Chapter 164: Lord of All Demons? (2)

Seojun left the demonic practitioner’s corpse behind and departed. He figured the city’s martial artists could handle the cleanup since he’d dealt with the demonic practitioner.

After that, he scoured the area based on the map he’d gotten from the Hao Sect.

The map had six locations marked on it, and he was able to find demonic practitioners at four of them.

As expected of the Hao Sect. Pretty good success rate.

All of this took less than a day.

With all his immediate plans completed, Seojun couldn’t help but fall into contemplation.

Seriously, what the hell is this?

The four demonic practitioners he’d encountered were all weaklings below Peak Realm, but no matter how insignificant they were, Seojun shouldn’t have had the ability to control people with a single word.

Yet they’d been unable to resist even his command to commit suicide, as if his words carried some kind of compulsion, and had killed themselves.

Naturally, he could assume this was possible because of their special nature as demonic practitioners.

Of course, he’d done similar things before.

Capturing people, soaking their brains in demonic qi, then forcing them to confess everything.

He’d used it a few times, but this was different. That method involved bleaching most of their consciousness with demonic qi to draw out responses that matched the trigger of questioning.

It wasn’t something he could use like some kind of spirit speech command like this time.

I should look into this a bit more.

He reached a conclusion.

He’d told Chunbong he’d be back quickly, but things had finished much faster than expected.

Since he had spare time, he figured he could catch a few more demonic practitioners for experiments.

While he was at it, he could also test his new Primordial Divine Art.

New Primordial Divine Art.

It sounded grand, but it was nothing special.

While hunting demonic practitioners this time, he’d been able to steal their martial arts quite easily, and all of their cultivation techniques used reverse flow methods that operated inner qi in the opposite direction.

He didn’t know if this was because they were low-level demonic arts, or if most demonic arts used such methods.

In Seojun’s case, he could create demonic qi without needing such methods, which made it even more so.

But regardless, he had obtained demonic art cultivation techniques.

Since the realm he was aiming for in the future was the middle path between Supreme Demonic and Unrestrained, his Primordial Divine Art also needed to change accordingly.

What’s that thing called? Quantum superposition?

Seojun relied on his hazy memory to lay the foundation for his New Primordial Divine Art.

Roughly speaking, when measuring quantum states, multiple result states already exist probabilistically, but since he couldn’t remember it properly, he just borrowed the concept.

Schrödinger’s cat could be used as an example.

Is the cat in the box dead or alive? There’s no way to know whether the cat is dead or alive without opening the box.

Therefore, the probabilities for both results exist simultaneously, and the cat’s state is determined by opening the box and observing. The same was true for the mystery of the New Primordial Divine Art.

The observer here was naturally Seojun himself.

Since qi both exists and doesn’t exist, Seojun only determined the circulation path of his Primordial Divine Art while leaving the direction of circulation undetermined.

At this point, the direction of qi circulation could be represented by a wave graph… or some bullshit like that.

To dumb it down, it just meant that inner qi flows both forward and backward simultaneously.

While leaving room for Seojun to determine that direction whenever he wanted.

In short, it could be called the “However the fuck I want martial art.”

Easy.

When Seojun opened his eyes, a gentle dawn was breaking. Despite staying up all night, his condition was better than ever.

He came down from the tree. Last night he’d casually sat on a branch and created his New Primordial Divine Art while practicing breathing exercises.

Honestly, the New Primordial Divine Art didn’t have much significance.

Seojun could create demonic qi without being constrained by circulation paths. The reason he’d bothered to create the New Primordial Divine Art anyway wasn’t anything special.

For the future, to achieve balance between Supreme Demonic and Unrestrained Realm.

I can readjust it once I get a better demonic art.

It wasn’t difficult.

After stretching refreshingly, Seojun organized his plans for the day.

1. Fly around diligently with Primordial Step while maintaining qi detection.

2. When demonic qi is detected, immediately conduct a home visit.

3. Once I get some results, return to Henan and squeeze Chunbong’s cheeks.

Perfect plan.

“Let’s go.”

Flying Seojun soared across the martial world.

He’d forgotten for a moment. This crazy Central Plains. No exaggeration, but it was genuinely insanely vast.

For ordinary people to travel the entire Central Plains would definitely require more than their entire lifespan. Setting aside the huge balls needed to endure all kinds of dangers…

After three days of scouring Shaanxi, Gansu, and Ningxia without a wink of sleep, Seojun was finally able to find traces of demonic qi.

It was in western Gansu, close to the Black Serpent’s territory, and also quite near the Demonic Cult’s area.

Of course, the Demonic Cult’s stronghold at Mount Tian was absurdly far away, but this was almost right next to Qinghai where the Kunlun Sect was located.

“Lucky.”

Was this his reward for all his flying around? This place didn’t have only one demonic practitioner judging by the demonic qi traces.

There were at least three.

If things went well, he could secure plenty of test subjects.

Seojun first used his face-changing art to change his appearance. The face of middle-aged charming Heavenly Seojun.

Of course, since this was still orthodox faction territory, he didn’t do anything crazy like openly displaying demonic qi.

The county he entered was called Gulang County.

Boldly entering Gulang County, Seojun followed the demonic qi traces.

What’s this?

But something was strange. Small fry below Peak Realm weren’t skilled at hiding demonic qi, yet there were traces of them wandering in all directions more than expected.

Any martial artist with some level of skill would find it strange not to notice.

And one of those traces led into what appeared to be the largest sect in Gulang County.

Frowning, Seojun used Shadowless Under the Moonlight to melt into the shadows.

The sect’s main gate bore the characters “Righteous Profound Sect” written in powerful calligraphy on its signboard.

Seojun stealthily infiltrated the interior and searched through the Righteous Profound Sect.

“Hey, we should have a drink after training ends today.”

“Sounds good! You’re buying this time, right?”

“Hmm… I don’t have money right now…”

“Ugh… Then you buy next time. I’ll pay this time.”

“Haha! Thanks!”

Despite the presence of demonic qi traces, it wasn’t different from any ordinary sect. Just the appearance of an appropriately large sect you’d expect to find in a moderately sized city.

Seojun followed the demonic qi traces suspiciously.

The demonic qi traces led to the deepest part of the sect. That is—to what appeared to be a fairly majestic building where the sect leader seemed to stay.

What’s this? Did the sect leader learn demonic arts?

He had no intention of killing someone just for learning demonic arts. Hell, anyone could learn demonic arts.

In fact, by that logic, Seojun himself could be put on the martial world’s public enemy list right now.

The first thing he did was enter the sect leader’s quarters.

The interior was empty. There were traces of people, but no visible occupants.

However, Seojun’s qi detection noticed there was a hidden space below.

A secret space… could exist.

With an open mind, Seojun searched for the entrance to the secret space.

Of course, he couldn’t find it. More precisely, he found the entrance but had no idea how to open it.

In the end, he had to use his universal key.

Shing—

Seojun drew his sword and cleanly cut through the floor connecting to the secret space.

Nice.

Very clean. If he fit this back properly, it wouldn’t be discovered immediately.

It would be found out eventually… but he wouldn’t be here then, so it didn’t matter.

Entering the secret space, Seojun carefully fitted the cut floor piece back into place.

With a click, the light was blocked and the interior was plunged into total darkness.

Seojun channeled inner qi into his eyes to enhance his vision. The darkness brightened like broad daylight.

He could sense human presence deeper inside. Maintaining his Shadowless Under the Moonlight, he stealthily moved forward, soon hearing quiet voices.

“…when was that again?”

“In due time. When the Heavenly Demon descends to the Central Plains, all under Heaven shall fall to the Demonic Path.”

“Don’t care about some demonic path world domination stuff. Where’s the item?”

“Impious bastard.”

Seojun carefully observed where the voices were coming from.

One man emanating the pure righteous aura characteristic of orthodox factions, and one demon practitioner emanating rough demonic qi.

Surprisingly, the demon practitioner was around the edge of Peak Realm. He didn’t know for sure, but someone at that level wasn’t exactly a weakling.

“I have the goods now. Did you prepare what you promised?”

“Yes.”

The orthodox faction man tapped a specific part of the wall. Rumble! The secret space vibrated slightly as the wall opened.

There was a small room inside the wall that opened up, and inside were about ten people writhing with their limbs bound.

Having roughly grasped the situation through qi detection, Seojun clicked his tongue.

“Hm, so this bastard was a spy?”

At the sudden voice, both men were greatly startled. The orthodox faction man hesitated in confusion, but the demon practitioner was different. He immediately swung his sleeve, and dozens of daggers flew out from within.

Swish swish swish!

Seojun casually extended his right hand and pressed it down.

Thoom! The Black Hand Great Demon Palm unfolded, creating a giant palm that forced all the daggers to the floor.

“Demonic arts…!”

The startled demon practitioner stared at Seojun warily.

Seojun first withdrew his demonic qi. Instead, he circulated his White Ice Divine Art and ordered.

“Cut off your right arm.”

The demon practitioner hesitated, however he showed no signs of complying.

This time, Seojun stopped circulating his White Ice Divine Art and circulated his Primordial Divine Art, manifesting demonic qi.

“I’ll say this for the last time. Cut off your right arm.”

The demon practitioner’s body trembled. His shaking left arm twitched as if it might move.

As expected, it does seem related to demonic qi.

It also seemed certain that it worked less effectively as the opponent’s realm increased. Someone at the edge of Peak Realm could resist quite well.

But that was all.

Since he was using all his mental strength to resist…

Crack!

The demon practitioner’s limbs flew off from a casual strike.

It was slow enough that he could have dodged under normal circumstances, but he wasn’t able to while resisting Seojun’s command.

“Aaaaah…!”

The demon practitioner screamed.