Chapter One: Crawling Out of the Grave

He had no idea how much time had passed before he opened his sore eyes, his entire body racked with unbearable pain. His head ached even worse, as though a severe migraine had taken hold, and his mind felt stuffed with a jumble of chaotic memories.

He looked around. The place was shrouded in gloom, with heaps of bleached white bones scattered haphazardly across the ground. In the distance, strange, shadowy substances gave off a stench so foul that even a single breath made him want to retch.

“So, I really died. This must be the Underworld,” he thought with a hollow despair. To die so young—what rotten luck. His last life had been a waste; he should hurry and be reborn, and hope not to repeat the same fate next time.

As these thoughts circled in his head, a sharp pain flared in his mind. He clutched his head and cried out, but when the agony subsided, it felt as though he suddenly understood countless things.

“Brian… Brian… Who on earth is Brian?”

Half an hour later…

He was stunned. How could something as bizarre as soul transference, the stuff of television dramas, happen to him? And, to top it off, he had ended up in the body of a foreigner. Had that lunatic Chu Canglan’s strange sorcery gone awry?

Now, his eyes were growing accustomed to the darkness. He flexed his limbs and brought his right arm close to his face. The black mole that used to be on his wrist was gone, replaced by a network of gruesome, writhing scars that twisted like earthworms across his arm, sending a chill through him at a single glance.

This was not his body. Dumbstruck, he realized he had truly transmigrated.

Although Brian had died, for reasons unknown, he could recall Brian’s past. Not only had he possessed a new body, but it was not in America, England, or any Western country.

He was in a foreign world called the Continent of Chio, in a country known as the Lancelot Empire—a strange land of swords and sorcery, roamed by all manner of alien races.

Brian’s parents had died young. When he was only ten, his uncles sold him to slave traders, who in turn sold him to Babylon Magic and Martial Academy—thus began the darkness of his life.

Brian had died at sixteen. At the Babylon Magic and Martial Academy, he had spent his days as a menial in the weakest department—the Necromancy Division.

For six years, his job was to help the necromancy students by hauling away failed necromantic experiments—broken skeletons, zombie remains, and other discarded corpses—to the cemetery. Aside from that, he was responsible for chores like serving tea, cleaning, and pest control—any and every trivial task.

Worse still, the necromancy students used him to practice their spells—testing the combat abilities of skeletons or ghouls on him, or experimenting with necromantic magic directly on his body.

Timid and meek, Brian had lived a life worse than death for six years, his body covered in scars. He survived on bread so hard it was barely edible, endlessly toiling. Whenever necromancy students lost to other divisions in magic duels, they vented their frustration on him.

Sixteen years old—six years of torment. For a child, could there be anything crueler? More than once, Brian had considered ending his own life, but even in this, his cowardice prevailed. He simply endured, silently bearing six years of agony.

Finally, just two days ago, he was killed when Lisa, the little witch of the necromancy division, summoned a “wraith” that invaded his soul. In his final moments, Brian felt no pain—only a bittersweet sense of release.

After six years spent hauling corpses and bones, in the end, Brian was thrown into the very cemetery where he had dumped so many failures, discarded as waste by another menial.

Han Shuo had always thought his own life bleak enough, but compared to Brian’s, he felt a sting behind his eyes, realizing for the first time how fortunate he had truly been.

Coming to terms with Brian’s past, Han Shuo’s voice trembled as he sighed, “How could there be such a foolish, timid soul in this world? Brian, now that I occupy your body, what should I do for you?”

Suddenly, Han Shuo sensed a thin, liquid-like current within his body. At that instant, a sharp pain struck his mind, and a series of memories flashed by. That strange liquid flowed slowly through him, and Han Shuo, momentarily dazed, involuntarily absorbed things he’d never known before—imparted by the eccentric Chu Canglan.

There were nine stages in the art of demon cultivation: Solidification, Meridian Expansion, Soul Shaping, True Demon, Bloodlust, Demon Division, Indulgence, Nine Transformations, and Heavenly Demon. A true demon followed only desire, unbound by law or morality, seeking only absolute power.

Upon achieving demonhood, one gained godlike powers to move mountains and overturn seas.

Han Shuo sat, lost in thought for who knew how long, learning things he’d never imagined possible. He was now certain that Chu Canglan’s final magic had gone awry. Chu Canglan’s own soul was gone, but all his memories of demon cultivation had been left behind.

That faint current within his body was surely the essential foundation of demon cultivation—demonic origin energy, the root of all demonic arts. According to the memories left by Chu Canglan, it normally took three to five years of cultivation to condense even a trace of such energy. Yet Han Shuo, who had done nothing to prepare, found a real, though pitifully weak, demonic origin within himself.

Han Shuo thought bitterly that, while Chu Canglan had intended to use him as a scapegoat, he never expected to send him to such a strange world. The chaotic demon cultivation techniques now in his head were surely Chu Canglan’s final legacy.

As for this world, Han Shuo only knew what little Brian had learned as a lowly servant at the Magic and Martial Academy—a pitifully limited perspective. For the sake of survival, Han Shuo began to plan ahead.

Brian was dead, and Han Shuo now inhabited his body. He was Brian—and Brian had been sold to the Magic and Martial Academy, a permanent mark of identity. In this world, the punishments for runaway slaves were unspeakably cruel, so escape was out of the question, even if he could manage it. Besides, he didn’t have a single copper coin to his name.

After much deliberation, Han Shuo finally decided he must return to Babylon Magic and Martial Academy—only there could he hope to change his status as a slave and perhaps do something for the pitiful Brian whose body he now inhabited.

His whole body ached intolerably—Brian’s body still bore many old wounds. He tried to stand but was overwhelmed by pain, collapsing with a groan.

He had no fondness for Chu Canglan, who had forcibly brought him here, nor did he understand the world Chu Canglan had come from. Still, the memories he’d inherited revealed that from the very start, demon cultivation could toughen the body, and at higher levels, grant one the power to fly, burrow, move mountains, and overturn seas.

Although Han Shuo considered Chu Canglan somewhat mad, the fact that Chu Canglan had once carried him all the way to the moon made him half believe the legends of demon cultivation.

With a trace of demonic origin inside him, Han Shuo decided to try. Desperate to increase his chances of survival, he recalled the cryptic incantations for demon cultivation and focused his mind, attempting to control that faint bit of demonic energy according to the first stage, Solidification.

Concentrating, Han Shuo found that the demonic energy responded just as Chu Canglan had described—it went wherever his thoughts directed it.

Elated, Han Shuo marveled that, mad as Chu Canglan had seemed, the demon cultivation method he left behind was indeed useful. He steadied his thoughts and guided the demonic energy throughout his body as instructed by the Solidification method.

By the time his stomach began to rumble hungrily, Han Shuo emerged from his trance, unsure how long he’d been cultivating. The pain in his body had lessened, and he felt a measure of strength return. If just a short session yielded such results, it was no wonder Chu Canglan had become so powerful.

When he stopped, Han Shuo noticed something odd—the demonic energy, no longer following the prescribed path, began to flow of its own accord through his muscles, bones, arms, legs, and head—every part of his body.

The first stage, Solidification, was a process of forging the body—strengthening skin, muscle, and bone. Besides refining with demonic energy, some fanatical demon cultivators used brutal methods, battering their bodies to inflict wounds, then using demonic energy to temper themselves inside and out for faster progress.

“This demon art is practically self-torture! Still, Brian’s entire life has been like this. Maybe when I return to the Academy, I’ll be able to cultivate Solidification even faster. Perhaps being Brian isn’t without its advantages,” Han Shuo reflected wryly.

He resolved to leave this place. The thought struck him that remaining in this graveyard was foolish. The stench was now unbearable.

A faint, pale light came from above. Drawing on Brian’s memories, Han Shuo knew there was a large hole in the roof, used for dumping broken skeletons. He stood up, wincing at the pain, his body battered and frail from years of torment and poor nourishment—thin as a skeleton himself, and barely over five feet tall.

Treading on slippery moss, Han Shuo dragged his feeble body upward. After several falls, he finally climbed out of the grave pit. The full moon shone down, bathing the cemetery in silver light. A surge of joy at being alive welled up from his heart.

Feeling the demonic energy still coursing through him, Han Shuo comforted himself, believing that surviving such a calamity must mean fortune lay ahead. Now, he had one advantage—the secret cultivation method Chu Canglan had bestowed, which might help him realize ambitions he’d never dared dream before.

Yet Han Shuo remained unaware that the trace of demonic origin left by Chu Canglan was more than a tool for Solidification—it was a seed. As it changed his body, it also began to alter his thoughts. The evil impulses he’d never dared act upon might soon be beyond his ability to control.