Demonification

Daoist Fayuan said, "This corpse transformation case involving Shenxian Dao was originally being investigated by our Qingyang County Daoist monastery, and we were the ones who captured this heretic. Since when is it your turn to interrogate him?" Li Changqing said coldly, "The gravity of the case is immense, involving local gentry, officials, and powerful clans. The Demon Suppression Bureau must interrogate him personally." With that, he waved his hand and barked, "Take him away." The Demon Suppression Bureau and the Heavenly Master Sect belonged to two separate systems—the imperial court and the state religion. Both were tasked with apprehending demons and monsters, and friction had long existed between them. In the early days of the Demon Suppression Bureau's founding, the Heavenly Master Sect had rendered great assistance, providing numerous martial arts, Daoist arts, and alchemy techniques. Later, however, as the imperial house began using the Demon Suppression Bureau to counter the Heavenly Master Sect, the friction between the two sides grew increasingly fierce. Seeing Li Changqing about to take away the heretic he had captured, Fayuan slammed the table and rose. "Li Changqing! Since when does the Demon Suppression Bureau have the right to take prisoners seized by my Heavenly Master Sect?" Li Changqing strode up to Fayuan step by step, an unrestrained murderous aura in his voice. "Fayuan, when it comes to taking prisoners from me, you don't make the cut." The moment Li Changqing finished speaking, a flash of saber light flickered. As if struck by a massive hammer, Daoist Fayuan was sent flying like a cannonball. Pale-faced, he pointed at Li Changqing, unable to utter a single word for quite some time. Li Changqing looked down at Fayuan from the corner of his eye and said, "I am a chiliarch of the Demon Suppression Bureau. Whenever imperial officials and their kin are implicated in demonic cults, it falls under my jurisdiction. If you object, have the Lingzhou Daoist Registry take it up with me." The Lingzhou Daoist Registry was the governing body within the Heavenly Master Sect that oversaw every Daoist monastery throughout Lingzhou. Hearing this, Fayuan's face turned livid, clearly beside himself with fury, but being outmatched in skill left him with no way to press forward. Faced with the terrifying intimidation of the Demon Suppression Bureau, none of the other officials present were willing to speak up on Fayuan's behalf. Still, Li Changqing seemed disinclined to offend everyone too deeply, ultimately agreeing to have his men interrogate Master Tianji in the county yamen's jail cells. *** Seated on a chair outside the cells, Hao Yongtai gazed toward the prison with deep apprehension. A manservant beside him said, "Rest assured, Young Master. This is the county jail, after all. No matter how overbearing the Demon Suppression Bureau might be, they won't dare harm the prisoner here." Yet before even a cup of tea's time had passed, an intensely horrifying shriek—as though hailing from another world—echoed from deep within the cells. Every soldier and runner present shivered instinctively, rendered completely incapable of moving. Hao Yongtai stared toward the cells in dread, squeezing out with difficulty, "A demon?!" With a thunderous crash, the exterior wall of the cells was violently shattered. Clouds had crept over the sky at some point to conceal the moon, plunging the courtyard into dim gloom. From the pitch-black interior of the prison, an eerie, ghostly cackle swept outward as a colossal shape squeezed its way out inch by inch. Suddenly, amid the churning clouds, moonlight poured back into the courtyard, illuminating the monster's true appearance. Shrieks and agonized cries erupted one after another. The fainthearted runners fainted on the spot the instant they laid eyes on its true form. It was a swollen, writhing, gigantic sphere of flesh. Sprouting from the sphere were dozens of pale, gnarled arms of varying lengths. Every arm was covered in fleshy nodules resembling flower buds, and as these nodules twitched and throbbed, thick green slime continuously secreted from them, dripping onto the ground and giving off a rich, roasted meat aroma. Yet what inspired the deepest terror was the distorted, grotesque human face atop the sphere of flesh. Its mouth slightly opened and closed, and through the fissures in its upper palate, countless identical human faces seemed faintly visible within. A single glance at that face nearly made Chu Qiguang vomit, but he could still roughly tell that it seemed to belong to Master Tianji. Roaring, this fiendish beast straight out of an otherworldly nightmare stormed out from the prison, its every movement radiating waves of mind-shattering terror. Just as Chu Qiguang was reeling from the unprecedented monster before him, another figure wielding a Demon-Slaying Saber tore through the night sky like a bolt of black lightning. A blade light cut across the air, accompanied by the pungent stench of rust. At a speed far exceeding Chu Qiguang's visual perception, the figure darted back and forth around the monster, his saber slicing through the atmosphere with shrill, piercing shrieks. As the blade light ripped across the monster's body like crashing thunder and flashing lightning, accompanied by heart-rending shrieks of agony, the creature's body shattered into pieces, ultimately bursting into a shower of flesh and blood that rained upon the ground. The figure resembling black lightning finally halted. It was none other than Chiliarch Li Changqing of the Demon Suppression Bureau. At this moment, the skin all over Li Changqing was flushed crimson, radiating waves of intense heat like a boiled prawn. At the same time, his eyes had turned entirely white, without any pupils visible. Even after killing the monster, veins bulged along his face as though he were wrestling against some invisible force. He pulled a bottle of pills from his bosom, hastily swallowed one, and only then did his expression ease slightly. Chu Qiguang thought to himself, 'Did he take a Demon Suppression Bureau pill?' It would be an entire incense stick of time before these bizarre phenomena completely receded and he returned to normal. At that moment, seeing Hao Yongtai, Chu Qiguang, and the others still staring at him, Li Changqing barked, "What are you all gawking at? Do you have a death wish? Go summon people from the Daoist monastery immediately! Fetch Fayuan and have them dispose of this demon corpse!" Hao Yongtai immediately ordered a runner who could still move to run to the monastery, then glared furiously at Li Changqing. "What did you do?" Li Changqing said coldly, "Can't you see he underwent demonification?" Hao Yongtai snapped in rage, "The Shenxian Dao heretic was perfectly fine when handed over to you! Did you interrogate him until he fell to demonhood?" Li Changqing replied impassively, "A heretical cultist who doesn't revere Daoist Lord Xuanyuan succumbing to demonic corruption is only natural." Seeing him turn to leave, Hao Yongtai instinctively reached out to block him. Sensing danger, Chu Qiguang moved to stop him, but a black streak flashed from Li Changqing's hand as the saber scabbard struck Hao Yongtai's arm, snapping the bone clean in two. Hao Yongtai groaned in pain, stumbling back as Chu Qiguang caught and supported him. Li Changqing swept a cold gaze over the two of them. "You two... if you disrupt the Demon Suppression Bureau's duties again, I will not be lenient." With that, Li Changqing gave Chu Qiguang and Hao Yongtai no further look, leading his men away and leaving the county yamen in utter shambles. Yet Chu Qiguang's mind was still churning with images of the monster Li Changqing had slain. It was only when Hao Yongtai gritted his teeth, clutched his broken arm, and patted Chu Qiguang's shoulder that Chu Qiguang snapped back to reality. Hao Yongtai sighed. "Brother Chu, what should we do next?" Chu Qiguang asked instead, "That monster just now... was a demon?" Enduring the pain from his arm, Hao Yongtai answered casually, "Yeah, what of it?" Chu Qiguang asked again, "When the monasteries slay evil and purge demons... the demon-corrupted people they drown... the demon-corrupted people they arrest... and those who suffer cultivation deviation and turn into demons..." Chu Qiguang exhaled slowly. "The demons they turn into are that kind of demon?" Hao Yongtai asked, puzzled, "What's the matter with you?" 'What's the matter...' Chu Qiguang roared internally. 'On top of turning into monsters, people in this damn world can also turn into things like that?!' In truth, Chu Qiguang had long known from Ergou's memories the claims that ordinary people could undergo demonification, that they needed to revere Daoist Lord Xuanyuan, and that they had to rely on the power of faith to stave off becoming demons. Ergou had grown up hearing all sorts of tales: scholars studying for the xiucai examinations easily fell to demons if they read too many books; so-and-so's elderly relative mastered too many crafts, turned into a demon, and was burned to death; so-and-so's child was too clever, turned into a demon, and was drowned... Only by praying daily to Daoist Lord Xuanyuan and maintaining devout faith could one resist demonic corruption. However, under the conditioned mindset of a modern Earthling, whenever Chu Qiguang thought of the "corrupted people" drowned, burned, or beheaded by the Daoists in his memories, he had assumed it was merely a racket for monasteries to amass wealth and an imperial court policy to keep the populace ignorant—much like the witch burnings on Earth. He recalled reading in the Hao family library earlier. No wonder Hao Yongtai had been worried that he was reading too much. No wonder such a massive library was perpetually deserted. No wonder Hao Xiangtong had to sneak inside just to read, without any support from her family... 'So that's another reason wealthy families take the martial examinations. And that's why the martial exam's canonical texts are so simple, spanning a mere twenty thousand words—all to reduce the practitioners' chances of demonification.' 'That's why Qingyang County, and indeed the entire world... is teeming with ignorant men and women.' 'Yet... demonification is actually real... People really turn into monsters... Just what is the mechanism behind this?' 'And why does faith in Daoist Lord Xuanyuan ward off demonification? Could Daoist Lord Xuanyuan actually be a real deity?' To Chu Qiguang, it felt as though knowledge was not pursued by humanity in this world, but rather that knowledge was pursuing humanity. Chu Qiguang tried his best to steady his mind. 'No wonder... No wonder the Daoist monasteries hold so much power. It's because the people of the world truly cannot live without them. Humanity needs faith to resist demonification.' At this thought, Chu Qiguang suddenly grew worried about whether he might turn into a demon himself. After all, he had read vast amounts of books, possessed an immense store of knowledge, and held zero faith in Daoist Lord Xuanyuan. He thought to himself, 'I must ask Qiao Zhi once I get back.' Later, when Chu Qiguang asked Qiao Zhi, Qiao Zhi replied, "The path of Daoist cultivation is inherently one where the deeper and higher your realm, and the more you learn, the greater the peril of demonification. But you are a banished immortal descended from heaven, blessed with the aptitude to achieve immortality. If you can learn the methods of immortality without turning into a demon, what harm could learning a bit more mortal knowledge possibly do?" Later on, Chu Qiguang also learned that monsters had a far lower rate of demonification than humans, which was why most of them were fine even without faith. Back in the yamen courtyard at that moment... Hao Yongtai tugged at the visibly unsettled Chu Qiguang and urged, "Brother Chu, we must hurry to the Wu estate and report what happened here to my father and the others." Supporting Hao Yongtai and his fractured arm, Chu Qiguang left the county yamen. Before long, the monastery's Daoists arrived, setting up rituals to cleanse and dispose of the demon corpse.