Way of the Devil

‘What is this place?’ Lu Sheng quickly calmed down.

He’d still been in the Zhao Family’s manor a second ago, and he was now abruptly in this garden. Nobody else could have fooled him besides the people of the Zhao Family.

Also, he was the mainstay of the team that purged Zhao Luoying of the pollutants. Even if the Zhao Family had their agenda, they would not have chosen this moment to act against him.

Hence, he was very calm now.

Zhao Shengying blinked and slowly stood.

“Teacher Lu… Didn’t you say… that you’d… design a method for me?” Her gaze was blank. Her limbs moved gingerly and weakly as if she was a walking dead.

However, Lu Sheng could clearly sense an extremely terrifying and powerful aura which he had never encountered before inside her. The aura was contorting and swirling as if it would break out of Zhao Shengying’s body at any time.

He was merely standing before her, yet he could already sense a vast amount of decaying aura charging wildly against his body.

His body had been impenetrable before. However, under this impact, he was starting to feel sharp pangs of pain.

“Lady cousin, if this is an illusion art, please undo it. I’m only a doctor who doesn’t even have the strength to strangle a chicken. I’m not skilled in actual combat. Please understand.” Lu Sheng lowered his head slightly as he pleaded with her with a solemn expression.

“Aren’t you… the one who… came here to look for me?” Zhao Shengying’s voice answered with intermittent breaks. She stared at Lu Sheng and let out a faint, mocking laugh.

“Heheh… Your power… is interesting.” It seemed as if she had not been talking for a long time. After saying those many words, she gradually got used to speaking. The pace of her speech was much smoother now.

“So, are you still lady Zhao Shengying?” Lu Sheng asked with a slightly stern tone.

“Me?” Zhao Shengying raised her hand. The countless red meat lumps grew in number on the back of her hand. In no time, the entire back of her hand was swollen.

“Have you heard of the original core before?” She licked her swollen hand. Her barbed tongue dislodged the meat lumps and she chewed on them.

The meat lumps grew in a frenzy as if they were in a competition. Then, she easily licked and swallowed them. They resembled red sand lumps.

“Original core?” Lu Sheng frowned. He had never heard of that before.

“I’m a child of the original core, a tinder of the Undead City. The Anomalies you’ve heard about are actually products of the beings that survived after being tainted by our auras,” explained “Zhao Shengying” with a smile.

“This is my Heart World, Garden of the Apocalypse. If you’re interested, you may take a tour. But for now, I want to ask you the same question. Can you design a health-maintenance cultivation method that enhances my charm?”

“That’s what you need?” Lu Sheng answered with a question.

“That’s one of my other needs.””Zhao Shengying’s” lips were curved upward at a peculiar angle.

“Believe me, if you follow me and submit to me, I’ll give you everything. I’ll make your heart stay in eternal bliss…”

“Pchht!”

Lu Sheng’s vision blurred. He suddenly snapped back to his senses. He was still sitting before Zhao Shengying. Aunt Mei was standing on her left as she eyed him nervously.

The dozen or so gazes of the experts were also locked on him. These bodyguards were starting to feel impatient as well.

It was only then that Lu Sheng realized what had happened. He had been pulled into the Heart World under the noses of so many people and was instantly returned.

None of the others noticed anything.

‘Wow…’ Lu Sheng had just recently improved his strength. He even thought that he was the best in the world already. He did not expect to be taught otherwise this soon.

‘Tinder of the Undead City. Child of the original core…’ Lu Sheng committed these names to his memory. He had an inkling that the clues would be hidden within these two terms.

What were the Anomalies? How were they formed? Where did they come from? Why would they not budge from their spots?

Lu Sheng had had this series of questions since a long time ago. However, he had never found an answer.

‘Why wouldn’t they die? Why’re they so eccentric?’

By the look of things, Zhao Shengying herself and this Aunt Mei had no knowledge of the child of the original core’s existence.

Lu Sheng retracted his finger slowly.

He could not find anything. The moment his spirit-prompting threads entered her body, they were quickly devoured by some strange power. He did not have the time to probe about.

It was only now that he understood that perhaps this was the truth behind Zhao Shengying’s so-called Leak-all True Lord.

“How was it? Teacher Lu?” Zhao Shengying looked at him with anticipation. Aunt Mei was giving him with the same look.

Lu Sheng gave it some thought. Eventually, he shook his head.

“Lady cousin, your constitution is shocking. I can’t do anything…”

Zhao Shengying immediately looked disappointed.

“…however, it’s not exactly as if there’s nothing we can do.” Lu Sheng completely switched the tone of his speech.

*****************

In the universe, in the spot where the Cloud Sky Pavilion had exploded and disappeared, the remnants of the planet condensed into misty objects which floated across this space slowly.

Within the darkness, there seemed to be some strange gravitational force pulling on these floating clouds. They managed to clump together and form a small nebula.

“Hiss!”

In an instant, a gray rift suddenly opened up among one of the floating clouds.

It resembled a huge eye which opened in the void. A giant figure slowly poked its head out of the gray rift which spanned 100 meters.

This figure was being illuminated by a distant star. Eventually, it revealed its entire body.

It was an impressive-looking giant with a pair of misty, colorful and radiant wings.

The giant had no hair. In the center of its bald head, there was a huge and complicated triangular pattern.

“Is this the place? Zhuang Jiu had fallen here?” The giant’s deep voice slowly spread in all directions.

“Yes, esteemed Third Devil King. Master Zhuang Jiu’s clones and main body were reduced to ashes at the same time. Early findings suggest that he was struck by a Backtrace-tier attack. It only lasted for an instant. He didn’t even have the time to use his life-saving item before he was completely destroyed. Not a single trace of his spirit was left.” Several blurry black shadows surfaced in space. They had upper bodies of men, which were covered in thick black cloaks. Their lower bodies were long black shadowy tendrils which resembled snakes. The tendrils twisted and turned slowly in the void. It was as if they were leaving behind some mysterious and profound traces.

The giant narrowed his eyes slowly. “So, you guys don’t know what to do but summon me here?”

“We have no authority to direct your movements. These are orders from the Ghost Borneo King himself,” the black shadows hastily explained.

Ghost Borneo King, Ghost Borneo World’s First Devil King. He was also the master of a world.

The giant knew that if these black shadows were mobilized, it signified that these were orders given by the First.

Although he was feeling slightly dissatisfied, he did as he was told. He bit his finger. His colorful cicada wings-like radiant plumes suddenly unleashed two strips of colorful light.

The colorful light hovered before the giant. He pressed his bleeding finger into the colorful light.

“Space-time Mark, open!” the giant shouted in his deep voice. The colorful light suddenly erupted.

Before everyone’s eyes, the scenes which had happened before the Cloud Sky Pavilion’s explosion were replayed.

Within the test corridor, the machinery worked as programmed. It was as if they had gone back in time.

The poisonous light that was shot out quickly returned to the crystal.

The poisonous mist that was released suddenly shrunk backward and returned to being red, tantalizing, juicy fruits.

The ferocious monsters that emerged quickly walked backward into the dark prison where they had been sealed.

The scenes rewound before them. The giant and the black shadows inspected the afterimages of the space-time spectrum left behind in this spot.

Time passed them by. In the blink of an eye, six hours had gone by.

“Found it!” The giant suddenly paused. The scene before the others instantly froze over.

The scene was paused at the point where Lu Sheng leapt into a gray rift.

“This fellow’s alive?” exclaimed the giant with surprise.

“Can we go back even further? What about the scenes before this? This is incomplete,” said one of the black shadows.

“We can’t. The traces here are thin. They seem to have been damaged by the Eight-headed Griffon’s flames. I can’t go back further.” The giant shook his head.

“In other words, that little Heavenly Devil, who we thought was dead all this while, has surprisingly escaped with his life. Meanwhile, the Fifth Devil King, Zhuang Jiu, who was much more powerful than he was, and the other experts in the Cloud Sky Pavilion were cleanly burned away by the Eight-headed Griffon’s flames?” said one of the black shadows, sounding perplexed.

“Regardless of whether this matter is related to this person or not, he escaped from the corridor before any real danger occurred. There’s surely something fishy about this.”

“You’re right. If we can get our hands on this person, we might be able to learn about part of the truth.”

The black shadows kept analyzing and adding their own views. They quickly confirmed the key points.

“It’s true. No matter what, Zhuang Jiu’s body is one of the candidates meant for the world master. If he’s dead, this means that the world master has one less chance for rebirth. Our current priority should be apprehending this person,” the giant eventually said calmly. “No matter what, this person has successfully escaped before the great disaster occurred, just as if he anticipated that something would happen. This alone indicates that this person is connected to this incident.”

“You are right, master. Allow us to track him down for now. This person’s blood relatives and clan are still around. With our power, we can surely track his current position if we can discreetly get our hands on his bloodline,” one of the black shadows quickly spoke.

“I’ll leave this to you, then.” The giant nodded slightly. “I’ll be sleeping in the Sumeru Rift. You may call upon me if the need arises.”

“Thank you for your trust, master,” one of the black shadows replied in a deep voice.

“Be careful… The Eight-headed Griffon Tribe is troublesome. This is not the time for us to butt heads with these primal beasts,” said the giant in his deep voice.

“Naturally. We understand this.” The black shadow nodded slightly.

“Mm-hm. Go, then.” The giant waved his hand.

The group of shadows instantly plunged into the void like shuttles. They vanished in the blink of an eye.

The giant remained where he was. When all of the black shadows were far enough, he turned to look at the empty space where the Cloud Sky Pavilion had been before it exploded.

With Ghost Borneo World’s most powerful Shadow Play Assassins making their move, the target could already be considered found. What he needed to know now was why Zhuang Jiu would come to this area.

Logically, there was no way that the settings here were leaked beforehand. Zhuang Jiu was the Fifth Devil King. With his Void Underworld strength, many organizations would have kept a close eye on his every move.

‘So, why did he send a clone over? This is strange.’

At a crucial moment such as this, there was no room for error.

“I hope that nothing’s up with the Mother of Pain… Otherwise, we might have no other choice but to start prematurely.”

The giant swept his ice-cold gaze in the direction of the Yellow Springs planetary system. He turned around, stepped into the rift, and vanished.

The gray rift swiftly faded as well.