I Was Called A Demon

Lei Kai Lian had never seen a true dragon up close, as even Long Shiyi was only seen from afar when she had transformed. So, this enormous dragon head, glaring at her… was quite the introduction.

“Who are you that treads upon my hell? Name yourself, human!”

“I-I am Lei Kai Lian, of the Righteous Court! And you… are the Crystal Terror?”

“Do not insult me, human! To intrude upon this place and yet not know the truth… that which forced me to change my peaceful ways, the beast with which I have been trapped!”

“The… the beast?”

“The one you would know as Su Guo, the otherworldly monster that was unleashed upon us! He hunted my children, tore them to pieces, remade their bones into weapons and scales into armour!” the vast dragon maw roared, her voice making the entire cave tremble, “Even in death, I was not free from his torment. Our souls, our treasures, entangled into one spatial realm, controlled by our wills. He and I as spatial spirits, left waiting for those to continue our eternal conflict…”

Lei Kai Lian could only look at the Crystal Terror, mouth agape, trying to sort it out in her head. History like this wasn’t her expertise, but even then, the name Crystal Terror had long outgrown Jun’s prior title, the Dragon of Song. More importantly, though, the fact that there was an otherworldly demon involved, and that the legendary Su Guo had been one…

“This… this is all too much. If that’s the case, why did I end up here? What happened to the others?”

“I sought one who would fight demons like him with the same fervour as I had. He sought one from his world. With our clashing wills, our realm had remained hidden until both of us had found our inheritors… you, human, have an otherworldly demon you hate, do you not?”

“I… w-wait, do you mean that Bianca is…” Lei Kai Lian froze up.

She recalled the various details she had heard about her, and suddenly, it all made sense. Progressing through realms at an incredible pace, possessing skills that seemed to come out of nowhere, with a name that had always seemed strange…

And she did hate her. Bianca had captivated her master’s attention for the last few months of his life, and it had led him to further conflicts within the Righteous Court. She had somehow deceived him, and led him to think that she was just some innocent girl, whereas in reality… she was a monster, a demon, a deceiver!

“I know not that name, but I can feel that presence in that demon’s part of the realm. It is unmistakably that of an otherworldly demon, an invader into our lands, and I can feel their souls resonating. If permitted to run amok, that monster would be as devastating as Su Guo had been, if not more!”

“Can you not stop them?”

“No. I can only ensure that my own inheritor is well equipped – and that would be you, human. To you, I can bestow the greatest of my cultivation techniques, the remnants of my secret skills – you already cultivate the Crystal archetype, so it should be a perfect fit for you.”

Again, Lei Kai Lian was dumbfounded. A dragon’s treasure, be it material or not, was often extremely difficult to glimpse, never mind take, and here she was, being offered something so precious with barely any conditions.

It sounded too good to be true, but rather than doubting it, she couldn’t help but think about what Bianca might be being offered.

“Whoa… Are you sure you weren’t the dragon? There’s so much in here, and it’s all so shiny…”

“Each one of these is exotic-tier! Hah, I was so happy when the first one was made by the Throne of Armaments, and look at it now, hundreds of items scattered all over…”

“Exotic?”

“It’s… uh, the Throne would rate items with rarities, like a game. Exotic was the highest rarity.”

“Right… I didn’t really play games back on Orbis, so this just sounds like nonsense to me. How did you even have time to play them while you were becoming a billionaire?”

“Rather than working constantly, it is important to take breaks! Have a proper work-life balance, and also focus in investing rather than simply- wait, you… you look like you’d still be in college.”

“I was, yes… don’t remind me of it, please, the shared dorms in Rowiem are awful.”

“…”

She hadn’t been looking at him while she talked, to save herself the effort of restraining her impulse to punch, but she did glance over then, and saw him looking peculiar again.

“Don’t tell me… it got destroyed in your world?”

“It did. The rebuilt structure was called the Riel University, named after the scientist of the same name.”

“Weird. Why would they bomb the college?”

“Why would they bomb a pleasant mountain road?”

“You tell me, the Enians are strange people. Did you know that they- ah, wait, you’re rich, you’re probably into the same stuff as they are,” Bianca rolled her eyes, “Weirdo.”

“I didn’t even say anything. Regardless… you haven’t got forever. This place will shatter soon enough, as both of our wills have been completed.”

“About that… could you hold the seventh realm cultivator longer?”

“I… can attempt it.”

“That would be enough, thank you. With her, there’s no chance of getting away, but without her… yes, it might be possible. Depends on how long you can hold her, of course. Anyway, there’s zero chance I’m carrying all of this stuff away with just my two hands.”

“Worry not, I have some spatial treasures. I treated them as disposable since the Throne of Armaments was able to hold anything I needed, but they seemed to have value to others, so I kept a few with me, even when going into battle against the dragon.”

He reached out, his palm facing up, and suddenly a couple of items appeared upon it. A bracelet, a ring, a pair of earrings, and a small pebble.

The pebble seemed out of place, but all of these items had a certain aura around them, so presumably… somehow, the pebble was also a spatial artefact. Even then, Bianca knew full well that carrying around a pebble would be far riskier than the other options, since it was easily lost, but something worn on her body would not be.

“This is the selection. You can pick what you prefer, though you cannot carry the other spatial treasures within it. Think of it as putting a Bottomless Bag inside a Bottomless Bag.”

“I don’t know what that means, but okay,” Bianca said, reaching out before pausing, “Uh, can you throw me those earrings?”

“Ah, excellent choice! You can just take them-”

“No, I insist.”

“Very well,” he threw them over, and fortunately, this spiritual presence didn’t sweat, so she didn’t need to worry about that.

The earrings were relatively small, golden and roughly diamond shaped, two spiralling lines converging on a central ‘orb’ of sorts. They were subdued enough to not look garish, but had enough presence to be noticeable. However, even when holding them, she wasn’t able to feel anything special from them besides that aura.

So, she put one on, and when she still felt nothing special, the other.

That was when the feeling suddenly changed. It was as though a vast space opened up beside her, both everywhere and nowhere, and all she had to do was reach out and wish to grasp whatever was inside.

There was a small goblet near her, the first of the countless treasures sitting in this hoard of wealth and power, and she picked it up, barely even looking at it before trying it out, tossing the goblet into that other space. All it took was that thought, and before it even left her hands, it was gone, moved into that open storage space. It hovered on the spot, exactly where she left it, exactly how she left it.

“Wow… wish I’d had that earlier. And this stuff was just… nothing to you?”

“The most powerful of my treasures were lost in the battle, what remains is insignificant in comparison. It’s just some spatial storage, nothing more.”

He lowered his hand, and all those treasures vanished, though on second glance, Bianca could see the pebble appear at the top of the pile, where it likely had been from the start. Given that the man was supposedly just a being that controlled this dimension, all of the items had to be coming from it…

“Say, I’ve not been in this world as long as you apparently had been… what is most of this stuff?”

“If you deposit it into your spatial treasure, you should have all the time in the world to examine the specific objects. However, I will break down the main categories. The first is jade slips, containing techniques-”

“Your Throne could make even that?”

“Those were just part of my personal collection. They counted as weapons, so they were able to fit inside the Throne,” Jonathan explained, “Still, those jade slips contain numerous skills and techniques for you to use, whether to learn yourself or trade them away. They can be used numerous times, so if you have a force you command, like I did, then it would be an ideal incentive for them to continue following you.”

“How lucky, that’s exactly what we- ah fuck, is this that luck taking effect again? We needed exactly this to be able to train our disciples, and recruit new ones.”

“… Perhaps. Then, there are the weapons. Most are conventional in form and nature, though some are more unusual – but all are artefacts with immense power, enough for a fifth realm to survive a sixth realm.”

A few items appeared before her as examples, ranging from swords and axes to that pebble… again.

“I have to ask, that pebble…”

“Ah, it was an experiment of mine, to see how much I could fit inside a single item. It has a small spatial pocket within, as well as the ability to accelerate rapidly when thrown. It can even be shattered on demand, causing the items within to burst out… could be a useful weapon, but I never found a use for it.”

“Nah, sounds useless, not interested,” Bianca didn’t really bother thinking it through, her gaze fixed on the larger pile of artefacts.

There were so many that she could outfit an army matching the Exarch’s forces, and if it was all truly as powerful as Jonathan claimed, then it would be trivial to confront that sentient rag the instant she reached the sixth or seventh realm herself. Huang Su would likely get there before she did, but still, she couldn’t trust the ‘false phoenix’, as Long Shiyi seemed to enjoy calling her, to win the fight in the end.

In either case, the possibilities of the pebble didn’t enter into her mind at all.

“Then, there is the armour. There is quite a lot, though most of what remains isn’t in perfect sets. When I had originally outfitted an army, each soldier had a full suit of plate armour, covering them from head to toe, each piece overflowing with energy… but here, I think you’ll find a dozen complete sets at most.”

“That’s fine, we don’t need too many sets… and you say complete sets, how many incomplete ones are there?”

“About a thousand, give or take.”

“Oh, then that’s perfectly fine. Even a single protective piece will probably do wonders compared to nothing at all… which, as I’ve just realised, has been how we’ve been approaching most fights. It’s a miracle nobody has gotten seriously hurt yet,” Bianca muttered to herself, before suddenly clapping her hands together, “So! What next?”

“Then, there are consumables. Pills, talismans and the like. There are too many to go over, but the summary of it all is that they are usable a limited number of times for some great effect. I enjoyed collecting such things, even though they were rarely necessary for them.”

He demonstrated a few of those items, and while some certainly looked a little unusual, it seemed like these pills were not much different from what Bianca had already encountered.

“The final category would be… items without as clear a category. For instance, this hairpin,” he produced a pin with a wing-like design, though this one was made of silver rather than gold, unlike many of the treasures on display, “It has a simple purpose – it can ‘observe’ an archetype and then allow you to replicate it for a time, using any skills belonging to it seamlessly-”

“Give! Give me that!” she held her hands out, glaring at him until he threw it over, visibly confused, “Oh, fucking finally…”

“Is that an item that you needed? I didn’t know that my Archetype Replicant was known at all…”

“I don’t know how it happened for you, but I’ve been stuck with a cultivation technique and a few skills since I first got to absorb planar energy. I’ve been incredibly limited in what I can actually perform, so this thing is like a dream come true,” Bianca explained, instantly putting it on, “This will save me so much trouble… fuck, I could almost hug you. Almost.”

However, all it took was a few seconds before she felt like throwing up at the mere thought, so she quickly discarded that idea.

“My Crystal Heart is my fundamental core, the technique from which I nearly derived victory. Had I been a stage higher, or my development of it been more advanced… or even if I had merely trained for combat longer before that demon forced me into battle, Su Guo would have fallen, and I would have lived.”

“The Crystal archetype… the same that I cultivate.”

“Indeed, human. That is another reason why you were a suitable inheritor for my will. However, your technique is lacking in comparison, an impure and weak imitation of grander things. My Crystal Heart is as close to perfection as one can get.”

The vast crystalline cave, and the draconic maw floating within, made a lot of sense given this context. If anything, she was surprised that there weren’t even more crystalline objects all over the place, perhaps a pile of crystal treasure from the dragon’s vast hoard… but at the same time, she knew that the Crystal Terror had been forced to go out into the battlefield in a hurry, and hardly had the chance to bring all of her treasures with her.

Furthermore, her core goal before falling was to take down a demon, not to collect further wealth – especially given that all of the items she could have plundered would’ve been made from the bones and scales of her own children…

So in hindsight, not having any treasures made perfect sense… and it was a distraction compared to studying the technique that the dragon wished to teach her.

“What is the core of the technique?”

“The creation of an array-like crystalline structure within the dantian. It is able to amplify our singular focus, our Crystal archetype, and surpass all other techniques tenfold.”

“An array… I’m not particularly experienced with them.”

“Irrelevant. This technique has all the instructions you need; you need only pay attention to me and discard your preconceptions about the archetype that you might have formed so far. Your inferior technique is worthless, your past experience is irrelevant, and your prior teachings should be forgotten. Only the Crystal Heart is worth your time, inheritor.”

“I… I understand. I will attempt-”

“No, you will do it, or I will not teach you, human. Do not waste my last moments!”

“… Yes, Dragon of Song.”