Chapter 163: The Ultimate Scheme of the Demon Clan Traitor

Shen Yan’s hand still rested on Pei Yue’s wrist, the light from his phone screen reflecting off his glasses, turning them white. The line of text pierced his eyes like a nail: 【Abyss Gate, accessible only to bloodline holders】.

Before he could speak, the sky above them suddenly split open.

It wasn’t the exaggerated scene of the heavens collapsing, but rather like a curtain slashed by a knife—a dark fissure slowly widened, and a cold wind carrying demonic energy poured down. Several figures descended through the air, led by an old man draped in a black robe adorned with golden patterns, leaning on a snake-headed cane. When his gaze swept over them, even the air seemed to freeze.

“Traitorous daughter, colluding with outsiders to awaken a Forbidden Technique—” the old man’s voice was hoarse, yet each word struck like thunder, “Luo Li, how dare you stand upon this Altar?”

Luo Li’s ears twitched, her tail instantly puffing up like a dandelion. She took half a step forward, shielding Pei Yue: “Great Elder, how did my mother die all those years ago? Do you dare speak of it before everyone?”

“Outrageous!” The Great Elder flicked his sleeve, and the stone wall beside the Altar crumbled with a roar, revealing an iron cage. Inside were seven or eight disheveled elders, their bodies branded with Seal Runes, who began to howl as soon as light touched them.

“These are the elders who opposed the royal authority back then,” the Great Elder sneered. “Now that you’ve awakened your bloodline, it is the opportunity they’ve been waiting for. Had I not arrived in time, you would have already opened this Abyss Gate, bringing about a world-ending Tribulation!”

Ye Zhao’s sword hilt trembled slightly, her gaze sharp as a blade: “You call her a traitor—where’s your proof? Based on a few mad old men?”

“Proof?” The Great Elder raised a hand and pointed. “Her Half-Demon body is itself a taboo! If she is not eliminated today, the consequences will be endless!”

Before his words faded, Shen Yan had already finished typing a Defense Script on his phone with the tip of his finger. He gently pushed Pei Yue behind him and whispered, “No matter what happens later, don’t move around.”

Yu Xiaotang crouched on the ground, picking up the bamboo skewers from the Candied Hawthorn, muttering, “This old man’s acting is quite convincing. Should we give him a Best Villain Award?”

No one responded to her.

A strange ripple suddenly stirred in the air, like the static of a poorly tuned television. Shen Yan’s Terminal beeped with a popup window: 【Detected high-level concealment technique, source location—directly above】.

The moment he looked up, a Dark Shadow swooped down from the fissure, moving so fast it left only an afterimage.

The target wasn’t Luo Li, nor was it Shen Yan.

It was Yu Xiaotang.

The figure clamped one hand on her shoulder while the other pressed directly against her chest. Yu Xiaotang froze entirely, her face instantly turning deathly pale.

“Did you think you were well hidden?” The newcomer’s voice was icy, a crack appearing in his mask. “The blood flowing in your veins is that of a clan-destroying lineage!”

Shen Yan’s phone screen flashed with red text: 【Detected ancient Devil Clan genetic sequence, match rate 97%】.

Silence fell over the entire scene.

Yu Xiaotang’s lips trembled, her fingers digging tightly into the hem of her skirt. She tried to break free but found all her Spiritual Power suppressed, without even the strength to draw a Rune.

Ye Shi’er sneered, “The real traitor was never your sister, but the one you all trusted wrongly.”

Just as Shen Yan was about to initiate a counterattack program, he saw Yu Xiaotang suddenly raise her head, a flash of crimson-gold Talisman Patterns gleaming in her eyes.

She smiled.

“Did you think… I’d let you succeed a second time?”

As the words fell, the broken candied hawthorn in her hand suddenly exploded, the sugar shell shattering into countless fragments that transformed into talisman chains in the air, winding around Ye Shi’er’s limbs and body. Each talisman pattern was burning, as if writing code with life itself.

Ye Shi’er’s pupils contracted sharply: “Impossible! The seal within you clearly…”

“Seal?” Yu Xiaotang coughed up blood, yet her voice grew light. “The day my parents died, my mother implanted the final script seed into my body. She said—’Survive, and trust no one.'”

Shen Yan’s terminal automatically traced back the energy waveform, and an image surfaced: a snowy night twenty years ago, a couple kneeling in the snow holding an infant, with a Mystic Gate steward raising a sword behind them, declaring, “The devil seed must not remain.” Before dying, the mother imprinted a talisman pattern onto her daughter’s forehead, blood trickling down like a tearstain.

The image abruptly cut off.

Yu Xiaotang staggered, nearly falling. Ye Zhao swiftly supported her arm, saying nothing, only placing her sword before them.

Luo Li’s tail drooped, her voice slightly hoarse: “You should have told me earlier.”

“What would have changed if I did?” Yu Xiaotang smiled bitterly. “Would you still have let me stay? A devil clan bloodline, liable to lose control and harm others at any moment… I’d rather be a foolish talisman second-generation, at least then I could still eat candied hawthorn with you all.”

Shen Yan stared at his phone, his brow furrowed deeply. Suddenly remembering something, he quickly pulled up previous data records—every time Yu Xiaotang used high-level talismans, the system would prompt 【Anomalous energy invocation path】, but he had always assumed it was a program compatibility issue.

It wasn’t a bug after all.

It was the bloodline awakening.

The Great Elder stood at a high point, his expression shifting uncertainly. Seeing the situation spiraling out of control, he snorted coldly, turned, and left, his figure gradually merging into the demonic mist. No one pursued.

Ye Shi’er, bound motionless by the talisman chains, still wore a smile at the corner of his mouth. He looked at Shen Yan and said word by word, “This is just the beginning…”

The next second, his chest suddenly bulged, as if something were about to burst out. Shen Yan reacted swiftly, immediately initiating the quantum encryption shield, but it was still a step too late.

Boom!

The devil core self-destructed, the shockwave overturning half the altar. When the dust settled, Ye Shi’er had vanished, leaving only a bloodstained bronze mask lying quietly amidst the rubble.

Shen Yan walked over and picked up the mask; it felt icy to the touch. He looked down at the crack, suddenly finding it familiar.

It looked exactly like the face that had appeared in his dreams.

Yu Xiaotang leaned on Ye Zhao’s shoulder, panting. Her coin hair tie had snapped, her twin ponytails falling loose, covering half her face. She clutched the last piece of candied hawthorn in her hand, the sugar long melted, sticky in her palm.

“Sorry,” she whispered.

No one responded.

Pei Yue sat by the stone platform, her fingers unconsciously tracing the golden mark at the bottom of her medicine pouch. When she saw the memory image earlier, she vaguely felt that the Medicine Valley disciple who was killed resembled the “defector” her master had mentioned.

Could it be that what happened twenty years ago wasn’t about purging the devil clan at all?

But rather… silencing witnesses?

Luo Li walked up to Yu Xiaotang and suddenly reached out to tuck her messy hair behind her ear, her movements gentle, unlike her usual style.

“Don’t carry it alone from now on,” she said. “If you hide secrets again, I’ll burn your talisman paper with demonic fire.”

Yu Xiaotang’s nose stung, and she nodded.

Shen Yan put the mask into his Cosmic Bag, and the phone interface switched back to the main program. Just as he was about to close the monitoring module, he suddenly noticed an anomaly log:

【Record Time: Unknown】 【Content: Mother’s blood as the key, child’s soul as the guide—but there is more than one key】

His heart skipped a beat.

Pei Yue was a key.

Yu Xiaotang was also a key.

Then who exactly, twenty years ago, had left behind two “backups” at the same time?

Ye Zhao had somehow come to stand beside him, her voice lowered to a whisper: “She’s trembling.”

Shen Yan turned his head and saw Yu Xiaotang curled up in the corner, her fingers clutching her knees tightly, as if trying to shrink herself into the smallest possible ball.

He walked over, took off his jacket, and draped it over her shoulders. The plaid shirt was a bit wrinkled and carried a faint scent of sweat, but it was warm enough.

“Do you know what I did the first time I wrote code?” He crouched down, his tone light. “I blew up the company server, cutting off the internet for the entire building for three hours. My boss almost sent me to the police.”

Yu Xiaotang looked up, her eyes red-rimmed.

“Later, I realized it wasn’t the code that was the problem. I was so afraid of making mistakes that I didn’t dare to run it.” Shen Yan pushed up his glasses. “Now I’m not afraid anymore. If it’s wrong, I fix it. If I can’t fix it, I rewrite it. At worst—I format and start over.”

Yu Xiaotang stared at him blankly.

“You’re not from the Devil Clan,” he said. “You’re Yu Xiaotang. That silly teammate who loves Candied Hawthorn and always draws Talisman Paper into little dogs.”

She finally cracked a slight grin, but her tears fell even harder.

Shen Yan extended his hand: “Come back.”

Yu Xiaotang hesitated for a second, then placed her cold hand into his palm.

At that very moment, the phone suddenly vibrated.

It wasn’t an alarm.

It was a memory fragment playing automatically.

In the image, there was a woman dressed in Mystic Gate attire, holding two infants in her arms. One had a copper coin hair tie on its wrist, and the other wore a jade pendant engraved with the character “inkstone”.

The woman whispered, “As long as you both live, the truth will have a day to see the light again.”

The image ended.

Shen Yan stared at the screen, his breathing growing heavier.

Twins?

He and Ye Shi’er… were actually biological brothers?

And why did Yu Xiaotang’s mother appear in that memory?

He slowly raised his head, looking at the still-weak Yu Xiaotang. His lips moved slightly, but in the end, no words came out.

The wind swept up the fragments of Talisman Paper from the ground. One piece landed on the top of his shoe, the ink still wet, bearing a single character:

“Trust.”

(End of Chapter)