Black Prison Minister of Justice

Thump, thump. Accompanied by the faint resurgence of a heartbeat, a circular magic ring manifested behind the death-shrouded woman without the middle-aged man realizing when it had appeared in the corner of his eye. A sacred light instantly dispelled all darkness within the cramped cell, and the deathly aura diffusing around the woman began to disperse rapidly under its brilliance. In a flash, the faint beat of her heart grew robust and powerful, and her dilated azure pupils swiftly contracted back to normal. The anxiety in the middle-aged man's eyes hardened into solemnity. Compared to retained elders who carried out field assignments year-round, the mortality rate for jailers within the Black Prison was almost negligibly low. But if danger did strike, a jailer's chance of death was practically absolute. And today, it seemed he had drawn the unlucky lot. Buzz— A shrill hum rang out as the Qi-Disrupting Array inside the cell activated to disturb the prisoner's Source Qi circulation. Iron chains clattered loudly, and the blue light radiating from the formation patterns across the inner walls instantly illuminated the cramped dungeon cell as bright as day. At the same moment, the middle-aged man drove a fist straight toward the foreign woman's heart without the slightest hesitation. In accordance with Black Prison protocol, when this woman was imprisoned, the Minister of Justice had provided him with an intelligence report on her. Compared to other guests housed in the Black Prison, the contents of this report were pitifully sparse. There was no background information and no description of her cultivation techniques—only a few brief words: "Physically frail, heart is her weakness, keep alive." Those few words, however, were more than enough for him. His fist wind tore through the air with a howl, only to be halted with a dull clang by a thin, honeycomb-patterned barrier of light. With consciousness restored to her body, Orenli's gaze flicked past the fist blocked before her chest, locking eyes with the middle-aged man for a split second. A bewitching smile curled unbidden at the corners of her blood-stained red lips. "Sir, doing such things while a lady is asleep is hardly gentlemanly behavior..." "..." The middle-aged jailer could not understand her foreign babble, but that did not hinder him from reaching a decision. He had to run. The woman before him was beyond his comprehension. Before entering the Black Prison, every prisoner was drained of all intent-soul and Source Qi by the Soul Siphoning Array. Furthermore, every cell in the Black Prison was constructed from obsidian crystal ore, a material that barred external heavenly and earthly Source Qi, creating an utterly sterile void. In other words, even if a prisoner held in the Black Prison had not had their dantian crippled, they possessed no source of Source Qi to cast techniques. Not to mention that the Qi-Disrupting Array was now active, disrupting any circulation of cultivation techniques within the room. The middle-aged man could not fathom how she could cast spells without restraint beneath so many shackles. But he knew that when a situation exceeded his understanding, escaping first was unquestionably the best choice. Since the founding of the Black Prison, though prisoners had broken out of their holding cells, not a single one had ever successfully escaped the prison itself. The moment he stepped outside this qi-devoid cell, he would be able to send an immediate alert. Bang. The middle-aged jailer kicked off the floor, springing backward in an instant. Simultaneously, he flicked his fingers upward toward the woman. Four iron chains suspended from the ceiling snapped taut, their hooks pulling in four different directions, poised to tear Orenli's delicate body to shreds. "That will not do." Orenli glanced down at the iron hooks piercing her shoulders and palms. A magic ring encircling her heart began to revolve, and four invisible hands condensed in midair, seizing the chains to forcibly arrest the momentum that would have torn her apart. "You cannot leave just yet, sir." This time, the middle-aged jailer actually understood her awkward Great Yan speech, yet his body showed no intention of stopping. Orenli let out a soft sigh, the look in her beautiful eyes turning razor-sharp. The magic ring around her heart spun rapidly, and a thin, azure curtain of water materialized out of thin air over the cell door, blocking the middle-aged man's retreat. The middle-aged jailer's brow twitched upward slightly. Pivoting midair, Dao resonance flared around him as his fist transformed into a blazing ball of fire, blasting forward like a swimming dragon. His target, however, was not the thin water curtain covering the doorway, but the adjacent wall. As an enemy, he had no idea how strong the water curtain's defense was. But as a jailer, he knew the obsidian crystal wall intimately. To his dismay, before his fist could strike the wall, the woman behind him seemed to have already anticipated his intent. The thin water curtain shielding the doorway dispersed, enveloping all four walls in an instant. The glow of the formation patterns rippled outward as it refracted through the water. Seeing nowhere to evade, the middle-aged man could only clash head-on with this unknown art. But what happened next instantly brought his fist to an abrupt halt. The instant he made contact with the water barrier, both the flames wrapping his fist and his palm were instantly consumed and dissolved by the crushing pressure within the water. Drip... drip... Blood trickled down from a mangled wound that bared pale finger bones, splattering onto the floor. The middle-aged man froze in place. Slowly turning his head, he fixed his gaze upon the foreign woman still bound by the iron chains. "You speak the language of Great Yan?" Orenli slowly straightened her posture, though she made no move to rip herself free of the hooked chains. After all, she did not know whether doing so would trigger alarm mechanisms. Her tone held a smile: "Not running anymore?" The middle-aged man glanced at the various colored magic rings floating around her, his tone frank and composed: "For an insect at the bottom, knowing one's own limits is crucial to climbing higher. You are not bound by the arrays, and I am no match for you. Since you haven't killed me immediately, you must want to pry information out of me. In that case, how about we make a deal, foreign prisoner?" "A deal?" Orenli sized him up, somewhat surprised by the man's decisiveness. "Do tell." The middle-aged man folded his legs and sat directly onto the floor, speaking softly and candidly: "I want to buy my life with intelligence on the Black Prison." Hearing such a blunt response, Orenli's beautiful eyes widened slightly. The middle-aged man drew a breath, his meticulously trimmed beard twitching slightly. "I used every means at my disposal to climb to my current station and attain my present cultivation. Fleeing under the Prime Minister's Manor's hunt gives me high odds of dying, but if I refuse you here... I die right now." Orenli gave a light giggle, interrupting him with an airy tone: "So, you would betray your lord so readily just for your own life?" The middle-aged man shook his head and said calmly: "I am merely a retained elder of the Prime Minister's Manor. What they give me is not enough to buy my life. If Your Ladyship is willing..." "No, thank you." Orenli waved her hand, rattling the chains. "I would never dare employ someone who betrays his lord on a whim." "In that case, let us proceed with the trade." The middle-aged man seemed to have anticipated this. He raised a hand slightly, and pale blue Source Qi traced an intricate map in the air. "This is a map of the Black Prison. My rank and authority here are not particularly high; the vacant areas are cells only accessible to Heaven-rank jailers. Breaking out of the Black Prison is difficult, but an attempt can be made. Afterward, I will summon a Human-rank jailer. You will kill him and disguise yourself as him, and I will use a secret technique to disguise him as you..." "Sir." Orenli interrupted him once more. "Excuse me... can you not understand human speech?" "..." The middle-aged man broke off, his eyes lifting. "Since you can betray your master, you can just as easily betray me." Still bound by the chains, Orenli smiled radiantly. "I wouldn't dare trust your word." The middle-aged man waved a hand to disperse the map in the air. He stared at Orenli for several breaths before speaking in a very low, muted voice: "If you trust me, you have a slim chance of escaping. If you don't, you have no chance whatsoever of breaking out of the Black Prison. Not even a Saint could escape." A circular magic ring steeped in deathly aura surfaced in Orenli's azure pupils. "Perhaps you are right. "However... "What if I can make your corpse speak?" *** Tap. Tap. Tap. A cramped passageway wound forward. By the flickering torchlight, an aged, weathered wooden door could be faintly discerned at the end of the gloom. Echoed by the reverberating footsteps, a black-robed figure walked slowly up to the wooden door and raised a hand. The sleeve slipped back, revealing a hand so withered it looked like nothing more than skin clinging to bone. A light knock resounded through the silent corridor. After a moment of silence, a gentle, youthful male voice came from within: "Enter." The wooden door swung open. The room inside was dim, with only two torches mounted on the inner wall faintly revealing its layout. It was arranged like a study, yet everything inside appeared exceedingly ancient. A faint scent of rotting wood dust drifted through the air. The bookshelves flanking the room were coated in dust, and upon a cracked, yellowed desk lay a few documents and ancient curios meant as decoration. Behind it, a rocking armchair sat facing away from the door, swaying gently with rhythmic, creaking groans. With measured steps, the black-robed figure walked up to the desk and stood still. From behind the rocking chair, a voice tinged with a smile spoke: "Minister of Justice, I've always heard you fancied antiques, but the wood in this study of yours has rotted to a stench. Why not try adding some incense?" Hearing this, the black-robed figure gave no immediate reply. After a brief silence, a sweet, girlish voice completely at odds with the surrounding environment rang out: "Xu Changtian, that woman you sent in has made her move." "Oh?" With a light exclamation, the rocking chair slowly swung around. Xu Yuan looked at the black-robed figure before him and smiled. "The Imperial Princess of Sien acted that fast? I thought she'd need at least two or three days to come up with a plan. Tell me, what happened exactly?" The black-robed figure fixed an eerie, fathomless gaze upon Xu Yuan, her sweet voice cool and detached: "An Earth-rank jailer entered her cell, but came back out half a quarter of an hour later." Xu Yuan crossed his legs and pondered briefly. "It seems Orenli placed a restriction on him..." "No. He is already dead." "..." Xu Yuan went quiet. Straightening up slightly, Xu Yuan frowned. "Something like the corpse-controlling arts from Jianghuai?" "While corpse-controlling arts can manipulate a corpse to speak, they cannot retain memories. Yet that Earth-rank jailer's demeanor and actions were no different from normal." "Then it must be a technique unique to the Sien Empire..." Xu Yuan furrowed his brow, murmuring with a trace of concern: "Still, a corpse is a corpse in the end. Running into other jailers could easily give her away..." The black-robed figure took a deep breath, an edge of impatience creeping into her sweet voice: "If you are worried she will fail to break out, I can simply order all the jailers outside." "That won't do." Xu Yuan shook his head at once, speaking earnestly. "That woman is extraordinarily clever. A stunt like that would likely tip her off, and our plan would almost certainly fall apart." The black-robed figure gave a cold huff and uttered three words: "There is vitality." "What?" "I said, that corpse is radiating life force." "A dead person can radiate life force?" A gleam of intrigue flashed across Xu Yuan's eyes. He could understand a corpse moving, and he could understand a corpse behaving according to its living habits. After all, the world possessed myriad arts; perhaps Orenli knew necromancy. But a corpse possessing life force was something he genuinely could not fathom. At this thought, Xu Yuan turned his gaze to the black-robed figure, hoping the master of the Black Prison could enlighten him. Unfortunately, all that came from beneath the black robe was a sweet voice laced with disdain: "Xu Changtian, you certainly demand a lot. You refuse to startle the snake, yet you insist on real-time surveillance. If you're so curious, how about I go capture that dead jailer for you to dissect and study?" Hearing her sarcastic retort, Xu Yuan offered an awkward chuckle, entirely unfazed. Capable people always had bad tempers. The Minister of the Black Prison before him clearly disliked him. After all, the Black Prison was her domain, and his operation would likely tear her territory upside down. Were it not for his father's special imperial dispensation, he would probably have been beaten black and blue and thrown out long ago. "There's no rush on that front. Once our goal is achieved, we can investigate at our leisure." Xu Yuan slowly stood up and looked at the black-robed figure. "Still, are you certain everything remains under control? If the monsters locked up in your Black Prison get loose, it will cause no small amount of trouble." The black-robed figure scoffed coldly. Reaching out with a withered, skeletal hand, she pulled down her hood. Her voice was icy, yet her sweet tone sounded almost adorable: "Before things spiral out of hand, I will step in personally and execute that woman." Xu Yuan looked at her face, his brows lifting in slight surprise. In stark contrast to her withered hands, beneath the hood lay the face of a young maiden. "Minister, you are actually this young?" The Minister of Justice narrowed her peach blossom eyes slightly. "Xu Changtian, I am old enough to be your grandmother." "Great. I'll be sure to tell my father later that you want to be his mother." "..." The girl's face twitched. Xu Yuan cleared his throat and returned to business: "If things truly get out of hand, could you leave her with a breath of life?" The girl's eyes curved in a smile. "I could. But there is a condition. Do you care to hear it?" Locking eyes with her for an instant, Xu Yuan shuddered and waved a dismissive hand: "I really don't understand why all of you elders enjoy thrashing me so much. My uncle is like this, Lou Ji is like this, and Hua Hong is like this too. What twisted tastes you all have, tsk tsk..." Hearing this, the girl shook her head slightly, her eyes narrowing into slits. "I happen to be different from them." "How so?" "Looking at your face reminds me of someone who rubs me the wrong way." Xu Yuan froze, then chuckled softly, seemingly seeing right through her thoughts: "It couldn't be my mother, could it?" "..." After a moment of silence, a trace of despondent inferiority flickered across the depths of the girl's eyes. Tightening her black robe around herself, she said coldly: "Enough. According to your plan, it is almost time for you to make your move. I will go prepare." With that, the young Minister of Justice pulled her hood back up, turned around, and vanished into the corridor outside without looking back. Watching her disappear, Xu Yuan slowly sank back into the rocking chair. His fingers gently caressed the rough, yellowed armrest as he sighed softly in the direction she had departed. The Minister of the Black Prison, named simply Qing. In Cangyuan, she had been the final boss of the Black Prison map—one of the high-ranking figures of the Prime Minister's Manor who died out of loyalty to Xu Yinhe. When Qing first appeared in Cangyuan, her character art had been so exquisitely beautiful that it rivaled even the primary heroines. Her eyes were like jade lakes, her grace like a startled swan—so much so that Xu Yuan had initially believed she was a romanceable character. Only as the plot unfolded did Xu Yuan learn that beneath that breathtaking visage lay a grotesque, deformed body. Upon entering her second phase, the black robe enveloping Qing would fall away, revealing the horrifying monstrosity beneath. Slender arms resembling arthropod limbs grew in dense clusters across her torso, while a head that had been dead for many years grew from her chest. She was a blood slave refined from flesh and blood by a demonic cultivator. Born in misery, raised amid looks of revulsion, slaughtering in desperation, scraping by a lingering existence in the shadows. Her life would originally have frozen forever the moment that demonic cultivator died. Yet before that could happen, Qing had encountered that transcendent youth who seemed like an immortal banished from the heavens.