I Was Forced to Marry a “Trash” Cultivator, But She Turned Out to Be a Reborn Empress!

A killing blow, born from the deepest shadows!

A pitch-black short blade, its steel etched with malevolent crimson veins, hissed through the air. It aimed true, targeting the space between Shen Xian’s shoulder blades with surgical precision.

The assailant was none other than Lin Lang.

The man had been a ghost, haunting the periphery of the fifth floor, waiting for the singular heartbeat where his prey’s guard might falter. As the blade drew within mere inches of Shen Xian’s back, a feral, triumphant grin split Lin Lang’s face. This entire hunt had been his masterpiece—he was the one who had slipped the bronze key to Wei Zhaoli, lighting the fuse of this conflict. He had intended to be the fisherman reaping the spoils while the exhausted birds tore each other apart.

He had not expected Shen Xian to arrive so soon, nor had he anticipated the terrifying depth of the man’s hidden cultivation. But now, with Shen Xian surely drained from the fray, the moment of execution had arrived.

Clang!

The world erupted in the deafening toll of a celestial bell. Golden light exploded from Shen Xian’s pores as the [Zhenyue Huntian Bell] manifested. Earthen-yellow battle-runes flared to life, and a spectral dragon let out a silent roar, weaving a mountain-heavy barrier around its master.

The black blade struck the golden wall and shattered like cheap glass against an ancient peak.

“What?!” Lin Lang’s pupils shrunk to pinpricks. He recoiled, his triumphant grin twisting into a mask of horror.

Shen Xian’s expression remained as cold as a frozen tundra. Without sparing a glance over his shoulder, he kept his left arm firmly around Wei Zhaoli’s waist while his right hand flicked upward. The [Wuchen Sword] whistled through the air, a streak of frost-white silk aimed squarely at Lin Lang’s throat.

Desperate, Lin Lang summoned his life-bound bone shield. The sword-light hummed, passing through the thick bone as if it were mere parchment. The shield disintegrated, and a spray of hot blood painted the air as a jagged wound opened across Lin Lang’s chest.

“Cough!” Lin Lang staggered back, clutching his torso. His mind reeled. The ambush was perfect, yet Shen Xian had countered it with the casual grace of a man swatting a fly. There was no sign of exhaustion, no faltering Qi—only a sharp, oppressive aura that felt heavier than before.

“A rat who hides its head and tail dares to show its teeth?” Shen Xian’s voice was a low, lethal rasp.

He leveled the [Wuchen Sword], his gaze locking onto the intruder. Through the [Taixu Yingshen Mirror], he had tracked this skulking presence since the moment he entered the fray. The Lin family did not deal in coincidences; they dealt in treachery. His display of “exhaustion” had been a curated performance, a trap designed to lure the venomous snake into the light.

“The Shen family’s scion… has a heart of blackest ink,” Lin Lang spat, wiping gore from his lips.

Shen Xian didn’t waste breath on a dying man’s insults. He surged forward, but Lin Lang was already reaching into his robes. With a frantic snarl, the man crushed a blood-colored jade talisman.

Crimson light blinded the clearing. In an instant, Lin Lang’s form splintered into dozens of identical blood-shadows, each streaking toward the horizon with identical auras. Shen Xian’s brow furrowed; he swung a horizontal crescent of sword-qi, vaporizing half the clones in a single breath, but several managed to slip into the dense fog.

He shifted to pursue, but the weight of the wounded Wei Zhaoli in his arms slowed him. Movement techniques had always been his singular weakness, and against a desperate scion’s life-saving secret art, the gap was too wide.

“I’ll be waiting for you at the bottom!” Lin Lang’s voice echoed through the mist, dripping with venom, just as one of the shadows vanished behind a shimmering bronze barrier.

The ground began to tremble. From the depths of the [Blood Fiend Grand Formation], the sound of clanking chains rose like a funeral dirge. Dozens of humanoid puppets—monstrosities with the aura of late-stage Golden Core experts—emerged from the red haze. Their eyes burned with mindless hunger, their limbs bound in rusted iron.

“Time to leave,” Shen Xian muttered.

He pinched a [Wuying Wuzong Talisman] between his fingers. Deep blue light washed over them, turning their forms translucent until they vanished into the churning mist. They moved like ghosts through the “dark forest” of the formation, eventually finding a moment of reprieve on the far side of the plaza.

Shen Xian knelt, pressing a palm to Wei Zhaoli’s back. He funneled [Exalted Origin True Power] into her, the golden energy acting as a soothing balm against her tattered meridians. However, his face darkened. The fiendish energy of the array had already begun to gnaw at her heart-gate.

“Shen Lang… it’s all right,” she whispered, her face as pale as porcelain.

“Peace,” he commanded softly, pressing a high-grade healing pill into her hand. “Do not speak.”

The situation was dire. The formation was a cage, and the only way out was down.

“Here,” Wei Zhaoli reached into her storage bag with trembling fingers, producing an ancient bronze key. “The way to the fifth floor.”

Shen Xian took the artifact, his Qi igniting the runes etched into its surface. A pillar of cyan light erupted, forming a protective cocoon around them. From the shadows, a stray puppet lunged, its claws bared. Shen Xian didn’t even turn; a backhanded flick of his wrist sent a sliver of sword-qi through the creature’s skull.

The world blurred. The oppressive air of the plaza was replaced by a crushing, suffocating weight.

They stood now in a realm of nightmares: the [Blood Fiend Thunder Prison]. Above, the sky was a churning sea of gore-colored clouds, spitting bolts of crimson lightning that tore the earth asunder. Each strike carried the harrowing screams of a thousand tortured souls.

Shen Xian scanned the perimeter. Near the landing zone lay several fresh corpses, their bodies charred and twisted in expressions of eternal agony. One still clutched a bronze key in a death grip—a silent testament to those who had reached this floor only to find a tomb.

“I will stabilize your wounds first,” Shen Xian said, his voice grim. He began to lay out the components for a [Crude Formation]. It was a simple thing, barely more than a basic ward, but in this lightning-scoured hell, any shield was better than none.