The morning sun broke over the jagged western mountains. The harsh winds that usually howled through the ravine seemed slightly subdued today. It was as if the world itself was taking a cautious breath.

  Li Yu opened his eyes from his night’s sleep. He still enjoyed sleeping even though he didn’t need to. His second mind continued to work while he was asleep so it isn’t a complete waste of time. Li Yu felt it was these little joys that kept him going.

  The passive absorption of the Devouring Abyssal Leviathan Physique hummed beneath his skin. The law of Wood constantly refreshed his vitality as he slept. His body felt like a coiled spring of boundless energy but it was perfectly sheathed beneath a calm exterior.

  He stood up and stretched his arms. Across the dead ashes of the campfire, Demon Lord Malos was already awake. The ancient entity was sitting on the exact same boulder as last night. His pale hands were resting in his lap and he was watching Li Yu with an expression of quiet fascination. Whether or not Malos slept or meditated Li Yu didn’t know. Perhaps this was the first time the Demon Lord had stopped moving during the night time.

  "Good morning," Li Yu said while he was beginning to pack away his few supplies into his spatial ring.

  "Is it?" Malos mused at this question. He was then looking up at the red sky. "I suppose it is. The sky is the same shade as it was yesterday. But the sensation... the sensation is entirely new."

  Li Yu paused for a moment before going back to kicking dirt over the remaining embers. "What sensation?"

  Malos stood up. "The sensation of unadulterated ignorance. For the first time in millennia, I woke up this morning and I did not know what this day would bring. I do not know if we will walk left or right today. I do not know who we will encounter. The future is a thick, impenetrable fog."

  Malos smiled and then laughed. It was a genuine expression that reached his dark eyes. "It is deeply unsettling. And it is the most exhilarating thing I have felt in a long time. So, my young friend... where are we going?"

  Li Yu couldn't help but shake his head at the Demon Lord's enthusiasm. A thing that most people dreaded. A thing that brought nervousness and anxiety to others was now bringing this man before him such overwhelming joy. It just goes to show that people saw and valued things differently. The man was treating his sudden inability to read fate like a child experiencing a new game.

  "We are heading to Grim Spire," Li Yu answered. "It's the nearest major trade hub. Before I do anything else, I need to know what has been happening in the realm while I was secluded up here."

  "Grim Spire," Malos nodded agreeably. "A wretched hive of cutthroats and opportunists. Excellent choice. Shall we fly? I could tear a spatial rift and have us in the center of their market square in moments."

  "No," Li Yu said immediately. "We travel normally. I enjoy that more when I am not in a rush anywhere. The goal is to be anonymous. This way you can enjoy the sights and sounds of travel."

  Malos gave him a graceful bow in a playful manner. "As you wish. To be an ordinary traveler once more. Lead the way."

  They set off soon after. They were leaving the secluded ravine behind them. Li Yu dialed back his aura until he appeared to be nothing more than a Core Formation cultivator. Strong enough to deter bandits but not strong enough to warrant the attention of local warlords. Malos did the same. He quickly masked his apocalyptic presence until he felt like an entirely unremarkable Core Formation scholar.

  The journey to Grim Spire took them through winding canyons and sparse, ash choked plains. By midday, Grim Spire loomed on the horizon. As they entered the city gates, the atmosphere hit them like a physical wall.

  Grim Spire was usually a place of rowdy, violent commerce. Today, there was a frantic, paranoid edge to the hustle and bustle. Mercenaries moved in tight clusters with their hands resting on their weapons. Merchants were shouting aggressively and haggling over the price of defensive talismans and healing pills.

  Li Yu led Malos into a crowded, smoky tavern near the outer ring of the city. They found a small table in the corner and quickly ordered two mugs of bitter demon ale. It was the only thing this tavern was selling for drinks.

  It didn't take long to gather the information they needed. The tavern was practically vibrating with gossip. Li Yu simply sat back and sipped his ale. He was carefully listening to the overlapping conversations of the beastmen, demons and rogue cultivators around them.

  The news of the five dead apex beings—Malakor, the Spider Queen, the Gale Ape, the Sky Rending Condor, and the Rotting Bone Lord—had thoroughly shattered the realm's hierarchy.

  "The eastern plains are a total bloodbath," a scarred Jackal-kin was loudly telling his companions at the next table. "Lord Ignis's Vanguard is sweeping through the Rotting Bone territory and three new warlords have sprung up in the south fighting over the Ape's jungle. It's a free for all."

  "What about the Night Queen?" Another mercenary asked in a hushed whisper.

  "She expanded but she's not being greedy about it," the Jackal-kin replied. "She took back her old borders and secured the key resource veins but she stopped there. The other Lords are thrilled she isn't pushing further. They’re giving her a massive buffer zone. Nobody wants to be the idiot who trips over her border and incurs the wrath of whoever killed those five."

  Li Yu synthesized the information. The Demon Realm was tearing itself apart in a massive power vacuum. There was fighting over territories, mines and resources that now had no owner. Normally, this would be the perfect time for a cultivator to dive into the chaos, raid the warring factions and hoard resources to advance their cultivation realm.

  But Li Yu didn't need to do that. At least not yet. He closed his eyes for a brief second and his inner vision looked at the massive, glowing sphere of condensed Qi and essence floating inside his embryonic inner world. It was a battery of such unimaginable density that his body would be slowly digesting it for quite some time. He wasn't in any desperate struggle for resources.

  Malos leaned forward with curiosity. "So, what is the grand plan? If you do not intend to capitalize on the chaos and carve out a domain of your own? To grab what you can so you can continue advancing your cultivation? Where do we go next?"

  "We are going to the Night Demon territory," Li Yu stated.

  Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

  Malos raised a pale eyebrow. He then recalled that Li Yu had told him yesterday that the Queen of the Night was actually one of his followers somehow. The news had surprised him greatly but then it made his choice of tagging along with Li Yu seem all that much more fun. He was loving all the surprises that Li Yu brought.

  "To the House of Night? Ah, you wish to check on your newly acquired vassal. Are you going to demand a throne? Or perhaps inspect the tribute they have gathered for you?"

  "No," Li Yu shook his head. "I'm not going as an honored guest and I certainly don't want a throne. I'm going as a wandering traveler. I just want to see it for myself."

  "You want to... observe?" Malos asked and was genuinely baffled. "You hold the soul contract of Queen Morrigan. You could walk into her capital and she would lay the entire empire at your feet. You could command her armies. Yet you wish to sneak in through the back door and walk the dirt roads?"

  "Exactly," Li Yu said with a small smile playing on his lips. "I'm curious about how she rules. I’ve never seen it for myself. I don't want to change her ways or dictate how she manages her people. I don't know the first thing about running a demon nation. But I want to see this world. I want to see what kind of society forms when they have the ultimate safety net of everyone else being too terrified to attack them for the time being."

  Malos stared at Li Yu for a long moment. He tried to search for a hidden motive, a subtle, grand scheme of manipulation. He ended up finding nothing. At least nothing came to his head. This boy was really just curious.

  "You are a remarkably strange cultivator, Li Yu," Malos chuckled loudly as he was shaking his head. "Most men who attain your level of power immediately seek to exert it. They want their statues carved into mountains. They want to reach for greater heights and power. You just want to walk down the street unbothered."

  "Is that so hard to understand?" Li Yu asked. “I want to get stronger, yes. However, I don’t want to forget why I am trying to get stronger. If I am miserable the entire way, then what is the point?”

  He stood up and went to pay for the drinks.

  "For me to understand? Yes," Malos admitted as he followed him out of the tavern. "But as I said, I am here for the novelty. If you wish to play the role of an ordinary tourist in a demonic empire, I shall gladly accompany you. It has been a long time since I walked a path simply to see where it leads."

  They left Grim Spire the same way they entered. Quietly, efficiently and entirely unnoticed.

  The journey toward the House of Night took several days. They didn't rush to get there. There was no need to rush when they had no real destination. They walked along the broken trade routes and occasionally took to the sky to fly at a low altitude over impassable ravines or treacherous swamps.

  The trip was surprisingly peaceful. For Malos, the simple act of traveling with a companion was an entirely alien experience. And because he had no flashes of destiny to guide him regarding Li Yu, every mundane event felt remarkably fresh. He treated Li Yu as an ordinary, albeit fascinating, traveling companion. Not someone that he would have traveled with at any other time.

  "You know," Malos commented on the third day of their journey. It happened as they walked through a dense, grey leafed forest. "I usually only visit places like this if a vision prompts me to. If I see a flash of a supreme artifact hidden in a cave or a rival planning an ambush, I go. Otherwise, I simply ignore the scenery. Walking for the sheer sake of walking is a surprisingly quaint concept. I can’t remember the last time I did something like it."

  "You should try looking at the world instead of just looking at its destiny," Li Yu replied dryly. He was stepping over a massive protruding root. "There's a lot going on down here. I’ve always enjoyed such things. At least once I had enough power to travel safely. It would be a much different experience if I was constantly worried about every bandit I came across. I only need to keep a constant scan of beings of your power to watch out for now."

  Malos hummed thoughtfully. "There is a certain raw charm to it, I suppose. Tell me, Li Yu, why are you content to walk through the mud?"

  "Because wealth doesn't make you invincible," Li Yu answered with his tone turning a bit more serious as they navigated the woods. "And power without understanding is a dangerous thing. If I stay isolated, hoarding resources and never interacting with the world. Perhaps my Dao Heart will stagnate. I like to see how people live. I enjoy seeing sights. I like to understand the gears of this world. It is all a new experience and I feel connected."

  Malos considered the words carefully. "A balanced perspective. Very rare. Most cultivators view mortals and low level demons as nothing more than numbers on a ledger or fuel for their arrays. Some cultivators wouldn’t even recognize those that are much weaker than them. I’m sure you’ve seen it. You are definitely the weird one in this world."

  "And how did you view them, before you got bored?" Li Yu asked.

  "I tried to shape them, once," Malos admitted with a hint of genuine nostalgia in his voice. "Long before I ascended to the title of Demon Lord. I used my visions to build a kingdom. I tried to establish laws, order and fairness based on the flashes of tragedy I saw. Believe it or not, I tried to make this world a better place."

  Li Yu looked at him in surprise. "You? Tried to build a better society?"

  "I was much younger then," Malos sighed. "And much more foolish. I quickly realized that the moment you divert one tragedy, another simply takes its place. I would execute a traitor I saw in a vision, only for his brother to take up the knife years later. It is the nature of existence to struggle. The visions showed me that no matter how hard I tried to rule the people, the decay was inevitable."

  "So you gave up?" Li Yu asked.

  "I didn't give up," Malos corrected smoothly. "I simply elevated my perspective. Why fight the tide when you can just watch the ocean? I stopped trying to rule and simply let the chaos play out. It is far less demanding. I wasn’t fit to lead so many people so I decided not to. Unlike the other Demon Lords, I have no real territory of my own. I am but one person."

  Li Yu couldn't help but shake his head. The Demon Lord's worldview was horrifyingly detached, yet presented with such calm logic that it was hard to argue against the sheer exhaustion behind it. Malos wasn’t wrong either.

  They broke through the tree line by late afternoon and arrived at a minor border town. It was a dilapidated settlement built from scavenged scrap metal and bone. It was situated precariously on the edge of a deep canyon.

  The town was flooded with refugees. Tents made of ragged cloth were pitched tightly against the town walls. Beastmen with missing limbs, demons carrying starving children and rogue cultivators with haunted eyes were all huddled together. They were waiting for a chance to move further.

  Li Yu and Malos walked through the muddy streets and kept their heads down.

  "They are all heading to her," Malos observed. His voice a quiet murmur as they passed a group of minotaur demons sharing a single, moldy ration bar. "To the Night Queen."

  "She has the only stable border right now," Li Yu said softly.

  "Indeed. Rulership is a tedious burden," Malos noted philosophically. "I am curious to see if Queen Morrigan cracks under the weight of so many desperate souls now that she has the spotlight."

  "She won't, or at least she shouldn’t." Li Yu said somewhat confidently. He was thinking of the fierce and calculating intelligence in Morrigan's eyes. However, he barely met her so he didn’t know her that well. "She has Vespera and her sons to help her manage the influx. They aren't going to build a utopia but they should provide a place where people can at least live."

  They reached the far end of the border town where a small and relatively intact inn stood near the canyon's edge. Li Yu paid the innkeeper a handful of spirit stones. That secured a private room and a hot meal of roasted root vegetables and spiced meat for the night. A grand treat to most of the people around here.

  They sat by the window and ate their meal. Li Yu was looking out over the sprawling, jagged landscape stretching beyond his sight. Li Yu felt a sense of quiet anticipation.

  "Tomorrow, we cross the canyon," Li Yu said as he pointed toward the distant horizon. "Once we cross, we are officially in the territory of the House of Night."

  Malos took a sip of his wine while his dark eyes fixed on the unknown lands ahead.

  "Excellent," Malos smiled. "I look forward to being completely and utterly surprised."