She turned on her heel and left the room, walking through the ruined corridors as if she were strolling through her own garden. Upon reaching a cracked corner of the wall, the Demon Empress stopped, squatted down, and drew an imprint on a foundation stone that had darkened with age.
"...Clang." A clear, cold sound rang out. The stone vibrated slightly, then slowly split open, revealing a small hollow sealed with a thin, spiderweb-like array. The Demon Empress reached in, her five slender fingers moving as if crushing something invisible. Each line of the magical script trembled and vanished like thin smoke.
Inside, a jet-black storage ring lay quietly, its surface etched with winding demonic patterns. A thick layer of dust could not conceal the cold, heavy aura emanating from it.
"Oh… my treasure is here." The Demon Empress lifted the ring, her amber eyes shining with ill-concealed satisfaction. "It's a good thing those foolish righteous cultivators didn't know it existed when they were cleaning up. This is the entire fortune I've accumulated to live a life of leisure!"
She carefully slipped the jet-black ring onto her ring finger. The ring fit perfectly, as if it had been born for her finger. The Demon Empress smiled faintly, a fleeting, casual smile on her childlike face.
"A new beginning," she muttered, her voice as small as a passing breeze. Her finger gently stroked the smooth surface of the ring. "There is no longer a Demon Empress, only a lazy person who likes to enjoy life. Hehehe…"
She stood up, lightly dusted off her clothes, and strode out into the grand hall. She took one last look around. On the floor, the rotten corpses and skeletons reeked of both demonic creatures and cultivators.
"I should probably say a proper goodbye to these stupid subordinates of mine, shouldn't I?"
With that, she clasped her hands, pretending to bow solemnly.
"Pfft, hahaha…! A Demon Empress like me praying like those righteous fools, it's hilarious!" She burst into laughter.
"Honestly… these subordinates, every one of them is as lazy as the next. I had to handle everything myself; sometimes I thought I established the Demonic Sect just to feed them, not for them to serve me. They deserve this!"
Suddenly, a heavy sound rang out, breaking the silence of the grand hall. "Cough, cough..." This was followed by a tired, hacking cough from a hidden corner.
The Demon Empress, who had been walking away, suddenly froze. She slowly turned her head, her amber eyes narrowing as she coldly glanced toward the source of the sound.
In a corner where the wall had collapsed, a pile of rubble shifted slightly. A skinny, bony hand, covered in blood and dirt, slowly reached out, trying to push away the large rocks pressing down on a body.
A voice rang out, chillingly cold: "You have five seconds. If you don't get up, I will crush your head."
In the rubble, he heard a clear, childlike voice. It sounded exactly like a child. He panicked, trying to move, but his body seemed to have no strength left. The thick dust, the pungent smell of blood, and the heavy rocks had drained his last bit of strength.
"Five…"
"Four…"
The cold, emotionless voice rang out. He was desperate but powerless. He heard footsteps approaching.
"Three…"
He tried to open his eyes, but his eyelids were heavy. He only managed to see a small figure, wearing a black Hanfu. He frowned, wondering who this was and why they were here.
"Two…"
"One…"
He heard the final count, followed by a powerful kick that landed squarely on his body. "Ugh!" He groaned in pain as his body was sent flying from the rubble, rolling onto the filthy ground. He lay motionless, in agony, but now fully conscious.
The Demon Empress squatted down, staring at him. "Not dead yet? Good."
He lay flattened on the floor, his bones feeling like they were about to fall apart. The kick wasn't just a physical attack; it also carried a cold wave of demonic energy that coursed through his body, causing him excruciating pain down to his very bones. He tried to breathe, coughing a few more times, then looked up, his blurry eyes staring straight at the Demon Empress.
"Little kid… who are you?" he muttered, his voice weak and full of suspicion. He saw that the Demon Empress was just a small child, wearing a pitch-black Hanfu. He frowned, trying to search his memories. "I remember I was undergoing a tribulation… the lightning had shattered me… why am I in this pile of rubble?… and why is there a child here?"
The Demon Empress was silent. A sinister smile appeared on her lips again. "If you're not dead… then I'll have to kill you." She slowly walked toward him, and a powerful surge of demonic energy began to emanate from her small body.
His eyes widened. This demonic energy… was terrifying! He had never felt such a dreadful power before. "You… you're not a normal child!" he screamed, trying to prop himself up, but his body wouldn't obey. "Who are you? A demon? A fiend?"
"You guess," she whispered, her childlike voice hiding a cold cruelty. She held out her small hand, a thick black stream of demonic energy covering her fingertips, preparing to finish him off.
In his previous life, he had transmigrated as a good-for-nothing. Although he didn't have a system like in the cultivation novels he had read on Earth, he had trained hard to become the esteemed Sword Sovereign, eliminating evil and being admired by all. He had once thought he was the strongest person in the world. But now, he was about to die at the hands of a child… He closed his eyes, despairingly accepting his fate. "Must I die yet another time…"
But…
The strike never came. He slowly opened his eyes, seeing the Demon Empress's hand just inches from his forehead. Her amber eyes stared straight at him, but her gaze was no longer as cold as before; instead, it held a hint of curiosity.
"You… you are not a person of this world," the Demon Empress whispered, lowering her hand. "Where are you from?"
He was surprised. "You… you know?" He tried to sit up, staring at her. "Who are you? How do you know?"
The Demon Empress crossed her arms, her childlike voice full of arrogance: "There is nothing in this world that I don't know. You can call me the Demon Empress. What is your name?"
He was confused. Demon Empress? Why does she look so tiny? He remembered reading about a Demon Empress in some stories, a ruler of the demonic clan, but in his previous life as a Sword Venerable, there was only the Demonic Clan, no leading Demon Empress. He never thought he would meet one.
"My name… I was a Sword Venerable, people called me Supreme Heaven Sword."
"Supreme Heaven Sword?" The Demon Empress snorted. "What a sissy name. Where are you from? And why are you in the body of my useless subordinate?"
He was surprised by her question and recounted his entire story. From being a modern inhabitant of Earth, having an accident and transmigrating, training hard to become a Sword Venerable, until he encountered a tribulation and transmigrated here.
The Demon Empress listened, her face devoid of any expression. When he finished his story, she only curled her lips into a smile.
"What a ridiculous story," she said. "Why did you train so hard? In the end, you died a meaningless death to a lightning tribulation, then transmigrated into a rotten body, and now you almost died at my hands."
He was silent. He didn't know what to say. Everything he had done, everything he had achieved, in the eyes of the Demon Empress, was just a joke.
"But it's good," the Demon Empress continued. "My 'retirement' life has one more idiot to play with. You can come with me."
He was surprised. "Follow you? You… what do you want me to do?"
The Demon Empress stood up straight, her amber eyes staring directly at him. "It's simple. You will be my attendant, earn money for me to eat and play, and make sure no one bothers me. Or I will grant you a gentle death, freeing you from this rotten body. What do you say?"