Chapter 5

The crow spirit told me that the Azure Empress came from the spirit clans. She was an innate deity, the only Baize in all creation.

While cleansing the world of demonic miasma, she had also awakened the intelligence of countless spirits. Many clans whose awareness had come later worshipped her.

The crow had come out to forage and was not far from its ancestral lands. I never grew tired, and following it on foot, I arrived soon enough.

The statue had a dragon’s head, green hair, and horns. Its body resembled a white deer, but it bore dragon horns. Perhaps because spirits worshipped her here, they had not depicted her human form. That form appeared in a portrait hung behind the statue.

The statue still held a trace of her divine essence from the time she awakened all living beings. After I gazed at it for a long while, a spark of light suddenly settled upon me.

Tears fell from the statue’s eyes. With them, that trace of divine essence dissolved.

At last, I understood everything.

I truly was the Azure Empress reborn. So was the woman in the heavenly palace.

The Azure Empress had died long ago. To cleanse the mortal realm of the filth left by the war between gods and demons, she had become the blessed rain that washed the whole world clean and awakened its creatures.

Over all these years, a few fragments of her soul had merged with other souls entering the Well of Reincarnation. That was why the Old Man of the Moon recognized the woman in heaven as her reincarnation. If they truly examined my soul, they could recognize me in the same way.

Looking upon the statue, I admired the woman who had held all living beings in her heart and sacrificed herself for the Dao.

Looking upon me, the statue grieved for a mortal toyed with by the very gods who should have protected her.

That trace of divine essence joined my soul and, together with the remnant lost in ancient times, became an old sword of withered vine.

I took it in my hand.

The blessings of all the beings she had awakened and cleansed descended upon me. My half-demon body, the Blood Sea Reincarnation Art—both ceased to exist. The Azure Empress’s divine body took shape anew.

In ancient times, the self I had once been sacrificed herself for the Dao.

Now, this self who was not that self would give herself to defend it.

With the Sword of Eternal Life in hand, the Azure Empress assumed her divine station once more, after tens of thousands of years.

The first thing I did was not return to heaven, or travel to the eastern heavens.

I went to the bottom of the Well of Gods and Demons.

“Oh? Back already? How many years has it been? Aren’t you impressive?” the Demon Emperor sneered.

I still wore the cloud robe in which I had been thrown down. I did not carry the Sword of Eternal Life. I simply said:

“Imprisonment has muddled your head.

“It has only been a few days.”

“Can’t you recognize sarcasm? Sarcasm!” He laughed coldly. “You haven’t been thrown back down here, have you? If you get out again, don’t tell anyone I taught you.”

His smooth talk could not deceive me. He had plainly sensed how extraordinary I had become, and that I was no longer half demon.

From the inheritance I had received, I knew there was only one power in the world that could cleanse a half-demon body: authority over living beings.

“You once said I resembled the Azure Empress of ancient times.” Standing beside the stone tablet, I could finally understand its celestial inscription.

Here the Azure Empress seals Zuo Jun, the Demon Emperor.

“So you really are her reincarnation?” Zuo Jun’s voice grew colder. “Even gods can misjudge someone, it seems.”

From the moment I fell, heaven’s treatment of me had made him dismiss the correct answer.

“I still would not call myself that,” I said without much sentiment. “Only a mortal who has been saved.”

“Since your nature is not entirely evil, I can release you.” I laid a hand on the tablet. “You helped me escape, which allowed me to receive the inheritance. Authority over living beings places the greatest weight on cause and consequence. I owe you a debt.”

“But freeing you would be another cause. If you committed evil afterward, I would be responsible for its consequences. So my offer has conditions.”

“I am the Demon Emperor! An innate demon! Why should I submit to your whims?” he roared.

I withdrew my hand and turned to leave.

“Hey! Hey! Treacherous mortal! Stop!” At last he panicked. He had no doubt I would truly go.

I did intend to leave.

An unpaid debt of karma would burden me. But if I could not accept responsibility for freeing him, I would rather carry that debt.

“I saved you, and you would bind my nature, restrain me with your authority over living beings? What sort of freedom is that? What sort of repayment?” he shouted. Everything he said amounted to: the price needed to be higher.

“I can free you and permit you to commit evil. You are an innate demon; evil is part of your nature as a living being. I can understand that.” After a little thought, I found the best solution.

“I will offer myself to feed the demon. So long as you do not hinder my cultivation or threaten my life, I will allow you ten thousand years of evil within my dreams.

“And if I make war on heaven in the future, you may kill its wicked, useless gods.”

I could allow him to express his nature, but only against me.

This was what I owed him. Without his help, I would not be here now. With the debt repaid, my conscience would be clear; however much I suffered, I would have no regrets.

Once I repaid this karma, the Great Dao would be within reach.

“Agreed!” he said at once.

I drew the old sword of withered vine. The karma between us wound around it. So long as we both lived, neither could break this oath.