152 - Divine Mastering Dragon System

Chapter 152: The Demon Spawn The first time Long Rui Qing met Yu Zi Ming was at an adult's manor. Despite being pregnant, the woman’s slender figure contrasted sharply with her swollen abdomen. Initially, Long Rui Qing had no particular thoughts about Yu Zi Ming. Even when Yu Zi Ming showed concern for Long Rui Qing, who had just lost two fingers, the most striking impression she left was the abrupt appearance of a human cultivator who was visibly pregnant in such an unexpected place. Having lived on Jade Green Mountain for over a decade, Long Rui Qing had never heard of anyone by this name. However, the idea that a nobody could be the guest of the Demon Clan's right emissary seemed implausible. It was likely just a made-up name. Clutching her wound, Long Rui Qing left the manor, unsure of where home was, yet too afraid to wander aimlessly. She headed back to the left emissary's residence. A servant who had previously guided her was already waiting at the main entrance, perhaps anticipating her predicament. In disguise, Long Rui Qing moved naturally through the streets, exhibiting no interest in the array of partially revealed demon forms around her. Hesitantly, she queried, "I encountered a human cultivator at the manor..." "Don’t ask what you shouldn’t," the servant interrupted coldly. Predicting this dismissal, Long Rui Qing refrained from pursuing the matter further, but noted a hint of unease in the servant's expression. The servant muttered under his breath, "Don't mess with that woman." But even keeping her distance from Yu Zi Ming didn't help. Within three days of returning to her now-strange home, the authority summoned her. Unfit for frontline work, Long Rui Qing was assigned as a close aide to Yu Zi Ming. Initially, she had no objections. As a double agent, if she couldn't access any information, she would be of no use to Xiang Shi Yan. Besides, her mother had remarried and started a new family, and it seemed inappropriate for her to disrupt their newfound peace. Her "stepfather", being a distant relative of the Crow Clan, would normally not qualify to marry someone from a core family like her mother's. The clan leader had dealt lightly with her mother’s affair, stripping her military rank but still entrusting her with clan responsibilities. However, the clan still viewed it as a disgrace, offering her little kindness. Long Rui Qing imagined how the clan leader might dismissively view the scandal, yet she wondered why her mother would still bear a child from such an affair. Despite being taken away by the clan leader, her younger sister, still an infant, needed her mother's care. With a human-cultivating elder daughter returning home, tensions became awkward, disrupting the previous harmony of the household. Long Rui Qing was uncertain how much love her mother still harbored for that man after all these years. Her young sister, hostile towards her human sister, wished fervently for her immediate departure. When their parents were detained, it was Long Rui Qing who disguised her demon features, hiding her sister, living off scraps for over ten days. The sixteen-year-old looked at her coldly, her feathers quivering as if ready to attack. Before Long Rui Qing's return, she had no knowledge of her ancestry or past. Long Rui Qing yearned for the days on Jade Green Mountain, recalling the lovable younger ones and the warmth of her teacher, Hua Ye. Initially, Long Rui Qing got along well with Yu Zi Ming, who she assumed might have been sent to manage the army affairs. But soon, she realized Yu Zi Ming’s role was merely that of a personal attendant. Contrary to her expectations, she discovered that pregnant cultivators might not differ much from ordinary human women. Long Rui Qing had never seen a pregnant female cultivator, let alone one in the Nascent Soul stage, suffering severe morning sickness. Most encounters with Yu Zi Ming found her reclined, exhausted on her chaise lounge, exuding a heavy sweetness that not even cleansing spells dispelled. Yu Zi Ming rarely practiced cultivation. Sometimes she'd doodle on meridian charts, other times she vanished suddenly or stared blankly while touching her swollen belly, her gaze drifting out towards shadows cast by the trees. At night, Long Rui Qing stood guard in her room. Yu Zi Ming's belly was so distended it seemed ready to burst forth an unsightly child, requiring cautious vigilance. During meditation, Long Rui Qing occasionally heard Yu Zi Ming's terrified murmurs from her dreams. At times she woke with the discomfort of milk-filled breasts, pulling away quietly to tend to herself with a sheepish smile if noticed. As the intrigue wore off, Long Rui Qing sensed something amiss. She first met Yu Zi Ming in late autumn, unfamiliar yet determined, she even wrote to her mother, who had raised four children, for advice. When Yu Zi Ming nonchalantly dismissed concerns over the due date, Long Rui Qing independently calculated her delivery to be by spring. Perhaps powerful female cultivators differed from ordinary women. When summer reached its peak, the heat forced Long Rui Qing to finally inquire again, faint with worry. Though Yu Zi Ming's outward demeanor was gentle, it sent chills down Long Rui Qing’s spine. By then, Long Rui Qing wasn’t unnerved by the grotesque or frightening—it was the eerie nature of the situation. Yu Zi Ming feared the heat, with her translucent overlay drenched in perspiration lamely patted dry, bearing the guise of a mother eagerly expecting a daughter. Yu Zi Ming was oddly certain her baby was a girl. These scattered clues gnawed at Long Rui Qing. Yet probing the household for information seemed insurmountable. The petite, gentle woman, with an overly distended belly stood, smilingly refusing to answer before leaving Long Rui Qing bewildered. Long Rui Qing awaited Yu Zi Ming's delivery patiently. When Yu Zi Ming was absent the entire day, she assumed she had been summoned for a meeting. By then, Long Rui Qing no longer viewed the seasoned cultivator as a fragile pregnant woman, reassured by her absence. That night in her sleep chambers, a gust of cool air roused Long Rui Qing from meditation. The room where she meditated was empty. Peering through a screen, Long Rui Qing saw Yu Zi Ming had not returned. Despite the heat and darkness, she felt inexplicably cold, as if something sinister lurked in the shadows. Long Rui Qing wanted to close the window but hesitated as she felt a weight on her shoulder. With melancholy, Yu Zi Ming said, "Long Captain, from the moment I saw you, I was drawn to your beauty." She reached forward to tilt Long Rui Qing's chin. Long Rui Qing froze, caught in the sultry ambiance. For a split second, she questioned if this task of hers included intimate duties. Although she despised Yu Ming, memories of her former mentor returned unbidden, remembering how he’d embrace her like this, his chin resting on her shoulder whenever he was intoxicated. Now she wondered if Yu Zi Ming truly had a partner to father her child, detecting a strong scent of alcohol and suspecting the woman cherished a hidden memory, just like Yu Ming. Recalling Yu Ming left Long Rui Qing uncomfortable. She wished to turn and kick away the offending senior, as if that might quell the burning sensation inside her. But in reality, she was a mere pawn, gifted as a toy to esteemed guests. Bound to feign contentment. Long Rui Qing bowed, yielding to Yu Zi Ming's caress without a trace of indignity in her voice: "If the senior finds me pleasing, use me as you wish." "Indeed, your spiritual roots are quite suitable. Your cultivation at the Golden Core stage hasn’t solidified, leaving room for refinement..." Yu Zi Ming rambled drunkenly, her tone suddenly woeful, "But you are Xiao Luan’s kin, and disturbing you will anger her." Hearing her name invoked, Long Rui Qing's heart skipped. She spun around to face not a nurturing, expectant mother, but a haggard female cultivator with a deflated stomach. As Yu Zi Ming staggered, she took a few steps back. Her thin garment, soaked with sweat, alcohol, and milk, offered little cover. Long Rui Qing clearly saw blood still flowing between the woman's legs, with a slight bulge suggesting remnants of something not fully expelled from her belly, though her abdomen now hung loose and slack. Unbeknownst to Long Rui Qing, Yu Zi Ming had retreated to a secluded corner, drinking heavily to numb her senses, and there, in a raw stupor, she had birthed the child. But neither sight nor sound of an infant reached Long Rui Qing. The woman, once so devotedly awaiting her child's birth, returned alone. Long Rui Qing couldn't comprehend what Yu Zi Ming had delivered; suddenly she found it hard to breathe. Clutching her mouth, she suppressed the rising nausea, watching as Yu Zi Ming, weeping, stumbled back to her quarters, leaving a trail of blood behind. Curled on the couch and lost in tears, Yu Zi Ming ignored Long Rui Qing for a long time before softly speaking again, "Go deal with the guest in the west wing." The vast manor seemingly housed only the two of them, raising questions about the existence of any guest. Bowing, Long Rui Qing withdrew to handle the task. In the oppressive summer night air, enclosed within the guest room, mingling with the scattered remains, a robust stench of decay burgeoned rapidly. Silently, Long Rui Qing managed the distinctly adult corpse, noticing it donned the robes of a human cultivator sect yet unable to muster any visible reaction to this discovery. In the half-month that followed, the moon waned to a meager crescent. Long Rui Qing feigned normalcy, but one night, disturbed by strange, lascivious sounds from within, curiosity compelled her to peep inside. In her surveillance, she feared no discovery. Yu Zi Ming never diverted her spiritual sense from monitoring the child within her, and post-birth, the four-century-old Nascent Soul senior lived entranced in her world, oblivious even as Long Rui Qing cleansed her body. What shocked Long Rui Qing was something entirely unexpected. —There was someone else in the room. It seemed every ounce of life had been drained from Yu Zi Ming, now nestled in the thin arms of an unfamiliar presence. The emaciated woman's body leaned against this unknown figure. The frail woman clutched at the person’s arms and knees beneath her to maintain her balance, her watery eyes locked onto Long Rui Qing or oblivious to the servant’s intrusion entirely. Her waist bore bruised marks, her abdomen glistening, while the presence beneath her coldly gripped her hair, forcing her head back. The instant Long Rui Qing entered the room, this individual turned to gaze at her, unmoving, purple eyes fixed upon Long Rui Qing. The stranger's eyes were pitch black, distinctly inhuman, yet not demon either. She voraciously bit into Yu Zi Ming's neck. Long Rui Qing stood paralyzed, not merely by her superior's compliant demeanor but due to the hauntingly fierce ghostly aura emanating from the stranger, chilling her to her core. Suddenly, comprehension struck Long Rui Qing: Yu Zi Ming's cherished child had not been abandoned—she had brought it back home the night of the delivery, though Long Rui Qing had been blind to it. "Master, next time, I swear... next time I will..." Tears welled in the woman's eyes, uncertain whether born of genuine grief or consumed by rapture. The following day, the late-stage Nascent Soul Ghost Cultivator emerged from the room poised, as if nothing had occurred. Yu Zi Ming was pregnant again. Upon hearing from Xiang Shi Yan that Hua Ye was missing, Long Rui Qing’s mind flashed to the corpses she had disposed of over the past four years—each a female cultivator connected to various sects and houses, their lives extinguished painfully, heads obliterated beyond recognition. Such gruesome fates were no match for that fleeting glimpse of the ghost king. Thinking of the headless corpse she was to dissolve with corpse-melting powder in the isolated forest, clad in the scarlet robe of a Jade Green Mountain elder disciple, Long Rui Qing was overwhelmed with nausea. She retched twice, then beseeched Xiang Shi Yan, "Quickly, find her…" In a cave where Yu Zi Ming had slain the previous demon beast occupant with ease—a feat near the formidable Ghost Rift chasm—she had grown more powerful. The cave was immaculately prepared by her capable aide; Long Rui Qing never disappointed in such regards. Yu Zi Ming mused she might keep her indefinitely, depending on Xiao Luan's consent. The ghost cultivator cheerfully observed the young woman on the stone bed—a fortuitous capture of a Golden Core body cultivator. Her weak soul was ripe for safe consumption, robust physical health balancing the fusion process—a prime vessel indeed. And… that handsome visage, perfectly suited for her mentor's return. Author’s Note: This chapter took me two days—I glance back after writing: hmm, another stable bout of madness today. 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