Chapter 614

Giant Sun’s will instructs Hei Lou Lan to hold his breath, relax, and clear his mind so false emotion fake will Gu can take full effect. Ma Hong Yun interrupts, distracted by the peacock’s tears. Hei Lou Lan, furious at the disruption, snaps that of course the land spirit is alive, since the blessed land ends when it dies. ^{ch. 614}

Giant Sun’s will resumes his instructions, but Ma Hong Yun interrupts again, protesting that he cannot accept manufactured feelings between two men. Hei Lou Lan is enraged by the objection. Only Giant Sun’s will’s presence keeps him from attacking Ma Hong Yun outright, and Zhao Lian Yun and Chang Li both urge Ma Hong Yun to look past it for the blessed land’s sake. ^{ch. 614}

Ma Hong Yun proposes instead that he and his wife Chang Li perform the ritual themselves, since their love is genuine and would spare the Gu, but Giant Sun’s will refuses: using the Gu on the two men is not optional. He mocks Ma Hong Yun for trusting in true love. The chapter states that Chang Li never truly loved Ma Hong Yun: Chang Biao treated her as a political bargaining chip and delivered her to Ma tribe to win over Ma Ying Jie. After Chang Biao died she lost her backing and stayed only because Ma Hong Yun’s rise to rank three elder, with Ma Ying Jie’s trust, gave her a good life. ^{ch. 614}

Giant Sun’s will secretly sends part of himself into Chang Li and Zhao Lian Yun’s minds to read their memories, undetected because of True Yang Building’s power and his own skill as an Immortal Venerable. Ma Hong Yun asks what he means. Giant Sun’s will answers that Chang Li’s adoptive father ordered her to approach him and that even Ma Hong Yun’s heroic rescue of her was staged, and Chang Li turns deathly pale at the words. ^{ch. 614}

He adds that Zhao Lian Yun, forced by circumstance to stay by Ma Hong Yun, had at first only wanted to protect herself and has only grown dependent on him as he grew stronger. Zhao Lian Yun feels exposed but dares not refute him. The chapter states she is in fact a transmigrator, whose experience of this world’s cruelty has left her sharply aware of its dangers. Giant Sun’s will’s words suddenly stop, his projected image shocked. ^{ch. 614}

He names Zhao Lian Yun an otherworldly demon lurking at Ma Hong Yun’s side, and killing intent floods his projection, though Hei Lou Lan, despite his experience, has never heard the term before and sees nothing unusual about her. Ma Hong Yun steps in front of her. Giant Sun’s will explains that otherworldly demons are enemies of the whole world and that one, in the past, grew strong enough to nearly destroy the five regions. ^{ch. 614}

Hei Lou Lan, astonished that the claim rivals a rank nine venerable, has no choice but to believe the words of Giant Sun’s will and turns his killing intent on Zhao Lian Yun as well. Ma Hong Yun refuses to let her be harmed. Zhao Lian Yun, moved that he would defend her at the cost of his own life, steps forward herself and tells Giant Sun’s will to come and take her life if he wants it. ^{ch. 614}

Giant Sun’s will is a special will Gu construct that can carry a fixed command triggered by set circumstances, and the main body built into it, at its formation, the resolve that finding an otherworldly demon means killing it takes priority over everything else. It moves to attack Zhao Lian Yun. Ma Hong Yun throws his arms around her in a last, desperate attempt to shield her. ^{ch. 614}

At that instant, Giant Sun’s will is seized by a formidable, hard-to-resist force and yanked bodily outside Eighty-Eight True Yang Building. Chaotic lightning balls bombard it there. The lightning balls, which attack wills directly, damage and destroy part of it while restraining smoke swallows the broken pieces, and the surviving core still fights to force its way back inside. With Giant Sun’s will gone, Eighty-Eight True Yang Building’s Gu worms stop functioning and act only on instinct, leaving the building, though structurally intact, exceptionally fragile. ^{ch. 614}