Villain: Manipulating the Heroines into hating the Protagonist

Chapter 977: Elders Take Action

The interior of the Ice Heart Pavilion was a world carved from winter’s bone. The corridors were lined with pale blue spirit-crystals that emitted a soft, frigid luminescence, and the air was kept at a temperature low enough to turn a mortal’s breath into falling snow. It was an environment meticulously crafted to suppress the heart-fire of its inhabitants, encouraging the cultivation of the Ice Heart Palace’s signature technique—the Frozen Soul Art.

But tonight, a foreign element had invaded this sanctuary of cold purity.

It began not with a bang, but with a scent that defied the sterility of the ice. It was a fragrance so subtle that the olfactory senses barely registered it—a phantom hint of blooming night-lotus, heavy with sweet nectar and the damp earth of a summer evening.

The Drunken Lotus Slumber.

Wang Jian moved through the ground-floor hallway, his steps making no sound on the frost-covered floorboards. He walked with his hands clasped behind his back, his demeanor relaxed, like a scholar strolling through his own private garden. He watched the invisible currents of the airflow array carry the poison into the open chambers of the disciples.

In the third room on the left, a young female disciple sat cross-legged on a prayer mat made of woven snow-grass. Her name was Lan’er, a cultivator at the Middle Stage of Foundation Establishment. She was currently circulating her Qi, attempting to refine a shard of glacial essence she had purchased at the market earlier that day.

Her brows were furrowed in concentration, her skin pale and flawless, radiating a faint chill. Suddenly, the tension in her forehead smoothed out. The biting cold of the glacial essence, which usually required immense willpower to endure, transformed into a comforting warmth.

She opened her eyes, but she did not see the spartan walls of her meditation chamber. Instead, she saw a vast field of golden flowers swaying under a warm sun. The spiritual pressure that constantly weighed on her shoulders evaporated.

”So warm...” she whispered, a dreamy, intoxicated smile spreading across her lips.

Her hands, which had been held in a rigid mudra, went limp. She swayed, her body succumbing to a heaviness that felt like sinking into a bed of feathers. Without a sound, she slumped backward onto the floor, her chest rising and falling in a deep, rhythmic slumber.

Wang Jian paused at her doorway. He didn’t enter, merely observing her from the threshold. His Stellar Demonic Eyes pierced through the fabric of her white robes, assessing the quality of her Yin essence.

’Pure,’ he noted with clinical appreciation. ’Her Primordial Yin is intact and dense. A fine vessel for dual cultivation. Once broken in, she will make an excellent servant.’

He moved on. Room after room, the scene repeated itself. The poison was a masterpiece of alchemy, bypassing the instinctive defenses of the Foundation Establishment cultivators by masking itself as a beneficial surge of spiritual energy before dragging the consciousness into the abyss of dreams.

’Liu Ruyan has truly outdone herself,’ Wang Jian thought, a flicker of satisfaction crossing his mind. ’Most poisons damage the meridians or taint the blood essence, lowering the value of the cauldron. But this... this preserves them in pristine condition. It freezes them in a moment of bliss, waiting to be harvested.’

He sensed the silence deepening around him. The subtle hum of circulating Qi from the disciples’ quarters faded, replaced by the stillness of a tomb. Twenty disciples, the future hope of the Ice Heart Palace, were now his for the taking.

However, as the poison drifted upward toward the second floor, the resistance increased. The air currents thinned, and the cultivation bases of the targets grew stronger.

Wang Jian halted at the base of the grand staircase carved from a single block of translucent ice-jade. He could feel the disturbance in the flow of Qi above. The Drunken Lotus Slumber had reached the nostrils of the Core Formation Elders.

Unlike the disciples, their spiritual seas were vast lakes compared to puddles. The moment the foreign agent tried to invade their consciousness, their formidable defensive instincts kicked in.

”Something is wrong!”

A sharp, authoritative voice boomed from the upper landing, vibrating through the structure. It was filled with spiritual power, a sonic wave meant to alert the entire district.

”Who dares intrude on the Ice Heart Palace!”

The shout was deafening inside the pavilion, shaking the icicles hanging from the ceiling. But Wang Jian didn’t flinch. He didn’t even blink. He knew that outside the Seven-Star Obscurity Array, the night remained silent. The shout had slammed against the spatial barrier he had erected and dissipated harmlessly into the void.

’Scream all you want,’ Wang Jian thought, unfurling his folding fan with a sharp snap. ’No one is coming to save you. The City Lord is enjoying his wine, the guards are patrolling the next sector, and the world believes you are sleeping soundly.’

He took a step onto the first stair. Then the second. He adjusted his aura, carefully suppressing the vast, terrifying ocean of his Stellar Core. He dialed it down, compressing it until he radiated the fluctuating, unstable energy of a Late Stage Foundation Establishment cultivator—a man who had perhaps touched the threshold of a higher realm but had not yet stepped through.

Above him, the sound of hurried footsteps echoed.

”Intruder!”

Three figures burst onto the upper landing, their robes billowing in the sudden release of their spiritual pressure.

Leading them was Bing Yun.

She was a vision of frozen beauty. Her silver hair flowed behind her like a waterfall of moonlight, and her pale blue eyes burned with a mixture of shock and killing intent. She held nothing in her hands, but the air around her twisted, forming invisible blades of ice. Her cultivation at the Middle Stage of the Core Formation Realm was fully unleashed, creating a zone of absolute zero around her.

Flanking her were two older women. To her left was Elder Leng, a stern-faced woman with a scar running down her chin, wielding a jagged longsword made of blue crystal. To her right was Elder Han, slightly shorter but radiating a dense, defensive aura, her hands glowing with icy light. Both were at the Early Stage of the Core Formation Realm.

They stopped at the top of the stairs, looking down at the solitary figure standing calmly in the middle of the flight.

Wang Jian looked up, fanning himself gently despite the freezing temperature. He met Bing Yun’s gaze with a small, polite smile.

”Good evening, Fairy Bing,” he said, his voice smooth and cultured. ”I hope I haven’t disturbed your rest.”

Bing Yun’s eyes narrowed. Recognition flashed instantly in her gaze, replacing the initial confusion.

”You,” she hissed, the word dripping with venom. ”The arrogant servant from the auction. The dog of the Fragrance Melody Sect.”

She scanned him, her Divine Sense sweeping over his body. She confirmed his cultivation—Late Stage Foundation Establishment. A nobody. An ant. And yet, the insolence of this man, standing alone in their sanctuary while her disciples were ominously silent, made her blood run cold.

”Where is your master?” Bing Yun demanded, looking past him into the shadows. ”Where is Hua Yimei? Does she think sending a mere servant to die will delay us?”

Behind her, Elder Leng stepped forward, her crystal sword humming. ”He must have used a poison array. The disciples... I cannot sense them. He drugged them!”

”You court death, invading our sanctuary!” Elder Leng shouted, her temper flaring hotter than her element allowed. She raised her sword, gathering a massive amount of Ice Qi. ”A Foundation Establishment trash dares to defile the Ice Heart Pavilion? I will flay the skin from your bones!”

Wang Jian chuckled softly, closing his fan and tapping it against his palm.

”Invading? No, no,” he corrected gently, shaking his head. ”I am merely here to return the greeting from this afternoon. You called my sect ’ruins.’ You insulted my... employer. I felt it was only polite to come and show you the true nature of the ’ruins’ you so despise.”

”Die!” Elder Leng didn’t wait for Bing Yun’s order. She pushed off the landing, diving down the stairs with her sword raised, intending to split Wang Jian in two with a single strike of Glacial Cleave.

Wang Jian didn’t move. He didn’t raise a defense. He simply watched her descend, his smile widening by a fraction.

Just as Elder Leng crossed the midpoint of the air above the stairs, the shadows in the vaulted ceiling beams exploded.

BOOM!

A figure wreathed in roaring, golden flames dropped like a meteor. The heat was instantaneous and overwhelming, flash-vaporizing the moisture in the air into a dense, blinding fog.

”What—!” Elder Leng gasped, her instincts screaming danger. She tried to twist in mid-air, raising her sword to block.

Hua Yimei crashed into her.

”Burning Heaven Palm!”

Hua Yimei’s hand, encased in the solidified essence of the Golden Phoenix Flame, slammed into the flat of Elder Leng’s crystal sword.

The impact was catastrophic. The ice attribute Qi coating the sword was not just shattered; it was consumed. The Phoenix Flame, fed by the high-grade fruit Wang Jian had given her, possessed a domineering property that burned spiritual energy itself.

Elder Leng was blasted sideways, smashing into the banister and tumbling down to the ground floor in a shower of splintered wood and ice.

”Ambush!” Bing Yun screamed, her eyes widening in horror as she recognized the attacker. ”Hua Yimei!?”

Before she could react, a second anomaly occurred.

Elder Han, who had stayed back to guard Bing Yun’s flank, suddenly felt a chill that had nothing to do with her ice cultivation. It was a coldness that seeped into her soul.

From the shadow cast by the decorative pillar right beside her, a silhouette emerged. It wasn’t a gradual appearance; it was an instant transition from non-existence to existence.

Chen Ying materialized. She wore no armor, only the form-fitting black stealth suit Wang Jian had designed for her, which left her arms and legs free for maximum mobility. In her hand, she didn’t hold a sword, but a long, thin stiletto made of dark metal—a weapon designed for piercing defenses.

”Sleep,” Chen Ying whispered.

She struck. The blow was aimed at the meridian point just below Elder Han’s armpit—a weakness in the Glacial Armor technique that Wang Jian had pointed out during their briefing.

Elder Han was a veteran. She twisted at the last second, forming a shield of ice over her side.

CLANG.

The stiletto chipped the ice but didn’t penetrate fully. However, the force of the blow, enhanced by Chen Ying’s Core Formation cultivation, sent Elder Han staggering backward, separating her from Bing Yun.

”You...” Elder Han gasped, staring at the assassin whose face was covered by a black veil. ”Core Formation... another Core Formation expert!”

The landing was now a chaotic battlefield. Hua Yimei had landed on the ground floor and was rushing Elder Leng with a flurry of fiery kicks and palm strikes. Chen Ying was circling Elder Han like a wolf, striking and vanishing into the shadows, keeping the defensive Elder pinned down.

Bing Yun stood alone at the top of the stairs, her chest heaving. The situation had flipped in an instant. Three Core Formation experts against three. But they had been caught off guard, and the attribute advantage of the Phoenix Fire was suppressing the entire environment.

She looked down at Wang Jian.

He was still standing on the stairs, untouched by the chaos. The shockwaves of the battles raged around him, but they seemed to bend away from his body, repelled by an invisible force.

”Hua Yimei... a generic assassin...” Bing Yun gritted her teeth, her killing intent locking onto Wang Jian. ”So you brought helpers. You think this gives you the advantage? I am a Middle Stage Core Formation cultivator! I will slaughter your master and your hired help, and then I will torture you for eternity!”

She raised her hand, gathering a terrifying amount of blue light. The air around her began to crack, forming hundreds of ice needles.

”Is that so?” Wang Jian asked softly.

He took a step forward.

And he let the mask fall.

THRUM.

The sound was not loud, but it was felt in the marrow of everyone present. It was the sound of a heavy, iron door slamming shut on a tomb.

The fragile, fluctuating aura of the Late Foundation Establishment Realm vanished. In its place, a darkness erupted from Wang Jian’s body. It wasn’t the chaotic, evil darkness of a typical demonic cultivator. It was the heavy, crushing, absolute darkness of a collapsing star.

The Stellar Demonic Core in his dantian spun, releasing its pressure.

Gravity seemed to double on the staircase. The ice needles floating around Bing Yun trembled and then shattered, falling to the floor as harmless dust, crushed by the sheer density of Wang Jian’s spiritual pressure.

Bing Yun’s eyes bulged. Her breath hitched in her throat. The pressure hitting her wasn’t just raw power; it was a qualitative suppression. It felt ancient. It felt predatory. It felt like standing before a beast that ate dragons.

”Core... Formation...” she stuttered, her voice losing its sharpness. ”You... you are also...”

”Foundation Establishment?” Wang Jian finished her sentence, mocking her previous assessment. ”Eyes can be deceived, Fairy Bing. But power cannot.”

He walked up the stairs, one step at a time. With every step, his aura grew heavier, pressing against her protective Qi field, compressing it, suffocating her.

”You called me a servant,” Wang Jian said, his voice resonating with a metallic timbre. ”You dismissed me as an ant.”

He stopped three steps below her, looking up into her pale, terrified face. His eyes were now fully black, the spinning starlight mesmerizing and terrifying.

”Look at me now,” he commanded. ”Does an ant cast a shadow this long?”

Down on the ground floor, the battle between Hua Yimei and Elder Leng was fierce.

”Sect Leader Hua!” Elder Leng shouted, parrying a flaming fist with her sword, steam hissing violently. ”Have you gone mad? Attacking the Ice Heart Palace... the Alliance will destroy you! Your sect will be leveled!”

Hua Yimei didn’t respond with words. She responded with fire. Her eyes were glowing gold, the Golden Phoenix Flame surging through her veins. She felt powerful. For years, she had been a mediocre Middle Stage cultivator, looked down upon by elites like Leng. But now, with Wang Jian’s upgrades, she was suppressing a cultivator of the same rank with ease.

”The Alliance?” Hua Yimei laughed, a harsh, imperious sound. ”There is no Alliance here. There is only the Master.”

She spun, her leg wreathed in fire, delivering a roundhouse kick that shattered Elder Leng’s ice shield.

”Disrespecting my Master requires punishment,” Hua Yimei declared, her voice cold and imperious, channeling the persona Wang Jian demanded of her. ”Kneel!”

She pressed the attack, forcing Elder Leng backward, away from the stairs, ensuring Bing Yun remained isolated.

On the upper landing, Chen Ying was a silent ghost. Elder Han was a defensive powerhouse, known as the ’Iron Ice’ of the sect. She had erected a turtle shell of Glacial Walls.

Chen Ying didn’t try to break them with brute force. She used the Stellar Demonic Shadow Arts Wang Jian had taught her. She didn’t strike the wall; she struck the shadow of the wall.

Shadow Pierce.

Elder Han screamed as a cut appeared on her shoulder, despite the wall being intact.

”What sorcery is this?!” Elder Han shrieked, swinging her sword blindly.

Chen Ying didn’t answer. She was a tool. A blade. She moved efficiently, her strikes aimed at tendons and meridian nodes. Her goal was to dismantle, not destroy. To disable, not kill.

Meanwhile, while the titans clashed above, a silent drama was unfolding in the lower levels.

In the East Wing dormitory, the poison had done its work. But in the security control room located in the basement, three Peak Foundation Establishment disciples had managed to barricade themselves in before the gas hit full potency.

One of them, a senior disciple with a resolute face, stood before the Emergency Transmission Array. It was a complex runic circle carved into the stone floor, designed to bypass normal jamming by using blood essence as a fuel source.

”We have to signal the City Lord,” the disciple gasped, her face pale, sweat dripping from her forehead. ”The Elders are fighting. I can feel the shockwaves.”

”Hurry!” her companion urged, watching the door. ”The shadows... they are moving under the crack!”

The senior disciple bit her tongue. She spat a mouthful of cultivation blood onto the array.

”Ice Heart Distress Signal: Crimson Flash!” she shouted, slamming her hand onto the center node.

The array flared with blinding red light. A beam of concentrated spiritual information shot upward, designed to punch through the roof and explode in the sky above the city, alerting every cultivator within a hundred miles.

ZOOM.

The beam flew up. It passed through the floors. It passed through the roof.

And then it hit the Seven-Star Obscurity Array.

BWONG.

There was a sound like a giant gong being struck underwater. The red beam didn’t penetrate. It hit the spatial distortion of the Seventh Grade array and bent. It curved back on itself, ricocheting off the invisible dome like a ball bouncing off a wall.

The beam slammed back down into the courtyard, dissipating harmlessly into sparks.

The disciple in the basement stared at the monitoring crystal in horror.

”It... it bounced back?” she whispered, her voice trembling. ”That’s impossible. The distress signal ignores standard jamming...”

”We are trapped,” the second disciple realized, backing away from the door. ”Space is sealed. We are in a cage.”

Suddenly, the shadows in the corner of the room elongated. They didn’t just stretch; they detached from the floor.

Wang Jian, even while confronting Bing Yun upstairs, had part of his mind linked to the array. He felt the attempt.

’Persistent,’ he thought.

He snapped his fingers behind his back.

In the basement, the shadows surged. Tendrils of darkness, thick and oily, erupted from the floorboards.

”Look out!”

The disciples tried to draw their swords, but the shadows were faster. They wrapped around ankles, wrists, and throats.

The shadows weren’t just restraints; they were conductors. As soon as they touched the disciples’ skin, the second layer of the trap activated. The shadows secreted a concentrated dose of the Drunken Lotus Slumber directly into their pores.

”No... please...” the senior disciple gasped, slashing at a tendril. Her sword passed through it as if it were smoke, but the tendril tightened its grip.

Her vision blurred. The panic in her heart was suddenly replaced by a confusing, overwhelming sense of peace. The sword dropped from her hand. Clattering to the stone floor.

”So... tired...”

One by one, the last line of defense crumbled. The disciples slumped into the embrace of the shadows, their consciousness dragged down into the artificial dreamscape.

The Ice Heart Pavilion fell silent, save for the sounds of battle on the top floor.

Upstairs, Bing Yun felt the severance. The faint connection she had to the pavilion’s defensive array—the sense of her disciples’ life forces—vanished abruptly. It wasn’t the feeling of death; it was the feeling of absence.

”What have you done to them?” she demanded, her voice trembling with rage and a rising, unfamiliar panic. She backed away until her back hit the grand doors of her meditation chamber.

Wang Jian stood on the top landing now, looming over her. The shadows cast by the flickering spirit lamps seemed to bend toward him, crowning him in darkness.

”They are sleeping,” Wang Jian assured her, his tone mockingly gentle. ”Having sweet dreams of spring meadows and warm sun. Far better than the cold, lonely existence you force upon them.”

He took another step, invading her personal space. The heat radiating from his body was intense—a stark contrast to her ice.

”Just as you will, soon,” he whispered.

Bing Yun looked left and right. Elder Leng was being battered by Hua Yimei, her robes scorched, her defense crumbling. Elder Han was bleeding from a dozen shallow cuts, pinned down by an assassin she couldn’t catch.

She was alone.

The pride of the Ice Heart Palace, the aloof fairy who looked down on men, was trapped in a box with a monster.

”You think you have won?” Bing Yun spat, her eyes flashing with a desperate, dangerous light. ”You think because you trapped us, I will submit?”

She reached into her dantian, summoning her connection to her Lifebound Treasure.

”I would rather freeze this entire city than let a devil like you touch me!”

She raised her hand high. A blinding white light erupted from her palm, condensing into an ornate, ancient mirror rimmed with frost-jade.

The Frost-Moon Mirror.

The temperature on the landing plummeted to absolute zero instantly. Frost crawled rapidly across the floor, freezing the wood until it cracked.

Wang Jian stopped. He looked at the mirror, feeling the threat it posed. It was a Peak Earth-Grade artifact, capable of unleashing a beam that could freeze even spiritual energy.

”A mirror?” he laughed softly. ”Perfect. I’ll need it later to show you what you look like when you’re begging.”