At the border of Xilan.

On the very top of the mountain, white clouds piled thick in every direction. A thread of morning light broke through the clouds, but it brought no warmth at all, only a faint, cutting chill.

A figure in red stood at the edge of the peak, lonely and worn to the bone. She was slender, so slight that under the wild mountain wind, it seemed she might be swept straight off the cliff at any moment and vanish without even a body left behind.

Her robes had once been white. Now they were soaked through with blood, dyed so completely that not a trace of their original color could be seen. There was only that glaring red, as if she had just crawled out of a sea of blood. And still the blood kept flowing, as though even that was not enough, running down the hem of her clothes little by little before dripping into the earth and staining the ground beneath her feet.

At that moment, one hand was clamped tightly over her abdomen. Her knuckles had gone white, like she was forcing herself to endure pain so fierce it could split a person apart.

"Why? Why!"

The blood-covered woman stared at the people approaching her, her eyes filled with hurt.

The first question came out trembling. The second was almost a broken cry.

A group of people was making their way toward her at an unhurried pace. At the front stood a young woman in a pink dress.

She looked gentle and refined, with clear features and an almost ethereal grace. She walked forward calmly, like some fairy untouched by mortal dust. Her eyes were bright and lovely, yet the venom inside them was impossible to miss.

"Why?" she said. "In this world, where do so many whys come from? But if you insist on an answer, little sister, do you understand this saying—an ordinary man commits no crime, yet treasuring a jade invites disaster?"

As she spoke, she stepped closer, one step at a time. Her eyes were full of mockery, cold and playful all at once.

The woman covered in blood looked at the pink-robed lady in utter disbelief.

What had happened yesterday was still vivid in her mind. Even now, every scene was clear as day. But how could she ever have imagined things would turn into this?

Until last night, she had treated the woman before her as her own elder sister. She had never held anything back from her. Whatever that woman wanted, she would go after it for her, even if it meant staking her life.

Three years ago, that woman had fallen gravely ill. No medicine, no remedy, nothing had worked.

So she had fought her way through blood and danger and gone to the Dragon-Taming Bone Cavern, where she killed a Biluo Viper and took its inner core to use as the catalyst for medicine.

That time, she had nearly died. She had dragged herself out by sheer will alone, carrying wound after wound across her body.

Later, after taking the spiritual medicine, the woman's health truly improved. She still looked frail, though, and her face remained pale.

Not long after, another letter arrived, said to be from a divine physician. The letter claimed that if she was to recover fully, then the only way was to use the blood of someone with abundant spiritual power and a sincere heart as the foundation, combined with rare medicinal herbs.

She had kept feeding her blood, little by little, to nourish her, because all along she had truly treated her as family.

Even yesterday, in broad daylight, the moment she got up, she had cut open her own scar-riddled wrist and offered up a bowl of fresh blood. It was because of those three years of constant bloodletting that her body had grown frail and thin, and even her spiritual power had barely improved.

Now, looking back, all of it felt painfully ridiculous.

What nourishment? What healing? In the end, it was only to make that woman’s body better suited to taking her spiritual root.

Last night, she had drugged her. Her whole body had gone limp, unable to move, yet her mind had stayed cruelly clear. She had lain there on that freezing stone platform, fully conscious, watching with her own eyes as the woman dug out the spiritual root that had grown inside her for fourteen years.

That pain cut into the bone and shook the soul.

But what hurt more than her body was her heart.

Was it that she had hidden herself too well all these years, or was Seraphina Voss simply too stupid?

Beside the woman in pink stood a strongly built middle-aged man with a face that looked upright and honorable.

He wore a dark blue robe, and at his waist hung a golden flame token, the mark of the Ashford family head. He looked kind and gentle on the surface, but in his eyes was a trace of venom and disgust. He swept a cold glance over the blood-soaked girl and said, “Why waste so many words on her? My Ashford family picked her up and raised her all these years. Naturally, she ought to repay us.”

At that, the woman covered in blood suddenly burst into laughter, wild and sharp, almost mad.

This man was someone she had always respected as though he were her own father. Yet now, in his eyes, she was no different from livestock raised in the yard.

At that thought, a mocking smile lifted the corner of her pale lips, so drained of blood they were nearly white.

“You wanted the spiritual root. Fine. I gave it to you. Let it count as repayment for all these years of raising me. Now... will you let me go?”

Her voice was cold and flat. She looked at the two before her, still clutching the last sliver of hope in her heart.

The woman in pink gave a soft snort, her eyes dripping with malice. “Let you go? My dear little sister, you really are simple to the point of stupidity. Honestly, you’re so stupid I almost want to laugh right in your face. Let you go, so you can run back to the Voss family, complain, and turn them against the Ashford family?”

“What else do you want?”

The blood-covered woman’s eyes flew wide open.

The woman in pink stepped forward on her own and reached out to grab her by the cheeks. The tendons in Seraphina Voss’s hands had already been severed. She had no strength to resist at all and could only let herself be handled like a doll.

“What do I want?” The pink-robed woman smiled, slow and poisonous. “The Voss family. The greatest of the four great families of Xilan. Their legitimate daughter, heaven’s favored child, with the finest cultivation resources in the whole household, and even the Crown Prince of Xilan as her betrothed. Tell me, little sister... what do you think I want?”

That fair, pale face should have been lovely. At this moment, though, venom and triumph twisted it into something hideous.

"A couple days ago, when I painted your portrait and sent it back to the Voss family, do you still remember what I said to you?"

The words hit, and memories from a few days earlier rushed back all at once.

"Xing'er, you've been lost outside for fourteen years. The Voss family probably doesn't even remember what you look like anymore. Xing'er, sit still, all right? If I paint you poorly and they mistake someone else for you, that would be troublesome."

Mistake someone else...

So that was it.

She wanted to take her place.

"You—"

The young woman in pink clearly still wasn't satisfied. Her lips curled, and her voice turned even softer, even crueler.

"Don't worry. We were sisters, after all. I certainly won't be so heartless as to let you lie all alone in the underworld. I will send them to you, one by one, in the name of the Voss family's eldest young lady, Seraphina Voss. Everything the Voss family has will belong to the Ashford family sooner or later. Hahaha!"

She laughed wildly, yet the malice in that laugh was deadlier than the most poisonous serpent.

The woman in blood-red clothes was shaking with fury. Gritting her teeth, she threw her broken body forward and slammed toward the smug woman before her. But she had no strength left at all. In the end, she only smeared blood all over the other's clothes.

The woman in pink clearly had not expected that. After being struck, her expression darkened even more. She raised her hand and slapped the blood-soaked woman hard across the face.

"Cheap wretch!"

The woman in blood-red stared at her with eyes full of hate, as if she wanted to tear the person before her apart with the sharpest blades in the world.

"Vivienne Ashford, you will die badly! I curse you with my blood. I will summon the fiercest evil spirits in this world to rip you to pieces—"

The woman in pink seemed startled by that vicious curse, and by those utterly mad eyes.

A dark glint flashed through her gaze. Without hesitation, she pulled the long hairpin from her hair and drove it straight into those cursing eyes.

"Ah—"

Blinded by agony, the woman in blood-red staggered backward. Her body tipped, then fell straight into the bottomless abyss.

The woman in pink stood atop the mountain ridge, looking down at the girl who had already vanished into the clouds and mist below. A savage smile slowly spread across her face.

"The Ashford family's eldest young lady, Vivienne Ashford, died a heroic death while protecting the Voss family's legitimate daughter. Her deed shall be praised and remembered. From today on, I am the Voss family's eldest young lady, Seraphina Voss!"