Aspiring to the Immortal Path
chapter-718

The next morning, Tang Jie returned with a handful of fiend pellets, one of them from a fiend king and the rest from fiend generals. He had also brought back the fiend corpses, which were also highly nutritious.

Throwing a fiend corpse on the ground, Tang Jie said, "Skin its hide and bleed it. Once you've washed it, steam it on a gentle flame for six hours. Remember to add in herbs as well."

The villagers came up and began to prepare the corpse.

Now that they knew Tang Jie's identity, his status had changed, and none of them found it weird that he had brought back a fiend corpse.

Wasn't it normal for Immortals to hunt fiends?

Thanks to Er Hu, the villagers of Daoxiang Village went through a brief fiend meat craze. Fiend meat was packed with so much nutrition that those villagers with somewhat poor constitutions couldn't endure. That night, many people started to bleed from their noses, forcing Tang Jie to portion out the meat for them.

Starting from this day, Tang Jie would go out hunting at intervals to bring Er Hu fiend pellets and fiend meat so that he could recover. He also occasionally brought back medicines, some from fiend territory and some he had made in Fengshan.

All this nutrition filled up Er Hu's hollowed-out body, and his strength began to grow. The Blood Bane Classic was a powerful art that relied on killing, but as it was a Demon Gate art, the excessive slaughter could eventually backlash on the body. Er Hu's condition was the best example of this, but thanks to Tang Jie, the effects of the backlash had been neutralized, allowing the power of the art to manifest.

But Tang Jie wasn't satisfied. His perfectionist personality didn't allow for the smallest error, so he continued to search for treasures for Er Hu every few days. Of course, for him, "searching for treasure" meant killing. A fiend pellet cut out from the belly of a great fiend was also a kind of treasure.

Fiend kings also had a population limit.

For each fiend-king-level fiend pellet Tang Jie obtained, another fiend king was felled.

Moreover, Tang Jie focused his efforts only on the territory of the Iron Blood Fiend Emperor. After all, this guy was on bad terms with him and had been constantly causing him trouble. In his eighty years of traveling, while there had been no big wars, there had been quite a few minor actions, like repeated border skirmishes and various plots and conspiracies. The fiend king rebellion Yiyi had gone through was even apparently connected to the Iron Blood Fiend Emperor. Of course, Yiyi had returned the gesture, sending the Mother Cloud combat puppet into Iron Blood territory to sow some chaos before running off.

And Tang Jie chose to reap the fiend pellets belonging to Iron Blood.

In three short months, six Iron Blood fiend kings were slain.

This was no small number.

The repeated death was akin to a slap on the face, but the Iron Blood Emperor couldn't even find the culprit, which left him utterly enraged. He even suspected that a human Violet Palace cultivator had taken action, or else how could those fiend kings have been slain so easily?

But Feng Wuxiang, Liu Zongchang, and Reverend Seer had all sworn Heavenly Dao Oaths. This sort of action would be breaking their word, which was bound to result in punishment.

So who could it be?

A new Violet Palace cultivator?

But the world would react if someone had attained Violet Palace.

Once this happened, everyone else would force the newcomer to swear a Heavenly Dao Oath to not interfere in human-fiend affairs.

But if it wasn't a Violet Palace cultivator, he really couldn't think of anyone who could travel and kill so freely within fiend territory.

To deal with this fiend king hunter, the Iron Blood Fiend Emperor even personally took action, investigating which city Tang Jie might strike next and lying in wait to ambush him.

But Tang Jie decided to just head to another city. After all, he could identify whichever city Iron Blood was hiding in and avoid it.

Through the entanglement of Fate, Tang Jie could clearly see that a bright point of light was linked to him through Karma, and through this Karma, he could see every move Iron Blood made.

This was the advantage of Fate entanglement.

The one who entered the Dao of Fate and walked the path of Fate entanglement enjoyed the protection of the Heavenly Dao. As fortune's favored, they were almost guaranteed to never be ambushed.

Only someone else proficient in Fate could hide their traces, which was what it meant to hide from the heavens.

Alas, although the Iron Blood Fiend Emperor was entangled by Fate, he wasn't proficient in the Dao of Fate. Unable to hide his traces, he could never trick Tang Jie.

Thus, for the next two months, Tang Jie hunted down three more fiend kings and got off scot-free with his spoils, almost driving the Iron Blood Fiend Emperor insane.

If he kept on killing, the Iron Blood Fiend Emperor would end up a commander without any officers.

Fortunately, Tang Jie finally stopped.

The harvest of nine fiend king pellets was more than enough to restore the blood energy that Er Hu had lost. His strength rapidly rose, all the way to the peak of Spirit Ring, only one step away from the charge at Heart Demon.

Tang Jie didn't have Er Hu immediately make the charge, instead having Er Hu meditate and study the Heart Questioning Mantra.

Demon Gate arts feared Heart Demons the most, and they could easily lead to death.

The Blood Bane Classic involved vast slaughter, and each killing left another lingering resentment. When one made the charge at Heart Demon, these would become vicious demons that would come to reap one's life.

Even though Er Hu had a forthright personality, and killing fiends didn't go against his Origin Heart, and he also had the Heart Questioning Mantra from Tang Jie, he had killed far too much for it to be that easily dealt with. After all, Er Hu had been killing for eighty years, and so many fiends had died at his hands that it would be difficult to add them all up.

Perhaps things would be even better if he could give Er Hu the Wisdom Sword, but this was a secret art of Basking Moon that could only be passed on through that one high terrace in the Water Moon Paradise. Anyone who dared to transmit it through any other method would be a traitor to the sect. Thus, Tang Jie could only patiently wear away at the murderous intent in Er Hu's mind.

What had once been the power that supported Er Hu now became the greatest obstacle to his progression.

Another ten years passed.

The farming tools and other inventions had spread from Fengshan into fiend territory.

More and more Fates became entangled with Tang Jie, and the binding power on him grew.

In this process, Tang Jie gained an even clearer understanding of his surroundings, and a voice rang out in his subconscious, telling him that this was the correct path.

That guidance of Fate had finally appeared.

But the long-wary Tang Jie rejected this guidance.

He didn't believe nor trust in it.

He was only letting himself be entangled so that he could one day break free.

Only by obeying could one defy.

Obeying wasn't the goal, nor was defying. The goal was to not be bound and to walk one's own path!

Ten years of meditation had greatly calmed Er Hu's mind.

Those bitter slaughters had put his nerves on edge, and he would often wake up in the middle of the night, swinging around his saber in a murderous state. Tang Jie would then intervene, and that omnipresent murderous intent that had soared toward the heavens would silently disappear.

It was only at those moments that Er Hu felt a little peace.

After ten years, Er Hu possessed a more profound cultivation and greater strength, and his mind had also been completely pacified. He joined the villagers in working the fields and drinking alcohol, joined the children in playing with kites, and he joined his master in working the bellows and forging metal, allowing his face to age.

He was no longer the infamous Sanguine Blade King, only an ordinary villager of Daoxiang Village.

The villagers initially treated him as a god, with the utmost respect, but as time went on, they found that he talked and smiled like any other person, so they opened up and treated him as a friend, just as they used to.

All that majesty and awe was ground away.

Finally, Er Hu began his charge at Heart Demon, with Tang Jie personally attending to him.

Seated cross-legged on the ground, Er Hu began to silently circulate his mantra, and everything Tang Jie had experienced before began to play out again with Er Hu.

Countless thoughts emerged in Er Hu's mind—memories from the distant past.

Er Hu's recollections were mostly of killing, full of blood and wailing.

All of these turned into Heart Demons and attacked, and Er Hu found it hard to defend himself.

Even though Tang Jie had prepared so many things for him, even buying the most famous heart-calming medicines for the charge at Heart Demon at a high price, Er Hu's Heart Demons were too strong and fierce, ten times stronger than what Tang Jie had to deal with. As they charged, Er Hu threw up mouthful after mouthful of blood, his eyes glazing over with a dark purple light. This was a sign that the Heart Demons were infiltrating his soul and turning him into a demon.

The Demon Gate was so called precisely because it was so easy to turn into a demon when one cultivated their arts to the apex.

Once one entered the demonic path, one's evil nature would grow immensely, and a person would no longer operate according to common sense. This was why cultivators had always despised Demon Gate members, considering Demon Gate cultivators the same as demons. In truth, there had originally been differences, but because humans had excluded them, demon cultivators ultimately chose to mix with demons and form their own race.

The deep purple demonic energy in Er Hu's eyes told Tang Jie that Er Hu was reaching his limit.

Sighing, he said, "Oh well, perhaps this is also the work of Fate. The heavens had me meet you and pass onto you the Blood Bane Classic, causing you to throw yourself into killing, and then it had me entangle myself in Fate and meet you again right when I was about to break out. Ten years of Heart Questioning couldn't grind away your Demon Will, so only the protection of the Heavenly Dao can ensure your safety. Today, I will pass on my thirty years of virtue to you, letting you be entangled by Fate in my place, protected by the Heavenly Dao. From now on, you are the Child of Fate. Whether this is a blessing or a curse all depends on you."

Tang Jie waved his hand like he was brushing off dust, and in another space, the threads of Karma began to fall from his body and onto Er Hu.

Threads of Karma weren't easy to remove, and thirty years' worth of accumulated spider webs was hard for even Tang Jie to break out of. But what if they weren't directly bound to Tang Jie? This made things different.

It was like he had stretched out his arms before being bound up. No matter how tight the ropes were, so long as he took back his arms, the ropes would fall to the ground.

Tang Jie had been entangled by Fate, but in reality, his body wasn't actually entangled.

He had been running a test from the very start. As he had no plans on going down this path, he had taken precautions from the beginning.

Around him were the villagers of Daoxiang.

The villagers were his outstretched arms, taking on the threads of Fate for him—they had been the ones to sell the farming tools, so the influence had actually been achieved through them rather than Tang Jie.

So when Tang Jie didn't need these threads of Fate anymore, he just needed to draw back his arm to break free.

He then collected the free threads of Fate and attached them to Er Hu's body.

On the Web of Fate, one point of light disappeared, and a new one took its place.

Er Hu stopped shaking.

The deep purple in his eyes began to fade. While it roiled and churned in his eyes, this was only its last struggle.

Gradually, his eyes cleared.

The wailing and shouting disappeared from his ears, and his eyes began to glow golden, indicating a nascent Divine Soul.

He had achieved the Heart Demon Tier!

Raising his head to look at Tang Jie, Er Hu prostrated and said, "Master, thank you for this new lease on life!"

The moment his Fate became entangled, he knew what had happened. While Fate entanglement was a shackle for Tang Jie, for Er Hu, it was a blessing that had come down from the heavens!

"Rise," Tang Jie indifferently said. "This is your Fate."

"My Fate is Master's Fate!" Er Hu firmly said.

At this moment, a tremor shook the Web of Fate.

A vast and majestic will unleashed a furious roar:

"TRAITOR!"

Every intelligent lifeform in the Verdant Cloud Domain heard this roar as if it had been shouted straight into their ears.

At this moment, in the secret chambers of Aurora, Iron Blood, Blackwater, Silver Eyes, and Thunder Blade, a powerful energy erupted into the sky from the dark and bottomless caves in each of them, the five pillars of energy resonating with each other and transforming into an Azure Dragon.