Demon
“It seems we failed again.”
“Hmm.”
On the outskirts of a small village in Sichuan, two men stood on a mountain behind the settlement, gazing down at it.
One had black hair.
The other had hair as white as snow.
Below them, the village was shrouded in a dark red mist.
“The Malign Spirit Curse Poison was the last of it as well.”
Malign Spirit Curse Poison.
A new poison developed by the Heavenly Demon Cult.
It looked like a tiny pill, but as time passed it spread like fog, swallowing everything around it.
That demonic energy seeped outward like poison, leaving only the qualified alive and killing all the rest.
And the qualification in question was talent for demonic energy.
The talent to wield demonic arts without being eaten alive by demonic energy, without having one’s lifespan drained away.
It meant the body of the Heavenly Demon.
“If it were so easy to find, the whole world would already belong to our cult.”
The white-haired man said flatly.
The black-haired man nodded.
The body of the Heavenly Demon was a legendary realm, even within the Heavenly Demon Cult, which had a history stretching back countless years.
In the cult’s entire recorded history, there had been only three such bodies.
So it was not strange that even after searching the vast expanse of the world, they had yet to find a single one.
“Let’s go back. If we drag this on any longer, they’ll catch our trail.”
The white-haired man spoke in a low voice.
They were already being watched by the Tang family.
It was only a matter of time before pursuit would be on their heels.
It was regrettable that they had found nothing, but the odds had been absurdly small from the beginning.
Still, probabilities had a habit of appearing precisely when least expected.
“W-wait just a moment!”
The black-haired man called out hurriedly to the white-haired man.
The red mist of the Malign Spirit Curse Poison was gathering in one place.
There could be only one meaning.
“The body of the Heavenly Demon!”
“At last, we found it!”
At the white-haired man’s words, the black-haired man chimed in excitedly.
The Malign Spirit Curse Poison was called a poison, but in the end it was simply demonic energy spread through the area.
For it to gather in one place could mean only one thing.
There was a being there who had begun to accept demonic energy.
In the center of that red mist, a life was being born.
A true demon, one who could command endless demonic energy at will!
“I want to rush there this very instant and check for myself.”
“You must wait until the poison disperses. If you don’t, everything will be for nothing.”
“Yes. Right. I’m beginning to look forward to it.”
A future pillar of the cult was waiting there.
Expectation lit both men’s faces.
***
Surprisingly, this is comfortable.
That was the first sensation Soyeong felt as she accepted the demonic energy.
Aside from the blood she had coughed up when she first tried to force it away, everything felt inexplicably calm.
Was demonic energy always this docile?
No. It’s just this body’s talent.
Soyeong, who had once been the lord of the Sa-pae Alliance in her previous life, already knew demonic energy well.
She had never been the sort to hold prejudices about strength, so she had taken an interest in demonic arts as well.
But she had lost interest quickly.
Demonic arts were martial arts that only the truly gifted could master.
If someone without talent practices demonic arts, their lifespan gets shortened.
For those with no intention of living long, demonic arts might have suited them, but Soyeong wanted to grow stronger and live a long life while doing it.
So now, as she absorbed the demonic energy, she knew.
This body had talent for demonic arts.
The demonic energy that entered through her breathing traveled backward along her meridians and entered her dantian.
It was only strange because its direction was opposite that of ordinary energy, but it did not hurt.
No, it actually felt more natural this way.
Even the dantian is strangely calm.
The dantians of demonic practitioners were always perilously close to bursting.
They were demons who desperately kept their demonic energy from tearing free of their bodies and ripping them apart from the inside out.
But Soyeong was different.
The demonic energy was settling quietly in one corner of her dantian.
It didn’t even conflict with the righteous internal energy she had gathered through Hyeoncheon Jinwon Shingong.
This feels good.
Soyeong continued absorbing the demonic energy.
By the time she was done, the demonic energy gathered in her dantian amounted to fifteen years’ worth.
The twenty years of inner power from Hyeoncheon Jinwon Shingong had come to envelop it like a protective shell.
“......Did it work?”
It had been only a half-gamble, but the result had been unexpectedly good.
“If I judge by what I gained, this is about as good as it gets.”
Soyeong drew out her inner power and took a look around her arm meridians.
The demonic energy resting in her dantian remained perfectly still.
Even after she had used the inner force surrounding it, it still did not stir.
At this point, should I even learn demonic arts?
Soyeong seriously considered joining the demonic cult.
The only reason she had abandoned demonic arts in her previous life had been her lack of talent.
If she had talent, there was no reason not to choose them.
Just then, she felt the inner energy in her dantian twitch slightly.
It seemed the energy she had built through Hyeoncheon Jinwon Shingong was protesting.
It was asking her not to abandon it.
“......Well, I can just do both.”
Soyeong quickly reached her conclusion.
It wasn’t as if the two energies were fighting each other, so it should be fine.
Soyeong was greedy.
She couldn’t give up either inner force or demonic energy.
And once she made up her mind, her dantian settled down again.
What a long life she had to live if she was already having to soothe her own dantian.
“Then now that my problem’s solved......”
Shall we receive our guest?
“As I thought! There was someone alive in here!”
The man who opened the door and entered the room where Soyeong sat was the black-haired one.
He spotted Soyeong sitting cross-legged with her eyes closed and muttered to himself.
“The demonic energy hasn’t spread; it’s all been contained. To have survived the Malign Spirit Curse Poison in such perfect shape! You must be exactly the vessel the cult has been searching for!”
The man rambled on in excitement.
But then he noticed something odd.
If the body of the Heavenly Demon could completely contain demonic energy, that would make sense.
But the atmosphere around her didn’t feel like someone filled with demonic energy at all. It felt more like a master of righteous martial arts who had internal energy stored in the body.
“Strange. Did something go wrong?”
The man stepped closer to check.
The moment the distance between them shrank to about an arm’s length, Soyeong’s hand blade shot for his throat.
-Sshhk!
“Tch!”
The man twisted away immediately.
He had been prepared.
Demons who harbor demonic energy in their bodies usually become savage and violent.
He had assumed it wouldn’t be much different even for the body of the Heavenly Demon.
But still, this felt a little strange.
“Why are your eyes not reversed?”
Any demon who possessed demonic energy would, without exception, develop reversed eyes.
That was true of the black-haired man, and true of the white-haired man as well.
But this woman before him clearly had white sclera.
“Ask King Yama in the afterlife.”
Soyeong answered his question with a flying knife.
The knife, infused with inner power, shot straight for the man’s throat.
Chasing Soul Flying Knife.
Chasing Soul, Chasing Moon.
-Thud.
“Ghk!”
The Chasing Moon knife embedded itself in the black-haired man’s throat.
Soyeong approached the man as he rolled on the floor, seized the knife lodged in his neck, and dragged it sideways.
-Fwoosh!
Blood sprayed from the man’s throat like a fountain.
Dark red blood.
The strange sensation of blood flowing not like that of the living, but like the blood of the dead.
That was a trait of demons.
“So the demonic cult really was behind this.”
Soyeong had been planning to bring this demon’s corpse back to the Tang family.
The demon’s corpse would be the proof of this incident.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
Along with that voice, a demonic art exploded into Soyeong’s side.
Crimson Blood Hand Demon Fist.
-Bang!
“......Kuh!”
The impact was massive.
This was the first time in this life she had taken a blow like that.
It was fortunate she had managed to snatch up the sword beside her and block with its scabbard. If she had taken that hit directly, it would have been a fatal wound for sure.
The aftershock of the strike collapsed the old man’s house, and Soyeong tumbled across the floor.
“Impressive. You defended yourself in that split second?”
The one who emerged from the ruined house was the white-haired man.
A demon with black pupils.
I didn’t sense him approaching at all.
Soyeong wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth and glared at the demon before her.
She was first-class, but with the instincts from her previous life, she should have been able to detect a concealed aura from a master in the peak realm.
But this demon had not only approached without her noticing; she had not sensed his presence even when he was right next to her.
There was only one thing that could mean.
A peak master. No, someone standing right before the wall to the next realm!
A master on the verge of transcending the peak realm.
Someone at a level Soyeong, who had only barely set foot in first-class, could never hope to handle.
“And yet this is strange. Why have you not become a demon eye despite becoming a demon?”
The white-haired demon had the same question as the black-haired one.
The reversed eye was the symbol of a demon.
It was clear this woman had absorbed all the demonic energy contained in the Malign Spirit Curse Poison, but no demonic aura could be felt from her.
“Well, we can always take you back and check in detail.”
The man did not think long about it.
They could verify the details back in the cult.
In an instant, the man moved in front of Soyeong and threw a punch.
Crimson Blood Hand Demon Fist.
“Tch!”
Soyeong raised her sword case again to block.
The fist wrapped in dark red demonic energy collided with her Hyeoncheon Jinwon Shingong.
-Bang!
Soyeong managed to stop the demon’s attack.
But her body could not bear the impact and went rolling across the floor.
The chance is now!
Soyeong forced her body upright.
Now, after blocking the opponent’s attack, was her only chance to strike back.
There was only one way to defeat a master stronger than herself.
Cut his throat the moment he lets his guard down!
Hyeoncheon Jinwon Shingong.
Inner power flowed through Soyeong’s body and sword.
Soyeong lunged forward faster than she had been knocked back and swung her blade.
Each slash was a killing sword form.
Yet its foundation was unmistakably a third-class sword art anyone could learn.
The level of swordsmanship Soyeong in her previous life had only realized in her later years.
Basic fundamentals.
No matter how gorgeous the sword technique, in the end it could always be dismantled by a plain, unimpressive thrust.
That was why the swordsmanship of Hyeoncheon Jinwon Shingong had no flashy forms.
It simply cut, blocked, and pierced.
Because of that, no one could understand it, and no one could teach it.
It was Soyeong’s sword alone.
And that was what made it a peerless sword art.
“Splendid swordsmanship.”
The white-haired demon praised her technique.
It was not empty praise, but sincere admiration.
Though demonic arts were a little rough around the edges, martial artists all tended to see things in similar ways.
The swordsmanship Soyeong was displaying would surely be among the finest in the world.
“But it won’t reach me.”
Yet the difference in their realms was far too great.
The white-haired demon stood at the end of the peak realm.
He was looking at the next realm right before him.
By contrast, Soyeong’s own level was first-class.
Not even truly established there yet, only just having stepped into it.
“The subtlety hidden in that sword would surely let one speak of the world itself, but......”
Dark red demonic energy roared in the man’s hand.
“Today, I win.”
Crimson Blood Hand Demon Fist.
The man’s fist surged toward Soyeong.
Fast. Twice as fast as before!
“Kuh!”
Once again, Soyeong barely managed to lift her sword and block.
But this time it was different.
...My right arm is broken.
Because she had twisted her body mid-attack to force the block, her stance had not fully settled.
Of course, the hastily thrown defense had also burned through a great deal of inner power.
“That strike told me your inner strength is all gone.”
Indeed, despite being a demon, the man was a master.
From that one blow, he had realized Soyeong had exhausted all her inner energy.
“Now I understand why you survived the Malign Spirit Curse Poison and still could use inner power without becoming a demon.”
The man, certain of victory, slowly walked toward Soyeong.
His chest brimmed with joy.
At last, he was taking the first step toward fulfilling the grand design of the cult!
“Sleep for a while. By the time you wake, you’ll be the sky of the cult.”
The next time they met, this child would surely have become the Heavenly Demon.
And then she would help bring the cult’s long plan to fruition.
The moment the man’s hand reached for Soyeong’s throat, she spoke.
“Now.”
“......What!?”
Soyeong threw the flying knife.
A decisive strike aimed at the instant he let his guard down.
But the man, by a stroke of fortune, managed to evade it.
“You were still hiding a dagger......!”
At that moment, a white line flashed through the corner of the man’s vision.
His instincts screamed at him.
This was not the end!
Behind me!?
The man immediately whirled around and snatched the returning knife out of the air.
To catch the knife returning under Cheongi Hwanmu was unquestionably a feat of skill.
“Looks like I won’t be escorting you back so gently after all!”
Once more, the man gathered dark red qi in his hand.
Even if his body suffered a little, this called for absolute suppression.
His opponent was already an empty husk with no inner power left.
Which meant there was no way to dodge this blow.
That was the exact moment the man let down his guard the most.
“Is this how it’s done?”
Dark red qi gathered in Soyeong’s left hand.
It was the same as what had swirled in the man’s right hand.
In other words, demonic energy.
Above her black pupils, green irises flashed brilliantly.
“How!?”
She copied it after seeing it once!?
The man cried out in shock and hurled his fist.
Soyeong dodged by the width of a sheet of paper.
“You should’ve never let your guard down until the very end.”
A cold smile touched Soyeong’s lips as she evaded the Crimson Blood Hand Demon Fist and thrust out her hand blade.
Strike the throat the moment the opponent lowers his guard.
Soyeong’s hand blade pierced the demon’s throat.
Crimson Blood Hand Demon Fist.
“Ghh......hk!”
And that was the end.
-Fwoosh!
The moment Soyeong pulled her hand from the man’s throat, blood gushed out like a fountain.
“You talked too much.”
That was the last thing the dying man heard.
***