yunxin.

A Painting Daoist of the Painting School can create a "Precious Scroll" at the Manifestation Realm, and at the peak of the Manifestation Realm, with a flash of inspiration, they can create a "Treasure Scroll." The Perverted Eating Picture he jokingly drew in Qionghua Tower was a Treasure Scroll. And that Lingkongzi, who was full of precious magical treasures, treated his Treasure Scroll with solemnity and care after seeing it.

After entering the True Realm, a Painting Daoist can create a "Spirit Painting."

And the reason a Spirit Painting is "spiritual" is that it can interact with the real Great World through the painting.

Does the painting of Weicheng on his fan, the Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains Painting, count as a Spirit Painting? It does.

Yue Yunzi's soul was sealed in the painting by him, and he could also see the Second Dragon's Son, Yazi, coming towards this place in the painting—some things that happened in the real world could already be reflected in this painting.

But... the Lord of Dongting's Spirit Painting, Misty Dongting Lake, could do even more.

It could already influence this real world—just like before, trapping and pulling back Yue Yunzi's Spiritual Soul clone, who had cruelly shattered his vital magical treasure!

This should be the method of a Profound Realm Painting Daoist.

A Profound Realm—at least a Profound Realm Painting Daoist—drew this Spirit Painting, and the Lord of Dongting obtained it.

Li Yunxin realized that there must be some stories in this that he would be interested in.

After the Lord of Dongting used this Spirit Painting to trap Kun Wuzi, he turned to look at Yazi: "So, now, how do I get out?"

By now, it was completely dark.

The sun had finally set on the other side of the mountain, and the moon was still partially hidden in the west. Kun Wuzi had previously turned Dongting upside down, pouring a huge amount of lake water from the sky. The water vapor had not dissipated, making the moonlight hazy.

It was in this hazy light that Li Yunxin saw Yazi smile: "This so-called imprisonment is actually for you to guard a great treasure."

"You have been guarding it in this Dongting for two thousand years... well, the time has come today. Do you know who asked me to come and free you?" Yazi's teeth flashed in the moonlight when he smiled.

For some reason, Li Yunxin's heart suddenly tightened when he saw him like this. He remembered the former Young Master Nine.

He was now a great demon of the True Realm, and Young Master Nine was only at the peak of the Manifestation Realm.

But he... only he had ever given him that kind of pressing pressure.

That was the pressure of life and death.

And at this moment, when Li Yunxin saw his teeth and his smile, he thought of that Ninth Dragon's Son again.

He inexplicably felt that the atmosphere was a little strange, so he slightly tightened his grip on the folding fan in his hand.

The Lord of Dongting did not speak, so Yazi smiled and continued: "It's the real dragon. The real dragon has appeared. Now the real dragon wants to see you, and it also said that once you are free, since you won't need this cave anyway, you can give it to me—this young master... this king, can then cultivate and recover my realm in peace."

"And before you leave, you must hand over that great treasure to me, so I can continue to guard it. And you, you can retire from your duty."

Li Yunxin frowned.

He wondered if it was his own illusion, or if being in between two Profound Realm great demons was making him nervous.

He felt that Yazi's slip of the tongue, "this young master"... sounded very familiar.