Once he decided the footage was clear enough, he plucked the phone out of Yin Yue's hand.

Both women blinked, confused.

Neither of them knew.

As for Helena's 'adulterous' situation, she was perfectly aware how lucky she'd been meeting Li Zhiming.

A man who had long lost his desires and never touched her improperly.

In a hierarchy like this, serving the boss was simply normal... You didn't get to escape it.

More importantly, Helena, who had finally settled into a peaceful life with her family, would never have agreed to this with anyone else.

With this man, though?

Bullshit.

As if she had a choice.

Aside from a pinch of guilt, she felt nothing.

She certainly didn't dare think he wanted her as his woman, if anything, she was relieved if all he wanted was to "use" her occasionally without disturbing her normal life.

Still swallowing the bitter taste in her mouth, she buttoned up her white shirt, slipped into her sleeveless black blazer, then pulled the brown jacket on.

Though this time… she forgot to button the top two buttons of her shirt.

Her ivory breasts peeked out softly as she sat next to him, unintentionally giving off the impression she was offering herself again, as if inviting him to slip a hand inside and squeeze.

It wasn't ambition.

Just shock.

Her mind was still spinning.

But Wang Xiao had other plans.

He noticed the way Helena shifted her legs, stiff, uneasy, a low pink flush crept across her face.

He glanced down, amused. "You wet yourself?"

Helena froze, she wanted to leap off the mountain.

Her pussy was still dripping semen from earlier, and she hadn't wiped properly. Sitting like this, she could feel the wet warmth spreading through her underwear, sticking to her thigh in the cold night air.

Sex in the freezing open air was already a first for her.

Now this humiliation?

She sighed inwardly.

Too much.

Why couldn't the world just let her retire and rot peacefully?

She wanted a cigarette so badly her fingers twitched…

But with him beside her?

No chance.

"Here."

He held one out.

She blinked, surprised, before he placed it between her lips and lit it for her without asking.

The bitter taste of the smoke mixed with the bitterness of his cock in her mouth, and somehow the combination soothed her nerves.

A long drag filled her lungs, relaxing her shoulders.

Now if someone would just hand her emergency pills, life would be perfect.

As if summoned, another voice cut in:

"You won't get pregnant from that."

"Hiss~!"

She sucked in cold air so sharply her chest tightened. "Can you read my damn mind?"

Wang Xiao shook his head. "I can… predict your next actions and words. Reading minds is easy, but I usually don't bother."

"…"

Helena's expression darkened, was she supposed to feel relieved or terrified that he could see the future?

She exhaled smoke. "Boss, I'm over forty, already married. What interest do you even have in me? You have women far better than me. Or—" her laugh cracked— "are you planning to leak my video and force me to kill myself? Torture's worse, you know."

She didn't understand.

She'd never been recorded in her entire life.

Why the hell did a literal god need her nudes?

The answer arrived with unbearable casualness.

"I'm sending these to the people on the list I gave you. You'll serve them from the background. Don't meet them unless they ask. If you fail your duties… well, I don't know what they'll do with your videos."

A shiver ran down her spine.

"Boss, blackmail is way too low for someone at your level," she muttered with a depressed smile.

Genius!

Fucked-up genius!

She was President of the United States. If a scandal dropped, everything she had, power, career, family, life, would evaporate.

She'd be forced to work.

And if she ever lost her position in the future?

The nudes would be irrelevant anyway.

As long as she held power, she'd be chained to the work.

He wasn't blackmailing her for himself, he was designing a system where she would keep working even if he disappeared.

Right now, if Wang Mei needed help, there was Wang Xiao.

If Luna needed support, he was there.

If Anran caused trouble, he cleaned it up.

But what if he entered the Netherworld again?

What if Luna or Anran got tied up in their own battles?

He needed a grounded, permanent foundation.

Helena was one of his pillars.

Wang Xiao continued, "You'll work parallel to Anran and Luna. And you'll keep working even after they retire. You're not allowed to rely on them... They might quit at any moment."

He added lazily, "And if you're thinking of deleting the videos from their phones… The moment you delete anything, bad things will happen to you."

Helena frowned. "What do you mean 'bad things'?"

He didn't explain.

He simply demonstrated.

Far above, Ning Xue, mid-air, exchanging blows, suddenly veered like someone shoved her.

She slammed into a news helicopter.

Then ricocheted straight into a passenger airplane passing by.

"…"

Helena's soul almost fled her body.

He could curse reality with his voice.

Her eye twitched three times.

A fucking jinx in human form!

She took a long drag of her cigarette and gave up.

Fine.

Fate sealed.

Serving the boss ladies couldn't be that bad, right?

She thought it was easy… until she went back to her office.

Years later, she would regret not jumping off that cliff.

Wang Xueying's disasters alone required five PR teams.

Zhenxi and Yue caused enough mess to drown nations.

Every woman connected to him needed constant internet wipes, government-level cleanup, and background silencing.

Helena cried inside every day.

Now she understood why he had smirked devilishly when he said:

"You won't work for free... You'll receive the blessing of eternal life in return."

Blessing, her ass.

It was a curse.

Her breaking point came a century later.

When her grey-haired, trembling, paper-skinned son died in her arms, she could do nothing but helplessly wipe his tears with her shaking hands.

And she was still a young woman, still forced to work, still unable to age, still unable to leave. She didn't even get the time to properly be with her family.

Only then did she truly understand the weight of what she'd agreed to.

She'd tried everything.

Even throwing herself into a volcano, and crawling back out alive, screaming.

Her immortality refused to let her die.

That was the moment Helena realized she hadn't been blessed.

She'd been bound.

She smoked an entire pot alone that night, shaking, empty, furious at the universe and at herself.

And when she finally crossed paths with Wang Xiao again, after many years, the bastard actually smiled at her grief and called it:

"A good character-building arc."

She nearly detonated on the spot.

But that rage belonged to the future.

Right now, the younger Helena, still naïve, still nonchalant, still believing some things were under her control, looked at him with a raised brow.

"Aren't you afraid I'll betray you, if you force me like this?"

Wang Xiao's answer was maddeningly casual.

"You want to stay away from divine business. Unless you willingly step into it… your chances of betrayal are low."

Helena actually smiled.

He wasn't wrong.

She had zero interest in gods, devils, pantheons, or cosmic politics. If anyone tried to recruit her to betray him, she'd walk away. Getting dragged into god-level nonsense was more dangerous than serving him.

She was even more unsettled when he said the chances were low.

Did that mean he had already accounted for her betrayal?

He hadn't said zero, her betrayal was simply… beneath his concern.

Her second thoughts evaporated. She swallowed them instantly.

"Although…" Wang Xiao added softly, "keep an eye on that girl... Amaya."

Helena's smile faded.

Amaya, Li Zhiming's current bodyguard.

A girl whose brother had been killed by Wang Xiao during the rescue of Anran.

Both siblings were deviants.

Losing her brother broke her.

Yet she hadn't attacked.

Not yet.

Suppressed hatred like that… was the most vicious.

Helena finally understood something chilling.

Amaya wasn't beside Li Zhiming because she was loyal.

She was there because Wang Xiao wanted her close.

He loved keeping enemies within arm's reach, so he could monitor them,

manipulate them, and choose when they were allowed to explode.

Even in battle, he controlled the stage.

He forced the Executioner to reveal himself and fight him on his own terms, teaming up with Xue Hanqin so every outcome was already mapped out before the first blow landed.

A battle is half-won the moment you dictate the time and place.

The same logic shaped his handling of the Netherworld.

He didn't stop the universe from colliding with the Netherworld, he let it happen gradually, deliberately.

Not as a savior, not as a conqueror, but as an outsider who disrupted the old four-lord balance just enough.

Now the Netherworld's factions would fight for his favor, competing to pull him into their camp…

Instead of uniting to crush him.

He wasn't arrogant enough to believe he could take on all four Great Lords alone.

... Not yet.

Similarly, he let his daughters have controlled explosions fights, outbursts, tantrums, so they wouldn't erupt uncontrollably later.

The secret to managing power was never eliminating conflict.

It was managing the pressure release.

After dismissing Helena with a casual wave, Wang Xiao turned and ascended the mountain with Yin Yue by his side.

Helena watched him disappear, then finally let out a shaky exhale and grabbed her phone.

She called the Secret Service.

"Pick me up," she muttered. "Your President has been raped and blackmailed. And you incompetent bastards can't do a damn thing about it."

She snorted, but didn't blame them.

The only thing she blamed was her own tragic fate.

The day she met Wang Xiao… her retirement, her peace, her lifespan, everything, had been fucked beyond repair.