Way of the Devil

“Open the Gate of Destruction?” Lu Sheng had never heard of this theory before. It felt strange to him, about as strange as God cleansing the world by destroying everything. As for the Gate of the Devil World, that could be referring to the Gate of Contamination. The Gate of Pain might be the one under the Golden Plaza.

He quickly processed this information, then promptly smiled lightly at the awkward-looking King Shadow.

“I hope you told me the truth.” He didn’t bother with anything else and turned away. “Once I confirm that this information is accurate, I’ll come back and release you!”

“Huh!!??” King Shadow wanted to stop him, but didn’t even have the time to call out before Lu Sheng’s shadow disappeared.

***

The Golden Plaza.

Lu Sheng once again jumped into the cavern, landing lightly on the hard floor of the Golden Plaza.

This place probably wasn’t made out of pure gold. Pure gold couldn’t be this hard, yet these gold blocks were extremely hard.

The golden wheel spun around in the distance like a ferris wheel, while the air around scented with a faint and unidentifiable fragrance.

The golden giant had disappeared, and the golden buildings were also replaced by completely different ones. Everything had changed since Lu Sheng’s last visit.

“What is this place…” Lu Sheng frowned, staring at the massive golden wheel looming in the distance. He couldn’t even hear any noise because of the distance between them.

Lu Sheng stopped his breathing. Inhaling too much of of this unknown smell couldn’t be good.

Ignoring the ferris wheel, he looked left along the floor, and quickly found the entrance to the tunnel he had found last time.

The loosened golden floorboard, along with the dark hole leading deeper underground, were both still there.

“It definitely is the same place, but this plaza… maybe something has changed…” Lu Sheng tapped his feet, and his whole body lightly flew up, and then descended into the tunnel entrance.

Without a single doubt in his mind, he walked into the ghostly cavern.

After walking along the tunnel for about ten breaths, he soon saw the source of the water from the River of Poisoned Fog: an ancient door made of roots filled with Mental Energy.

He walked up to it and put his hand against the door.

“Hisss…”

Slivers of Mental Energy were absorbed into this body.

“It had 50 units of Mental Energy stored in it. Not bad.” Lu Sheng retracted his hand after quickly absorbing the mental energy, quite satisfied by the fact that 50 units of mental energy had been accumulated in such a small amount of time.

“Whoosh, whoosh…”

Lu Sheng suddenly thought he heard something.

He looked both left and right in confusion, but the surrounding mist didn’t have any commotion at all. He was the only living being in the empty, pitch-black tunnel.

Finding nothing, he once again turned his attention back to the door. He tried to look through the crack, attempting to find what made this Gate of Pain so special according to King Shadow.

But, he failed to sense the shape crawling up from the floor behind him.

His body was a dark-yellow color, with insect pupa hanging onto his entire body.

The stranger seemed to be a male, his body filled with hundreds of uneven wounds. Within each one, half of a pupa could be seen hanging out from it.

Even on his face, pupae were crawling in his mouth and eyes. These pupae were also dark yellow, and through the half-clear shell, one could see the disgusting, oozing pus inside of it.

Slowly, a dark-yellow moth wing unfolded from the stranger’s back, covering all possible escape routes. Fine powder from the moth wing spread in the air, covering all corners of the tunnel.

His hands slowly reached toward Lu Sheng’s neck, while a strange smile formed on his face.

“I never turn my back on my enemy,” Lu Sheng suddenly spoke. “And when I do, it means it’s not a threat at all.”

The stranger’s arms floated in the air, but couldn’t press down further no matter how hard he tried.

“Boom!!”

A layer of an immense force field exploded outward from Lu Sheng’s body; in an instant, the stranger was slammed into the wall before he could even react.

“BAM!”

The wall exploded, and countless pieces of gravel flew out. The stranger’s two meter tall body was embedded deep inside the wall, only leaving behind a man-shaped hole a couple meters deep.

Lu Sheng didn’t even bother lifting his hand. Finally, he turned around and stared at the hole in the wall.

An invisible force extended out and easily grabbed the stranger out from the wall. It was the power of Blood Net; after the integration of Inner Qi and Devil Qi, their power would manifest into a net of Qi protecting his body. This net was powerful and tough, and furthermore, Lu Sheng could even control it like an arm or use it as a force field.

“Can you talk?” Lu Sheng looked at the stranger restrained in midair.

This man looked like a corpse infested with moths, his wounds filled densely with moth pupae. He even had two moth wings flapping behind his back.

“Kill…kill me…” The stranger twisted his body and screamed, “Kill me…” The sound he made seemed to be able to communicate with the soul. Lu Sheng could understand him despite the lack of language being used.

Lu Sheng could only get one answer despite asking repeatedly.

He started to activate his Blood Net out of desperation.

“Rrrrippp…”

The mothman’s body was instantly cut into hundreds of equal-sized pieces, killing him along with the pupae on his body.

“You want to enter the Gate of Pain?” a scared voice voice asked from his side of the gate.

Lu Sheng frowned. He once again failed to sense the approaching person, which was strange. His sense had reached the peak of human limits, yet he still did not sense whatever had just talked to him.

What did that mean? It meant that whatever just talked to him might not be approached by just using the traditional five senses.

He looked in the direction the voice came from.

A pale little girl clad in a black coat and black hood entered his view. Her face was delicate, but without a single hint of color as if she just went through a great illness or lost too much blood.

The girl was only half as tall as him, and had to lift her head to talk to him.

“Who are you?” Lu Sheng asked calmly. “Can you take me through the Gate of Pain?” He thought of the demon who desperately wanted to go through the Gate of Pain. There must have been some secret he wasn’t aware of.

“They call me Ansha.” The girl smiled sweetly. “It is actually very easy to enter the Gate of Pain. You only need to experience the pain within and pass the test.”

“Experience the pain…?” Lu Sheng was perplexed.

“The mothman was sent here to assist you in experiencing pain. Unfortunately, you killed him.” The little girl, Ansha, smiled. “Once you have experienced pain, you will realize that the Gate of Pain was never closed…”

As she finished talking, her body started to disappear as if it was an illusion all along.

The little girl Ansha disappeared, while Lu Sheng stood still instead of chasing her. He fell into deep thought.

What did the Gate of Pain represent? According to King Shadow, the Devil World’s main goal was the Gate of Pain that connected to the Human World. There had to be a secret hidden in this—a secret that no one knew.

“Experience pain….” He had a bad feeling about this. The feeling was foreign for him as he had never experienced it before. Not even when he was facing the skeletal hand of the Devil Master within the Gate of Flesh and Blood.

After some hesitation, he still couldn’t steel his resolve, and walked away instead. He didn’t have to take this risk; at this rate, he would break through to the Devil Master level eventually.

“Are you leaving?” The girl suddenly appeared again in the shadow behind him.

Lu Sheng turned his head to face her. He could sense an air of of twisted destruction about her, which he had only sensed once before: during his battle against the skeletal hand.

Within this little girl probably hid something horrifying.

“If you could stay and spend some time with me, I will be very happy,” Ansha said with a smile.

“You seem to know about a lot of stuff.” Lu Sheng narrowed his eyes.

“Yes, more than you could imagine,” Ansha answered honestly.

“Unfortunate… I need to leave. I am moving away from here.” Lu Sheng’s calm expression didn’t change at all.

“Because of this plaza?” Ansha widened her eyes. Tears swirled in her charming, delicate, crystalline eyes.

“No… it’s not about this place. I just want to leave this place. The world outside is getting increasingly chaotic,” Lu Sheng answered casually.

“Will you ever come back and visit me?” Ansha seemed to be very interested in Lu Sheng.

“That might be hard.” Lu Sheng shook his head.

“Is that so?” Ansha was disappointed. “You are the first man I’ve seen. The first strange one.”

“Really? How long have you been here?” Lu Sheng asked casually.

“Can’t remember… it must have been a very, very long time. Ever since I moved here, my perception of time has been blurred. There are no nights or days, no seasons, no sunlight, and no rain…” Ansha said bitterly.

“Really?” Despite knowing that this girl wasn’t normal, Lu Sheng still felt a pang of sadness. If it was him imprisoned in this sunless place, he would go mad too.

“One last request.” Ansha widened her eyes as if to plead with him. “Can you come closer? Let me see you?”

The space between the two was filled with mist that blurred their vision.

Lu Sheng narrowed his eyes.

“Of course.” He walked forward until he was only ten meters away from the girl.

“So close…” Ansha stared at him as if she was in a trance. She lowered her head toward the ground, and raised it again to stare at Lu Sheng. She repeated the same motion many times.

“Thank you…”

“No problem.”

“I am very grateful. You are the first one to have agreed.” Ansha smiled a sincere and sweet smile. “Thank you… no matter who you are.”

Lu Sheng didn’t quite understand her.

“I will leave then.”

“Yes.” Ansha stared at him calmly. “Will we meet again?”

Lu Sheng paused.

“I think… not…”

“Not long from now,” Ansha interrupted him. “Not long from now, we will meet again.” She again displayed a sincere and pure smile.

Lu Sheng had never seen such a innocent smile before. It was as if he was in a sea of sunlight and sunflowers.

Warm and cozy, as if inviting him to go hug all of it.

Without saying anything else, Lu Sheng turned and stepped out, disappearing in the bend of the tunnel.