Way of the Devil

Midnight, twelve minutes past two, at Fei Mansion.

The collection room was chained by dark golden locks made from chants. Inside, antiques were all over the floor and shelves.

More than half of the rug was charred, and the rest of it was covered in a gray-white dust from some unknown source.

It was completely silent. In the small tent beside the pond, guards were breathing softly as if they had all fallen asleep.

“Hiss… hiss, hiss…”

Suddenly, the sound of electricity hissing came from inside the collection room. The air inside the collection room started twisting and turning, forming a vortex the size of a fist.

A small black dot slowly formed in the center of the vortex.

“Hiss!”

The black dot suddenly expanded and formed a tall figure giving off black smoke.

“This node… is destroyed?” The figure looked toward the spot where the mirror was destroyed.

The figure seemed to be very unstable, twitching every now and then like a tv with a bad connection.

“This is the territory of the Thousand Sun Sect. You shouldn’t have been so impulsive.” A slim figure walked in behind him.

“I know, I thought there was another node here,” the tall man said in a low voice. His voice seemed to be a collection of rumbles or the buzzing of a thousand bees. He didn’t speak the language of the Great Yin, but rather a completely different language. Except, this language seemed to be able to get meaning across directly, so one didn’t have to know the language to understand it.

“Since the node broke, let’s just go back to the Three Sacred Gates and buy more. There’s no need to invoke danger upon yourself,” the slim figure said.

“No, I just wanted to see who foiled my plans,” the tall man explained.

“Some lucky little guy from a branch of the Thousand Sun Sect. It was completely by chance. If you seek revenge, you will expose yourself. That would be bad for the sect.”

The tall man paused for a bit.

“You’re right. I’ll just find a new node.”

The two of them looked toward the pieces of the broken mirror, falling silent.

***

Lu Sheng’s gaze swept over the books on the huge bookshelf. There were five main categories for True Qi Arts: Mental, Chants, Magic, Martial Arts, and Secret Arts.

These five categories were really categories for the results of True Qi.

Mental arts cultivated True Qi and kept improving it, ignoring the physical body.

Chants improved both True Qi and the body at the same time.

Magic focused more on the body, and True Qi was only used to enhance the physical body.

Martial Arts pursued True Qi that dealt great damage in actual battles.

Secret Arts were rare secret arts that used True Qi. Most of them took a great toll on the user, hurting others and themselves.

Glancing over, Lu Sheng liked Chants better than the others. He wanted to improve his True Qi and body at the same time.

But Chants were also the hardest among them. They were either mediocre at best, or extremely hard, and needed a lot of talent to use. They also took the most resources and time.

After much debate, he finally settled on a Chant for cultivating earthly fire.

“Melting Core Earth Heart Chant.”

There were nine levels to the Chant. The ninth and highest level was powerful enough to control lava inside the earth. As long as one was standing on the ground, they would have an infinite amount of earthly fire to control. It was very strong.

“Junior Apprentice Brother Lu, why did you chose this chant?” Yun Wanfei came over and looked at the Chant book in Lu Sheng’s hands puzzledly.

“Among Chants, the Melting Core Earth Chant is only average. The Violet Jade Wings Chant is better at developing the body, while the True Qi aspect of the Light Dream Chant, which is one of the lower Chants, is better than this one’s despite being so very mediocre. There isn’t much potential to that, either. The only benefit would be being able to control earthly fire for as long or as much as you want and greatly reduce the effort on yourself.” Yun Wanfei paused, then continued, “But after cultivating to the highest level, the damage is only equal to that of a top Earth level, but takes more than twice the resources needed for other Chants.”

Lu Sheng understood her. She wanted to persuade him that this Chant wasn’t worth it. But the points she mentioned weren’t what Lu Sheng was looking for. The reason he chose this one was the infinite amount of earthly fire it supplied and the relative looseness to cultivation environment.

A lot of other Chants required strict environments and rules as well as tons of rare herbs or treasures. Only this Chant required nothing. Other than being hard and average, there were no big faults.

“It’s okay, I’ve already picked this one. It’s only a supplement.” Lu Sheng smiled.

“That’s true. Junior Apprentice Brother’s master is That One, so you wouldn’t need me offering advice on things like this.” Yun Wanfei also laughed.

Lu Sheng took out the human-height book and flipped open to the first page. In the center of the white sheet was a delicate flower pattern. It was a faint golden color.

Under the guidance of Yun Wanfei, Lu Sheng reached out with his hand and laid it on top of the flower pattern.

“Hiss…”

After a series of small noises, he lifted his hand and looked at his palm. There was a rectangle of tiny print on his palm.

Above the text, in a really tiny font, it wrote: Melting Core Earth Heart.

This was the matrix the Autumn Moon City branch of the Thousand Sun Sect had purchased from the main sect to pass on secret manuscripts. Every book could be imprinted onto the reader.

This book imprint would only last five days. Although it seemed like a shadow, if one looked closely, one could still read the words. One could also flip the pages with their mind.

Lu Sheng put the book back into the bookshelf.

“Junior Apprentice Brother, do you want to go over together? I’ll show you our newest arrivals.” Yun Wanfei smiled.

“Senior Apprentice Sister, you have to give me a discount,” Lu Sheng chuckled. He didn’t have much money right now. All he had was the allowance the sect gave over the months, and the bigger chunk came from his allowance this month after becoming a direct disciple. It was fifty pieces of devil gold. Along with apology gift from the Song Family a while ago, the Ziying Orb, he would only have a hundred fifty in total. This money would a huge sum for an ordinary person, but to them, it was barely average.

“Don’t worry, Junior Apprentice Brother. With your fame and identity, you can easily borrow a few thousand pieces of devil gold. You can return it when you get back to the Moling Mansion. We have a branch in the Moling Mansion too,” Yun Wanfei explained.

Her family had already given Lu Sheng a rating. Originally, it was only a B, but after he became the disciple of That One, it immediately got raised to an A+, even higher than most elders, who were A.

That meant that in the eyes of the Yun family, Lu Sheng, who only displayed the strength of the Realm of Snake, had a higher standing than most Earth level elders in this branch.

“I’m in your debt then, Senior Apprentice Sister.” Lu Sheng nodded, indicating he acknowledged her offer.

The two left the bookshelf together and followed the path back. In the long, empty hallway, Yun Wanfei briefed Lu Sheng on the events back at the Moling Mansion.

As a transferred direct disciple and the disciple of That One, Lu Sheng got the identity of a direct disciple at the main sect immediately too.

And as a direct disciple of the main sect, there were many ways he could make devil gold.

For example, he could take on a task of killing leftover Devil Armies, explore the Other Worlds, or carry out some investigation tasks. If he had a talent in things like formations, medicine, or weapons, he could also make lots of money.

“Isn’t this like the things in the novels?” Lu Sheng felt strange. Purifying pills, drawing magic notes, carving matrices, building magic weapons… these seemed like stuff in those xianxia novels.

“Of course, we’re still different from xianxia novels. If you don’t have a bloodline, you can’t enter a sect. Otherwise…” Yun Wanfei smiled. “You’ll know when you get there.”

The two left the buddhist temple and raced towards the Southwest for over ten miles. Soon, they came to a green valley full of birds and flowers.

At the entrance of the valley were two statues of golden toads, each over a few meters tall. Wisps of green clouds floated above. Standing at the entrance, Lu Sheng could also see green smoke coming from inside the house.

“Elder.” Multiple green-robed men ran out, kneeling and saluting Yun Wanfei from a distance.

“I have a visitor with me. Prepare the cargo.” Yun Wanfei made a few signs with one of her hands.

“Puff, puff!”

The two toads at the entrance opened their mouths and spat out two streams of blue smoke.

The blue smoke covered Lu Sheng and blurred his vision. After a moment, the blue smoke dissipated, and Lu Sheng’s surroundings completely changed.

He and Yun Wanfei were now standing in a round, stone chamber.

On one side of the stone chamber, the side they were facing, was a tunnel. Light-up pearls lit up the dark hallway. Lu Sheng didn’t know what type of light-up pearls they were, but their light was bright and white—like torches.

“Please sit.” Yun Wanfei gestured to Lu Sheng.

The two sat down on the chairs behind them.

“This is a special underground chamber my Yun Family constructed. It’s made specially for VIPs, so you don’t have to worry about any information leaking out. Here, every visitor can say their deepest desire. No matter what it is, we will try our best to make it come true. As long as you have enough devil gold, everything is possible,” she explained with a smile.

Lu Sheng instantly understood. If she dared to speak like that, then the backing the Yun Family had had to be frightening.

Maybe they even had connections to the Three Big Families. After all, the place with the most slaves was the royal palace of the Great Yin.

“Truly amazing!” Lu Sheng nodded.

“Bring the tea.” Yun Wanfei clapped her hands.

Immediately, two bees with human faces flew out the tunnel with a buzz. They set down tea and cakes.

This was the first time Lu Sheng saw a human-headed bee.

These creatures were taller than a regular person. Their heads were that of beautiful women, but their bodies were huge bumblebees. Among the black and yellow stripes, their wings flapped at an extremely high speed. Their feet didn’t touch the ground, and they appeared obedient and humble.

After they set up the tea, the two human bees floated behind the two.

“Clap, clap.”

Yun Wanfei clapped her hands gently once again.

A man and a woman walked out of the tunnel slowly. Both were completely nude. Every inch of their faces and bodies were perfect.

But the two walked to Lu Sheng and Yun Wanfei and kneeled down. They then turned around so their backs were facing the two.