Then suddenly another pair of memories began flooding into our unfortunate soul laying here about to be brought into death's embrace.
Memories of a life before his own, in a world not with mana but with qi, not with magic but with martial arts.
He was the heavenly demon of central plains, he was the supreme leader of a barbarian group in the far north.
The barbarian tribe was one that pillaged and destroyed countless sects and villages in search for more techniques to add to their repertoire to make and improve their own original techniques.
Eventually the heavenly demon declared a stop to the pillaging and announced that their new martial art had been perfected.
This was how the divine shadowheaven martial art was created.
A horrifying martial art where when practiced, the air, the earth, everything around the user would for turn into the face of an asura.
After announcing the creation of such an ironically devilish art, the heavenly demon would spread his arms wide as he let his aura pour outwards everywhere.
It reached every corner, every hidden spot, every town, every building, every person, Everything.
They all felt his presence at that very moment.
His aura was invisible but glowing a golden light, it looked like a diamond reflecting off the light coming from the sun at all angles, except there were no edges like a diamond it was smooth and its light was vastly more vibrant.
His entire body had turned completely white, making him look like a statue.
On top of that his eyes, the iris and pupils had turned into a glowing gold.
The rest of his body including his hair had gained a glowing golden hue.
As everything around him, as his aura, was shaped into that of a terrifying demon from hell only seen through the golden light occasionally outlining its appearance.
His name was Jie Zhou Guang, the most evil man in all of the jianghu.
A prince of the imperial palace who murdered all of his brothers and their men while stealing their martial arts from a glance creating his first martial art, the holy underdemon art.
Which later on as you know turned into the divine shadowheaven art. This martial art was an impossible existence, it was the fusion of the most demonic spiritual energy and the most holy spiritual energy combined into one.
Abilities stolen from the most holiest monks and the most demonic spiritualists.
As he showed off his power he began mocking the whole of the jianghu.
"All living organisms, kneel before your master."
As he boasted of his new found power in his audacious madness he then declared war on the whole of the central plains.
"We are no longer barbarians, we are not inferior, it is they who are inferior."
"This jianghu, this world will have only one ruler and one sect."
"As of now I declare us as the divine shadowheaven sect, we will go and conquer this world and unite all of the central plains under a wedding of death as every corpse marries their limbs across our river of blood."
"March on my men as we fill the heavens with thousands of more souls."
The crowed cheered and screamed loudly at their masters orders and then soon marched toward every part of the jianghu killing everything in sight.
Eventually the entire central plains would be covered in mountains of bodies separated by rivers of blood flowing atop bones of those who tried to fight back.
The heavenly demon was engaged in a battle that took over a century to complete.
He was fighting against a hero of the murim who tried to save as many as he could but in the end he remained the only one in the Central plains left.
Having nothing to lose he fought for as long as he could leaving behind an entire century of time. In the end the heavenly demon was victorious.
"Tell me, hero of the murim alliance…no, hero of the central plains, what is it that kept you going, what was driving forward you for so long. Even though you knew you couldn't win"
"I…I just…the world deserves to progress, have you ever wondered in your entire decrepit life, what the future held, and how things could've evolved, improved to be interesting, so interesting in ways you could never imagine."
"That is what you took away from the people, from the world"
The heavenly demon looked down at the lone warrior eyes half shut as he slouched forward lazily.
"Whats your name?"
"I am Guan Yu, no one special, just a normal man from the central plains like everyone else you've slaughtered."
"I am Jie Zhou Guang, I'll remember your name as I ascend to go slaughter the heavens next"
Just as the heavenly demon made his declaration to the fallen hero to go to war with the heavens themselves, suddenly the skys above began burning a bright golden light.
The heavenly demon and the world around him was covered in that light until everything faded to white.