In a high-level martial arts game, a wife is given to you at the start.

He could feel the purified polluted energy surging into his body through the crystal, rampaging through his meridians, trying to find a place to take hold. It felt like countless venomous snakes were biting his meridians simultaneously, injecting venom into every corner of his body.

But he remained conscious throughout.

He endured excruciating pain while staring intently at the heart—at every beat, every movement of its tendrils. He had said, "If you dare to play tricks," and that threat was not empty words. If he detected even the slightest flow of energy that did not belong to "purification," he would immediately release the crystal, causing the heart to be reduced to ashes in the backlash.

Meanwhile, the dark golden blood demon power within him also responded.

An ancient, timeless power surged from the depths of his bloodline, enveloping, devouring, and transforming the polluted energy that flooded his body. Dark gold and dark red light clashed fiercely within him, each collision placing immense pressure on his meridians, as if they were about to burst at any moment. His body trembled violently in the clash of the two forces, and crisscrossing patterns of light appeared on his skin, as if it were about to explode at any instant.

But he did not back down.

He stood before his heart, his palm firmly pressed against the crystal, letting the pain wash over his body again and again. His face grew paler and paler, veins bulged on his forehead, and beads of sweat slid down his cheeks, dripping onto the rocky platform beneath his feet, instantly evaporating into white mist. His lips were bleeding from being bitten, but he still did not let go.

He heard a sigh from deep within his heart.

The sigh carried a sense of relief, a sense of comfort, and a final regret: "Thank you... Master didn't misjudge me."

Lin Qiye did not respond.

He didn't lower his guard; instead, he sensed every energy fluctuation emanating from his heart even more carefully. Purification could be real, but the heart might also secretly leave something behind during the purification process—like that monster in the Azure Bone Mountains, who was plotting its sacrifice until the very last moment.

Only when he was certain that every wisp of energy surging from his heart was being purely transformed and purified by the crystal, without any hidden tricks, did he slightly relax his tense shoulders.

The dark red light began to fade at a visible rate. The veins on the surface of the heart gradually became transparent, and the open, tooth-filled mouthparts withered and drooped, as if they had lost all vitality. The tremors in the underground space gradually subsided, the falling rubble from the dome stopped, and even the putrid smell in the air began to dissipate.

Purification is underway.

But the backlash is also underway.

The clash between the dark golden light and the dark red polluted energy within Lin Qiye's body had reached a fever pitch. The purified polluted energy surged into his body like a tidal wave, each wave more turbulent and violent than the last. His meridians were under extreme pressure, and some places had begun to show minute cracks, but the dark golden blood demon power was constantly repairing these cracks, destroying and repairing at the same time, forming a dangerous balance.

He didn't know how long this balance could last.

He knew only that he absolutely could not let go at this moment. If he did, the polluted energy that had been absorbed into his body would lose its restraint and explode completely within him. At that point, not only would all his previous efforts be in vain, but he would also become a new source of pollution.

He gritted his teeth and mobilized the power of the dark golden crystal deep within his dantian—the fragment he had brought back from the Canggu Mountains. The two forces of the same origin converged within his body, like two great rivers merging, washing away the surging torrent of pollution.

He didn't know how long he had been standing there.

It could be a cup of tea, an hour, or a whole day. All he knew was that when his heart finally stopped beating, when the last wisp of dark red light was absorbed by the crystal, and when the crystal in his palm finally stopped transmitting new polluting energy, he was soaked to the bone, as if he had been pulled out of the water.

He slowly released his grip.

The crystal slipped from his palm and landed on the ground with a crisp sound. The dark golden light on the crystal's surface had dimmed considerably, but it still retained its complete form, like an ancient relic that had fulfilled its purpose. It lay quietly on the rock platform, gleaming with a warm luster in the dim light.

He looked down at the heart.

The heart was no longer beating, its surface covered with a grayish-white, rock-like substance, like a giant fossil frozen in time. The once repulsive dark red veins had vanished, leaving only a smooth surface with a hint of dark gold. It stood silently before the rock face, like a wordless monument.

Lin Qiye watched it quietly.

He didn't say "thank you for your hard work".

This heart did indeed fulfill its mission, but it was also the root cause of this land's pollution. It found release before its death, and for that release, it paid the price with a dark red mark. There was no debt owed, no gratitude; it was simply a matter of settling accounts.

He crouched down, picked up the crystal from the ground, and put it in his pocket.

He checked the underground space again—confirming there were no remaining sources of pollution, no hidden restrictions, and no contingency plans left by the dying heart. He never believed in the "sincerity" of anything dying unless he saw it with his own eyes and confirmed it was truly dead.

After confirming that everything was correct, he turned around and walked back the way he came.

The dome of the underground space began to tremble again, but this time it wasn't a tremor of collapse, but a rhythm of renewal. The dark red light on the rock walls gradually faded, revealing the original gray rock layers below. The putrid smell in the air completely dissipated, replaced by a crisp scent of earth and rock.

He climbed up the narrow crevice he had come through.

The thick, gray-black mist that had been spewing from the rock walls on either side of the fissure ceased, and the glow of the magma gradually dimmed until it finally went out completely. Those crimson eyes that had lurked in the shadows, at the moment the purification was complete, seemed to have lost all support, extinguishing and disappearing one by one as if they had never existed.

He crawled out of the crevice and stood on the basin again.

The black winds in Blackwind Valley have stopped.

The sky overhead revealed a long-lost blue, and sunlight poured down through gaps in the clouds, bathing the entire basin in a warm golden hue. The aura of the strange beasts that once roamed the valley had completely dissipated, leaving only fresh air carrying the scent of grass and trees. Even in the crevices of the charred rock walls, a few tender green shoots were quietly sprouting.

He stood in the center of the basin, breathing in the long-lost tranquility.

Then, he looked down at his palm.

The dark gold emblem still lay there quietly, but its radiance seemed purer than before, as if it had undergone a baptism. The dark red line along the edge of the emblem was also a shade deeper than before.