BTTH: Demon Emperor Xiao Yan

After the Xiao Sect's reputation spread far and wide, Xiao Yan threw himself into alchemy like a madman, refining Pills day and night. However, unlike before, none of these Pills were sold. Instead, they were all stockpiled and handed over to Hai Bodong. This intense period of pill refinement also allowed his strength to improve significantly. By the time he completed the final batch, Xiao Yan had officially stepped into the Nine-Star Dou King level.

At this point, Xiao Yan was just one star away from the Dou Emperor realm. While that might not sound far, bridging that gap required considerable time and effort. Since nothing urgent was pressing at the moment, Xiao Yan decided to enter seclusion for cultivation. If he could break through to Dou Emperor, it would greatly enhance his fighting strength—making it much easier to compete for either a Heavenly Flame or the Bodhisattva Body Transformation Saliva in the future.

'What a pity... the Green Lotus Core Flame is in Queen Medusa's hands. Otherwise...' Xiao Yan sighed with regret. If he could refine and absorb that Heavenly Flame now, its power alone might be enough to help him ascend to the Dou Emperor stage—saving him from months of closed-door training.

With a bitter smile, he took out the Green Lotus Throne from his storage ring, sat cross-legged upon it, quickly formed a hand seal, and entered cultivation mode. Before his retreat, he had already informed Hai Bodong and the others that he intended to break through to the Dou Emperor realm. The Pills were meant to be sold off in batches during this six-month period.

However, perhaps due to his rapid previous breakthroughs, Xiao Yan found the leap to Dou Emperor unusually difficult. Of course, breaking through from Dou King to Dou Emperor was never easy. Across the Dou Qi Continent, many had remained stuck at peak Dou King for decades without advancing.

So even though he had hit a bottleneck, Xiao Yan didn't panic. He simply continued cultivating steadily and methodically, drawing in the surrounding energy.

Just like that, half a year passed in the blink of an eye. Over this period, Xiao Yan's Dou Qi had grown several times stronger than before. Although he had yet to step into the Dou Emperor realm, he had clearly reached the pinnacle of the Dou King stage—just one final push away from breaking through. Yet that final step could take quite some time to complete.

'Breaking through to Dou Emperor really is this troublesome, huh?' Xiao Yan sighed as he exited cultivation. Even though he had gone through this in his previous life, he had assumed it would be easier this time with all his accumulated experience. But clearly, the process wasn't so simple. It left him feeling more than a little frustrated.

Judging by the time, the Pills he had given Hai Bodong to sell were probably almost all gone. Since he hadn't broken through yet, Xiao Yan decided to suspend cultivation and focus on refining the next batch of Pills for the remainder of the year. But just as he was about to look for Hai Bodong to request ingredients, a furious roar echoed from the direction of the storage warehouse.

"My medicinal herbs!"

'What happened?' Xiao Yan walked toward the warehouse. In truth, most of the rare herbs collected by Xiao Sect were kept in a special storage ring, which Xiao Yan had managed himself. When he went into seclusion, that ring was handed over to Qing Lin. Only a portion of the ingredients—specifically those for the Purple Spirit Recovery Pill—were kept separately by Hai Bodong.

Hai Bodong had quietly skimmed these herbs while managing the supply chains—out of caution. He had seen how crazed Xiao Yan got during pill refinement and worried that if he handed them over, the precious ingredients would get tossed into the cauldron and used up. So he built a separate mini-warehouse to store them.

He didn't put them into his own storage ring because he was afraid Xiao Yan might later accuse him of hoarding the materials for himself. After months of effort, he had finally collected everything needed for the Purple Spirit Recovery Pill. Once Xiao Yan emerged from seclusion, he planned to ask him to begin refining—but now, it was all ruined.

Xiao Yan stepped into the warehouse and saw a vast, empty space. His mouth twitched.

The metal racks that once held the herbs now had only a few open jade boxes left. Some shelves didn't even have boxes—just fluttering labels left behind like grave markers.

Hai Bodong had gone through great lengths to restore his former power. Not only did he bend the rules and withhold herbs, he even spent a fortune on cold jade boxes to preserve the materials' medicinal strength. Each box was neatly labeled to avoid confusion.

And now, it was all gone. Looking at the empty racks, the Ice Emperor looked like he was on the verge of coughing up blood.

'Even if it were a rat that broke in here... it would've come out in tears,' Xiao Yan thought silently.

Hai Bodong had considered the possibility of theft, even if it was unlikely. So, to be cautious, he had set up energy screens in front of each shelf—similar to the Dou Qi Pavilion back at the Xiao Clan, but hundreds of times more secure.

Xiao Yan pressed a finger gently to one of the energy barriers. After a moment, he concluded, 'These barriers can only be broken by someone at least at the Dou King level. And even then, if one were breached, Hai Bodong would've sensed it immediately. There's no way this theft should've happened. Yet... the herbs are gone. And all the barriers are intact.'

"Looks like we've been robbed..." Xiao Yan squatted down and picked up a shred of leftover herb. Even with only a fragment left, he recognized it immediately—it was a Wood Spirit Triple Needle Flower, a spiritual herb worth at least hundreds of thousands of gold coins in the Black-Corner Region. Now all that remained was a tiny leaf.

"To bypass Senior Hai's energy barriers and steal these herbs, only someone with mastery over spatial manipulation could've pulled it off—a Dou Zong level expert," Xiao Yan said thoughtfully. His gaze swept over a severed stem on one of the remaining leaves. The cut looked odd, almost as if it had been... bitten.

"Could a Dou Zong have done it?" Hai Bodong's face darkened. "For someone of that level to pull something like this… it's beneath them, isn't it?"

"A real Dou Zong wouldn't even look at your stash, let alone steal it. And if they needed it, they'd just buy it outright. There's no need for them to go sneaking around." Xiao Yan shook his head. "Besides, I didn't sense any spatial fluctuations nearby, so we can rule that out."

"Then what else could it be?" Hai Bodong was getting more confused by the second.

"This world is full of strange races and rare creatures. There are some beings that can naturally bypass energy barriers without triggering any defenses," Xiao Yan said, casually tossing the herb fragment to the floor with a faint smile.

"Let's get ready. Tonight, we set a trap—and catch the thief in the jar."

(End of Chapter)

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