Rebirth of the Strongest Empress

Episode 3

Transformation

Ye Qingtang paused and continued.

“Father, think about it again. I’ve always been weak. When I had the spirit root, my ability could be considered high. No one would dare to challenge me. However… now I lost my spirit root. If I still request to marry over to the Duan family, it would make their whole family unsatisfied. I don’t have the ability to defend myself anymore. Why do I have to go over just to be mocked by others? Even though Young Master Duan’s words were not pleasant to listen to, he said them for my own good.

Ye Qingtang sounded very calm. None of her sentences were said out of anger. It seemed that she really did believe whatever Duan Tianrao explained.

Ye Ling was stunned. He did not imagine that Ye Qingtang would say so.

Previously, it was the Duan family who came over to ask for the engagement when Ye Qingtang’s spirit root just emerged. Now, right after Tang Tang’s spirit root was broken, they claimed that her daughter was extremely ugly. It seemed as if it was the Ye family who was forcing an engagement with the Duan family.

Duan Tianrao smiled after hearing what Ye Qingtang just said. He was pleased that she understood the situation. Ye Xun also felt pleased that Ye Qingtang knew what was the right choice to make.

Ye Ling’s face was still clouded.

Duan Tianrao continued to speak as Ye Ling remained silent for quite a while.

“It’s rare that Tang Tang is so sensible. Uncle Ye, a few days later, it’ll be the day for the greatest families of Lin Town to gather and worship the Heavenly Dao. I am the heir of the Duan family, so my fiancé needs to go with me to turn the Heaven-Spinning Wheel. Only a person with a Connate Level Five ability or above can turn that wheel. Do you think Tang Tang’s current ability will be enough for her to turn that wheel?” Duan Tianrao said.

“If she can’t, the prestige of Duan family will be damaged in front of everyone.”

“GET OUT! NOW!” Slamming the table violently, Ye Ling shouted at Duan Tianrao and pointed towards the main door.

Enough was enough. He would not allow this bastard to continue to humiliate his daughter.

He would not allow the Duan family to humiliate his daughter in such a way.

Duan Tianrao frowned but decided to keep quiet after seeing how furious Ye Ling was.

“Uncle Ye, you should figure this matter out by yourself. Whether you agree or not, I am going to annul the engagement in front of everyone in a few days when we worship the Heavenly Dao. I shall leave now.” Duan Tianrao waved his hand insincerely and turned around.

“Take all your things back! Our Ye family does not need such rubbish!” Ye Ling said.

Duan Tianrao’s mouth twitched. He signaled his servants to bring everything out and walked out of the hall.

Ye Xun immediately followed up and said to Ye Ling, “Father, we cannot forget our manners. I shall go and send Young Master Duan off.”

Ye Xun caught up with Duan Tianrao without waiting for Ye Ling’s reply.

Witnessing Ye Xun’s misplaced hospitality, Ye Ling looked towards Ye Qingtang, who kept quiet all along, with indignation.

“Does this Ye Xun understand the situation? Duan Tianrao greatly humiliated you today, yet she still wants to send him off?” Duan Tianrao said.

Ye Qingtang was totally unconcerned by Ye Xun’s actions and instead focused on peeling her orange.

“Father, if she wants to send him off, just let her be.”

There was no way Ye Xun did not understand the situation.

That would be a joke. It was hard to find a person in Lin Town who was smarter than Ye Xun.

Ye Ling was not aware that Ye Xun and Duan Tianrao had been secretly together since long ago. It was most likely Ye Xun who told Duan Tianrao the news of Ye Qingtang’s broken spirit root. If not, how could he have come over so early to annul the engagement?

Even though Ye Xun was an adopted daughter, she was very good at observing situations. She never liked her position as an adopted daughter of the Ye family even though the family had never treated her unfairly at all. It was definitely Ye Xun who told Duan Tianrao about Qintang’s broken spirit root.

In her previous life, not long after Duan Tianrao annulled the engagement, he announced that he was going to marry Ye Xun in front of the greatest families of Lin Town that had gathered for the blessing day,

She was there, and everyone in Lin Town began discussing the annulled engagement. As a result, Ye Qingtang faced great pressure and went over to try to convince Duan Tianrao to change his mind. However, she witnessed the ‘good news’ between Duan Tianrao and Ye Xun with her own eyes. She herself then became the target that everyone sneered at.

Ye Xun was very cunning and alert. In Ye Qintang’s previous life, Ye Xun became the mistress of the Duan family and showed her support to the Great Elder. Using her intelligence, she became the right-hand man of Ye You in the days to come.

Ye Qingtang suspected that the chronic poison in Ye Ling’s food was placed in by Ye Xun secretly.

After all, Ye Xun always hid herself very well. Ye Qingtang did not suspect her at all until the relationship between Ye Xun and Duan Tianrao was known.

Ye Ling treated Ye Xun as another one of his dear children and took good care of her all the time.

On the day her spirit root was stolen, Ye Qingtang was led by the Great Elder and Ye You to a place with no one else around, where the act then happened. All these could be credited to Ye Xun, who failed to keep her appointment with Ye Qingtang.

Now as she thought over the details again, Ye Qintang realized that Ye Xun was just a poisonous snake, a detestable traitor, that the Great Elder had placed near her.

“Tang Tang, I’m sorry that you had to go through all these tough situations one after another. I should not have agreed with the engagement from the Duan family back then.” Ye Ling sighed heavily.

“But at least you don’t need to go to turn that Heaven-Spinning Wheel anymore.”

Ye Ling was also worried that Ye Qingtang might not be able to turn the wheel with her current strength. Now with the engagement annulled, the Ye family would not send Ye Qingtang in order to prevent people from mocking her.

Turn the Heaven-Spinning Wheel?

Ye Qingtang raised her eyebrows.

How was Duan Tianrao so sure that she could not turn the wheel?

She needed to go the worshipping of the Heavenly Dao now as it seemed.

What was the worst that could happen without the spirit root? She needed to let Duan Tianrao and everyone in Lin Town witness whether she was truly incapable or not!

Ye Qingtang put away her thoughts. She smiled and shook her head. “As long as father is here, I won’t grieve.”

She did not even care about Duan Tianrao that much as long as Ye Ling was safe.

“You silly girl, I cannot be with you for your whole life. You’ll have to marry someone eventually.” Ye Ling touched Ye Qingtang’s hair lovingly. His health was deteriorating over the years. If not because of that, the Great Elder would have never been able to control the Ye family.

Ye Ling could not predict when he would pass away. The thing that he worried the most about was Ye Qingtang’s safety.

On the other hand, Ye Qingtang knew about Ye Ling’s concern. In her previous life, she was too depressed over Duan Tianrao to notice the abnormality in Ye Ling at all. Only after the Great Elder had asked assassins to kill Ye Ling and frame the Second Elder who just finished his seclusion, Ye Qingtang then realized that Ye family was not the one that she remembered.

Ye You took away her supreme-grade spirit root and was selected by the sect masters of the Chao Sect and the Yunxiao Sect. She was accepted as the direct disciple under the sect masters. The Great Elder was sending Ye You to the Yunxiao Sect now, so there was still some time before the Great Elder returned. Ye Qingtang must finish her preparations in this period of time.

The real battle would start when the Great Elder returned.

Ye Qingtang estimated that the Great Elder would return in half a month’s time. Around the same time, the Second Elder, who always supported Ye Ling and cared for Ye Qingtang, would finish his seclusion.

The Second Elder was the most powerful person in the Ye family. The Great Elder would not dare to kill Ye Ling and Ye Qingtang in his presence.

In Ye Qintang’s previous life, the Great Elder killed Ye Ling secretly and framed the Second Elder, effectively eliminating the Second Elder as well. Ye Qingtang then lost two of her greatest supporters in the Ye family. If she had not run away quickly enough, she would have been killed by the Great Elder in Lin Town as well.

All her suffering in her previous life happened after the Great Elder returned. This time, Ye Qingtang would not allow the same thing to happen again.

Whether it was her father or her second uncle, she would protect both of them!

She would return the enmity of her previous life a hundredfold back to the Great Elder.

Ye Qingtang’s heart was heavy up to this point.

“Father, can you ask someone to help me buy some herbs?” Ye Qingtang asked suddenly.

“Of course. What do you need? Just write them down, and I’ll ask someone to go and get them for you.” Hoping that she would not be too depressed from what happened with Duan Tianraok Ye Ling tried to satisfy every need of Ye Qingtang.

Ye Qingtang nodded and then wrote a long list of herbs to Ye Ling.

The first thing Ye Qingtang needed to do was to figure out the identity of the chronic poison in Ye Ling’s body.

Ye Ling’s true strength was equal to, or maybe even greater than, that of the Great Elder. It was the poison that the Great Elder had placed every day that caused Ye Ling’s health to deteriorate and his strength to decrease.

The Great Elder would not have been able to assassinate Ye Ling successfully in the previous life if not because of that.

Her father would regain his original strength only if the remaining poison was cured. If her father’s strength returned, even if the Great Elder wanted to do something, he would not be able to fight her father.

In her previous life, even though Ye Qingtang lost her spirit root, she was not depressed all along. She studied and practiced manufacturing, array formation, elixirs, and everything that could help her become more powerful. She memorized the ancient medicine recipes, and she could make any Spirit Pill if she wanted.

She only needed ten days at most to clear the poison in her father.

Ye Ling asked a servant to buy the herbs and bring them back to the Ye family as soon as possible. Once Ye Qingtang made sure that all herbs were bought, she returned to her room to prepare the antidote immediately.

Ye Ling was worried at first whether Ye Qingtang could recover from the emotional setback that Duan Tianrao had caused. However, Ye Ling felt a bit confused after seeing his daughter lock herself up with the herbs.

Since when was the little girl interested in herbs?

How come he did not realize that?

Ye Ling was very perplexed.

Ye Qingtang, however, had already started with the preparations.

Ye Qingtang was very familiar with herbs, and she was extremely skilled in classifying them accordingly. People who did not know of her talent might have thought that a master physician disguised herself as Ye Qingtang.

When she was almost done, she wiped away the beads of sweat on her forehead. When she raised her eyes, she saw her delicate but flawed reflection in the bronze mirror beside her.

She lifted her hand subconsciously and touched the large red birthmark on her face. A smile appeared on her mouth. She took a few herbs from the stack, mixed them together, and made a bowl of black herbal soup. She frowned after noticing the pungent odor coming from the soup.

Her birthmark had been on her face for very long. In her previous life, she initially thought she was born with the birthmark, but she found out much later that it was caused by a special poison.

The poison in Ye Qintang’s body would not affect one’s health, but it would ruin one’s appearance. Given that the Great Elder dared to poison even Ye Ling, the master of the family clan, it was obvious that he would not let her go either. It was most likely that the poison was fed to her when she was young by the Great Elder.

Ye Qingtang would not have noticed that if she did not study medicine many years later in her previous life.

The herbal soup in her hands now was the antidote to that poison.

In her previous life, Ye Qingtang was very ashamed of herself because of her birthmark and was not willing to reveal her face in front of others. Now, although she did not bother about her appearance anymore, she still did not want the peculiar poison to remain inside her body.

Ye Qingtang took a heavy breath and poured the entire bowl of stinky herbal soup into her mouth. She almost cried after tasting the extreme bitterness of the soup.

“I’ll never drink this again in my life.” Ye Qingtang frowned and wiped off the soup residue on her mouth.

Right after she drank the herbal soup, Ye Qingtang felt a stabbing pain on the portion of her face with the birthmark. She immediately went in front of the bronze mirror and observed the changes to her face.

The large red birthmark gradually disappeared in front of her eyes, revealing pure white skin.

Without the birthmark, Ye Qingtang’s appearance changed immensely. Her delicate features appeared more luring on her white face, and the ugly woman in the mirror transformed into an astonishing beauty.

“This… Now, this is much more pleasing to the eye.” Ye Qingtang touched the part of her face that just recovered and smiled, exhibiting unbelievable beauty.

Ye Qingtang admired her reflection for a while and then packed things up. She immersed herself in the bath bucket to wash off the fatigue of the day.

Cold water immersed her skin gradually. She felt as if she was reborn by the refreshing coldness of the bath.

As she calmed down, she recalled all the things that happened in her previous life, but she could only remember up to the moment she crushed her heart on Lingyun Mountain…

Ye Qingtang still could not figure out why she was not dead.

In her previous life, Ye Qingtang did not know that the heart inside her was the Heart of the Demon God until much later. She only felt that her heart was different from others and that it would sometimes let out some kind of sinister aura.

Ye Qingtang did not have any contact with the power at that time. She tried to suppress it, but people still treated her as an evil demon…

“The Heart of the Demon God, everyone is craving for you. If you really are as powerful as how they describe you, then… lend me your power…” Ye Qingtang rested her head on the edge of the bucket. Her eyes were hidden by a layer of water vapor, but one could still observe the coldness in her eyes.

As long as she could take her revenge and send all her enemies to hell, she would not mind abandoning her human skin and becoming a demon!

Just as she finished her words, the heart that was beating stably suddenly twitched. A strand of dark fog came out of the Heart of the Demon God and poured into her body. A sharp pain spread throughout her body and dashed towards her lower stomach.

The place that used to store the spirit root was cold as ice when her spirit root was dug out, and Ye Qingtang was more familiar with this emptiness than anyone else.