I Don’t Want To Court Death!

The Sacred Master and Yang Yang flew hours in their great chase. Even at maximum power, the warship was barely able to catch up to the Sacred Master. 

 

“I can sense traces of faith on that demon. Is that his collection of faith over the years? Impressive. I assumed only an angel, scion, or god could collect and properly use that much faith.” During the chase, Yang Yang was preparing all sorts of ways to take down the demon. “While it is surprising that he’s a first-step Wisdom King, it was not completely out of my expectations. Although, he’s slightly stronger than I am. Of course, if I use my reserve of faithful energy, I can kill him instantly. Though, that would deplete around half of my reserve. Most of my faithful energy is also too ‘young’ and needs time to develop. What to do... what to do...” 

 

At some point, Yang Yang paused his thoughts and marveled at the size of the Arcane Dark Kingdom. “We’ve been flying for hours already and there’s still land to fly over. We must have gone over hundreds of kilometers already. Maybe over a million. Just how big is this place? It’s almost as big as several provinces in the Ivory Continent.” 

 

“I hope you are still holding up, your holiness.” The Sacred Master made a sudden turn by descending further downward and into a cave. 

 

“You should be worrying about yourself. If you do not hurry and show me what you have planned, I’ll stop our little game.” Yang Yang carefully steered warship into the cave and zoomed right through the tunnel. He did not even bother to avoid any rock as they were destroyed before even making contact with the warship. The warship’s protective sphere was activated and it would crush anything in its path, especially at the current speed of the warship. 

 

“That would be very unfortunate because... the game starts now!” The Sacred Master put away the Sacred Prison Cube and threw multiple smoke bombs behind him. They exploded, and a thick veil of pungent smoke filled the cave. The dark cave turned into a black abyss from the smokes. 

 

Yang Yang was momentarily stunned, but continued the chase. Although he could not see through the smokes, he could at least sense the life force and magical power in the surroundings so navigating through the smoke-filled cave was relatively simple. He could even sense a dense mass of life force ahead of him. The Sacred Master and his innate death force would essentially be a light in the moonless night. 

 

Yang Yang continued his approach until he reached near the end of the cave when, suddenly, the Everlasting Insanity curse acted up. He instantly paused the accelerating warship, sending rolls of magical power that put cracks on the walls of the cave. 

 

“Damn it all! Not again!” He took one step backed. Yang Yang’s expression turned magical when the pain in his wrist lessened the moment he took that step back. He took another step back and another and then another. Each time, the pain would decreased until it eventually ceased on the ninth step. 

 

“Backing up... helped?” He tilted his head, and then took a step forward. The pain returned and was even stronger that before. He took a step back and the pain was gone again. He repeated these steps until he had a general idea of the situation. “Every time this red mark acted up was when I was in danger. When I’m safe, it calms down. Is this curse... telling me something?” 

 

Ecstasy Demon Magic was the most feared and mysterious magic of all demon magics. If it was ranked among the ancient magics, it would be within the top twenty. Many spells of Ecstasy Demon Magic were inconsistent, eccentric, and baleful. Anything goes with Ecstasy Demon Magic; nothing was out of possible effects. Actually, nothing may be an effect as well. It was impossible to tell. 

 

“Screw it. I’ll see what I can do once I enter the Wisdom King level.” Gritting his teeth, Yang Yang advanced through the pain, the smoke, and the cave. When he was sure that he passed through the cave, he realized that his connection to the Arcane Abyss via the Arcane Mark was fading.

 

“What!?” Yang Yang yelled and looked back, but only saw endless darkness. He sent out his spiritual sense, but lost track of the Sacred Master. Whatever this smoke was, it was beyond simple and might even be above the Spiritual-tier of natural treasures such as his warship.

 

Not even using force could push the smoke away. “I refuse to believe a couple smoke bombs could actually out match me!”

 

Pushing his engine to maximum power once again, Yang Yang tried to escape the smoke. The air around him distorted from the speed. His hair and robe waved furiously. In the thick darkness, his green eyes were like the eyes of a hunter and the golden light around him was like a hunter’s bait to the prey. 

 

Seconds turned to minutes. Minutes turned to hours. Hours turned to seemingly infinity. Eventually, Yang Yang stopped. “There’s no point, and I’m only wasting energy. This smoke has to fade at some point. There’s no way something as strong as this would be able to last that long. Wherever that demon is, I will hunt him down. Smell him down if I to!” 

 

He sat down and meditated, recovering any lost energy. He waited, and once twenty four hours had completely passed since the smoke bombs were thrown out, the smoke cleared, but the pungent smell remained. 

 

Yang Yang looked around and noticed that he was drifting in a completely unknown land. His connection to the Arcane Abyss was completely cut off. Instead, he could sense the magical laws of an entirely new world. 

 

In this strange dimension, the sky was red and the clouds were grey. The earth was pink and the trees were white. When he touched the ground, it bounced back at him. It was soft in some places, hard at other places, but bouncy like a piece of gum. When he touched the trees, it rattled for him. It was loose in some places, solid at other places, but hard like an ore of iron. 

 

He took a whiff at the ground and the trees and can tell the smoke smell was heavily concentrated in them. It reminded him of something, but he could not identify it. As he was thinking, the Sacred Master’s laughter invaded his ears. “Haha! Your holiness, what do you think about this place? A beautiful world, no?” 

 

Yang Yang turned his head all around, but could not see nor smell the royal Blood Demon anywhere. “Come out, or I’ll burn this place.” 

 

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Scion of Life," scoffed the Sacred Master. 

 

“Change my mind, punk.” Yang Yang furrowed his brows. 

 

“You must be aware of our Festival of Offering. In that festival, we imprisoned mortals or traitors and sacrifice their blood to the God of Fresh Blood, who would bless us with his divine might.” 

 

“Yes, I am aware of that disgusting practice. I learned a little when I purged the wickedness out of your archbishops as well.” 

 

“You may know that we sacrificed their life as offerings to the God of Fresh Blood, but did you know how? Well, you’re standing on the answer right now.” 

 

“Is this...” Yang Yang looked down in horror. A creeping feeling welled in his heart and made it jumped eratically. 

 

“You see, when we take the offerings, we extract the blood from the body. Then we separate the bones from the flesh. Fresh blood is the most precious commodity so we naturally sacrifice that first. However, flesh, bones, and even the souls of mortals are not accepted by the God of Fresh Blood. They are unwanted products so it’s only natural that we throw them out somewhere. But...,” The Sacred Master’s voice paused, “We Blood Demons are very resourceful people; our people's motto is 'no flesh shall be spared.' That is why we left it somewhere else...” 

 

The earth quaked and the sky rumbled. It was though a primordial beast was awakening from its slumber and prepared to trampled all existing civilizations to bring an end to history itself. 

 

The ground before Yang Yang cracked open and a giant bone spur emerged. It extended all the way into the sky and at the very tip of the bone spur, a fleshy, human face materialized. It looked exactly like an infant’s face, and when it opened its mouth, it let out a sharp wailing that could cut through the very fabric of existence. 

 

Flesh that was the ground crawled upward on the bone spur and expanded the creature that was apparent still an infant. In a horrifically moist and loud manner, millions of faces, billions of arms and legs, and trillions of eyes grew out of the massive beast like parasitical worms out of a diseased tree. 

 

The living mass of flesh and bones roared, accompanied by the chorus of screams from the millions of heads. Close to the top, and just below the infant’s face, Yang Yang could see the malformed, but recognizable faces of the six legacy students. The infant opened its mouth and let out the voice of the Sacred Master. 

 

“This is a true world of flesh and bones. A land where the unwanted are united into a single entity. It is the resting place of the creature of millions of hateful souls. Welcome to... the Macabre Child's Forest.”