Chapter Forty-Eight: The Monster

As that dreadful aura erupted, a muffled groan, long suppressed, escaped Lu Chenyuan’s lips—a sound of excruciating pain, as though he were enduring the ordeal of having his bones scraped.

Shangguan Chuci turned in shock, only to see the youth’s eyes tightly shut, veins bulging at his temples, sweat the size of beans rolling down his pallid face.

His right hand, which gripped the steel blade, began to tremble violently, as if it could no longer bear the weapon’s weight.

With a sharp clang, the blade slipped from his grasp and fell to the dust.

Immediately after, a wisp of ghostly blue flame suddenly ignited in his palm with a soft whoosh, arising from nothing.

That fire held no warmth, yet seemed capable of consuming mortal flesh. His coarse linen sleeve met the flames and disintegrated into silent ash, baring a muscular, sinewed arm.

Lu Chenyuan’s brows knitted ever tighter; his left hand clutched his now-transformed right wrist in a death grip, knuckles white with strain, as if wrestling with some monstrous presence within.

Yet the struggle was in vain.

Before their eyes, the flesh of his right arm came alive, bone melting away, skin and muscle writhing, and countless dark scales began to grow.

In the blink of an eye, the arm had twisted into a grotesque tendril, more horrifying still for the innumerable crimson eyes that slowly opened between the scales—utterly emotionless, coldly regarding the world.

At its tip, the tendril split into several smaller, snake-like appendages, each one bristling with those densely packed, blinking demon eyes.

At the same time, a mark woven of pitch-black lightning appeared on Lu Chenyuan’s brow, its shape ancient as the world. At first glance, it resembled the shadow of a primordial tree rising from the nethermost depths, straining toward the boundless sky.

Its roots ran deep, as if anchored in the chaos before creation. Its branches coiled and twisted, each fork a portal to another, fantastical realm.

Then, his right iris, too, was consumed by the ghostly blue fire, revealing an indescribable, unearthly malevolence.

Behind him, his shadow—cast by the lantern light—also seemed to come alive, swelling like spilled ink, surging with countless restless tendrils, disturbingly vivid and unnatural.

Shangguan Chuci’s heart pounded wildly, her mind blank, as if she had forgotten where she was.

This transformation was unlike the fall of any ordinary cultivator.

When a common soul perished on the path, their spirit succumbed to corruption, becoming a mindless beast driven only to kill—savage, but ultimately lowly.

The “Lampbearers” of the Corrupt Stream cult could control the current, opening doors and listening to the darkness, but they too were mere vessels, slaves to the stream’s decay and madness—there was no mistaking that taint.

But Lu Chenyuan’s current form seemed to transcend both.

He possessed the strangeness and frenzy of the Corrupt Stream, yet radiated a sense of ancientness and awe beyond words.

Most striking of all—he had not begun cultivation, had never borne the sacred fire, nor beheld the Corrupt Stream. How, then, had this transformation come to pass?

At that moment, Lu Chenyuan slowly straightened.

The agony on his face faded, replaced by a chilling calm that made the heart tremble.

He turned his head slightly, the blue flame in his eye sweeping coolly across the hall, as if regarding a gathering of ants.

He flexed the monstrous limb, the countless demon eyes swiveling in unison—an unspeakable horror.

A paper specter, silent as death, had already crept up to him, steel blade arcing down for his skull.

Shangguan Chuci cried out, “Brother Lu, watch out!”

Yet Lu Chenyuan did not dodge—the blade fell.

Suddenly, the dozens of crimson eyes on the mutated limb turned as one, fixing upon the specter.

A strange sight unfolded—the steel blade, mere inches from his brow, suddenly lost its metallic form with a hiss, collapsing into a limp, pale paper arm.

The specter, too, seemed momentarily stunned.

In that instant, the mutated tendril coiled, seized, and tore—

With a soft rip, the paper specter was shredded into drifting scraps, like decayed parchment, scattered with ease.

Shangguan Chuci stood frozen, heart thundering wildly.

As her spirit reeled, another specter had already circled behind her, its blade silently aimed at her back.

She realized too late to escape.

But Lu Chenyuan, whose feet seemed unmoved, shifted slightly—like a drop of ink dispersing in clear water, his afterimage rippled in place.

The next instant, he appeared before her out of thin air, intercepting the attacking specter.

With a casual sweep of the monstrous tendril, the paper figure was smashed to dust.

“Master Chu,”

Lu Chenyuan turned, the blue flame of his eye regarding her with serene indifference, his voice calm:

“I will handle things here. You are badly wounded; leave while you can.”

She gazed at him, finding the youth both familiar and utterly strange.

What sort of heart lay beneath this icy composure and overwhelming strength?

Wei Zhuo was already pale with terror, staring at Lu Chenyuan and trembling:

“You… you are also a Lampbearer? No, there’s not a trace of spiritual power on you—no fire, yet you bear the lamp? What… what are you?”

Lu Chenyuan’s strange blue gaze showed a hint of confusion, as if he truly did not understand.

Yet his lips curled into a faint, mocking smile. He countered,

“Oh? I am, after all, what you called the Dao Yuan Embryo—the Corrupt Stream cult’s candidate for Holy Son. Have you forgotten?”

Wei Zhuo recoiled as if he’d seen a ghost in broad daylight, shaking his head violently, the cracks in his paper face deepening as he stammered,

“No! You’re not… you’re not the Dao Yuan Embryo! You’re… you’re a monster!”

Shangguan Chuci found herself struck by the absurdity:

“That fiend is himself neither man nor ghost, yet now he points and cries ‘Monster!’ at another.”

She looked upon Lu Chenyuan—his posture tall, the features of a young man faintly discernible beneath the monstrous transformation, though the cold aura of death around him was now so dense it seemed he no longer belonged to this world.

She ought to heed his words and flee, to seek a way out.

Yet for some reason, her feet felt rooted to the ground, unable to move.

Pain lanced from her wounded shoulder—a sharp reminder of the danger she’d just escaped; within, her mind’s flickering fire of reason warned her frantically to escape from this now-uncontrollable youth.

And yet she did not go.

“If he’s become like this, how will he face himself afterward?”

A thought emerged unbidden: “If he falls to ruin like Wei Zhuo, who else will call him back if not I?”

Once born, that thought could not be suppressed.

She forgot her own safety, her gaze locked on that figure—so familiar, so changed—her heart caught in her throat.

Lu Chenyuan, meanwhile, felt as though everything around him had become slow and unreal.

Wei Zhuo’s shouts, Shangguan Chuci’s concern—all seemed muffled by a curtain of water, indistinct.

In his mind, only one thought echoed again and again:

“Monster… Am I a monster?”

He looked down at his transformed right arm, the countless demon eyes returning his gaze—empty, soulless.

He looked up at the remaining dozen or so paper specters, still rallying for a final assault.

Moments before, these specters had been harbingers of death, invincible foes.

Now, to his eyes, they were as fragile as paper windows—unworthy of fear.

His body flickered—Wei Zhuo saw only a blur as he passed through the blockade of seven or eight specters.

Their movements faltered in unison.

Then, with a hiss, their paper forms split from crown to base, as if cleaved by an invisible blade.

From the seams leaked tendrils of black smoke, dissipating in an instant, as though their very existence had been exposed as a lie.

Like a phantom, yet not; like a shadow, yet not.

Lu Chenyuan’s movement could no longer be described as merely swift—it was as if he tore through space itself, not moving but shifting between positions without trace.

Wherever the tendril swept, the paper figures met their nemesis—they vanished with a hiss into nothing.

In just a few breaths, the once-arrogant specters were utterly erased, leaving no trace behind.

His body had become an unwilling palace, its true master not Lu Chenyuan but some ancient, mighty will, displaying its incomprehensible power through his flesh.

His own consciousness was like a prisoner locked deep within, watching coldly from behind countless veils.

One step, and he stood yards away; another, and he was before Wei Zhuo.

Wei Zhuo’s soul had long since fled in terror. A master of the art of painted evil, he’d always believed himself able to manipulate hearts and overturn heaven and earth with brush and ink.

Never had he seen a being so utterly beyond reason.

This strength was beyond what he understood as “power.”

He tried to muster his tricks, but his bone brush trembled so violently he couldn’t form a single complete rune.

He was afraid—afraid from the depths of his soul, like an ant witnessing the wrath of heaven, fit only to quake.

Lu Chenyuan stood before him, head slightly tilted, the blue flame in his eye cold and aloof, like a god regarding ants.

Yet in his still-human left eye, there was only clarity—no killing intent at all—like a lost child earnestly asking a stranger for directions.

He looked at Wei Zhuo’s half-human, half-paper face, at the ink-stained socket, and the confusion in his heart only deepened.

“If I am a monster,”

At last, he spoke gravely: “Then it is only fitting that I devour you, isn’t it?”