Chapter Sixty-Eight: The Wicked King and the Poisonous Queen Regret Their Actions

Qixuan had already taken his green crystal while he wasn’t paying attention, leaving him with no choice but to obey Feng Tianlin’s every command.

“I’ll ask a question and you’ll answer. No lying. Do you understand?” Feng Tianlin said.

The man in green nodded.

“What is your name?”

“People call me Old Fourth or Fourth Master.”

“Why did you come to kill me?”

“Because the Dread King and Venom Queen said you stole the Demon Realm that rightfully belonged to her. As long as you exist, the conflict between the strange beings and humans will never end.”

“What exactly are the Dread King and Venom Queen?”

“They’re like us, strange beings from that era.”

Feng Tianlin curled his lips. Of course he knew “that era” meant the Age of Strangeness.

Did they really see themselves as ancient, eldritch creatures?

“If she wants to kill me, why doesn’t she come herself?”

“She is the hope of our kind. If she were to appear, humans would stop at nothing to eradicate her, so she cannot show herself.”

“What is this crystal?” Feng Tianlin held up the green stone.

“I don’t know, but the Dread King and Venom Queen said that as long as I carried it, I wouldn’t be affected by the Demon Realm.”

Now certain that it was this Dread King and Venom Queen who wanted him dead, Feng Tianlin lost patience and prepared to kill the man, dispelling his eerie domain.

“My lord, may I ask him a few questions?” Qixuan said at this moment.

“Ask, but finish him off when you’re done.”

Qixuan stepped before Old Fourth, shifting into human form, and asked, “Is the Dread King and Venom Queen you mentioned one person or two?”

At this question, Old Fourth, who had been prepared to self-destruct, hesitated.

“You know of the Dread King and Venom Queen? Judging by your appearance, you must be the famed Nine-tailed Fox, Qixuan, from back then?”

“Oh? So you remember me. Then tell me quickly, what does the Dread King and Venom Queen mean? Shouldn’t it be the Dread King and the Venom Queen?”

Both the Dread King and the Venom Queen were leaders among the strange beings of the old era, but they were two separate entities. Why did their names now merge as one?

But Old Fourth refused to answer. “Qixuan, though your demon emperor failed to reawaken, there’s no need for you to follow a Western strange being, is there? When this planet truly belongs to us, there will inevitably be a great war with those Western creatures. If you side with him, hmph!” With that, he self-destructed, leaving Feng Tianlin no chance to act.

Everyone understood the implication of his unfinished words.

Feng Tianlin shrugged helplessly. “Why do they keep saying I’m a Western strange being? Just because I look like a doll?”

Qixuan took a deep breath, gazing at Feng Tianlin. “We’re in trouble. The Dread King and Venom Queen are extremely powerful, and it seems the two have joined forces.”

This was the only way Qixuan could make sense of why two distinct strange beings were now spoken of as one.

“Joined forces?” Feng Tianlin was stunned. Strange beings could do that?

I’m not entirely sure, but that’s all I can think of...

Qixuan, meanwhile, was troubled. She’d already guessed that for the eldritch beings of the Age of Strangeness to re-emerge, they’d need to awaken. But her old boss, the Great Sage Equal to Heaven, seemed to have failed...

Feng Tianlin, stroking his chin, mused: the Dread King and Venom Queen, together? He recalled once asking Qixuan about strange beings taking human form. Once a strange being reached the Genesis Stage, they could evolve, gaining two forms: one for battle—their true form—and a human guise for easier movement.

If the Dread King and Venom Queen, one male and one female, had joined together, did that mean he too could find a female strange being upon reaching the Genesis Stage?

“So even if I become a doll, I could have my own harem?”

This thought sent Feng Tianlin’s mind wandering.

“But just what are the Dread King and Venom Queen...?”

...

In a hidden dungeon in Huaxia, once used by strange beings to imprison humans during the old era, now repurposed as the Dread King and Venom Queen’s base—

An elegant throne stood in the darkness. Seated upon it was a woman of lithe figure and delicate features, her every movement tinged with an uncanny allure. This was the Dread King and Venom Queen herself.

“Old Fourth and Old Fifth are both dead?” she asked.

Three humanoid strange beings stood before her, all with cracked skin and clad in garments of various hues.

The one in red spoke coolly, “Second Brother saw it with his All-seeing Eyes, and heard them expose your identity with his Keen Ears.”

The Dread King and Venom Queen’s brows arched slightly, a faint smile playing on her lips. “So, that doll does have some skill.”

She waved a hand. “You all go about your business. For now, leave him be.”

Her tone was light, but inwardly she felt a pang of loss.

Those two had been her trusted lieutenants, barely restored before being lost. Originally, there had been seven brothers—her seven retainers. Two had failed to awaken, and now two more had perished. Her strength was sorely diminished.

She turned to face a black shadow in the room, its shape identical to that of the figure within the bottle once held by Fu Zhang.

“What do you think?” she asked.

“What do I think? Naturally, I believe he must be eliminated as soon as possible. But with neither of us taking action, how do you propose to get rid of him?” the shadow retorted.

“Then... will you do it?” The Dread King and Venom Queen smiled, fixing her gaze on him.

“Hmph.” The shadow snorted coldly and vanished into the darkness.

Once the room was empty of all strange beings, she sank back onto her throne, murmuring to herself.

“Oh, Dread King, you failed to awaken, yet left me with such a daunting task. And now, a foreign doll has come to meddle. What am I supposed to do...?”

She had awakened at the moment of the great resurgence, but the Dread King, her ally of many years, had failed. In order to rally his old followers to her cause, she had changed her name to the Dread King and Venom Queen, determined to unite all the strange beings of Huaxia.

Her first thought had been to find the Demon Realm she had sought throughout her past life. Even while slumbering, she’d heard it whispered that the Demon Realm was the hope for their kind’s ascendance.

She also knew of the Demon Realm’s incredible powers: whoever possessed it would command all strange beings.

But all had been disrupted by this foreign doll. Who could have imagined that a Western doll would obtain the greatest treasure of the East? How could she abide that?

So she had sent Old Fourth and Old Fifth to eliminate Feng Tianlin, which led to everything that followed.

Her thinking was simple: how strong could a few newly awakened strange beings be? S-rank, perhaps? First stage Genesis?

As for the warnings of the Black Fiend, she’d ignored them entirely: what did a mere B-rank leader know, with his limited vision?

But precisely because she had dismissed the Black Fiend’s counsel, she had lost two of her best.

After a long silence, she made up her mind: she would leave the doll be. To interfere now might only backfire and cost more than it was worth.

“I just wonder, will that doll come looking for trouble with me? If he does, what then?”

She felt a flicker of unease.

It wasn’t that she feared being unable to defeat him, but that the real enmity lay between strange beings and humans. With her kind still weak, too much infighting would only benefit humanity.

“Ah, if only I hadn’t made a move against that doll. Now that we’re enemies, who knows how much more trouble will come?”

She regretted it—but what good was regret now?