Realm Walker

Zhang Yuanqing greeted the curly-haired poodle with a bow. ”Elder Teddy!”

Elder Teddy gave a slight nod in return, maintaining his crouch as he gazed toward the Demon Eye sealed within the tree.

”The person you wanted to see is here,” he said to the prisoner. ”I hope you’ll honor your promise.”

The Demon Eye Heavenly King looked at Zhang Yuanqing, the corner of his mouth curling upward with undisguised delight. ”I’d like to speak with Yuanshi Tianzun alone.”

Elder Teddy shook his head. ”You know that’s pointless.”

Inside the Zoo, every plant was his eyes and ears.

The Demon Eye Heavenly King bared his teeth in a grin. ”I simply don’t enjoy having small fry hovering around when I’m trying to have a conversation.”

The small fry in question, Fu Qingyang, raised an eyebrow.

Elder Teddy considered this briefly, then turned to Zhang Yuanqing. ”No matter what he says, you absolutely must not remove the band on his forehead.”

”An Enchanting Demon’s regular eyes can also unleash skills,” Zhang Yuanqing said uneasily.

”Don’t worry,” replied Elder Teddy. ”His abilities have been sealed. He’s no different from an ordinary person.”

With that, Elder Teddy departed with Fu Qingyang in tow. Only Zhang Yuanqing and the Demon Eye remained in the cell. The Demon Eye Heavenly King, completely swallowed up with only his upper body and head showing, smiled warmly.

”We meet again, Yuanshi Tianzun!”

”Frankly, I’d have preferred not to.” Zhang Yuanqing kept his expression blank and his voice low. ”Say what you need to say, Demon Eye Heavenly King. Though I doubt we have much to discuss.”

The Demon Eye Heavenly King maintained his radiant smile. ”At first, I merely wanted to swat you like the insect you were. To avenge Li Xianzong. Li Xianzong was cruel, yes, and bloodthirsty by nature, but he possessed one quality I valued. Compared to most Enchanting Demons, his moral floor was a fraction higher. I planned to groom him into a capable lieutenant, someone to help me cleanse the world. Unfortunately, you killed him. Of course, you were delivering justice. I won’t deny that.”

Can we skip the preamble and get to the point? Zhang Yuanqing grumbled internally.

”You know I follow rules when I kill,” the Demon Eye Heavenly King continued. ”I never take an innocent life. Therefore, after arriving in Songhai, I had my people investigate you for any crimes. Unfortunately, you’ve never broken a single law. No corruption, no abuse of power, no assault on women, no murder of innocents. I simply couldn’t find a reason to kill you.”

Zhang Yuanqing couldn’t hold back anymore. ”Heavenly King, has it occurred to you that maybe I just haven’t gotten around to any of that yet?”

The Demon Eye Heavenly King nodded. ”My subordinates pointed that out too. But how do you explain the Bronze Sparrow Tower case? The risk you took was completely disproportionate to any personal gain. What drove you to risk your life dismantling that operation? You don’t need to answer me. Just ask your own heart.”

Zhang Yuanqing had no rebuttal. He sighed.

”Why did you want to see me?” he asked instead. ”What is it you’re actually after?”

Rather than answering directly, the Demon Eye Heavenly King let out a long sigh of his own.

”My life has been one long failure,” he lamented. ”As a child, I scraped by just to survive, my life worth less than dirt. As a teenager, I seethed with impotent fury at corrupt officials and cowered before every thug who preyed on the weak.

”When I finally became an Enchanting Demon, the people I faced were the very kind I despised most. Sometimes the effort of tolerating them nearly broke me, and still I was powerless to act. I wanted to purge the world of its evil. To kill in order to end killing. To meet violence with violence. The Lawful crowd called me a radical, a lunatic, someone who deserved death. The Evil faction said I was out of my mind.”

Zhang Yuanqing listened in silence. And they were wrong?

”After all that searching, I finally found Li Xianzong, a passable companion at best. And then I learned about you.”

The Demon Eye Heavenly King’s gaze suddenly blazed with intensity. ”Yuanshi Tianzun, there are plenty of law-abiding people in this world. But those willing to risk their lives for what’s right are vanishingly rare. And among those rare few who have both the willingness and the ability, coupled with extraordinary potential, you are the only one I’ve ever encountered.”

His burning gaze bore into Zhang Yuanqing. ”Yuanshi Tianzun, follow me. Cleanse this world alongside me. This world is sick. It needs to be healed.”

You dragged me out here in the middle of the night just to recruit me? Zhang Yuanqing found it absurd, yet entirely in character for the Demon Eye.

He wanted to mock the man for being deranged, but as he took in that fervent expression, those earnest eyes, the way he spoke of cleansing the world with the zealotry of a martyr willing to burn for his cause, he found he had nothing to say. A person like that might be insane. Some might even say he was deserving of death. But what he didn’t deserve was ridicule.

After a moment’s thought, Zhang Yuanqing spoke. ”Demon Eye Heavenly King, you and I see the world differently. My grandfather once said that out of ten officials, nine are corrupt, and the last one simply has had enough of being corrupt. Government officials, people in the system, company owners, executives at major corporations, all those with a shred of power—who amongst them doesn’t take a cut? Who doesn’t look out for themselves?

”Greed is a fundamental part of human nature. Not being greedy is what goes against it. The saints and moral paragons of this world exist only on the internet. In reality, everyone wishes they could hoard every last advantage for themselves. We have to face human nature honestly, and confront those dark corners head-on. Punish evil and uplift good, yes, but also learn to temper your light and blend in with the dust.”

He shook his head. ”Your ideology is too extreme. The world you envision through this ’cleansing,’ is it really a purified world? No. It’s the extinction of the entire human race.”

The Demon Eye stared at him. ”So?”

”So I could never walk the same path as you,” Zhang Yuanqing said firmly.

The Demon Eye Heavenly King went quiet. A long silence stretched between them before he finally spoke again, slowly and deliberately enunciating each word.

”I understand where you stand. Then, Yuanshi Tianzun, let me leave you with a curse. One day, when you witness the depths of human darkness, when your grievances find no justice, when righteousness buckles under the boot of power, when the weak are slaughtered like lambs, I curse you to become exactly like me.”

That quiet voice struck Zhang Yuanqing like a physical blow. Pain lanced through his chest, as though an invisible hand had seized his heart and squeezed.

Fwip! Fwip!

Two vines shot toward him instantly, coiling around his body and radiating a gentle but potent emerald glow.

Seconds later, the vines retracted. From deep within the camphor tree’s trunk, Elder Teddy’s voice emerged, heavy with tension.

”There’s no curse. No evidence of enchantment either. Demon Eye, what did you do?”

The Demon Eye’s smile was dazzling. ”I didn’t do anything. My words only have power over those who share my beliefs.”

He fixed Zhang Yuanqing with a penetrating look and grinned. ”I’ve achieved my purpose. Yuanshi Tianzun, you will ultimately walk the same road as me.”

Fuck! Zhang Yuanqing didn’t waste another second. He summoned the Demon-subduing Awl and drove it hard into his own thigh.

Brilliant golden light erupted from the point of contact, blazing through his pupils until they shone like twin suns.

The next instant, the light faded. Zhang Yuanqing stared down at himself in confusion. Elder Teddy had been right. There was no curse nor enchantment. His body and soul bore no trace of any external negative influence whatsoever. The Demon Eye’s words seemed to have been nothing more than an ordinary declaration, carrying no real power.

Then why did my heart hurt? he wondered to himself.

Elder Teddy’s voice drifted out of the tree again, tinged with displeasure. ”Enough of your little tricks. Demon Eye, it’s time you fulfilled your promise.”

”Of course!” The Demon Eye’s lips curled upward, thoroughly pleased. ”I am a man of my word. I’ll tell you everything I know about the Chu family massacre.”

He paused briefly for dramatic effect. ”The ones who led the forces to wipe out the Chu family were Extinction and Ghost Blade. They were acting on Asura’s orders.”

”Asura?” Elder Teddy’s voice shifted to open shock. ”Why would Asura want to destroy the Chu family?”

Asura was the strongest Evil-class Walker alive, hailed by the Evil factions as the greatest Spirit Realm Walker in existence. He had withdrawn from the world years ago and rarely surfaced.

The Chu family was certainly a noble Spirit Realm house, but the idea of Asura specifically targeting them for destruction made no sense at all.

The Demon Eye let out a short laugh. ”Naturally, it was Dark Rose that wanted the Chu family destroyed. Dark Rose’s true objective was to seize the Chu family’s rule-type item. I don’t need to spell out what that item can do.”

Elder Teddy was silent for a long time.

”Resurrection,” he finally said. ”Who does Dark Rose want to resurrect?”

Before the Demon Eye could reply, Elder Teddy worked it out himself. ”They want to resurrect Dark Rose’s leader.”

It clicked. That was why the Demon Eye had said Dark Rose had no leader before the Chu family massacre.

At that time, Dark Rose hadn’t yet grown powerful enough to annihilate the Chu family on its own, so they conspired with the Bing Zhu Sect to carry it out. But if that were the full extent of it, Dark Rose would only have needed to contact a Heavenly King-level figure. Why would Asura himself concern himself with something like this, let alone issue the order personally?

”Why would Asura care about something this minor?” Elder Teddy pressed, unconvinced.

”This was no minor matter,” the Demon Eye Heavenly King replied. ”Think about it. Dark Rose’s leader is a Nocturnal Specter. With your clearance and position, you should know about the Prophecy of the Compass of Light, or at least have heard of it. I don’t know the actual contents of the prophecy myself, so all I can tell you is that Dark Rose’s Great Protector struck some kind of deal with Asura. Asura placed his bet on Dark Rose’s leader.”

The Prophecy of the Compass of Light? Zhang Yuanqing carefully schooled his expression into a mask of bewilderment, but inside, his mind was churning like a storm-tossed sea. The last time he’d heard about the Prophecy of the Compass of Light was in one of Demon Lord’s audio recordings. The mysterious Void Walker had mentioned it.

Thoughts cascaded through Zhang Yuanqing’s mind, one after another, each spawning new questions.

The Prophecy of the Compass of Light involves both Dark Rose and Asura? Even Asura, the so-called strongest of all Evil-class Walkers, cares this much about it. Asura destroyed the Chu family to help Dark Rose resurrect their leader, which was essentially an investment in Dark Rose. Meanwhile, the Aphrodite Society and that mysterious Void powerhouse also invested in Demon Lord...What secret does the Nocturnal Specter profession hold?

A prolonged silence fell across the holding cell, stretching so long that Zhang Yuanqing began to wonder if Elder Teddy had dozed off. Then the elder’s voice emerged from within the trunk.

”I understand. Yuanshi, you may leave.”

Zhang Yuanqing exhaled with relief. But he didn’t leave immediately.

”Elder, there was something in the Demon Eye’s words that was suspicious. This trip turned out to be a raw deal. I’d like to request compensation.”

”But you weren’t actually cursed or enchanted—”

Elder Teddy trailed off. He wasn’t in the mood to argue. ”Fine. What do you want?”

”I want to share this intelligence with the palace master.”

”Granted.”

Zhang Yuanqing turned and left, a spring in his step.

***

The moment he pushed open the cell door, he spotted Fu Qingyang standing beneath a streetlamp at the roadside, his posture ramrod straight, his expression unreadable. The man truly embodied the phrase ”standing like a pine.” 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ

When he saw him emerge, Fu Qingyang gave a slight nod, turned away, and started walking.

Zhang Yuanqing fell into step beside him and recounted everything the Demon Eye had said, word for word, leaving nothing out. Fu Qingyang slowed his pace, listening with intense focus.

When his account was finished, he said quietly, ”You didn’t get Elder Teddy’s permission beforehand, yet you’re just handing intelligence this critical to me?”

Zhang Yuanqing’s expression turned solemn. ”Once a White Tiger Guard, always a White Tiger Guard. Centurion, I will live as your man, and live on as your ghost after death.”

Fu Qingyang cut him a sideways glance. ”That’s a bit much. But I’m pleased with the sentiment. Your housing allocation just went up by five million.”

Zhang Yuanqing’s mood brightened considerably. How generous. That puts me at twenty-five million total.

Fu Qingyang murmured to himself, ”The Prophecy of the Compass of Light...”

Zhang Yuanqing’s ears perked up. ”Do you know anything about it, Centurion?”

Fu Qingyang pulled himself from his thoughts and considered for a few seconds. ”I don’t. But what you’ve told me tonight reminds me of something from my childhood. Around twenty years ago, the White Tiger Legion Marshal died in an incident. During that period, the Fu family elders were in a state of considerable alarm. They were afraid that the Legion’s influence would decline and it would be reduced to a second-rate power. I once overheard the words ’Compass of Light,’ but I was young and ignorant at the time. I didn’t think anything of it.”

Ah, I know about that. The marshal died during that upheaval, and the Five Elements Alliance was formed as a result. Zhang Yuanqing was disappointed that he couldn’t extract the actual contents of the prophecy from Fu Qingyang.

***

Several minutes later, the two left the side path and returned to the main road, heading toward the Zoo’s front entrance.

Just as they were about to pass through the gates, a chill crawled up Zhang Yuanqing’s spine. That inexplicable sensation of being watched, descending from some unknowable place, washed over him again.

This feeling again. Who’s watching me?

He couldn’t help but quicken his pace.

Once more, a faint, ethereal whisper drifted past his ear. ”You’ve finally come to see me...”

That voice again! Zhang Yuanqing walked faster, lowering his voice. ”Centurion, do you hear anything?”

”No.” Fu Qingyang’s expression was rigid as he stared straight ahead. ”Remember what I told you. Ignore it.”

Even as he spoke, the ever-confident Fu Qingyang also picked up his pace, as though eager to leave this place behind.

The whispery voice spoke again. ”Have you finally come to see me... Zhang Zizhen...”

Zhang Yuanqing’s body went rigid. He stopped dead in his tracks.

Zhang Zizhen was his father’s name.