I was born a god, the son of the Demon Lord.

Golden markings, as if alive, wrapped around the ghostly immortal's body, enveloping its gray-blue scales inch by inch.

The Nine Netherworld Ghost Seal slowly spun as it fell from Xu Nanyi's palm, stopping steadily half a foot above the Ghost Immortal's head.

The golden patterns on the bottom of the seal merged with the light net on the Ghost Immortal's body, and a vermilion mark appeared out of thin air in the center of the Ghost Immortal's forehead, like an ancient sealing talisman, firmly nailed to its brow.

Xu Nanyi let out a soft breath, "...Got it."

Wei Shenglan slowly retracted his short dagger and looked up and down at the ghost immortal whose head was still suspended by the Ghost Seal.

"Not bad, little girl! Yours is even better than our Merfolk's Dragon-Binding Rope!"

Lin Qingyue patted her head. "Well done."

Hailey had already come over and tugged at Xu Nanyi's sleeve, spinning her around in circles: "Yiyi is so amazing! Yiyi is so amazing!"

Shen Xizhou put away his whip, walked around to the front of the Ghost Immortal, squatted down, and carefully poked the golden light net with his paw.

Just as the group was chattering amongst themselves around the suppressed demon, a small, grayish-white figure slowly emerged from the shadows of the nearby reef.

It was the same lowly merman who had previously begged them for help.

"Please, please take me with you! I... I'm too scared to stay here alone... I'm afraid that monster will come back..."

As she spoke, she moved closer, her gray-blue eyes brimming with tears, her small hand slightly raised as if trying to grasp Wei Shenglan's sleeve.

Xu Nanyi instantly moved half a step from her original position, blocking the little mermaid's left retreat route.

Almost simultaneously, Shen Xizhou swept over from the right, while Lin Qingyue had somehow already positioned herself directly behind the little mermaid, the three of them forming a triangle.

The little mermaid paused for a moment, her pitiful expression still lingering on her face.

"What...what are you doing?!"

Behind the three, three golden rays of merit simultaneously shone.

Immediately afterwards, three golden rings solidified from the golden light, like three outstretched hands, and simultaneously covered the little mermaid.

"Buzz—"

The moment the golden rings landed on her, the grayish-white scales began to fall off like peeling paint, revealing grayish-blue, curling, rotting scales underneath.

"You—you already found out?!"

Xu Nanyi stood outside the golden ring, her small hands behind her back, tilting her head to look at her.

"I knew it the moment you first saw me. You're afraid of me."

She pointed to her eyes: "The fear you showed when you saw me is different from the fear a normal merman would have when seeing a monster. You recognize what's on me."

The demonic immortal, which had been suppressed by the golden ring, suddenly struggled, its six bony claws frantically scratching at the golden ring patterns on its body, and roaring.

"You think sealing me away is the end of it?! There are countless more beneath the abyss—"

Before he could finish speaking, Xu Nanyi, Shen Xizhou, and Lin Qingyue all raised their hands at the same time.

Nine pagoda rings shot out simultaneously from the golden light of merit behind them, each one landing precisely on the strange immortal. The rings, in groups of three, suppressed it layer upon layer.

The first group sealed her limbs and head, the second group crushed her resistance, and the third group, like a golden mountain, completely immobilized her.

The final roar caught in his throat, turning into a muffled breath.

The six bone claws of the evil immortal hung limply, its body curled up into a ball, and a vermilion seal slowly emerged on its forehead, echoing the mark on the forehead of the other evil immortal that was being suppressed.

The seawater has returned to calm.

Wei Shenglan's mouth was half open, and it took her a while to close it.

He glanced at the suppressed demon, then at the holder of the three golden rings, and then looked down at the dagger in his hand before silently putting it away.

"...So you all knew all along? You only kept it from me?"

Lin Qingyue retracted the Floating Pagoda Ring and glanced at him indifferently: "You were busy playing the hero in front of your daughter just now, so you didn't notice the change in her eyes when she looked at you."

Wei Shenglan: "..."

Hailey covered her mouth and chuckled to herself.

Xu Nanyi walked over, squatted down in front of the suppressed ghost immortal, tilted her head to look at the vermilion seal on her forehead, and after confirming that the seal was completely stable, she stood up, clapped her hands, and turned back to smile at Lin Qingyue.

"Alright, that's two now." She counted on her fingers. "One big one, and one that was pretending to be pitiful. We've caught them both."

Shen Xizhou crouched down on the other side, poked the bone claw of the strange immortal with the tip of his tail, and muttered, "Serves you right for pretending to be pitiful and deceiving people, for deceiving children."

Hailey swam over and tugged at Xu Nanyi's sleeve, blinking her big eyes as she looked at the two stunned eerie immortals, then at Xu Nanyi.

"Yiyi, what should we do next? Go back to the Temple of the Sea God?"

Xu Nanyi looked up at the bottomless darkness ahead. "Aunt Yue, you know, this kind of charlatan fairy who pretends to be pitiful and deceives people..."

Lin Qingyue: "We can't manage that much anymore. The rest are beyond our control right now."

"The most urgent thing is to get back and discuss it with Master. What exactly are these things that suddenly appeared? Why did they appear in the seabed rift in the Dream Sea? How many of them are there? These are not things that we can find out by ourselves in the deep sea."

"Let's go. Let's take these two back first and let Master take a look."

……

On the day of departure.

On the shallow beach surrounding the Temple of Poseidon, the seawater was warmed by the sun, its shimmering surface filling the view.

Wei Shenglan squatted beside a coral reef, while Hailey hugged his neck, crying with snot and tears streaming down her face.

"Father... I will come back to see you... You must try your best to win Mother's favor—"

Wei Shenglan held her daughter in one arm and wiped away tears with the other, her voice choked with sobs.

"Waaaaah, I will! I definitely will! Starting today, Daddy will go to the entrance of the Sea King's Palace every day! He'll bring a coral flower every day! He'll write a love poem every day! Every day—"

Hailey sniffed and interrupted him: "You're no good at writing poetry! Mother said that the poem you wrote last time, 'The bright moon shines, you are my little star,' she used it to line her soup bowl!"

Wei Shenglan choked for a moment: "Then, then Father, let's try something else! Father will learn to write prose! Seven-character quatrains! Parallel prose!"

"Even my mother can't understand parallel prose! Write in vernacular Chinese!"

"Good, good, good! Father will write in vernacular Chinese!"

"And another thing! Mother doesn't like clingy children! You can only appear a maximum of three times a day! Once in the morning, once at noon, and once in the evening!"

"Isn't three times too few? Father wishes he could hang himself on the roof beam of the Sea Emperor's Palace every day—"

"Then hang it up! Remember to comb the tail on the roof beam too! Grandma says a greasy tail looks like a stinky loach that hasn't bathed for three days!"