Sanguine and yellow smoke oozed from the mausoleum's pillars, blowing over Xinzi as he neared the entrance gate. The stench, like a mix of boiling flesh and rotting corpses basted in blood, was enough to throw even war veterans into an expeditious coma. But captivated by the maroon coffins, Xinzi ignored it -- stroking the lids with an eerie peacefulness.
Over the past three months, Xinzi had a secret, a dirty secret that he kept concealed from all Liberation Temple girls -- Tusha included.
He didn't have a choice. In each of these coffins lay a cultivator that had been drained to the last drop of blood by none other than Xinzi himself.
This all started with the seven Hengye juniors that Xinzi drained in Night Flower City. Though his emotions still struggled to liberate themselves, his sensations remained. Worse, they'd been magnified to such altitudes that the tiniest indulgence could lead Xinzi into a spiral of addiction. To control his impulses, Xinzi tried many things, even sampling the Paradise drug manufactured by the Heart-Wrenching Cult.
Alas, that wasn't enough. Only by gorging on blood and souls could Xinzi calm his appetite. But the more he consumed, the more tolerance he built. Trapped in this infernal cycle, Xinzi sank into indulgence, his actions causing the birth of another Evil Qi Tide above the mausoleum.
How did he get the food? Simple. Using the tunnels that now connected the Bloodstone Cult to Colorful Wing Supercity -- among other locations -- the Bloodstone Patriarch provided the victims, and Xinzi terminated them.
"How many coffins will I have to build, how many graves will I have to dig before I can sate this insatiable hunger of mine? Hungry...why am I so hungry?" Xinzi didn't know. At times, disoriented by hunger, Xinzi would forget important things. Thankfully, his many avatars didn't share his addiction, enabling him to operate with undiminished efficiency.
The Heart of the Underworld, "eye" of the Yellow Spring Formation, thus took shape. At first, Xinzi didn't plan to make this place, right underneath Colorful Wing Supercity, the heart of his underworld realm. Alas, his actions altered the original plan, making him accumulate so many souls and Evil Qi that this land simply became the most appropriate location for the "eye" through which the formation would run.
"And there is more to come," Xinzi sighed, and stepped over the yellow river, walking through the mausoleum's entrance door. Inside, tens of thousands of spectral strands whirled towards the domed ceiling. Gray ghost fire burned on long torches, lighting up the area with a sinister splendor.
At the center of the spectral strand spiral, one silver coffin hovered, encrusted with large scarlet stones that gleamed with a mesmerizing, albeit corrupt allure. Xinzi stepped into the air, ambling at the coffin. It opened wide, and with a gust of suction force, pulled him in.
Our lost monk closed his eyes, and the coffin closed over him.
Right afterward, a procession of three million Lesser Spirits walked out of one tunnel, landing at the Heart of the Underworld.
Fire Spirits, Water Spirits, Wood, Earth and Metal Spirits, it didn't matter. As soon as their eyes swept past the yellow river, coffins and ghastly mausoleum, all showed the same reaction: complete terror.
Yes, for once, the scions of the various spirit clans showed flawless unity, but perhaps they wished that it wasn't the fear of the catastrophic fate they'd likely suffer here that bound them together.
The Spiritual Aristocracy wasn't a united class. Clans and branches had existed since the dawn of time, with superiority and inferiority complexes separating the Great Spirits from the Lesser Spirits. All Great Spirits belonged to the Spiritual Aristocracy, but the same didn't apply to the Lesser Spirits who, more numerous, had to fight tooth and nail for an opportunity to rank among the hereditary aristocrats.
The Great Desolation World at large had billions of spirit commoners. The only difference being that, unlike human commoners, all spirit commoners were cultivators.
To pacify Xinzi, the imperial clan's supreme elder, Shentu Shun, had three million spirit scions captured by his loyalists and sent towards Colorful Wing Supercity. Zhen-Xinzi intercepted them, then had the Bloodstone Patriarch arrange a more proper shipping route.
Born in far-removed lesser branches, though equipped with spirit lineages, these spirit scions didn't have the resources to aspire to successful cultivator careers -- at least by spirit standards.
And while they all wanted to scream, golden metallic mouthpieces kept them shut. They wouldn't be alone for long. An army of 666,666 demons emerged from another tunnel, joining their spirit partners of misfortune as the offerings of the Heart-Wrenching Demon Noble.
Yes, unbeknown to the world, the Heart-Wrenching Demon Noble hid an army of one million Lesser Heart Demons, bestowed upon him by his devil master in the contract that helped him secure his wretched cultivation method.
That same devil supported Shentu Shun, but while undoubtedly more powerful than Xinzi, there wasn't much he could do all the way from the Infernal Paradise -- especially now that Xinzi didn't have to fear devils attempting to possess him through Evil Qi.
Aware that Xinzi had already seen through all he had to offer, the Heart-Wrenching Demon Noble decided to pay a king's ransom, hoping that Xinzi wouldn't dare to accept this offering. After all, though insignificant in the eyes of their master, these troops came from a dominant Lord of the Infernal Paradise.
Xinzi had already offended him by stealing a core piece of the Void-Shredding Claw. Would he add insult to injury by taking ownership of these 666,666 demons?
Xinzi didn't plan to.
It was best to eat them.
The cultivation base of these demons went from peak Nascent Soul to peak Void Tribulant. Without a doubt, this was a formidable force. But Xinzi had already seen through the identity of the Heart-Wrenching Demon Noble's backer and, knew that if he used the Servant Sutra to indoctrinate that person's servants, he risked exposing his Devil Root Refining Sutra -- exposing it to Vritra...Lord Sheitan's most loyal servant.
This was a fight that Xinzi didn't want to pick. Even from his prison, Sheitan's influence wasn't something that the average Sovereign Devil could compare to. Xinzi could offend Vritra, but drawing Sheitan's attention so early would cause no end of disasters.
Also, he was hungry.
And as all hungry folks, he had to eat.
Misty ink oozed from the 666,666 demons' full black eyes. Xinzi's coffin opened, revealing a gargantuan draconic arm that lunged out of the mausoleum to swipe at the shackled Heart Demons.
'Don't--'
They couldn't scream -- and even if they could, didn't have the time to.
With one swipe, the draconic claw cleaved 1,000 demon lives. Rolling waves of Blood Energy and Evil Qi spread through the rest. By the time they realized what was going on, the 666,666 demons had burst into a sea of blood, forming a lustrous red river that flowed into Xinzi's coffin, feeding our lost monk with tanks of Blood Energy and Evil Qi.
"Aaah..." A long sigh of contentment echoed throughout the mausoleum. The draconic limb returned to the coffin. Again, it closed. But faced with this terrible scene, the three million spirit offerings fell on their knees, shaking and sweating profusely.
