I Was Called A Demon

As soon as she stopped talking, Shouge Zhe leapt up, ghastly light coating her scythe, and suddenly flew through the air in the blink of an eye, shrouded in the eerie green. Her target was the necromancer floating in the sky, who had looked so unassailable and confident just moments prior.

The gap in cultivation realm between the two of them should have made it impossible for her to do any harm, and yet Dao Shenzhen evaded desperately, while conjuring countless bone spikes around himself. Within a breath, a thousand of them manifested around him, shooting out the next moment, but as Shouge Zhe exhaled, her energy spread outward along her breath, turning into a ghastly veil of light.

Any bone spike that touched it withered and turned to naught, save for a spark of ghastly green that swiftly mixed into the veil and let it grow further out.

He tried to get away further using the momentary delay, but the reaper reached out her hand and a vast scythe of ghastly light appeared, swinging through the air, seeming to anticipate his every move.

“Reaper! How would your kind react to you using our necromancy against us?”

“I break no rule, breaker of the Compact. This power is not my own – I merely use your strength against you.”

The necromancer was only barely able to manifest a barrier of ribs and bone before the ghastly light hit, but it only slightly dulled the impact, for his defence melted away in the blink of an eye. The scythe cut into his flesh, down to the spine, sending him flying half-way across the dome of ‘Song Village’, dark blood dripping from the gaping wound.

He looked like he was entertaining the thought of escape… so how could Bianca or the others ever permit it?

With her movement skill, she was at his side in an instant, unable to fly, but more than capable of swinging a sword while she was in the air. Crimson arcs coated the blade as she drove it into the necromancer’s side, focusing on nothing but letting her energy permeate his body.

“You-!”

The bodies of Song Village rose up to swat her out of the sky, but just before they hit, Shouge Zhe’s energy swept over them, letting them fade to bone and dust. The only thing that collided with Bianca in the end was the wave of air, which pushed her down and away, but left her otherwise unharmed.

Most importantly, she could see the crimson crackling away at the man’s wound, and the man himself grimacing from her energy spreading throughout his body.

Being flung away like that gave her a rather cinematic view, zooming out to a wide shot, of the others stepping in with their abilities. Countless metal shards intertwined with flaming feathers and struck him all at once, and as though that wasn’t enough, the kitsune lifted a gleaming spear of sunlight into the air, calling down a beam of it upon the necromancer.

The person that emerged from all that looked to barely be alive, his skin scorched, his body coated in wounds, big and small. Though whatever means he used to protect himself prevented his outright demise, the fact remained that his aura was weak, his energy likely on the brink of exhaustion. Without some miracle, he would not survive for long.

Bianca did not intend to allow him a chance at a miracle, not to mention a proper one. Whatever means of keeping himself alive, whatever trickery he might pull to get out of this situation alive… she wouldn’t let him.

“Pet, put the rune on my blade!”

“Y-Yes, Mistress!”

They’d never tried this before, but the light of a rune still appeared over her dark blade, and as she leapt up into the air, her own crimson mixed with the eerie light and swiftly glowing brighter and brighter, becoming nearly blinding as her weapon suddenly struck the side of Dao Shenzhen’s neck.

It was like hitting a brick wall, thick plates of bone appearing at the point she hit, but she didn’t allow him to get away with it. She kept her pressure up, and as the rune on her sword ignited, it was able to tear through his bone and flesh, striking the spine, and in the next moment, slicing through.

His head flew off his neck, crashing down to the mass of corpses down below, but his body lingered in the air long enough for Bianca to stab his dantian, the sound of shattering glass and fracturing bone heralding his fall.

With that, the necromancer was dead… probably.

People in this world had plenty of means and methods, not to mention the fact that she was literally dealing with those that raised the dead…

“Hah… quick, everyone, help me take out the rest of the cores for Song Village!” Bianca landed on the ground, already ‘purified’ by Shouge Zhe, and urged the others, “It will only last a little longer, and I don’t have enough energy to do it myself.”

“Got it, Mistress. Just point the way,” the dragon said, manifesting numerous shards of metal.

Without another will interfering, although ‘Song Village’ wouldn’t disperse itself like a regular planar construct might, there would be nobody to stop her from exposing each and every weakness to regular attack.

And thus, she bid the corpses to spread out, exposing every weakness, letting the others split up and handle the various ghastly cores within the ground. Shouge Zhe was able to resolve most of them with ease, drawing the ghastly light out of the vast orbs and shattering them with simple swings. The rest were destroyed by the others, combining their power to break through the tough shell and destroy those collections of energy.

After most of them were broken, ‘Song Village’ began to waver, some bodies collapsing from the vast spires and membrane on their own, and when the last orb was destroyed… all of them fell at once, any vitality or energy fading from the corpses, decay setting in.

Before most of them could even touch the ground, the bodies turned to dust, even the bones being reduced to nothing.

That was the end of Song Village, both as the abomination of countless bodies, and the village that had once stood amidst the endless sea of corpses.

Most of the corpses simply decayed to dust, though some of the fresher ones left behind bones. It seemed like the energy infused into them made the bodies more fragile once it was removed, or that even the ‘youngest’ bodies of Song Village had been dead for a long, long time.

Regardless, with so many bodies once buried underneath the ground, the whole village was now left a pit, a massive pit in the earth that slowly filled with water seeping in from the Heart Lake. A few of the homes remained in a vaguely liveable state, but the rest of the village was in ruins, broken either by the collapse of ‘Song Village’ or by the fighting that occurred prior to it.

“… Say, does anyone mind if I take all the left-over building material?”

“You are speaking of the gravestones for a mass grave, Sect Mistress,” Shouge Zhe replied sternly.

It made Bianca raise an eyebrow, “I’m not too familiar with the reaper customers, but I didn’t know you valued graves.”

“You misunderstand. It had been hidden by the skill employed here, but with it gone, I can sense the way that yin has permeated every aspect of this village. The material here would not be optimal for construction.”

“Ah.”

She only thought of it in the first place as she had wanted to show off her spatial storage earrings a little more, but since the others all seemed to have the same view, she dropped the idea.

“Well, then we should get out of here. While we do that, though, I have to ask, what prompted you to rush over here?”

“I had sensed a violation of the Compact here. We have perfected the means of detecting violators over the countless years of the Reaper’s Grave’s existence… so although my realm is insufficient to reach all this way with spiritual perception, I could still perceive the need for my presence,” the reaper explained, “Furthermore, I had just had an epiphany, as you might have seen.”

“You must be referring to the way you exploited the necromancer’s energy,” the kitsune spoke up, her eyes almost gleaming, “Tell me, how did you do it? What elements of the archetype did you modify to achieve this? Is this specific to the Reaper archetype, or could this be applied universally, as well?”

Bianca rarely saw Xue Yaling get so excited, though she understood why, to an extent. For a woman that enjoyed tinkering with techniques and skills as much as her, finding something that seemed so exotic and yet incredible was like striking gold.

Despite seeing quite a few different archetypes at this point, Bianca hadn’t ever spotted someone that was able to so freely take and wield the power of their enemies against them. It was akin to magic – even as everyone present with her would instantly insist that magic wasn’t real, as though by reflex – and if she could’ve wielded something similar, she too could take on a sixth realm expert while still in the fourth realm.

However, she had a feeling that it wasn’t quite so simple, and Shouge Zhe confirmed it as she shook her head.

“It is impossible. All the skills of a reaper are meant to combat the kinds of energy wielded by necromancers – not them specifically, but there are numerous similarities that make them our natural enemies. I was able to modify those elements, allow them to employ that energy instead of merely dispersing it. I wouldn’t be able to do this against regular cultivators, nor would it be possible to simply add this to a skill that lacks such properties.”

The kitsune looked completely distraught at the news, but only for a moment.

“But regardless, this proves that using another’s energy in such an efficient manner is possible! In the same way that the necromancers have pioneered something unprecedented, this development could also be taken forward.”

“Do not speak of me and the violators in the same breath. Their pursuits should be forgotten and purged, the sooner the better.”

“It was merely an example, don’t you worry, I have zero interest in the arts of the necromancers…” Xue Yaling assured her, though Bianca could see the bead of sweat running down her brow.

“On that note, Sect Mistress, how were you able to control this abomination?”

“It’s thanks to an item I obtained… sorry if I don’t say much, seeing as we’re still in hostile territory. That guy might be gone, but even that isn’t guaranteed considering their whole thing is raising the dead.”

“A reasonable fear, even if I believe that my ability was sufficient to extinguish that violator’s flame.”

“Yeah… so, I was able to use it to control ‘Song Village’, but that won’t be possible the next time, so let’s hope that they don’t secretly have an equivalent in every town and village.”

More specifically, it wouldn’t be possible unless another necromancer showed up in front of her, for her to be able to copy their abilities, but again, she had no reason to specify her weaknesses when in front of potentially prying eyes. The worse that she made the Archetype Replicant’s capabilities seem, the greater the chances of her being able to leverage it in future.

“I see. I merely feared that you had used some power of theirs that you should not have,” the reaper said, visibly relaxing, though her cold, frail appearance made the difference minimal, “I am glad to have arrived in time. These… necromancers… are a blight upon this world, more so than most.”

“Indeed, I can’t argue with that. They’re rather disgusting… it’s almost a shame this place disintegrated, there’s a lot of evidence in here that we can’t showcase to the world.”

“No need. Not only is the aura of this place obvious, but so is the fact that Song Village is no more,” Shouge Zhe replied, “It will be their word against ours, and fortunately for us, with the reapers gone, the necromancers have become the new target for the ire of the many. Their vile deeds are rising to the surface… in time, they will be eliminated, same way we were.”

“Are you looking forward to it?”

“It is the rightful course of the world. For all that exists to fade, for the goal of all Life… is Death.”

Not far from Song Village, or what remained of it, was the Soul-Binding Monolith.

A vast, indescribable pillar of obsidian, a single monolithic piece that brimmed with necromantic energy. Around it, the dead walked even without anyone employing techniques or skills to achieve it, though their thoughts were missing, their flesh decaying, leaving only shambling bones after enough time passed.

The sky above the monolith was dark regardless of the weather beyond, and rain never fell upon the land, which was so barren and dark that it seemed more dead than the skeletons walking around it.

This was the place the necromancers had chosen to be their main base of operations, many years ago, when the very practise and archetype was new. At the time, they were outcasts, people that were seen as fools for even attempting to contemplate this mysterious structure, or raise the dead.

Such a thing was impossible, they said. The living and the dead were firmly separate, they insisted.

And then, the first leader of the Soul-Binding Monolith, their first Caller, was able to establish their Necromancy archetype. Manifesting bone and flesh, cursing foes and most importantly, manipulating the bodies and souls of the fallen.

The Caller was able to control a body like a puppet, wielding it as a tool, and begun their pursuit into perfecting the act, ensuring that not only would they be able to raise the dead, but do so in such a convincing manner that nobody would ever be able to tell the difference. It would prove their ultimate belief, that life and death were one and the same, and only the cruel mockery by the heavens prevented both from living in full.

While most argued against their aspirations in public, who didn’t want to live forever? And so, in time, they gained prestige and fame, their means only being seen as unusual, but not reviled. Their only foes were the Reaper’s Grave, the complete opposite of their ideology, path and even location…

And when they finally managed to wipe them out, it had seemed like things would proceed smoothly.

“So how has it come to this? That Demon Queen… the Demon Queen of Obliteration, the last of the reapers, and more…”

The Soul-Binding Monolith brimmed with energy, emanating the light of countless souls.

It was so close to reaching saturation, the point at which their goals would advance by a step, and they could not have an interruption in the form of a larger conflict, nor of their various experiments being interrupted.

Song Village was an old attempt, but one that had been providing them with a lot of useful information. The Reaper’s Grave was another, a more recent experimental site than most, but it enabled them to advance significantly in the solitude that the ruins of that place offered.

The loss of both locations was tragic… but especially now that they were pressured, it was all the more important to push onwards, to pursue the greatest of goals… and hope for success after countless years of failure.

“Gather the Soulseers. We must succeed this time. Retrieve Dao Shenzhen’s soul, it must be imbued into the Monolith. We will attain our ascension. We will attain true immortality.”

The Caller spoke his instructions, and his subordinates followed. The cold and dead land moved according to his will, the shambling bones and treading flesh moving as though of one mind and one soul.

This was the Soul-Binding Monolith, a force of the living and the dead, necromancers and the raised corpses that they wielded… or perhaps, nobody wielded anything.

Perhaps this dead, cold place was their ultimate grave.

And the Reaper’s Grave, the place where rebirth would ensue.