In the midst of his grief, Yang Kai's voice reached him. "Tell me—how does this place feel compared to the Demon Realm?"
Since Yang Kai was asking, he naturally didn't dare refuse. Huo Lun steadied himself and said, "The energy of heaven and earth here is rather thin, and the laws are somewhat weak. If I stayed here for too long, my cultivation might actually regress." The Small World's original territory had been rich and complete in both natural energy and laws, but these newly devoured and merged territories were far inferior—they were, after all, nothing more than scattered fragments of long-vanished continents. That they could be fused back together at all was a pleasant surprise; asking for more would be unreasonable.
After speaking, Huo Lun hesitated for a moment and asked cautiously, "My lord, is this not the Demon Realm?" He was, after all, a lower-grade Demon Lord. Being suddenly transported from the Demon Realm to an entirely different world had naturally alerted his senses to something amiss.
"This is not the Demon Realm," Yang Kai confirmed, the corner of his lips curling upward. "Though it may well become another Demon Realm."
"What… what do you mean?" Huo Lun's face went blank with shock.
"Don't worry about what it means. I have a very important task for you. If you complete it well, the possibility of your freedom being restored may not be out of reach."
Huo Lun was overwhelmed with joy and disbelief. "Please speak, my lord. I will do my utmost to carry it out."
"Settle down and live here. In the near future, this world may undergo changes you never expected. Your job is to commit every single change to memory, then report them to me… Perhaps one day, you may find yourself unwilling to leave."
As if he'd ever be reluctant to leave this dump, Huo Lun thought darkly, though he agreed readily enough, his mind filled with confusion. What kind of task was this, really? And what changes could possibly occur in a world like this?
While he was still puzzling over it, Yang Kai had already vanished. Huo Lun was alarmed and hurriedly called out several times, but received no response, leaving him somewhat crestfallen. Still, remembering Yang Kai's earlier promise, he could only hope the man kept his word and would one day set him free.
Before long, a treehouse appeared atop the mountain peak. Since he was going to live here, he needed somewhere to stay. A lower-grade Demon Lord could easily fashion himself a dwelling, and with local materials at hand, a treehouse took shape in no time.
…
Inside his quarters, Yang Kai cleared his mind, sat cross-legged, and composed himself in stillness.
Ming Yue was dead and could not be brought back. The only thing he could do now was fulfill her last request and safeguard the fortune he carried. If he wanted to protect himself, he needed formidable cultivation.
Since breaking through his shackles and advancing a few days ago, he hadn't yet had the chance to properly examine his current state. Now, with a rare moment of leisure, he was eager to see exactly how the breakthrough had changed him compared to before. More importantly, he needed to check whether anything had gone wrong inside his body.
Such a drastic transformation in his internal power had him on edge. The unsealing of the ancient demon's demonic qi seal within his dantian especially worried him—would it leave behind any lingering consequences?
His powerful divine sense surged outward, scanning his body inch by inch, inspecting with utter thoroughness.
A full day passed before Yang Kai finally let out a long breath. The examination confirmed that his breakthrough had not caused any problems. The power within him had been completely transformed, his flesh and meridians were entirely unscathed, and the rich, pure demonic essence flowing through his meridians encountered no obstruction whatsoever.
His body was fine, yet Yang Kai couldn't help but frown. His current state made him an unmistakable upper-grade Demon Lord—and the realization was deeply unsettling.
He genuinely had no idea what would happen if he returned to the Star Boundary. Would he be chased down and attacked as a demon?
But dwelling on it now wouldn't help. Yang Kai swept those thoughts aside and attempted to circulate his cultivation technique.
Demonic qi from heaven and earth surged toward him in an instant. With each breath he drew, it poured through the countless pores of his body, flowed through his meridians, and pooled within his dantian.
He could actually cultivate here in the Demon Realm without any restraint.
He had been in the Demon Realm for a long time and had barely cultivated at all, mainly because conditions didn't allow it. The world was saturated with demonic qi, entirely different from the natural energy of the Star Boundary. Absorbing it carelessly might trigger any number of unpredictable consequences, and since he didn't possess the Avatar's Devouring Heaven Battle Art, he hadn't dared attempt it.
But now, after fully succumbing to the demonic path, the Demon Realm's environment posed no obstacle to his cultivation.
If he could absorb demonic qi from the air, what about demon crystals?
Without hesitation, Yang Kai produced a large quantity of demon crystals from his space ring and shattered them. In an instant, the room was flooded with dense demonic qi. As he breathed it in, the energy surged into his body without the slightest discomfort.
Next, Yang Kai flipped his hand and produced a single Myriad Demon Pill. He paused only briefly before popping it into his mouth and swallowing it whole.
The Myriad Demon Pill was not a medicinal pill. It was a unique product formed within the Myriad Demon Caves scattered across the Demon Realm's various continents. Those Myriad Demon Caves ceaselessly devoured the vitality, essence, and spirit of the demons on each continent, eventually birthing Myriad Demon Pills within the caves like fruit ripening on a branch.
Yang Kai didn't know why the Myriad Demon Caves possessed such a bizarre ability—he only knew that after the Demon Realm had fractured and scattered into separate continents, the caves had simply appeared.
The Myriad Demon Caves gave him an intensely unsettling feeling, as though they were living entities. But that didn't diminish the tremendous effect the pills could bring to demons. A Myriad Demon Pill born within the caves was essentially a crystallization of the vitality, essence, and spirit harvested from the demons of an entire continent—an object brimming with terrifying amounts of energy.