Chapter 1: Prologue
"Why did you kill Huang Xiu?"
The moonlight was dim, and Zi Wuji could not distinguish the assassin's face. The assassin had spoken cleanly, without expression. Black cloth, thick and padded, masked the upper and lower parts of their face. The perilous glow of the lantern down the riverbank reflected the assassin's ember eyes, and the eyes looked straight at Zi Wuji, fierce and still — and he knew the question was asked with no desire to learn the answer.
"How long do you intend to uphold this farce?" asked Zi Wuji, his voice amused.
He sat resembling the statue of the Gautama Buddha and closed his eyes to the world. The movement of the wind alerted him to the arrival of seven other presences.
"Have you all no desire to give me face?"
A dagger emerged from the assassin's sleeves. The silver blade glinted in the moonlight. Eight individuals for eight cardinal directions. Zi Wuji did not open his eyes. To act was the way, yet refusing action was equally the way.
"Zi Wuji," a voice, soft yet firm came from the south. "Hand over the Karma Desolation Way Codex, and we promise to spare your life."
Zi Wuji stroked his beard.
"The way called the way isn't the perennial way. A name that names is not the perennial name. For those in the Orthodox Path to not even know this much…"
His words were a stone dropped in a pond. The air was tinged with the scent of danger. All eight individuals grew tense. Zi Wuji did not move. He did not need to. Glints of silver emerged around him. The scraping sounds of blades being drawn against sheathes bathed the stillness of the night.
Zi Wuji opened his eyes. Blank and white, he could see only darkness.
"The named is the mother to ten-thousand things, but the unnamed is origin to all heaven and earth," Zi Wuji closed his eyes once more. "You have forgotten yourselves."
"We did not come here to debate philosophy with you," a sneer emerged. "Hand it over!"
"For the Five Heavenly Dragons and Three Phoenixes to cloak themselves as mere peons of the Phantom River Sect and come after a measly blind beggar…" Zi Wuji chuckled. "This blind beggar feels honored."
"Master Zi," a voice, soft, spoke. "We have disabled all your protection arrays and defense formations. Your cultivation has long been crippled. You have no means to resist us. All we desire is the Codex."
Zi Wuji laughed.
"Never bestow honors, and people will not quarrel. Never prize rare treasures, and people will not steal. Never flaunt alluring things, and people will not be confused. Such is the governance of the Sage."
Zi Wuji rose to his feet. The tense air thickened. With a single exhale, a forlorn expression appeared on his face. Blades shone underneath the moonlight, and Zi Wuji's folded his hands behind him.
A harsh wind blew throughout the mountaintops, and his clothes fluttered and flapped. No sound could be heard save for the crickets chirping in the darkness. The ground beneath Zi Wuji's feet began to glow.
An elaborate purple array emerged underneath Zi Wuji. Lines and calculations, numbers and figures, letters, characters, and ink burst forth like a living creature, covering the entire mountain, spreading and growing like an unstoppable wildfire.
"This —" a soft gasp emerged. "This can't be!"
"The Myriad Straw Depredation Array?" a loud cry emerged. "Impossible! Zi Wuji — you — you're a practitioner of the Demonic Path?!"
Zi Wuji smiled.
"All beneath the heavens know that beauty is beauty, only because there is ugliness — and know that good is good, only because there is evil."
"Stop him!"
"Kill him, quickly!"
The assassins lunged at once, only to freeze in their tracks. Their blades fell to the ground, and they, too, collapsed, incapable of motion. The inky letters spread over their body and latched unto them like furious serpents.
"I — I can't move!"
"Zi Wuji! You snake! Release us!"
Zi Wuji walked, about, his gaze turned upwards, to the sky.
"My master roamed the Rain World and saw the good and the evils of this world. He told me, 'Zi Wuji, the tree of the righteous is filled with thorns and the fruit it bares can only be eaten at the grace of others.'"
Zi Wuji opened his eyes.
"Heaven and earth are inhumane; they use the ten-thousand things like straw dogs. Thus the Sage too, is inhumane; he uses the hundred-fold people like straw dogs."
Zi Wuji slapped his hands together.
"I do not wish to ask permission to eat the fruit of the tree of the righteous. I would rather pluck fruit from the tree of the damned and tell the naysayers and faultfinders: to hell with you!"
A mighty shudder came upon the mountain. Great wails emerged from the assassins, and their blood seeped into the ink. The ink turned dark red, and Zi Wuji spread out his arms and roared.
Blood spurted out of his mouth. Zi Wuji glanced down, and though he could not see, he knew. He felt it, the blade deep within his chest. His heart punctured clean through. Behind him, he saw no one. The eight assassins were dead, and yet —
A hazy figure appeared through the darkness. An abominable aura descended down upon him. He could identify it at a glance. A sad smile fell across his lips.
"Playing the pig to eat the tiger has always been your style, but to use the Five Heavenly Dragons and Three Phoenixes as bait…"
Zi Wuji laughed.
"Celestial Slaughter Demon, Ye Fangcheng… I underestimated you."
A man emerged from the darkness, silent as the night. "Zodiac Formation King, Zi Wuji," the voice was calm. "Or is it Blood Flower Reverend, Long Gongji?"
No sooner did he speak those words, did Zi Wuji's entire appearance change. His old beard vanished. His eyes, seemingly blind, regained color and turned a deep ocean blue. His features, aged and wizened, regressed, as wrinkles faded and stretched skin regained its elasticity.
A young man of about twenty years of age stood, a blade still stuck in his chest. The young man chuckled, and blood poured out of his lips.
"As expected of the Heir of the Celestial Moon Devil Pavilion," he praised. "How did you discover my identity?"
Ye Fangcheng sneered. "You may have fooled the entire world, playing the role of a paragon of good and a paragon of evil at once, but to me, as long as you have cultivated with evil techniques, your true nature would always shine through."
Zi Wuji laughed. "Spoken as a true favored child of the heavens. Ye Fangcheng… Ye Fangcheng…"
Zi Wuji's eyes slowly closed.
"How truly fortunate it is… to be blessed by fate."
Zi Wuji's eyes remained shut. The rampaging formation died. Ye Fangcheng approached Zi Wuji's body and rifled through it.
"It's not here?"
Ye Fangcheng frowned.
"The Karma Desolation Way Codex… don't tell me —"
Ye Fangcheng let out a growl as he examined the corpse. All over his body, there were endless lines of ink and writings, scribblings and numbers, all of which began to disappear just as Zi Wuji's life force faded.
"No!"
Ye Fangcheng attempted his hardest to memorize the scribblings, but it was too late. They'd vanished completely. Ye Fangcheng realized the truth immediately. He'd been tricked. Zi Wuji had engraved the secrets of the codex into his own soul, and now that he'd been killed —
"ZI WUJI!"
XXXXXXXXXXXXX
How long has it been?
The darkness was long and the silence was unbearable. He was floating, yet, drowning. He could neither speak nor move, neither see nor hear. Ages upon ages passed, eternity upon eternities.
He counted down the seconds. He counted the minutes. The hours. The days. With nothing but time, he reviewed the secrets of the Way Codex. He had never liked the unnecessary name given to it. Karma Desolation Way Codex was too wordy, too much of a mouthful. The Way Codex simplified things. Even then, this went against the very first rule inscribed in the Dao —
Zi Wuji did not care.
He recited mantras in his mind and thought of methods to expand and utilize the Way. Acquiring it had not been easy. How many lives had he ended? How many souls had he consumed? How many men, women and children had he ravished? He could not recall. Master Gu reminded him that such things were meaningless to a Demonic Path Cultivator. The lives of others were but resources, and if he was weak, his life would be no exception.
Of course, Zi Wuji was no fool. To openly announce to the world that one was evil was to announce death and misery. He did not desire to have the entire heavens and earth become his enemy. Thus, to the greater Rain World, Zi Wuji was merely the Zodiac Formation King, a harmless, blind old man whose sole expertise and value lay in his powerful formations. It was for this reason that he'd been able to work in secret and gain the Way Codex. It was for this reason, he was certain that many individuals would target him once they learned it fell into his possession.
Did Ye Fangcheng truly believe he had not sensed him hiding amongst the rabble? Zi Wuji almost snorted. To ensure his righteous identity was spotless, his title of Zodiac Formation King was not for show. His Formations were layered upon layered, capable of killing cultivators at realms greater than his own. His mastery of arrays was second to none in the Rain World. His brain could memorize and decipher complicated formations as easily as looking and differentiating between faces.
He'd known all along that Ye Fangcheng was there, because a formation told him so.
He'd known when Ye Fangcheng launched his sneak attack because an array warned him so.
Everything had been calculated by Zi Wuji, down to the most infinitemesal detail. The act of revealing his demonic alter-ego was done specifically to buy time and activate a different, final array.
Zi Wuji wished to die at the man's blade.
Why?
Talent.
Zi Wuji did not have talent. He was born without it. In the world of Cultivation, this guaranteed he would remain a weakling. He would be stepped upon by others, crushed, used, and discarded like filth.
There were Eight Realms of Cultivation in the Lower Rain World:
Body Strengthening, Qi Refining, Core Building, Core Formation, Gold Core, Nascent Soul, Soul Fragmentation, and Soul Refinement.
The first four realms had nine small layers, and the remaining four realms were separated by four stages: initial stage, middle stage, upper stage, and peak stage.
No matter how hard or how long Zi Wuji cultivated, he could never get past the Ninth Layer of the Core Building Stage. He could not break through and become a Core Formation cultivator. In truth, his talent was so poor, that the fact he had already made it into the Core Building Stage could be said to be a miracle — an abnormality.
Individuals with poor talent rarely made it past the Body Strengthening Stage. If they were lucky, they managed to reach the first layer of the Qi Refining Stage, but it would take seventy to a hundred years just to move forward one small layer.
There was only one reason he had made it this far:
He was a Demonic Cultivator.
Long Gongji, the Blood Flower Reverend, was the name of his alter-ego. It was the identity by which he used to gain power and was an identity feared and loathed throughout the Rain World.
As Long Gongji, he would approach female cultivators with a flowery robe and a dazzling smile, and seduce them to his bedchambers. There, utilizing the Yin Peculation Art, he would have sex with them until they were begging him to stop and collapsed from exhaustion. During this process, he would endlessly drain their Yin Qi and steal their essence to vastly boost his own Cultivation.
Over time, his infamy grew. He could no longer seduce women, due to their wariness. Forcing himself on female cultivators was a risky endeavor, as one needed to be able to defeat them in combat first, which incurred too many risks. Thus, after a few decades of study, Long Gongji invented the Flutter Forcing Finger Art. A single touch of his finger was enough to crumble the wills of most women and imbue a potent Yang poison within their Qi which would heighten their arousal and demolish their resistance towards him.
For this reason, Long Gongji became invincible toward female cultivators. For if he could touch them, he could defeat them. However, the limits of his talent showed itself. He'd utilized the Yin Peculation Art on hundreds of women, turning many into yin cauldrons, draining their cultivation levels to that of mere mortals and reducing the vast majority of them into mindless sex-crazed husk, and even then —
He could not break through.
It went without saying that he had numerous enemies and individuals seeking his death for his actions as Long Gongji. When one was so loathed by the masses, the heavens themselves would begin to turn a foul eye towards them. Their karma would be so low, that they would inevitably meet a pitiful end.
It was for this reason Zi Wuji spent eighty years in search of the Karma Desolation Way Codex — The Way.
The Codex was a collection of teachings, techniques, formations, and inner arts which possessed the power to reverse the divine laws of karma and fate.
For a Demonic Cultivator, this was more valuable than their lives. In essence, one would be able to do an endless number of bad deeds or evil acts, and the heavens would reward them with opportunities and blessings.
Likewise, if one was born with an ill-fate, the techniques in the Karma Desolation Way would destroy that ill-fate and reverse one's fortune so they had a great destiny awaiting them.
With it, one could reverse or plunder the fortune of those more fortunate and become increasingly powerful.
Thus, Zi Wuji utilized the techniques in the Way, and let himself be killed by Ye Fangcheng, a genius amongst geniuses, all so he would plunder the man's good fortune and be reincarnated as an individual with unrivaled talent!
By engraving the Way into his very soul, he was guaranteed that it would follow him into his next life. Thus, Zi Wuji believed he would be reborn as someone not only with great talent but as someone who could do any unspeakable act and get away with it!
Without a doubt, in his next life, using the Way and his dual cultivation methods, no one underneath the heavens would be his rival!
Indeed, all of this would have been true. All of this would have happened as Zi Wuji predicted. However, there was one thing he did not and could not have accounted for. There was a simple fact that would hinder his plans:
This was not his first reincarnation.
XXXXX
The process of birth was one Zi Wuji did not find appealing.
His excitement at being reborn vanquished any feelings of disgust he felt at having emerged covered in unmentionables out of a woman. Indeed, he could already tell that this life was going to be different, as straight out of the womb, his vision was astoundingly clear.
In his previous life, he'd not lacked visual acuity, but the difference was far too vast. He could not only make out the faces of the nurses around him with great distinction, he could see every crease, every line, every scar, every twitch —
Already, Zi Wuji found it difficult to contain his excitement. His elation emerged as a healthy cry which sent expressions of relief throughout the faces of the women around him. His mind swam with possibilities.
Was I born with the fabled Myriad Eagle King Eye? Or perhaps the legendary God-Seeing True Vision?
He searched inwards for the nature of his talent, only to freeze upon doing so.
I can't feel any Qi. I was born without Qi?
Panic set into his heart as he felt something had gone wrong. Only commoners, humans who had no destiny or hope at cultivation were born without the tiniest glimmer of Inner Qi. Yet, Zi Wuji could not sense any Qi within him.
Am I a commoner? A lowly mortal?
The further he searched, the more frantic he became. His cries emerged louder and louder, as the nurses attempted to console him. Zi Wuji felt a deep-seated panic in his heart. He pondered immediately if he would need to kill himself and reincarnate again.
What is… this?
He felt something.
There was an energy in his body. There was an entire organ in his body that he had never seen before. Similar to the human circulatory system, this organ was undeveloped, but it circulated a strange form of life energy within him. The amount of life energy was laughably small, but it was there. Not only was it there, but it was… different.
Cultivators accumulated Qi in their dantian, but this was a biological mechanism, rather than a spiritual or supernatural one. Zi Wuji was amazed.
Words brought him out of his bewilderment, and for a brief moment, his expression changed as he listened closely.
That language… it's different but… why do I… recognize it?
He turned his gaze to the midwives and nurses and was baffled once he got a look at them.
Are they blind?
Their pupils were either pure white and clear or possessed a slight hint of lavender to them. No one who glanced at them would believe they were anything but blind.
These eyes… they look familiar.
A man arrived, equally with his clear eyes, and gazed upon him with a complicated face. There was joy, certainly, but there was also grief and sorrow. Despite being incapable of understanding the words spoken, Zi Wuji inferred that this man was his new biological father.
He also learned, that his mother had died of complications during childbirth.
The man took him into his arms and spoke several words, none of which Zi Wuji could understand. He did, however, grasp that one of them was a name, his name.
Not long after, the man departed.
Days turned to weeks and Zi Wuji came to terms with his new surroundings.
He'd learned quickly that he was in a Clan of individuals who all possessed the same white eyes he did, and learned that contrary to his initial assumption, he was a person of lower birth. This he could infer from the attitudes of the wet nurses who would place their breasts into his mouth to feed him. His eyes were keen to their expressions, and they lacked the typical haughtiness and confidence one possessed when they were of noble or higher birth.
Everyone he'd seen seemed to possess the aura of a slave. There was no other way Zi Wuji could explain it. The manner they spoke, the clothing in which they wore, the attitudes they possessed, all of it was reminiscent of the manner in which Sects in the Rain World treated their Outer Disciples — as menial labor and a disposable workforce.
As an infant, his options and actions were limited, and thus, he focused purely on his internal energy and the strange circulatory system within him. With nothing else to do except eat, sleep, and defecate, he spent hours with his eyes closed, exploring and learning the secrets of his new biological mechanism. The more he learned of it, the more curious he became.
Two months after he'd been born, he'd deciphered the nature of the energy. The energy was a combination of his spiritual force, acquired from meditation, study, and life experience, and his physical essence, acquired from the physical body, training, and exercise.
Learning this soured his mood. His spiritual force was without equal, certainly, but as an infant, he was heavily lacking in physical energy. How could an infant barely capable of movement exercise or build up their physique?
Without the corresponding building of his physical might, the energy within him would not grow nor would it blossom. Rather, there would exist an imbalance.
It was this realization that prompted him to action.
Four months after being born, he could crawl around on his own, sit, move, and stand. The wet nurses cooed in marvel, praising him for doing the barest minimum an infant was expected to do. During this time, he rarely ever saw his biological father. The man was not present, when, after exactly four months of his birth, Zi Wuji took his first steps.
He was not like those annoying and irritating individuals who loved to play the pig to eat the tiger. That is, he was not someone who would hide his abilities so as to gain benefits. He was Zi Wuji! His goal was to be a genius amongst geniuses! He desired to stand atop the world and crush nations with a press of his fingertip!
Thus, upon gaining the ability to walk, Zi Wuji would meet the numerous women of his clan and carry along a book with him, pointing and gesturing at it. They would not refuse him.
Contrary to his expectations, learning the language had been beyond simple. As Zi Wuji was the Zodiac Formation King, he had the innate ability to recognize characters and letters as easily as recognizing faces. The hanzi writing system he was familiar with was extremely similar to the kanji system utilized here, and as it was a logosyllabic writing system, he picked it up with relative ease.
This was around the time whispers began circulating of his nature as a genius.
This was around the time he realized an abnormality existed in his family.
He'd left his room and quarters in search of one of the wet nurses that often taught him the more complicated words, and arrived at a part of the Clan he'd been warned severely not to enter unauthorized.
It was affluent.
Everything from the nature of the buildings to the well-kept gardens, to the streams and ponds filled with exotic koi fish, to the individuals who roamed within, their heads held high, their robes spotless and pristine, and their faces carrying the smug self-satisfaction of men and women who knew no hardship.
The difference was night and day. Zi Wuji's confusion grew to new lengths. So too, did his feelings of irritation. Why was he kept on the poorer side? For what reason did this segregation exist?
The gazes of the individuals on the more affluent side of the clan were frosty towards him. There was none of the warmth he'd been accustomed to. Zi Wuji quickly made his way through in search of the wet nurse and stumbled upon a strange scene.
He found her on her knees, head bowed, whilst another woman dressed elegantly and with the air of nobility glowered down at her.
"Aya-sama, please, I - I had no choice —"
A heavy slap resounded. Zi Wuji's eyes narrowed.
"Do you take me for a fool?" The woman sneered. "My husband is not so despicable as to threaten you with the caged bird seal merely to have you spread your legs."
"I would not dare lie to —"
"Silence!"
The elegant woman made a strange gesture with her hands. The wet nurse immediately collapsed. A horrific scream emerged from her lips as she rolled and tumbled against the ground. She sounded like a savage beast and began to plead and beg for mercy.
Zi Wuji did not interfere. He did not have a righteous heart, to begin with. Rather, he observed the proceedings silently.
After five minutes straight of the wet nurse screaming and tumbling about in the mud, the elegant woman undid the gesture with her hands, and the wet nurse collapsed, ragged, panting, with a face contorted in agony.
"Remember your place. Should my husband approach you next time, you are better off biting your tongue. For if I receive word of any late-night activities…"
The woman made the strange hand gesture again, and the wet nurse's scream echoed out once more throughout the courtyard.
Eventually, the elegant woman departed. Zi Wuji approached the wet nurse only after she'd stopped trembling and shaking in pain. He examined her, finding her countenance similar to those of individuals who'd undergone immense torture at the hands of a Demonic Sect.
"N-Neji-sama?"
He did not speak. He merely helped her to her feet.
"W-what are you doing h-here N-Neji-sama? This part of the Clan is forbidden w-without permission."
Zi Wuji pointed to the book in his hand.
"Y-you wanted me to r-read to you?"
Zi Wuji nodded.
"Neji-sama…" the woman shook her head. A smile, soft and sad emerged. "Let us r-return. I'll r-read to you as m-much as you like."
They'd returned to their own little corner of the Clan, and she'd held up her promise and read to him for hours. Zi Wuji knew the only reason she did so was to cloak the misery and pain in her heart. Rather than returning to her quarters, she spent the whole day with him, teaching him characters and words.
Somewhere along the way, the woman began to cry. Soft, hopeless sobs, the kind that Zi Wuji found to be irritating beyond measure. She'd lamented and wept, holding him close, and eventually, she tore off her head covering and revealed a tattoo resembling the manji symbol, 卐 marred across her forehead.
"If… if it weren't for this… Neji-sama. You… you're so talented, but being in the branch house as you are…"
She wept and cried and said all manner of things that a child his age would never have understood. However, Zi Wuji was no child. He was able to piece together the entire story from her words and from what he'd witnessed.
The clan he was in was divided into two. The Main House and the Branch House. He was born into the Branch House, and the Branch House were the slaves and servants of the Main House, destined to obey, protect and serve them till their dying breath.
All of this was enforced through power and fear. The Main House possessed a method to punish, torture, and immediately kill members of the Branch House at but a single movement.
All of this brought Zi Wuji to one conclusion.
I've been reborn into a Demonic Clan.
No Orthodox Clan would ever utilize such methods. Not even those who subscribed to the Unorthodox Way would be capable of living with the knowledge that they were enslaving their own flesh and blood.
In the world of Cultivation, family was sacred. Individuals who betrayed or killed their own kindred and family members were often more loathed than Demonic Cultivators. If one were to wrong an innocent stranger, the world would merely grumble. If one were to wrong their own kin, the world would erupt in outrage.
Zi Wuji had seen with his own eyes how a man who'd raped his servant's daughter was held in high regard, trusted, and welcomed with open arms, whereas a man who'd merely struck his mother in anger was spat on, shunned, rejected, and ridiculed.
To overcome the blood bonds of kin and enslave one's family?
One had to be demonic.
In Zi Wuji's mind, there was no other possibility.
From the woman's crying rambles, Zi Wuji gathered that it was only a matter of time before such a brand would be imparted onto him as well.
"N-Neji-sama?"
He ignored the woman's sobs and rambles and grabbed her head close in order to examine the strange tattoo. Indeed, the manji symbol was often used in the Rain World as well, and in formations and arrays. It was the all-things symbol, and Zi Wuji had seen its utilization in certain ceremonies and formations designed by the original Shaolin Temple.
The nature of the seal made its way to him at a glance. The lines indicated the seal was connected to the skull and deeper into the brain. Zi Wuji clicked his tongue. He could not unravel it unless he could specifically see the manner in which the seal directed the flow of internal energy. To do so, he would need to either open the woman's brain or be able to see through her skull.
How was such a thing even inscribed?
Indeed, Zi Wuji grew curious. If he could learn the method of inscription of the seal, he would be able to reverse-engineer the means to remove it, and better still, he'd be able to upgrade and modify it. Alas, without seeing how it was implemented, there was naught he could do so far.
"When?"
"N-Neji-sama?"
He tapped the woman's forehead impatiently.
"When?" he pointed to himself. "Me?"
"I-it's customary to place the Caged Bird Seal on the third birthday of the Clan Heir…"
"Caged… Bird?"
Zi Wuji sighed.
This was why he did not like those who openly declared themselves Demonic Practitioners.
They didn't even attempt to hide the fact that the seal was meant to enslave others. If one wished to be evil, did they not also require the intellect to survive in a world where they would be the enemy of the forces of good? To so openly brand your own family with slave seals and then call it the Caged Bird Seal —
Should I just kill the entire clan?
Both sides annoyed him. The side who enslaved their family, and the side too weak and cowardly to fight back against their masters. If he was born into a clan and was told his fate was to be a slave for his older brother, and his older brother accepted the agreement, Zi Wuji would either kill that brother or kill himself.
He could not imagine being birthed from the same womb with someone, and being told his destiny was to be their servant. What utter nonsense was that? Even in a world where men were unequal under the heavens, to be deemed unequal at birth by one's own blood was an unforgivable sin. Even worse, Zi Wuji felt, was to accept such inequality.
It's decided.
He could not continue to stay in such a disgusting place surrounded by unfilial scum and sniveling cowards. The woman's wailing almost made him itch to snap her neck.
I must gain strength.
They wished to brand the Zodiac Formation King? They wished to enslave the Blood Flower Reverend?
They were welcome to try.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
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