Traveling south past the undulating red mountains of Du Yan, then crossing the murky green tributary of Zhi Qi River, one would enter the territory of the Demon Realm.
Although orthodox cultivation sects and spiritual mountains harbored considerable hatred for the Demon Realm, often appearing dismissive of that “remote mountainous region,” in reality, compared to the outside world, there wasn’t much difference except that the area wasn’t as large, spiritual mountains and blessed lands weren’t as numerous, and resources weren’t as abundant.
The Demon Realm wasn’t solely inhabited by deranged demonic cultivators who killed and burned without restraint. Many ordinary people lived there as well. Though the population was smaller than the outside world, the total number of cultivators was particularly high—almost everyone cultivated, matching the number of cultivators in the vast cultivation world and mortal realm outside.
It was said that the Demon Realm was originally another continent that drifted from somewhere unknown, suddenly appearing and merging with this world. Those who cultivated here naturally had reversed spiritual energy flow, different from the outside world. Their methods were more ruthless and unscrupulous, and they had previously engaged in a great war with the orthodox cultivation path. Thus, the name “Demon Realm” came into being, branded as an evil, heterodox path that everyone wished to exterminate.
Those in the Demon Realm didn’t waste this reputation—burning, killing, looting, committing all manner of evil. Many demonic cultivators enjoyed practices like dual cultivation with young boys and girls, mother-son gu refinement, and soul medicinal refinement—things that sounded terrifying just to hear about.
People from the outside world changed color at the mention of the Demon Realm, but once one lived there for a while, they would realize that it was just an ordinary city with more chaotic management, greater openness and freedom, and occasional dangers.
Within the Demon Realm, territories of various sizes were divided among different powerful demonic cultivators. These cities resembled mortal cities in the outside world.
Shi Yan had lived in the Demon Realm for almost ten years. For the first two years, she lived on the outskirts with a sickly father and an older brother. Afterward, they moved to this city called Crane Immortal City, where she had lived for eight years.
Crane Immortal City sounded ethereal and immortal-like, not typical of a Demon Realm city, more like a place for orthodox cultivators outside. But only its name was glamorous; in reality, it was no different from other cities in the Demon Realm.
The city was large and chaotic, with countless murders and robberies occurring daily. Sanitation was also concerning—one could often see disturbing things in the streets and alleys. Large pools of fresh blood were common, but dismembered limbs were worse. The city lacked sanitation workers, often leaving such remains uncleaned for ten days to half a month. Once they began to rot, the stench was unavoidable for anyone passing by.
“Which idiot did this again? If you kill someone, don’t you know how to dispose of the body? Leaving it at someone’s doorstep—do they think people don’t need to leave their homes?” Shi Yan couldn’t help but feel a headache upon seeing a bloody head and smashed internal organs not far from her door as she exited her courtyard.
She made a hand seal to burn the head, then used water to clean the pool of blood. After cleaning up, she felt she had become much stronger than when she first arrived in this world. At least back then, she wanted to vomit at the sight of corpses; now she only complained as if encountering carelessly discarded trash on her way out.
After leaving the relatively clean residential area, she entered the main street, which was truly chaotic.
People hurried about, colliding with each other, frequently erupting into disputes. Most people in the Demon Realm had bad tempers. Shi Yan suspected it was due to the climate—the Demon Realm’s climate was truly dry, and without proper hydration, irritability and dryness were inevitable.
Every day, there were people refining corpses right on the street, just like the breakfast and soy milk vendors downstairs where she used to live. The refining furnaces and cauldrons were almost placed in the middle of the street. The smell from these public-minded corpse-refining demonic cultivators’ stalls was simply toxic gas. Shi Yan instinctively covered her nose every time she passed by.
The most annoying were those demonic cultivators engaged in thievery. There were so many thieves and robbers that they could form their own factions. Previously, a shadow-controlling demonic cultivator stole things on this street—one moment of inattention and your belongings would be gone.
Shi Yan had encountered this before, having a bag of spirit stones stolen just after getting paid. Enraged, she traced the shadow cultivator and beat him severely, reducing his cultivation level and smashing one of his eyes.
The guy was covered in blood, crying for mercy and fleeing in terror. He immediately packed up and left, but when one left, others came. As long as they didn’t steal from her, Shi Yan didn’t have the time to deal with each one individually.
Here, those with high cultivation could freely control others’ lives without any rules to speak of. It was all about fighting and killing—might make right.
Shi Yan was doing relatively well because her cultivation level—Divine Transformation stage—was considered quite good here. According to her father, if she hadn’t been injured originally, she should have been at the Void Refinement stage, but her current Divine Transformation stage was sufficient.
After passing the main street and turning a corner, Shi Yan arrived at Rogue’s Theatre, the largest entertainment venue in Crane Immortal City. Rogue’s Theatre combined prostitution, gambling, and drugs, all legal industries in the Demon Realm—there were no illegal industries here. As long as someone dared to open a business, regardless of what it was, there would be customers willing to consume.
Rogue’s Theatre primarily operated at night. When evening came, the place was brilliantly lit with all-night revelry. At that time, countless corridors of Rogue’s Theatre were hung with red lanterns, a splendid sight resembling a paradise. During the day, Rogue’s Theatre was much quieter. She worked the day shift, so what she saw daily was this place slowly falling asleep under the morning sun.
Shi Yan worked here as one of the many enforcers employed by Rogue’s Theatre. In terms of her previous world’s occupational classification, she was a member of the security team. She was grateful for this body’s original physical strength; otherwise, she wouldn’t have gotten this job.
Having worked here for a long time, she was familiar with the front desk and the cleaning staff who dealt with corpses. Entering through the back door, she saw the cleaning personnel uniformly processing the swept-out corpses, preparing to transport them for recycling. Yes, after a night of revelry at Rogue’s Theatre, the most common garbage was corpses—truly a Demon Realm specialty.
After nodding a greeting to the uncle who processed corpses daily and had a face like a dead person himself, Shi Yan went in to report for duty, then patrolled once around. After that, she could start slacking off. Generally, at this time, there wasn’t much happening at Rogue’s Theatre, and even if she didn’t slack off, she would just be squatting on the roof, staring blankly at the sky.
She hadn’t eaten breakfast yet and planned to sneak off to eat first. In this respect, the Demon Realm was much better than the outside cultivators. Orthodox cultivators outside didn’t practice three meals a day, but demonic cultivators were different—most loved to satisfy their appetites.
“Hey, Lu Yan, come on! I’m off duty, accompany me to get something to eat!” A beautiful woman in red walked out of the red building, greeting her familiarly as soon as she saw her. Shi Yan happily accepted the invitation.
When working outside, Shi Yan used the name Lu Yan because her seemingly mystical father, who appeared to have mental issues, said their Shi family had a great enemy who was still hunting them, so they couldn’t use the surname, Shi. Shi Yan didn’t care whether her surname was Shi or Lu—it made no difference to her. Only she knew that her actual surname was Zou, and her name was Zou Yan.
“Damn, I’m exhausted! If I had known that cultivating the Path of Romance would be this tiring, not even allowing me to get a good sleep, I would have chosen to cultivate corpses instead of the Path of Romance back then.” The woman in red massaged her arms, cursing as she walked out. She and Shi Yan walked to the morning market outside Rogue’s Theatre and sat down at a familiar restaurant to order food.
The woman in red was named Hong Luo, a stage name—her real name was unknown. She was an employee of Rogue’s Theatre, selling her body, but this wasn’t her main occupation. Her primary pursuit was cultivating the Path of Romance, a demonic cultivation path that absorbed men’s yang energy for cultivation. Those who cultivated this path, regardless of gender, either became accomplished rapists or registered to receive clients at various pleasure establishments.
Most would choose the latter because it allowed them to cultivate while also making money. After all, life wasn’t easy for anyone. Whether for living or cultivation, without money, one truly couldn’t take a step forward—this was all too real.
Shi Yan was familiar with Hong Luo, and they often ate breakfast here, discussing the idiots and frustrating events they encountered at work. Although they were in different departments, they were still colleagues.
Shi Yan was eating breakfast, while Hong Luo was having dinner. After eating, Hong Luo would go back to rest. As usual, Hong Luo complained about last night’s client.
“You wouldn’t believe it—I worked half the night, and that guy couldn’t even get it up. If word got out, my senior and junior cultivation siblings would laugh at me to death. So I had to use my life-bound peach blossom gu before things could happen… Damn, if you’re sick, go get treatment! Why visit a brothel? I absorb yang energy, am I also responsible for treating erectile dysfunction? What nonsense!”
Shi Yan slurped a noodle and burst out laughing.
Hong Luo opened her mouth wide and viciously bit into a piece of braised meat, still venting her frustrations: “My cultivation has been stagnant lately, almost at a bottleneck, yet I can’t encounter a few quality men. Working all night, sleeping with them is the same as not sleeping with them at all. Why can’t I meet a Demon General or Demon Lord? If I could sleep with someone of that cultivation level for one night, I would have broken through the bottleneck long ago. Would I still need to struggle with these useless dead men?”
“Demon Lord” referred to the lord of a large city in the Demon Realm. Those who could occupy a large city were not simple people, with cultivation at least at the Grand Completion stage. “Demon General” referred to outstanding demonic cultivators under the city lord who could manage a small city, with cultivation at least at the Unity stage.
For those cultivating the Path of Romance, having a few rounds with cultivators of these levels would be like taking a major tonic.
Shi Yan wiped her mouth: “Doesn’t our city have a Demon General? You could try approaching him. If the mountain won’t come to you, go to the mountain. Maybe it could work out.”
Hong Luo spat again: “Both the Demon Lord and Demon General in Crane Immortal City are old men. I couldn’t bear to sleep with them. At the very least, give me someone who looks younger!” She looked at Shi Yan with regret, pounding the table in frustration: “Why aren’t you a man? If you were, would I be in this condition? I would have slept with you a thousand or eight hundred times already!”
Shi Yan was accustomed to her friend’s personality and reassured her: “If I were a man, I’d make sure you enjoyed yourself. But I’m a girl, and I’m disfigured too.”
Hong Luo looked at the coin-sized special burn scar on her left cheek and continued resentfully: “If you weren’t disfigured, you could still be my sister. Then the two of us could form a team. We wouldn’t worry about not being able to hook high-level cultivators. Even if we encountered good ones outside and had to force ourselves on them, our chances of success would be much greater!”
Shi Yan shrugged. The Demon Realm was full of such unruly people. Hong Luo was considered good since she didn’t enjoy killing people randomly or eating them.
As the two ate and chatted, Shi Yan was often reminded of her past when she would occasionally gather with colleagues for meals after work. It gave her a nostalgic feeling.