Jiuying and Yinglong hovered in front of Xiao Lin, each emitting an aura that consumed the other. Fiery red vs. icy blue. Su Chen's voice echoed from the swords: *"Choose! Human or demon? Past or future?"*
But Xiao Lin stared at the dying Luo Yan on the altar. Her blue blood merged with the black crystal, forming a pattern similar to a DNA chain. On her chest, a stab wound from the Ancient Dragon Worshipper's knife was emitting a dark mist—the Heavenly Demon from the present was beginning to possess her.
"No choice…" Xiao Lin growled. With his bare hands, he grabbed both swords. His skin blistered, red and blue blood flowed from his hands, merging into purple. Jiuying and Yinglong shook wildly, and then—
*Crash!*
Both swords broke. Shards shot in all directions, piercing the Ancient Dragon Worshipper's body and incinerating the half-dragon Su Liang. Su Chen, who remained as a spirit, smiled sadly. "You're crazy… but maybe that's the only way."
The world shook. The time portal began to close, sucking everything in like a black hole. Xiao Lin pulled the nearly lifeless Luo Yan, their bodies thrown into the vortex.
***
In the present, in the Valley of Eternal Death, the sky split open. Shifu Mao's half-vaporized corpse suddenly came back to life, his white eyes glowing. "Purple blood… Forbidden blood!" he howled as he stared at Xiao Lin and Luo Yan who had fallen through the portal.
But they were no longer fully human.
Xiao Lin had changed—his hair had turned white, his skin covered in purple dragon tattoos. In his hands, the fragments of Jiuying and Yinglong had fused into **metal claws** that were embedded in his bones. Luo Yan was more terrifying: the stab in his chest had become a small black hole, sucking in the light around her.
"You… you've merged the curses of two eras," Shifu Mao whispered in fear.
In the distance, the Tianmo Seal on Xuanji Mountain exploded. A giant, slimy figure with thousands of eyes emerged, but half of its body was still trapped in another dimension. **Tianmo** screamed in pain: *"I... am not whole? What are you doing, descendant of Su Chen?!"*
Xiao Lin stepped forward. Wordlessly, his metal claws tore through the air. A new technique—*Chaotic Dragon Dance*—made the earth crack and the sky bleed. Each strike created a mini portal that swallowed a part of Tianmo's body.
But Luo Yan knocked him down from behind. The black hole in his chest sucked away Xiao Lin's energy. "Stop..." he groaned, black tears flowing. "I can't fight... he's in my head..."
Tianmo laughed heartily. *"You two are now my extensions! Your Forbidden Blood is the final key!"*
Shifu Mao, secretly gathering the scattered sword fragments, suddenly stabbed them all into his own heart. "I will become a God!" he roared. But his body exploded, his blood dousing Xiao Lin and Luo Yan.
Shifu Mao's blood—which turned out to contain a soul-destroying poison—triggered an unexpected reaction. The black hole in Luo Yan's chest and Xiao Lin's claws merged, forming a **dimensional gate** that sucked Tianmo in.
"No! It can't be—" Tianmo cried out before being pulled in.
But the gate required sacrifices.
Luo Yan stared at Xiao Lin. In her eyes, flashes of their childhood: a boy in the forest and a little girl on the altar. "Do you remember? I... always wanted to be a hero like you," she whispered.
Before Xiao Lin could answer, Luo Yan pushed him away. Her body was sucked into the gate along with Tianmo.
***
Xiao Lin fell into the ruins of Xuanji Mountain. In his hand, only Luo Yan's necklace remained—a blue crystal pendant containing a drop of purple blood. The sky suddenly calmed down, but in the distance, where the Tianmo Seal once stood, a **silver-haired woman's shadow** appeared, holding the intact Yinglong.
"Do you think this is over?" she said, her voice echoing throughout the valley. "We Ancient Dragon Worshippers... never truly die."
Inside the crystal pendant, Luo Yan's voice whispered: *"Help me..."*