SCT-Novel Chapter 303: Shion Slays the Three Corpses
Chapter 303: Shion Slays the Three Corpses
"The three-hour agreement is over, Nalan... Itaen."
Staring at the falling Mirror Queen, Shion's lips moved slightly. No sound escaped, but clearly the prince understood lip-reading.
As expected, just after her lip movement, Itaen's face sank into an expression of bitterness.
The frantic hatred was gone.
After all, Shion had declared it over. No matter how proud someone was, they should be able to let go.
She then took out the white paper that had served as the marriage contract.
She could not rely on Itaen to willingly take out the contract, but that did not matter. Shion had prepared ahead of time.
"Itaen, from now on, you and my Jiang family have no ties. You are free... congratulations."
By the way, the anime's line "now both you and I are free" was a steaming pile of trash. Since when was I, the Flame Emperor, not free?
They dared to put the Flame Emperor on the same level as Nalan Yanran!Screenwriters who can't even copy a classic line should be sent straight to the execution ground.
She applied a little force, crushing the marriage contract in her hand. The fragments scattered like funeral petals over the girl's body.
Itaen showed a look as if a huge emptiness had opened in her heart, then slowly closed her eyes and fell downward.
Only when Itaen had completely fallen did Shion's expression change slightly. The tail behind her thrashed like a helicopter.
Ugh, this is infuriating!
You want to claim both Heavenly Fire Attainment and the Flame Emperor Fruit Position, take all the benefits you want—what about mine, mine, mine, mine?
Do you know how many exotic flames there are and then challenge me for the Flame Emperor?
I laughed in the face of someone who thinks they can compare to the one who knows Xuanhuang Flame, Ten-Thousand-Beast Spirit Fire, Yin-Yang Twin Flames, Nether Poison Flame, Qinglian Base Flame, Extinguish-Wind Furious Dragon Fire, Mountain Stone Flame, Cloud-Dousing Water Flame, Ocean-Heart Flame, Falling Heart Flame, Tortoise-Spirit Earth Fire, Nine-Dragon Thunder Rage Flame, Bone-Spirit Cold Flame, Nine-Underworld Wind Flame, Three-Thousand Radiant Flame, Red Lotus Karma Flame, Nine-Underworld Golden Ancestral Flame, Eight-Desolation Destruction Flame, Lifeborn Spirit Flame, Golden Emperor Burning-Heaven Flame, Purified Lotus Demon Flame, Void Devouring Flame, Endless Xiao Yan Flame—twenty-three different ways to write them!
You set up schemes and still want to steal my lines and screen time. If in the end you make me appear before Azure Cloud Sect three times, how will I face my ancestors?
This three-hour agreement—whoever wins will be the true Flame Emperor!
I clearly remember the part where the Flame Emperor generously congratulates Nalan; that line is iconic and I won't let Itaen steal it.
Besides, the other side didn't study the classics for thirty years. Being a Half-Step Bloom rank at most, this tussle for the Flame Emperor Fruit Position was bound to end with Shion coming out on top!
Over there, Mu and An Shiyu watched Shion raise her chin proudly. In a good mood, they reached out and touched her.
"Shion, we're here to play with you!"
"Get lost."
Mu, controlling An Shiyu's body, rolled through the air and grabbed Shion's sleeve. "Shion, Shion, what was that three-hour agreement with the Mirror King?"
Heh. Hearing that, Shion shot them a disdainful glance. "When I was publicly annulled in the palace, I made a three-hour agreement in front of everyone. You guys don't even remember?"
"You meant a three-day agreement, right?"
"What era is this? Who can wait eight days anymore? Eight time zones are too few; delaying for moon votes is archaic."
"What's a moon vote?"
"None of your business. Go play somewhere else."
Mu and An Shiyu were still ignorant children, as expected.
Shion glanced down, but regrettably, the Azure Cloud Sect disciples still had duties and couldn't come up right away.
Even if they had free time, they couldn't actually get up here.
Only Mu, relying on the Branch Sect's space fruit position, could run wild. Once she opened a path and found a trace of space, she would go wherever she pleased.
But if three Full Bloom opponents hadn't attacked her, she wouldn't have found that path. Even if Mu restored her peak power, she likely couldn't leave.
Shion felt a small regret. If only Bai Mei and Bingtang could come up.
Bai Mei, learned and perceptive, would see through her schemes and explain them to those ignorant lower cultivation folk.
Bingtang could plug holes and fix flaws.
As for other true-transmission disciples, she could not expect too much...
Her gaze shifted to the black Magical Girl beside her. The girl stood reservedly, her small hands awkward.
She had just delivered the strike that pierced the prince.
If the prince had fallen with no aid, he would have surely died.
A ruthless hand; a capable talent.
Shion casually asked, "Have you joined Azure Cloud Sect?"
Blackberry froze, then nodded repeatedly. "Reporting to the sect, Sect Master, Blackberry has joined!"
Shion had not expected the answer. "You're from the South China Disaster Control Bureau, right? Quite diligent, willing to upgrade from vocational to full branch."
In her view, that Disaster Control Bureau was like a junior college.
Her Azure Cloud Branch was of course the undergraduate level.
For a vocational student to be willing to study and advance to undergraduate—commendable.
Mu didn't understand why this was an academic promotion but murmured, "It's not really an academic upgrade. South China Disaster Control Bureau and Azure Cloud Sect negotiated. The bureau will fully join as an Azure Cloud Branch. South China Disaster Control Bureau is now entirely converted to an Azure Cloud Branch."
Shion was momentarily speechless.
She had thought Blackberry had worked hard herself to get her degree—didn't expect it was an institutional upgrade from her school.
One's fate cannot be judged by individual effort alone; one must consider the sweep of history...
Blackberry grew too nervous to speak.
She had only wanted to come with Mu-senior to deal with the Mirror Kingdom's threat—centuries of enmity between South China and the Mirror Kingdom was finally being put to rest. The Mirror Kingdom had been utterly destroyed by Azure Cloud Sect, and all the people of South China could sleep peacefully.
She had so many things to say, but before Shion she couldn't get a single sentence out.
She was so pretty, so powerful, and her voice was cute. Though terrified, she wanted to hug Shion like a doll, imagining how nice she would feel to hold...
Half afraid, half wanting to hug her, Blackberry's brain short-circuited and started to smoke.
Mu and Shion ignored her. Mu held onto Shion's great tail, refusing to let go no matter how Shion thrashed. "If you can't get down, we'll stay with you forever! Actually, this is great—if others can't climb up, we can go down. If you want something, I'll get it for you..."
No matter how Shion tried to shake her off, Mu wouldn't release the tail. Shion activated an electric current.
Electricity ran along the dragon tail, but Mu still wouldn't let go, trembling as she yelled, "Wah wah wah, if you shock me again I'm going to pee!"
Shion considered and decided she didn't want her tail fouled.
Even if the pee went back later, it would be in An Shiyu's body and not a true revenge on Mu.
So, acting mature, Shion ignored the brat and walked to the rift in the chaotic land.
She kept reshaping the cosmos within the Chaos Realm, creating stars.
Not merely for dramatic effect in battle or to prove the new world wasn't just a hydrogen plain,
but more importantly, to continue familiarizing herself with the authority granted by Fengqin.
In truth, Fengqin's authority was not as convenient as imagined.
At first Shion thought she could directly open a creation mode. Later she found she needed to use her mana to control and call certain authority functions.
For example, when mana touched the four remnant leaves below that represented South China, West China, North China, and East China in the new world, the world-adjustment authority would activate.
But because her mana could cover the entire world, the authority's demands were less important to her...
Somewhat useless.
The patched-together new world below slipped into momentary chaos when she removed the ring earlier.
The breakage became more pronounced.
She reached out her hand and toyed with the fragmented world below.
Mu and Blackberry both widened their eyes.
Fine threads of rain flowed from her fingertips and fell into the chaotic rift, sprinkling down into the worlds below.
Universes, planets, seas, continents.
Countless people looked up—some bewildered, some dirty-faced, some terrified. Blackberry's gaze fixed on South China, where the rain threads fell thickest.
She saw the companions and aunt-and-uncle figures who had supported and helped her, who had hoped she would solve the Mirror Kingdom problem. Now they nervously raised their faces to the sky.
"It's okay, everyone. It's okay, don't be afraid..." Though the people below could not hear her, she murmured instinctively, wanting to comfort South China.
The suffering was over.
Billions upon billions of violet mana threads pierced cosmic fissures, passed through planetary cores, through shattered seabeds and damp grasslands, through bare rock. Shion, like threading a needle, wove each mana filament into a precise net.
Every region connected by the mana threads, and after a long stint of threading, the hundred remnant leaves were linked by that mana fabric that shimmered like starlight.
Then her fingers spun like a spindle.
Mu was entranced by Shion's fingers and forgot to watch as the wound filaments on her fingers began to twine and turn. Gradually, all the regions tied together by mana fabric below slowly closed!
South China, dragged to the farthest distance by the Mirror Kingdom, behaved the same way. Because the linking threads were dense and complex, the slow tightening produced remarkably smooth, safe movement for the entire region.
Not even a single stone trembled. The inhabitants standing on the four remnant leaves only noticed the sky shifting slowly; they barely realized the ground beneath them was moving.
They were being gently pulled together by the girl above.
Ruo Yun was perhaps the first to realize this.
At that time she, Hyacinth, and Helen were intending to scavenge materials from the Mirror Kingdom—void mirror prototype was nearly finished, but key tech and materials were blocked.
Now that the Mirror Kingdom had fallen, they wanted to salvage the leftovers, although they would need to wait for Azure Cloud Sect to finish organizing.
From within the Mirror Kingdom's independent space, looking out, they could see how the new world was being threaded by violet mana and slowly drawn together.
They also had an unexpected acquisition.
A Mirror Kingdom Mirror King, falling from the sky.
This girl, stripped of technology and now an ordinary human, had been pierced through the chest and drifted like trash into the spatial turbulence. Hyacinth had just recovered her.
They tossed her into the Main God Space for emergency treatment—the Main God Space already had medical pods bought from Mirror Kingdom partners in the old world. As the Saint Hall Envoy said, the Main God Space is meaningless if you can't spend points to heal injuries.
This time, Helen paid the points for treating the Mirror King; she wanted the girl's full knowledge to complete the Void Mirror.
As the world gradually stitched back together, Ruo Yun, Hyacinth, and Helen watched the rift above the new world.
The girl's fingers danced deftly, precisely controlling each mana thread, ensuring every granule of the fissure covered by the threads was accounted for.
Stars were born and perished behind her.
Ruo Yun watched and couldn't help smiling.
Hyacinth and Helen looked at her, curious. "What are you laughing about?"
"Nothing, it just reminded me of some things from the past."
In that warehouse, a boy showing off the Saint Hall's great deeds, the illusions he conjured with mana—now they appeared before her in reality.
Absurdity, strange satisfaction, nostalgia, and happiness—all at once.
Someone who keeps every promise—how can she be called a liar?
Ruo Yun looked up at Shion and instinctively pressed her hands together, whispering: "Teacher Bai Mei, I'm sorry. It seems... now she is a little more important to me."
Perhaps she would never go back, would never seek out Bai Mei again.
"Please allow me to graduate privately, Teacher Bai Mei."
...
Yet in the new world, panic still erupted among the people.
Some places even descended into trampling and confusion.
What they saw was too shocking. Even though Azure Cloud Sect had expanded influence and set branches in the four regions, not every area had been briefed. People didn't know what it was; after the earth-shattering events, this more bizarre occurrence threw them into disorder.
Also, because the Central Bureau had been under Azure Cloud Sect's control for too short a time, many documents hadn't been distributed, so remote areas like the overseas Disaster Control offices didn't understand what was happening.
With inadequate personnel, officials panicked alongside civilians.
But soon, Azure Cloud Sect disciples appeared in each chaotic zone, carrying Winter's ice mirrors, calming disorder and broadcasting Shion's great deed.
"Our sect master is repairing the world. Please remain calm and wait. Do not panic!"
Legions of Azure Cloud disciples flew out everywhere, bearing images of their sect master cleaving heaven and splitting earth.
With Jincha from the Central Bureau confirming the situation and the strength of Azure Cloud disciples on display, both those deliberately stirring trouble and the frightened crowds quieted down.
Thousands upon thousands, including those who hid from the old world, looked on at the violet mana threads covering the world with envy and despair.
Until every area, with uncanny precision, fit back into place.
Each stone, each tectonic seam, riverbed and seafloor—all tightly sealed.
Where the cracks vanished, pale purple flowers tenderly bloomed—north to south, east to west—interwoven like an unfading stitch.
When Shion withdrew her hand, a more perfect new world had been formed.
Blackberry and Mu stared at the new world in stunned silence.
Only An Shiyu whispered, "Huh, why are there more Shions?"
Only then did they notice: beside the black-gold Dragon Lord Shion, two new Shions had appeared—one pure black, one purple.
The three Shions opened their eyes together.
At that moment, across heaven and earth and the chaotic cosmos, the dragon's roar was as clear as a sword's ring!
"Upper Corpse: Magical Girl Shion—lover of fine clothes and carefree pleasures, entrenched in the palace of the mind and sea of consciousness, the source of lustful and greedy delusions, demands total severing to restore clarity."
Mu, An Shiyu, and Blackberry listened blankly as Shion murmured.
"Middle Corpse: Dragon Lord Shion—gluttonous for the five flavors, greedy for goods and wealth, hunkered in the heart's nourishing seat, the root of all anxious attachments. It must be cut off to return middle emptiness and tranquility."
One spoke, then another. Finally, Dragon Lord Shion herself spoke:
"Lower Corpse: Witch Shion—addicted to wine and sex, indulging in lustful desires, hiding in the turbid caverns of lower orifices, a nest of filthy deeds and perverse cravings. It must be exterminated to manifest the true, pure primordial yang."
The three Purples stepped forward in unison, their voices solemn and great, thunder rolling over the cosmos in shock!
"Slash the three corpses to attain the Way, traverse the tribulations, and ascend!"
The three corpses raised their heads. Witch Shion strode forward one step and declared, "I am unparalleled among mortals—if not to fight Heaven, then with whom shall I contend!"
"Come, Way!"
With that cry, they transformed into a divine light and shot upward, rushing beyond the heavens!