The Heavenly Demon's Reincarnation
The generals of the Cheonma Tomb never stood at the forefront. It might have looked heroic for a commander who should have been directing the army to shout "Follow me!" and charge ahead, but if he took an arrow and dropped dead, the troops' morale would shatter in an instant. Strategy without its leader became nothing but empty foam. Therefore, a general leading from the front was pure selfishness to satisfy his own desires, never a virtue. Unless it was a situation where he truly had to risk his life.
Strictly speaking, then, Jijon had no reason to personally join the expedition. He could have sat solemnly upon his high throne and simply claimed the Heavenly Demon Soul his subordinates delivered to him. The current Jijon was little more than a puppet, not even invited to meetings run by the Demonic Cult's leaders. For such a figure to occupy a prominent place in the perilous quest for the Heavenly Demon Soul was, in itself, strange.
Yet the Demonic Cult's Jijon was here. Because the Heavenly Demon Soul was a sacred relic of the cult that no ordinary person could carry, and one without the proper qualifications could never touch. It was an object the Jijon had to claim with his own hands.
Cheong, who had coveted what belonged to another, paid the price.
Suddenly the floor vanished beneath her. The dizzying sensation of the earth yanking her down with the full pull of gravity swallowed her entire soul. Cheong's consciousness grew distant.
Meanwhile, her body suffered its own torment. From the Heavenly Demon Soul that had sunk halfway into her grip, a smoky, heavy magi erupted like an explosion.
Pacheon-magi. It was the crystallization of malice that the Demon God Angra Mainyu had forged by gathering every despair in the world.
The magi devoured Cheong's body and burst outward in every direction, swirling into a violent whirlwind. Thus, at the center of the tomb chamber, a darkness shaped like the universe drew a majestic vortex.
At the sight, Ji Seungju shook his head. He had predicted ever since she smashed that Divine Cult member's head during transport that she would eventually run wild and bring disaster upon herself. But he never imagined she would be so foolish as to not even recognize her own death.
Pacheon-magi was an energy no human could wield. Even those born with a demonic bloodline required special procedures from childhood to protect their meridians, plus rigorous training in the foundational Divine Vein techniques, before they could barely qualify as a vessel capable of containing the Heavenly Demon Soul. Anyone else who tried to hold the Pacheon-magi would have their body torn apart by the savage malice, exploding into pieces. The magi would simply return to the Heavenly Demon Soul, leaving behind a meaningless dog's death.
It was while Ji Seungju was clicking his tongue in disapproval that it happened.
"No..."
Choe-ri-ong collapsed beside him with a heavy thud.
Ji Seungju shook his head at the sight. In the end, only the Jajeon-magun had become truly pitiful.
He looked at Cheong's corpse within the formation. It was a bloodied body sprawled across an illusory space modeled after the Myth War. Yet Cheong had been perfectly alive. At the time, he had assumed someone who hated her had crafted the illusion to kill her. Or perhaps it was the lingering trace of some time-obsessed demon head's amusement.
Only now did he realize the master of that illusion had been the Jajeon-magun himself. No wonder his attitude toward Cheong had felt so strange. His mind had become completely twisted inside the formation. Cheong and his dead daughter had merged into one, so the daughter's corpse had taken Cheong's form. Thanks to that, he had been forced to witness his daughter's death twice. It was truly tragic.
Still, Choe-ri-ong had been a dead old man from the start. Right now, the incompetent Jijon needed comforting more.
The Jijon still had not awakened from the lost illusion.
As Ji Seungju approached him, the cries rang out.
"Ooh! The Heavenly Demon!"
"The Heavenly Demon descends!"
Excited shouts filled the air. Ji Seungju's head snapped around, and the young demon brain's eyes flew wide open.
The magi swirling in the shape of the universe contracted into a single point in an instant. It became a space so utterly black it seemed to swallow sight itself. Then darkness surged upward in two branches, spreading wings toward the heavens. They burned like savage black flames, filling the entire tomb chamber.
Giant wings.
The wings opened their eyes.
Thousands of eyes lifted their vicious eyelids in completely arbitrary order. Each eye—small, large, slanted—had a random number of pupils. Some had one, some two, some three, and others even more.
A woman stood with wings spread like a black barrier. Those wings bore thousands of eyes and even more pupils.
Faced with this mythical incarnation of malice, the cult members dropped to their knees.
A short yet eternal stretch of time flowed past.
Before long the wings vanished without a trace.
In their place, a girl drew her first human breath.
When her eyes opened, the surroundings were already pitch black.
Cheong bolted upright in shock.
"That's right! The Heavenly Demon Soul!"
With a scraping sound, the chair toppled backward with a crash.
Cheong turned to look and froze at the sight of the five-legged office chair with wheels.
Huh......
She scanned her surroundings. Blackout curtains blocked every trace of light. The only illumination came from the awkward glow of a monitor, leaving the room dim and hazy.
It felt both utterly foreign and strangely, overwhelmingly familiar.
Cheong fumbled along the wall and flipped the switch. It was pure reflex. The LED lamp instantly banished the darkness. Beside the sink sat a 138-liter refrigerator.
Without thinking, Cheong opened it and pulled out a can of beer. She cracked the tab with a sharp click and brought it to her lips. The beer, cold enough to sting, clawed its way down her throat.
"Kya. So refreshing. Hoo."
The chilled beer settled in her empty stomach. Only then did her dazed mind snap back into focus.
Cheong let out a small laugh.
What kind of insane dream was that? Entering a game?
She checked the clock first. 10:23 PM.
Let's see. Was I on night shift or day shift?
The rotation was critical. It determined sleep schedules, so production workers who at least tried to preserve their bodies kept their biological rhythms steady for a few days at a time. If it was day shift, she needed to sleep now. If night shift, she would have to stay up until morning.
But she couldn't remember the schedule at all.
Of course she couldn't. That was from years ago. No, what years? It was only a dream. Yet it somehow felt like several years had truly passed.
Cheong frowned and thought hard for a long time, but nothing came to mind.
With no other choice, she scanned the desk, picked up the familiar smartphone, and unconsciously traced the lock pattern. She must have touched something wrong, because the moment it unlocked, the camera app launched.
A pretty girl's face filled the screen.
"Huh?"
Cheong stared at the smartphone in surprise. A thick clump of hair had come loose above her right ear and was fluttering freely.
She skillfully untied her hair, then tied it back again. Once she finished, a strange feeling came over her......
A voice suddenly rang out.
Cheong's head whipped around. The beautiful voice had come from the speaker.
The monitor displayed a scene from the game. A beautiful girl rendered in an elegant art style appeared on screen, and the letterbox at the bottom had already cleared the previous line to show new text.
"It's a woman's body? A woman shouldn't be born with the Divine Veins?"
Cheonma frowned and muttered. The weight hanging from her chest made her shoulders feel strangely stiff. Even standing straight felt awkward and uncomfortable. In all the dozens of lives she had lived, she had never once possessed a woman's body.
But that lasted only a moment. After carefully examining the body, Cheonma could not hide her admiration.
The muscles were coiled like tempered steel, containing enough power to lift mountains. The tendons were both tough and flexible, already far beyond the limits of any human Cheonma had known. And the vastness of the dantian was so wondrous it could hardly be called human.
None of the previous bodies had been able to fully contain the Pacheon-magi. That was why Cheonma could never remain on earth for long after descending—the body would gradually break down.
But this one? It had completely sealed the Pacheon-magi inside yet still had room to spare for other energies.
Cheonma frowned. There were several strands of true qi hiding in the upper dantian, carefully avoiding the swirling Pacheon-magi. Not just one, but many. Energies that should have clashed violently due to opposing yin and yang natures were instead fused together strangely but solidly, camped out in a corner of the upper dantian. It looked almost as if they were protecting something.
Still, it was not an important matter. Cheonma quickly lost interest and returned to pure admiration.
"What does it matter if it's a woman's body? This one pleases me greatly. To possess such a body and yet be only at the Peak realm? She must have been utterly devoid of talent."
The tomb chamber where dozens of cult members knelt was so silent that not even the sound of breathing could be heard. Into that silence came the sound of bones grinding and shifting—crack, pop.
The noises came from Cheonma's body. Bones settled into new positions, muscles twisted and reattached, causing the skin to bulge and ripple. This was known as Body Reconstruction.
It was the phenomenon where a body that had reached the Transcendent realm was reassembled into its most perfect form, literally exchanging bones to achieve the highest possible state. In other words, the optimization of the physical vessel.
Even in the middle of Body Reconstruction, Cheonma continued walking. It was a truly astonishing feat. During the process, everyone was defenseless. All joints dislocated as bones grew or shortened, muscles loosened then compressed and reattached. It was something that happened only once in a lifetime after reaching the Transcendent realm. The bizarre sensation of the body being rebuilt, accompanied by intense pain, usually left one too disoriented to maintain focus.
But Cheonma had experienced it enough times to be used to it. She could walk without stumbling even while her body was being reconstructed.
When the transformation finally finished and Cheonma once again took the form of a girl, she revealed an absolute beauty so breathtaking that even darkness itself would feel ashamed and draw its black veil.
"Young Demon Brain, are you there? Who is the Young Demon Brain of this generation?"
"Heavenly Demon Descent, ten thousand demons bow in reverence. This humble one is Ji Seungju. I greet the owner of this soul and the future."
Ji Seungju stepped forward and bowed his head respectfully.
Cheonma extended a pale, slender finger. The beautiful hand stroked Ji Seungju's head.
"Oh-ho. Such a young demon brain. In all my long life, this is the first time I've seen one so young. Therefore I shall keep you by my side for a long time. I look forward to your good service."
Cheonma's words were gentle and benevolent. They were the words of the Heavenly Demon Jijon, the very embodiment of the Divine Cult's long history and a living sage.
"Yes, Heavenly Demon Jijon."
Ji Seungju's voice trembled with emotion.
It was then that a voice rang out without permission.
"Heavenly Demon Jijon! There is a proper body here! A suitable vessel for you to claim!"
An old man rushed forward without waiting for approval. He grabbed Jijon by the nape of the neck, slammed him to the floor, pressed down on him with a knee, and opened his mouth without even begging forgiveness for his insolent speech.