Way of the Devil

Ming Dynasty, Xuanyuan City, a lavish restaurant.

Zhao Chengxuan had his arm around a pretty maid, his hand moving all over her as he swallowed pears that were peeled, cut, and held up to his mouth. He was a typical rich second generation young master.

His father was the captain of the military in Xuanyuan City, so he was effectively the commander of the entire military stationed in the city. His mother was the beloved daughter of the leader of the underground forces known across three states, so he had free reign both during the day and the night.

He had a strong and powerful elder brother, who won a martial arts title last year and was now employed elsewhere.

He also had an elder sister, whose master was monk Sanxiao from the Fengming Monastery in the Zhongyun Mountains. No one knew her whereabouts, but she also had made a solid name for herself in the area.

Among the three children, he was the only one who flirted with girls and visited brothels all day. If there was a pretty girl, he would be the first one by her side.

The only good thing was that he wasn’t a flashy person. Apart from generating gossip around this, nothing else was talked about him. He had no talents, no skills, was twenty-six and had no job. Relying on his family wealth, he drank and partied the days away.

Because he had no strength and an annoying attitude, he wasn’t well known in the circles of other rich youths, either.

Right now, Zhan Chengxuan was sitting in a room, gently squeezing and rubbing the important parts of the girl, but his mind wasn’t on her at all.

If someone was paying attention to his gaze, they would notice that Zhao Chengxuan was carefully listening to the voices in the hall outside.

Zhao Chengxuan had completely shifted his focus from the girl in his arms to the discussion outside.

“… I heard that Elder Shen, Moon Sword King, has arrived, but I have no clue on his whereabouts. Last time, I sneaked a glance and saw the name of Tang Fei, the Flying Mantis from the Violet Flag Sect.”

“The rebirth of the Maroon Dragon Spear has attracted so many strong people. Violet Snow Garden is not big. It won’t hold up these many people fighting in it. If their fights affect the city, what do we do?”

“Sword King Elder Wang and Sect Master Zhu from the Divine Dragon Sect are here. It should be okay.”

“Who knows. We’re talking the first Divine Weapon in a hundred years, known as the weapon that will give its possessor the entire world. Even Elder Shen and Sect Master Zhu could be tempted.”

All those voices floated into Zhao Chengxuan’s ear, making him feel stranger and stranger.

Although he had no education or martial arts upbringing, because of his mother, he often heard his uncles mention these names of really strong people.

For this supposedly the best Divine Weapon in the world, all these strong people gathered here. This shocked him a bit.

‘This is a pretty good identity. A prominent identity that can get both legal and illegal information,’ Zhao Chengxuan, or Lu Sheng, thought. ‘The sect really has some wonderful tricks. I became Zhao Chengxuan fully. Even my memory and identity were fitted in perfectly.’

The soul inside this body was his, and not Zhao Chengxuan’s. Only his appearance and height changed. Other than that, all his original memories were preserved. This made Lu Sheng’s heart heavy.

Because this reminded him of the scene where he’d first time-traveled here. Back then, wasn’t it exactly the same?

‘If the Great Yin has such technology, then other forces likely have it too. Seems like it’s time to learn matrices and spells. Such technology must have come from talismans and matrices, so if I study them, I might be able to find the reason for my transmigration,’ Lu Sheng decided in his heart, coming back to reality.

“Young Master?” the girl in his arms called softly.

“Let’s go, time to go home.” Lu Sheng turned around, letting go of the girl and walking out of the room.

The few bodyguards standing outside the door glanced at each other, then followed. The girl hurriedly organized her clothes and followed behind them.

With Lu Sheng at the head, the group walked out of the restaurant amidst the fervent goodbyes from the front desk. A carriage was already waiting outside.

Lu Sheng pulled open the curtains and walked in. He was silent the entire trip back to the Zhao Mansion.

After getting off, he patted his shirt, then walked through the gate with the usual smile on his face.

Behind the gate was a wide expanse of empty space. In the corner stood a girl dressed in white. She had a long white sword strapped to her back. She was writing in big letters on a piece of paper held by two servant girls.

Lu Sheng walked next the girl and watched silently.

After quite a while, the girl finished the last character and threw away her brush. Glancing at Lu Sheng, her gaze was calm, but hid deep-rooted indifference.

“You’re back?”

“Mhm.” Lu Sheng answered as normal.

“Brother is back. There are a lot of things going on in the city right now, so don’t go out too often,” the girl warned.

“Okay, I know.” Lu Sheng nodded.

This girl was average in appearance, but her gaze was sharp and stubborn. This was Zhao Chengxuan’s older sister, Zhao Chengye, a sister who was the disciple of monk Sanxiao and was never particularly close to Zhao Chengxuan.

When she finished writing, Zhao Chengye ordered the servants to wrap it up and send to a specified address. Without looking at Lu Sheng, she turned around and disappeared into the sea of people.

Lu Sheng stood in place, thinking about how to get a better rating. In tests like these, there were definitely some outlines for how the scoring worked.

“Young Master Xuan, Miss Ye recently got into an argument with another strong person good with the sword, so she’s not in a good mood. She just wrote a battle challenge and sent it to him. Don’t take it personally,” a maid explained quietly. She was Zhao Chengye’s personal servant, Little Yu.

“It’s okay. She’s never liked me anyway.” Lu Sheng laughed at himself, leaving the corner.

He suddenly realized something. The Great Yin was built on the people, so the less casualties, the more successful his task completion will be. His rating would also be higher. This way, it would be easy to absorb this little world into their True Essence absorption matrix.

‘No wonder they gave us identities to hide in. This was what they wanted.’ Lu Sheng instantly understood what the upper levels wanted.

‘It’s clear what to do, then.’ He turned around and ordered his bodyguards to go get food. Then, he sent his maid away and walked into a side garden.

When there was no one left, Lu Sheng slowly took out an item from his backpack. It was a jade-green crystal dagger. There was a well-defined green dragon carved into the blade.

“Find the Violet Snow Garden and the birthplace of the Divine Weapon Maroon Dragon Spear,” Lu Sheng ordered.

“Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!”

In a flutter of wings, the dagger trembled, then glowed a faint green. Five almost invisible beings shot off the dagger, and the green light subsided.

This was the Invisible Dragon Dagger Lu Sheng had spent eight hundred pieces of Devil Gold on. It could summon five little invisible ghosts as slaves. Although the invisible little ghosts were very weak and only as strong as a kid, they were fast and invisible. Along with their high endurance, this dagger sold for a pretty high price even though it didn’t have much battle power.

After doing this, Lu Sheng walked out of the garden like normal and returned to his room to flirt with his maids.

A few hours passed by quickly.

When Lu Sheng opened his eyes, he was already back at the stone house. Everything was black, except for a streak of white shining through the window.

“I’m back.” He let out a long breath and walked out.

“How was it?” Elder Zhang Shilong was practicing his forms outside. Seeing Lu Sheng walk out, he turned around and stopped what he was doing.

“The beginning wasn’t bad.” Lu Sheng laughed.

“Tell me everything that happened and I’ll give you some tips.”

“Okay.”

Lu Sheng described his goal and everything that happened after he entered the world.

“That’s not right… the time jump you had doesn’t seem like an individual mission. There will probably be other people in it with the same goal, so be careful.” Zhang Shilong frowned after listening.

“How so?” Lu Sheng was curious.

“If it were just you, normally they would throw you in a few hours before the battle instead of sending you a few days earlier for you to find out information.” Zhang Shilong shook his head. “Based on your progress, to complete the task, you’ll at least have to wait for the Divine Weapon to be born. And that will take at least a few days. Those days will be your time to take action.”

“Okay.” Lu Sheng nodded.

“Tonight, observe carefully. Don’t let anything escape your consciousness,” Zhang Shilong warned.

“Don’t worry.” Lu Sheng smiled. If it weren’t for the fact that he wanted a higher rating, he would just kill every other person fighting for the treasure.

After resting a night, the two ate breakfast before starting on their journey again. From the stone house to the next resting spot was at least a day on horse.

Night came, and Lu Sheng entered the Other World inside the silk again.

“Young Master, what did you say?” asked the pretty girl the moment Lu Sheng opened his eyes. Her clothes were crumpled and showing most of her chest. She was looking curiously at him as if asking him a question.

“Nothing.” Lu Sheng went over his memories. During the time he wasn’t here, Zhao Chengxun went about his programmed personality and identity as if he was a type of software.

“Nothing.” Lu Sheng looked outside. It was completely dark again.

He then looked at the calendar, making sure that today was the start of the period of time that the Divine Weapon could be reborn.

“Stay at home. I’m going out to the night market.” Lu Sheng stood up abruptly and put on his clothes and belt and left.

As soon as he left the room, he saw his sister, Zhao Chengye, leaning against the railing and conversing with someone.

Zhao Chengye also saw her third brother walking out the room. With a whole hallway between them, she didn’t have anything to say to such a horrible brother. She continued talking, not wanting to bother with her annoying brother.

“Isn’t that your younger brother? Aren’t you going to go take care of him? Once it starts tonight, it will be a complete mess.” Her companion raised an eyebrow.

Thinking about it, Zhao Chengye realized he was right. She couldn’t just ignore her brother.

She ran in the direction that Zhao Chengxuan had left.

Running out of the Zhao Mansion, she saw her third brother leaning lazily against the stone pillar in front of their gate. His back was towards her; he seemed to be polishing something in his hand.

“Brother, it’s not safe tonight. Don’t leave the mansion so that you won’t have to worry me and your older brother.” Zhao Chengye was a little annoyed as she approached him.

“Okay, Sister, I understand.” Lu Sheng smiled and turned around. There was nothing in his hands, just as if he was just rubbing them together.

“That’s good.” Zhao Chenye nodded, looking at his hands suspiciously. But, in the end, she walked back in with saying anything.

Lu Sheng watched her go in, then slowly pulled out the blade from his sleeve a tiny bit. On the blade were five fast-moving red dots, showing the positions of the invisible slaves he’d sent out earlier.

‘I can’t cause too much damage. I need a peaceful solution.’ Lu Sheng pulled out his dagger and swung it around, chuckling. ‘Then I’ll just sever all their hands and feet.

‘As long as they’re alive. If they’re alive, they won’t lose much True Essence.’