Villains Aren't Stepping Stones!

Trash.

Bastard.

I wish you didn’t exist.

Those were the words Elder Mu, no, Mu Chen had always heard in his life.

They were the harsh, grating background noise of his entire childhood, echoing through the narrow, filth-ridden alleyways of the mortal city where he had been dragged into existence.

He wasn’t anyone special.

He was just a bastard child of a prostitute mother who despised his very breath for being an extra mouth to feed, and a gambling-addicted drunkard of a father who only acknowledged him when he needed a punching bag to vent his frustrations after losing his last copper coin.

He grew up sleeping on cold, damp stone floors, nursing bruises, and learning to steal scraps just to survive another day. He thought that his life would just end up exactly the same as his wretched parents—short, miserable, and entirely forgotten by the world...

Until, that gentle, radiating hand reached out to him.

It was a hand that belonged to a young, vibrant noble lady who looked like an immortal descending into the mud. Ye Hongyan had pulled him out of the darkness, looked past his filthy rags, and offered him a warmth he never knew existed.

She gave him a purpose, shared her resources, and loved him with a purity that defied the rigid class structures of the empire.

She was his salvation, his light, and his entire reason for climbing the brutal path of cultivation.

"...I sentence you, Death!"

Mu Chen snapped out of his lingering thoughts, his vision clearing as the cold reality of the present rushed back to freeze his blood.

He stared intently at Ye Hongyan, who was currently hovering in the fractured air right before him.

She was glaring at him with a gaze that carried no trace of their shared past—only an absolute, unyielding disgust.

Her magnificent, signature dark and pink scythe was held firmly in her hands, its massive, curved blade humming with a terrifying, high-frequency spiritual resonance that threatened to slice through the very atmosphere.

Why... why have everything turned out like this?

The question ripped through his fractured consciousness, leaving a trail of absolute despair.

How did a thousand years of pure, silent devotion mutate into this apocalyptic nightmare in the span of a single week?

If he knew this horrific tragedy would happen, if he had known that his jealousy would blind him so completely, he would have been thoroughly satisfied just by watching her from the safety of the distance.

He would have contentedly remained a silent observer in the shadows, never approaching her, never forcing his broken presence back into her immaculate life.

He slowly turned his burning, bloodshot gaze down towards the ground, locking onto the translucent shadow barrier below.

There stood Shen Haoran, completely undisturbed by the falling debris, watching the entire unfolding tragedy with a smooth, victorious smile playing on his lips.

Ah, you absolute beast,Mu Chen thought internally, his heart clenching with a profound, terrifying realization of the boy’s true depth.

You’re not even going to give me a proper, honorable death in battle?

You won’t even deign to draw your own weapon to execute me?

Instead, you have orchestrated everything so perfectly that you would let the very woman I love be the one to slaughter me?

How unimaginably cruel can a single human being be?

Do you not know that Ye Hongyan has an incredibly fragile, deeply compassionate heart beneath her proud Sage facade?

Mu Chen screamed silently, his mind racing as he looked back at the woman preparing to strike.

Even if she completely loathes and hates me now for my vile accusations, I was still once the man she loved more than her own life!

If you push her to murder me with her own two hands, the psychological guilt will eventually tear her apart!

She will break down completely, and you will have nothing but a hollow shell!

However, Ye Hongyan didn’t give him a single secondary moment to analyze the layout of the battlefield or think through his regrets.

Angered by the horrific, senseless destruction Elder Mu had just unleashed upon the innocent populace, she immediately attacked with the full, devastating force of a 6th stage Heavenly Saint.

*BOOM!*

The space beneath her boots imploded as she lunged forward, her dark and pink scythe cutting a massive, crescent-shaped rift through the atmosphere.

The sheer kinetic speed of her movement bypassed physical distance entirely.

Mu Chen barely had time to raise his forearms to channel a defensive barrier before the heavy, curved blade crashed violently against his spiritual energy.

*CRACK!*

The defensive shield shattered like cheap glass under the immense, focused weight of her strike.

Ye Hongyan attacked ferociously, her movements a blinding, seamless blur of absolute martial perfection.

She spun the heavy shaft of her scythe with fluid grace, using the blunt end to smash heavily into his ribs, the impact sending him spiraling through the air like a broken leaf.

Mu Chen was getting pushed back relentlessly, taking all the brutal, bone-crushing hits directly against his body.

Not to mention that he was already fundamentally weaker than Ye Hongyan—who had achieved the 6th stage of the Heavenly Saint Realm while he was a mere Peak Earthly Saint—but he also simply did not want to launch a single offensive strike against her.

He couldn’t bring himself to channel his lethal energy toward the only woman who had ever shown him true kindness in his entire miserable life.

He could only passively defend, his body absorbing the terrifying momentum of her rage.

She materialized directly above him, her face tight with a stern, unforgiving justice.

"You destroyed the academy, Mu Chen! You killed those children!" she roared, her voice carrying a profound, weeping anger as she brought the flat of her scythe down like a descending mountain.

The strike connected squarely with his chest.

The immense physical and spiritual pressure drove him straight out of the sky.

He plummeted downward at supersonic speeds, crashing violently into the ruined, dust-covered foundations of the courtyard below.

*THUDDDDD!!!*

A massive crater erupted where he landed, the ground buckling outward as stone and twisted metal tore into his flesh.

With that one final, devastating attack, Ye Hongyan had completely broken his remaining defenses and sent Elder Mu down to the hard ground.

He lay twisted in the center of the deep crater, coughing up massive, mouthfuls of thick, dark crimson blood.

His entire body was groaning in absolute, agonizing pain, his bones shattered, his spirit circuits completely disrupted, and he was barely even able to move a single finger.

Ye Hongyan descended slowly from the sky, her robes fluttering gently as her boots touched the edge of the crater.

She walked forward, the tip of her massive scythe dragging along the broken stone with a sharp, scraping sound, and stopped right beside his broken form.

"Mu Chen... I... I cannot spare your life today. You know that, right?" she said, her voice shaking slightly, though she tried desperately to inject an iron finality into her tone.

Indeed. Mu Chen’s reckless, unhinged release of his full Earthly Saint power had instantly killed hundreds of weaker junior and senior students who lacked the foundations to survive the atmospheric collapse, and it had completely destroyed more than half of the majestic Academy City.

The streets were ran red with the blood of the innocent.

No matter how much she had loved him in the ancient past, no matter the deep sacrifices she had made for his memory, she fundamentally could not let the innocent souls of those who had perished today die unjustly without a proper explanation.

Mu Chen coughed out more blood, the metallic liquid staining his gray beard and his torn robes.

He was so heavily and gravely injured by her ferocious assault that he didn’t even possess the residual spiritual strength to form a single spoken word.

He could only look up at her through his blurred, bloodshot vision, his eyes filled with a quiet, peaceful resignation.

He was ready to die by her hand. It was a fitting, poetic end for a bastard child.

Still, he regretted it.

If he that this would be his outcome, he shouldn’t have crossed that man. He shouldn’t have offended him for the sake of that student whose name he doesn’t even know.

If he had actually decided to just watch at the sidelines, ignoring that instinctive urge to help that student, would he still just be an ordinary man watching the love of his life from the sidelines?

Ah, that would be far better outcome than now.

Ye Hongyan stared down at his broken, helpless face, the memories of their youth briefly flashing across her mind like a distant mirage.

She slowly raised her massive scythe high into the air, the pink runes along the blade glowing with lethal intent as she prepared to bring it down to sever his head from his shoulders... and then, her entire body went rigid.

She hesitated.

The blade remained suspended in mid-air, trembling slightly.

Indeed. It seems that no matter how much she deeply hated this man for what he had done to the academy, and no matter how much she despised the vile, insulting words he had screamed at her virtue yesterday, she still fundamentally could not bring herself to actively swing the blade and kill him.

The deep, thousand-year-old roots of her first love were too firmly entwined with her soul to be severed so easily.

She stood frozen, tears of frustration and conflict welling in her eyes.

"Damn it. Why... Why can’t I do it...?!"

Just then, before her hesitation could turn into a full emotional breakdown, the space right beside her was immediately filled with a soft, comforting warmth.

Haoran appeared out of the shadows like an encouraging specter and reached out with his steady, warm hands and gently, firmly grabbed her wrists, halting the trembling movement of her scythe and stopping her from forcing herself any further.

"That’s enough, Hongyan," he whispered softly into her ear, his presence a soothing balm against her fraying nerves. "You’ve done more than enough. Let me handle the rest."

"Haoran..." Ye Hongyan whispered, her voice soft and pleading.

Haoran nodded at her, grinning mischievously. "Don’t worry. I’m not that petty, however, I have to make sure that he can’t cause trouble anymore. We can even visit him from time to time, and maybe in the future....you can introduce him to our child."

"C-Child?!" Ye Hongyan turned red, eyes widened, her heart beating frantically. "That’s... That’s way too early...."

Haoran chuckled, grabbing her by the waist and pulling her towards him, "That’s why I said, in the future."

Ye Hongyan bit her lips, but soon, she nodded and let out a soft "hmm", and rested her head on his chest.

Elder Mu stared at them.

No... No... Don’t...

Just kill me! Kill me! Why must you make me suffer like this?!

Aren’t you satisfied of taking the woman I love? You want to make me see the two of you act like lovers and even have children... something I can only dreamed of?

I don’t want to live!

Just kill me!

You bastard!

Beast!

Demon!

Elder Mu circulated his qi wildly into his spirit circuits, wanting to fry his body from inside out and kill himself.

He couldn’t bear to see the woman he loves have a child with someone else, what’s more, that someone was the man who made him suffer!

However...

*Stab!*

Elder Mu’s eyes widened as he felt his qi dissipate.

He looked down, a scythe was stabbed straight into his dantian, completely crippling his cultivation.

He looked up, and saw Ye Hongyan holding the scythe, looking at him with a calm, but apologetic gaze.

"I’m sorry, Mu Chen." She apologized, "This is the only thing I can do to keep your life. Your lifespan would surely be greatly reduce, but don’t worry, I will look after you for the rest of your life."

No! No! That’s worse than even killing me!

I want to die! Hongyan! Just kill me! He roared internally, he was ultimately, way too weak to even open his mouth.

Haoran stared at him, smiling, a smile so condescending that Elder Mu wanted to tear him apart, limb from limb!

"Don’t worry, Elder Mu. You are, after all, the man that Hongyan loved for over a thousand years. I’ll accompany her to visit you."

Beast! Beast! You deserve a faith worse than death, Shen Haoran!

Haoran ignored the hatred-filled eyes of Elder Mu and just looked at the sky.

’Next... it’s your turn.’

’Chu Yan.’