Ao Hang noticed the change in Mo Xuanli’s face and knew he was tempted. Since Ao Hang himself couldn’t leave the sea to search, the stronger this “tool man” became, the better.
But the next moment, Mo Xuanli took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and seemed to steady his scattered thoughts.
Gently stroking the restless God Nine Transformations, he said, “I refuse.”
Ao Hang frowned slightly. “You fought so hard to protect your master and still ended up so battered—shouldn’t you be looking for ways to get stronger?”
“I do want to be stronger. When I face difficulties, I’ll give everything to overcome them. But I won’t take the wrong path.”
After this battle, Mo Xuanli realized his progress was still too slow—before true danger, he was powerless, unable to protect his master. He had to work even harder than before.
His master’s teachings had always guided him toward being clever and perceptive, never toward heroism. Yet his master himself was the kind of man who’d rush into danger and protect the weak—because he was strong enough to act without fear. As his disciple, what else could Mo Xuanli do but grow stronger still, to seize away all the dangers his master might take on without thinking?
Even so, he could not walk a crooked road.
“Crooked road? You call awakening your own bloodline a crooked road?” Ao Hang couldn’t understand. To him, strength was the only truth. “What, are you afraid that once discovered, everyone will turn against you?”
“I have no ‘everyone,’” Mo Xuanli said quietly. “I only have my master.”
“Then you fear your master will slay you in the name of justice? Then just keep lying to him,” Ao Hang said carelessly.
Mo Xuanli’s gaze flickered. “Would you keep lying to Three Bean?”
“We’re not the same. They’re my…” Ao Hang paused, then looked at Mo Xuanli differently.
Since Ao Hang already knew his biggest secret, Mo Xuanli no longer bothered to hide the rest. “Yes,” he said slowly. “I do fear the day my master finds out. I fear he’ll despise me, loathe me, want to kill me. But what I fear more is that if I become a demon and he remains an immortal, I’ll lose the right to stand beside him.”
Ao Hang studied him, suddenly finding him fascinating. “So what? Pull him into demonhood with you—then you can be together.”
“No.” Mo Xuanli’s tone hardened at once.
“Why not?”
“You don’t understand. My master is a man of immense power and honor in the immortal sects,” Mo Xuanli said, lips curling in faint pride. “He’s so good—how could I ever drag him into darkness? I could never harm him. I want to stand with him in the light, to live where he loves to live. So I will never become a demon.”
There was one thing he didn’t say: once, an old man had told him that if he strayed from the right path, his master might… Even a passerby’s casual words had lodged in his heart, leaving him uneasy, determined to avoid that fate.
Ao Hang laughed. The more he listened, the more interesting this man became—a man who loved another man, his own master no less; a mixed-blood who dared to love a lofty immortal lord.
There was a kind of defiant arrogance in it—one that made the world-weary Ao Hang, who disdained all under heaven, feel an unexpected twinge of admiration.
“But you’re still a half-blood,” Ao Hang said. “One day, you’ll be found out. What will you do then?” He didn’t fully understand these things, but he knew the seal that suppressed Mo Xuanli’s mixed blood aura wasn’t permanent—and it was already loosening. Maybe in just a few years, it would be discovered.
Mo Xuanli suddenly looked at Ao Hang. “Have you ever heard of the God-Slaying Sword?”
“Of course. It shattered into eight pieces during the War of Gods and Demons and scattered across the mortal realm.”
“One of the fragments is on your side.”
Ao Hang thought for a moment. “Seems like it is.”
“I need the God-Slaying Sword. It can change my bloodline—turn me into a true human.”
Ao Hang was stunned. “Even if it’s a divine weapon, I’ve never heard it could do that!”
“Someone of great power told me.” Mo Xuanli raised the God Nine Transformations in his hand to show him.
Ao Hang had already sensed that this celestial-grade weapon carried a familiar aura, one particularly harmful to him. Now, as God Nine Transformations drew closer, Ao Hang could indeed feel the energy of the God-Slaying Sword fragment within it.
“So you already have a piece?” Ao Hang said. “Indeed, the God-Slaying Sword was a weapon of absolute destruction against the primordial gods and demons. If it can slay divine bloodlines, then perhaps it could purge your demonic one as well. You want my fragment, don’t you?”
Mo Xuanli nodded. “You can name your terms.”
But Ao Hang suddenly laughed. “There’s nothing I really want—except Three Bean. Still, this sounds interesting. I’d like to see if it’s truly possible. Before I go ashore, I’ll take you to get it. It might even increase your fighting power.”
When Junhua returned, she found the two of them getting along peacefully, an oddly harmonious atmosphere between them. She was immediately puzzled.
“What are you two talking about?” Junhua asked as she approached.
“How are the merfolk faring?” Mo Xuanli countered.
“Half dead. The bodies are all here,” Junhua said, scanning the surrounding sea where countless corpses floated. It would take time to recover them all.
“And you?” she asked Mo Xuanli.
“I still need some time.”
Junhua sighed and handed him several pearls she’d gathered. She had searched the entire merfolk settlement, but all the pearls that once covered the ground were gone. The attackers had swept through like locusts, leaving nothing behind. The sacred grounds were now leveled, the marks of spirit beasts’ digging everywhere—clearly, they hadn’t spared even a single mermaid bead.
“You look like you need spiritual replenishment,” Junhua said bitterly. “Ordinary pearls are fine—you can have as many as you want if you come to where we’re hiding now. But the mermaid beads are all gone. Without the Sacred Land, we’ll have to rely on sheer quantity.”
“No need,” Ao Hang interjected. “I’ll take him to the Dragon Palace.”
The Dragon Palace was where the true dragons slept, and beneath it lay a small spiritual vein for his use.
Junhua was stunned by Ao Hang’s generosity toward Mo Xuanli, hardly able to believe it.
But seeing that Mo Xuanli said nothing, she held her tongue, merely bowing to him. “This time, it’s thanks to you and your master. Without you, our clan might have been wiped out. I don’t know when we’ll ever repay this debt, I—”
“There’s no need to thank me,” Mo Xuanli said. “My master and I only did what we should. Junhua, what do you plan to do next? I’ve already heard about the beast demon.”
“You’re smarter than I am—why don’t you tell me what to do?” Junhua said wryly, half in jest.
But Mo Xuanli replied seriously, “No outsider can decide the merfolk’s fate. Still, I feel something isn’t right.”
“What do you mean?”
“The beast demon—if he were completely uninvolved, just a bystander who saw the merfolk being attacked, how could he know so many internal details? He knew your brother was in the Beast-Taming Manor’s hands—how could he be so certain? Did he see it himself? And he even knew about your Sacred Land. You told us that was a secret. And his timing… was far too coincidental. I didn’t see him myself, so I can’t be sure, but I suspect he might have some connection to the Beast-Taming Manor’s attack. Perhaps the demon clan intends to profit from the chaos—or has other motives. I can’t say for sure,” Mo Xuanli said, looking at her.
Junhua’s face darkened. Could it be that the merfolk’s suffering was partly driven by the demons behind the scenes? If that guess was true, their goal was simple—to force the merfolk into submission.
It was a bold thought, but something in Mo Xuanli’s words made Junhua instinctively believe him. His intelligence and insight had already left a deep impression on her.
“There’s one more thing,” Mo Xuanli continued. “He seemed eager for you to go to the Beast-Taming Manor. Why? I understand you want to rescue your brother or seek revenge, but his anticipation felt… wrong. Perhaps there’s a trap waiting for you. Or maybe he expects you to struggle and, in desperation, turn to him. These are just my suspicions—but you should think carefully.”
Even Ao Hang couldn’t hide his surprise as he listened. Though he’d only given Mo Xuanli a brief account earlier, without much detail, Mo Xuanli had deduced so much from it. No wonder this half-blood had seen through his secret so easily—his mind was truly sharp.
Junhua stared blankly at Mo Xuanli. His analysis wouldn’t change what she had to do, but it did make the future’s dangers clearer in her mind.
She couldn’t help thinking: if Mo Xuanli were strong enough, she would truly want the merfolk to ally solely with him. They could offer him countless pearls, even build him a new sacred ground for cultivation—just to earn his protection.
But Mo Xuanli wasn’t yet strong enough. It wasn’t disdain—she simply knew that if he lacked the power, such an alliance would only bring him harm.
Because a merfolk pact wasn’t just a simple cooperation—if the two sides trusted each other deeply, and if the partner had sufficient power, through the royal bloodline as a medium, the merfolk could even grant their ally the ability to command the seas and control all beasts.
That ability was known only to a few sect leaders who had once cooperated with the merfolk long ago.
Although the only one who had ever managed to do it was Baili Jinxian, who later turned it into an ordinary cooperative relationship, the reason no one else dared to hold such power alone was simple — the greater the ability, the greater the danger. To hold a treasure is to invite misfortune; Junhua understood this deeply.
They themselves were a treasure — but their very existence was a burning burden in others’ hands.
That was the fate of their race. Junhua didn’t want to bring harm to Mo Xuanli, so she swallowed the impulse that had risen to her lips.
After Mo Xuanli finished saying what he needed to say, he fell silent. He had no energy to concern himself with anything else — he only wanted to rescue his master as quickly as possible.
Seeing that Mo Xuanli’s condition had stabilized, Ao Hang planned to take his people back to the Dragon Palace first.
Junhua intended to tend to the bodies of their kin here before leading her group to rejoin them. Revenge might not yet be possible — they didn’t have the strength — but she needed to confirm the safety of their benefactor, Gu Baiqing. Once she reached the shore, she also planned to investigate the Beast-Taming Manor and find out what had become of Fu Ye.
Just then, she remembered the matter of the God-Slaying Sword fragments and mentioned it. Hearing that an agreement had already been reached, Junhua felt relieved.
As Ao Hang was about to take Mo Xuanli away, a merfolk came over, dragging several corpses tied with rope, and called for Junhua.
Junhua nodded to Mo Xuanli and turned to handle it — but Mo Xuanli suddenly stopped in his tracks.
“Wait,” he said.
Ao Hang frowned. “What is it?”
Junhua also looked back at him.
Mo Xuanli immediately walked over to the merfolk and frowned at the dozen or so bodies before him.
“These corpses… aren’t right.”
The others, grief-stricken before the bodies of their kin, hadn’t looked closely. But Mo Xuanli saw it at once.
“What’s wrong with them?” Junhua asked.
“Why are there so many women and so few men?” Mo Xuanli said. He remembered clearly that most of those who had stayed behind to fight were male merfolk.
The merfolk in charge of collecting bodies blinked, puzzled. “Now that you mention it… everyone else also brought back mostly women. That’s strange, why would that be?”
Junhua’s face changed. She hurried forward and looked more closely.
The merfolk had once lived freely throughout the sea, and even as a princess, she hadn’t known everyone. But they had all been living together lately — even if she couldn’t name them all, there should have been more familiar male faces among the dead. Yet now, only one or two were.
How could that be?
“These corpses aren’t fresh,” Ao Hang said, sniffing the air. “Some died recently, but most have been dead for some time — they carry the scent of preserved flesh that has begun to rot again.”
Junhua’s expression turned grave. As if realizing something, she immediately rushed toward the royal palace.
Though the palace had been reduced to ruins, beneath it lay a lake — a sacred underwater pool where the life-pearls born with every newborn merfolk were kept.
These pearls, unlike true pearls or mermaid beads, held no spiritual energy. They were stored here simply as symbols of life — like lamps marking the living — so that if a merfolk perished while far from home, their kin would know.
It was because the number of pearls hadn’t matched the number of living merfolk before that the First Princess had first realized something was wrong.
And now…
Junhua lifted the debris and entered the lake. The water there was separate from the sea. Beside it was a small pit she had dug herself — a place to keep the pearls of those who were missing but not yet confirmed dead, hoping to find them someday.
There had once been many pearls there. Now, nearly all had turned to powder.
And the ones still in the lake — which should have belonged to those fallen in this recent battle — remained intact.
That meant those merfolk who should have died in battle were still alive — they had been taken away. Someone had replaced their bodies with old ones, those of merfolk captured long ago.
But why?
Junhua couldn’t make sense of it. She rushed back and told Mo Xuanli what she’d found.
But she found him and the others standing over the corpses with dark, grim expressions.
“What’s wrong? Did you find something else?” she asked.
At that, the warrior-merfolk who had accompanied them finally broke down, wailing.
Mo Xuanli gestured for Junhua to lift the female corpses’ clothing and look for herself.
When she did, the blood drained from her face.
The truth about the mermaid beads — it was more than a romantic legend about love, blood-bonds, and lifelong devotion. There was another secret — one that could never be spoken aloud.
The reason the sacred land could exist, formed from mermaid beads, was because those pearls contained immense, pure spiritual power.
If a merfolk fell in love and produced a pearl for their beloved, and that pearl was later bonded by blood, the two would share everything — strength doubled, fate intertwined.
But if… at that moment of bonding, the lover instead dug out the pearl and consumed it — they could shatter the limits of their natural talent and cultivation.
Every person is born with a spiritual root, a limit to their potential. To surpass it requires extraordinary means — and the mermaid beads were the safest method.
But a merfolk without their pearl was like a human with their heart torn out — how could they live?
Junhua’s hands trembled as she examined each body. About a third of the female merfolk had a hollow in their chest where their heart should be. The rest were horribly tortured. Only the males had died in battle.
At last, she could bear no more — she collapsed to the ground, weak and numb.
So this was the real reason for the disappearances of the merfolk. Because this secret had been discovered. No wonder — no wonder their people’s fate had turned so dire. It wasn’t just greed for their treasures — those had existed for millennia without such catastrophe. Only this, this unique and irresistible benefit, had provoked envy and doom. So that was it…!
Mo Xuanli stepped forward. For the first time, he saw Junhua crying. After a moment of silence, he said quietly, “Judging from what you found in the lake — the people from Beast-Taming Manor must have switched the bodies, showing the world what they wanted to see, while keeping the captured merfolk for themselves. Those merfolk are likely still alive. Your people need you. Pull yourself together.”
Ao Tang felt his scalp prickle at the sight before him and stepped forward, saying, “I mean, don’t you all think this is strange? The merfolk may be simple by nature, but they don’t just fall in love that easily, right? I remember your mermaid beads only form when you fall in love with someone—but there are way too many of them here. Are we supposed to believe they got captured, then fell in love with humans afterward, and all those humans just happened to be scum? That makes no sense.”
Junhua slowly raised his head, dazed.
Mo Xuanli also frowned. “There must be some other trick—someone must have deceived the merfolk.”
“We have to go to Beast-Taming Manor… we must go.” Junhua murmured.
Mo Xuanli nodded. “The plan stays the same. Wait for me—we’ll go together.”
Meanwhile, deep within the mountain that housed the Beast-Taming Manor, somewhere in its middle layers, a small cat wriggled out from Gu Baiqing’s clothing while no one was watching.
Three Bean looked worriedly at Gu Baiqing, who was chained by the neck and slumped beside the water pool. Frowning, he bared his sharp teeth and bit into Gu Baiqing’s neck.
“Master, wake up!”
Gu Baiqing’s eyelashes trembled slightly, but he showed no sign of waking.
Beside him, lined up in the same row, were other merfolk—all unconscious, just like him. Judging from their serene expressions, they seemed to be dreaming sweet dreams.
——
“Gu Bai, you’re back! I’ve got a surprise for you.”
Gu Bai set down the bags of snacks in his hands. He had come to visit the younger children at the orphanage. Hearing the director say that, curiosity stirred, and he followed her into the office.
The next moment, a boy a head taller than him suddenly lunged forward and threw his arms around him.
Gu Bai froze, caught completely off guard by the tight embrace.
“Older Brother, I missed you so much! Did you miss me?”
Startled by the sudden enthusiasm, Gu Bai patted him awkwardly. “You’re choking me.”
The boy let go slightly, smiling shyly—but his arms still wouldn’t release Gu Bai’s waist.
Only then did Gu Bai get a good look at him. Those eyes were full of emotion, his features finely sculpted, a beauty’s bone structure, and a small mole by the bridge of his nose that made his face inexplicably alluring. Not even the most popular idol could outshine him.
“It’s only been a few years, and you—how’d you shoot up so tall all of a sudden?” Gu Bai chuckled, ruffling the boy’s hair. “Little Mo dog.”
“Brother, you’re calling me that again. My name’s Mo Xuan,” the boy protested with mock irritation, but in the end he couldn’t help rubbing his head against Gu Bai’s shoulder with unrestrained affection. “But only you can call me that.”
No sooner had he spoken than a crowd of children swarmed in, shouting “Little Mo dog!” as well, each trying to cling to Gu Bai.
Taking advantage of his height, Mo Xuan scooped Gu Bai up and ran. “Brother’s mine! Mine alone!”
Laughter and cheers filled the hallway. Gu Bai’s head was spinning from all the jostling, yet for some reason he felt deeply happy.
When he looked up at Mo Xuan again, he met a pair of bright, sunny eyes—so full of vitality that it was dazzling. It was as though losing his parents young and growing up in an orphanage hadn’t brought him any sorrow at all. He was cheerful, innocent, and impossibly warm—so much so it felt unreal.
Then, suddenly, Gu Bai felt something was off.
Those eyes, behind their joy, seemed to hide endless sorrow. Yet whenever they looked at him, they brimmed with happiness—so much that it ached to see.
“Mo Xuan… right?”
Can’t wait until next week to see more? Want to show your support? Come to my Patreon where you can get 10 or more chapters of After Becoming a High-Risk Master, I Flipped the Script right away ! Or go donate at Paypal or Ko-fi to show your appreciation! :)
