The last person in the crowd who retained any consciousness was that Body Integration cultivator who had pierced Lian Yunzhi’s shoulder blade with an iron chain. Now, he shrank back in utter terror, yet he had to watch with his own eyes as his body and Primordial Spirit were simultaneously pierced by chains formed from Black Mist. His Primordial Spirit was torn off piece by piece and swallowed into Mu Cheng’s belly.
“Celestial Immortals, save me…”
His body convulsed, and he muttered those words with eyes wide open in death.
And while Mu Cheng rummaged through over a dozen Storage Rings to find the best Pills, knelt on one knee with his back to the countless corpses, and gently fed the Pills into Lian Yunzhi’s mouth, the Immortals that the crowd had desperately called for finally arrived.
Lightning tore through the dark clouds, and rosy glows illuminated the horizon.
The Immortals rode colorful auspicious clouds down to the mortal world, cast their gaze down at Lian Yunzhi, and rebuked:
【The Evil Demon has descended upon the world, bringing calamity to all, and you bear responsibility as well.】
Lian Yunzhi leaned in Mu Cheng’s arms and looked up at them. Upon realizing the speaker was the statue that had entered his dream before, he sneered, parted his lips silently, and mouthed: What the hell are you? Get lost—
.
For tens of thousands of years, the cultivation world had never been without Evil Demons. Those who went mad and slaughtered countless others had never been only Mu Cheng.
Yet all Evil Demons in the world lost every shred of reason the moment they went mad. They killed everyone in sight and ended up destroying themselves. Reasonless Evil Demons brought disaster to the world, but only a disaster—like an earth dragon turning over or a volcano erupting. Earth dragons did not turn forever, nor did volcanoes erupt endlessly. After utmost madness came utmost destruction. Without exception, all Evil Demons met their end as ashes and dust, buried in the land stained by their sins.
Mu Cheng’s fate should have been the same.
The only difference was his extraordinarily unique physique and resilient soul. Even ten thousand years ago, when Immortals descended, they could not kill him completely. They could only torment his soul with the Reincarnation Punishment and erode his will. After ten thousand reincarnations, even the toughest, most powerful soul would be easily torn into a million pieces, never to return.
But that unremarkable Spirit Capturing Grass had become an anomaly.
He had toppled the Pure Bottle, released the Evil Demon ahead of time, and even secretly kept the Evil Demon’s Primordial Spirit, rebuilding his fleshly body for him.
And now, ten thousand years later, as Immortals descended once more to slay the evil, he had even shaved his hair into vines, stuffed them into the Evil Demon’s mouth, and transformed into a tiny Spirit Capturing Grass hiding in the Evil Demon’s collar. Every time the Evil Demon’s consciousness grew hazy, he extended his Divine Soul into the Evil Demon’s Knowledge Sea to sort and purify his chaotic mind.
What was an unprecedented, sane Evil Demon like?
The Immortals learned this time.
.
The battle of Xiaoze State lasted a full seven days.
On the evening of the seventh day, when Mu Cheng’s lotus body could no longer hold and was on the verge of cracking, Xiaoze State’s mountains turned into his bones, its waters into his blood, its land into his skin, its grasses and trees into his long hair, and its stars into his eyes.
Mu Cheng was no longer just an Evil Demon. He had become the true Lord of Xiaoze State. If another new title had to be given, then he was this world’s first-ever Demon God.
Thus, even the Celestial Immortals retreated step by step, unable to match him.
Yet Mu Cheng did not press his advantage. Instead, his movements grew slower and slower.
【What are you doing?!】
Lian Yunzhi asked via Divine Soul Force.
【Killing them all!】
Mu Cheng: “…”
Mu Cheng wondered for a moment who the real Evil Demon was.
Mu Cheng replied softly via Divine Soul Force: 【I can’t kill them. They’re gods.】
Lian Yunzhi: 【What, you can’t?!】
Mu Cheng: “…”
Mu Cheng said: 【Killing gods would be another grave sin. You even helped as my Dao Companion. If they truly died, you could never Ascend in this lifetime.】
Lian Yunzhi: “…”
Lian Yunzhi fell silent.
He still yearned for Ascension.
But letting them go just like that left him deeply unsatisfied.
Suddenly, he thought of something. He pulled the Pure Bottle from his embrace, infused it with spiritual power, and hurled the already soul-bound Pure Bottle at the group of Immortals who had been struck down to the ground—disheveled, dirtied, depleted of immortal power, no longer bearing any trace of their lofty arrogance!
In an instant, golden light blazed forth. The mouth of the Pure Bottle expanded hundreds of times over, descending like an airtight prison to clamp down inescapably on the Immortals!
By some stroke of inspiration, Lian Yunzhi intuitively grasped another use for the Pure Bottle. Countless green Vines crawled over it, inscribing runes inside and out—
【You shall fall into an endless Reincarnation Illusion. Within the illusion, you will become Spirit Washing Bodies with Myriad Absorption Spiritual Roots, exposed to the world. You shall possess undying souls, bound lifetime after lifetime to a giant tree. You will watch your blood flow into every river of the world, your flesh fill every greedy mouth. You will witness your Spiritual Roots extracted ten thousand times over. Though Heaven’s Proud Sons, you shall fall lower than waste.】
What started as pure, exhilarating revenge turned into fury by the end. Lian Yunzhi coldly watched the terror on those Immortals’ faces and thought:
Don’t blame me. Blame yourselves. If not for you, how would I ever think of such vicious punishment?
And what you’re about to endure is merely what Mu Cheng has already suffered for ten thousand years.
“Boom—”
The Pure Bottle sealed away the last ray of daylight.
The Immortals’ reincarnation began.
