If I Were a Demon, There Would Be No Demons in the World

Time flows like water, quietly passing.

Several more months had gone by since the last visit to the Ye family. During this time, Liu Ruyi had been subtly and not-so-subtly stuffing Ye Shu’s mind with ideas like "the righteous path is hypocritical, while the demonic path is sincere," hoping to win him over to the demonic way willingly.

But Ye Shu remained unmoved.

He simply stayed in the demonic sect, recovering from his injuries, waiting for an opportunity—a chance for a wandering dragon to return to the sea.

The most critical thing, though, was restoring his cultivation.

Otherwise, as a mere dead man, not only could he not leave the demonic sect, he might not even make it outside without being crushed by a stray shockwave, let alone go searching for his friends in the Qingxuan Sect.

"Oh dear, oh dear~"

Inside the stone chamber.

The little room’s decorations were still exactly as they had been on their wedding night: red candles, red curtains, red bedding—everything radiated festivity.

Liu Ruyi leaned back in a chair, her two pale calves swinging in the air. She toyed with a few Blood Pills in her hand, looking at Ye Shu with some frustration.

"Honestly, how many days has it been now?"

"You’ve just been sitting on the bed cultivating, ignoring your newlywed wife, and you haven’t even made any progress."

"At this rate, you’ll use up all my Blood Pills."

She pouted pitifully at Ye Shu as he sat cross-legged on the bed, looking so adorable that anyone would feel sorry for her.

And she truly was upset.

She had given Ye Shu so many Blood Pills, but he still hadn’t achieved anything—except that his body, thanks to the pills’ effects, had returned to normal function and was no longer on the verge of shattering at any moment.

But here was the problem!

This heartless man was only letting her look, not letting her taste!

So why had she gone to all this trouble?

Hmph!

Liu Ruyi puffed out her cheeks in anger, swearing to herself that if Ye Shu asked for more Blood Pills, her answer would be two words—"Not happening!"

Ye Shu remained silent, indifferent.

He had to admit, this woman was genuinely good to him. She gave him whatever he asked for. Now that he had lost all his cultivation, she could easily do anything to him, and he couldn’t resist. Yet she did nothing, just stayed by his side every day, bringing him medicine, chatting with him, and occasionally throwing a little tantrum.

Too bad... she was from the demonic sect.

Ye Shu sighed inwardly.

After refining the two Blood Pills in his hands, he opened his eyes again and looked at Liu Ruyi.

"I’m out. Give me two more."

As soon as he spoke, the woman who had just made up her mind immediately changed her expression, smiling as she handed over her last two Blood Pills.

"Here, these are the last two."

Ye Shu took the pills. Just as he was about to start cultivating, Liu Ruyi suddenly asked, a sly glint in her eyes:

"Hehe, I didn’t expect our Righteous Hero to use Blood Pills for cultivation too~”

"Do you know how Blood Pills are made?"

"Each one is refined from the vital blood of innocent boys and girls. Every pill you swallow represents the lives of at least a hundred children."

Liu Ruyi put on a look of alarmist exaggeration.

Of course, that wasn’t the truth. There weren’t that many children to go around—it would be terribly inefficient. In reality, they just refined entire cities, entire families into pills, regardless of height, age, gender, rich or poor—all treated equally, turned into Blood Pills for cultivation.

She only said that to mess with Ye Shu.

"So how about it, Righteous Hero?"

Liu Ruyi shot him a teasing smile.

"Feeling guilty? Looks like our great righteous hero isn’t that righteous after all~"

Ye Shu held the Blood Pills, his expression unchanged.

He spoke calmly:

"Were these Blood Pills made for me?"

"Huh..."

Liu Ruyi froze for a moment, then shook her head.

"No."

These were pills she had saved up from her own allotments over the years, and since she’d been by Ye Shu’s side lately, they weren’t specifically made for him.

"Then was I the one who refined those people into pills?"

"Uh... no."

Liu Ruyi shook her head again.

"Well then." Ye Shu shrugged and swallowed both pills in one gulp before closing his eyes to cultivate again. "The killer isn’t me, the victims aren’t mine. Why should I burden myself with this cause and effect?"

"Hey! You—!"

Liu Ruyi instinctively wanted to argue but couldn’t find the words.

What he said kind of made sense.

But it also felt completely wrong.

"Dammit..."

Frustrated at missing her chance, Liu Ruyi tugged at her hair in annoyance. She noticed that no matter what she said, he would always find a perfectly logical way to twist it back. She seriously suspected that at this rate, instead of dragging Ye Shu into the demonic path, she might end up being brainwashed by him!

This guy... was an absolute demon when it came to playing with people’s minds.

Liu Ruyi shot Ye Shu a wary look.

But Ye Shu paid her no attention. His mind was completely immersed in a different realm altogether.

As everyone knew, his body was already dead.

Now he had lost all his cultivation. Not only was his dantian empty, every acupoint was dried up. He had no spiritual power left and no ability to practice.

And the use of the Heavenly Cycle Star Formation was out of the question.

So he had to find another path—a substitute for ordinary cultivation methods. Fortunately, having once been a demigod, even if only for a fleeting moment, he had reached a level far beyond ordinary people. Creating a brand-new cultivation system was as easy as eating and drinking.

The Heavenly Cycle Star Formation required spiritual energy, which was still too cumbersome.

Moreover, dividing his power among over three hundred star positions seemed impressive on the surface but was ultimately scattered—flashy without substance.

Ye Shu sat cross-legged, breathing deeply and practicing exhalation.

Meanwhile, on each of his shoulders and above his head, a small figure appeared. The one on his left was wrapped in blood-red light, tangled with thick blood energy, floating above a blood-colored lotus pedestal. The lotus had already bloomed three petals, each as red as blood, radiating a chilling killing intent.

As the Blood Pills swirled in his stomach,

two streams of blood energy slowly rose from his abdomen and merged into the figure’s lotus pedestal, making the lotus even more vibrant.

The figure on his right shone with golden light, radiant with Buddha’s glow, standing above a golden lotus pedestal with only one petal opened. Golden characters swirled around the small figure, faint chants echoing as if countless monks were reciting sutras.

The figure above his head was the most ordinary yet the strangest.

It had fair skin, red lips, and white teeth, wearing a black-and-white Daoist robe. It sat cross-legged on top of Ye Shu’s head, eyes closed, breathing evenly.

All three little figures looked very similar to Ye Shu.

These were his Three Flowers of the Crown—also the foundation of his self-created "Postnatal Karmic Merit Method."

The Postnatal Karmic Merit Method, as the name suggests, focused on cultivating merit.

Or, one could say, cultivating karmic causality.

All sentient beings have spirit; heaven and earth have causality.

As a xuanhuan world, the profound concepts of karmic merit and sin naturally existed, but most people didn’t know how to use them. Buddhist practitioners understood a little, but only superficially, using only the methods of merit without understanding karmic sin.

But Ye Shu’s Postnatal Karmic Merit Method was different.

It resonated with the heavens and earth, bearing the karma of all living beings.

Take these two blood pills as an example. The creation of these two blood pills came at the cost of countless human lives.

Each life carried with it karma.

This karma should have been borne by the one who refined the blood pills, but Ye Shu swallowed them, and in doing so, took on that karma. That karma would, in turn, provide nourishment to the figure on the left, allowing it to grow continuously. The more petals bloomed beneath it, the stronger that figure would become.

As for the figure on the right, it grew through merit.

How?

For instance, if Ye Shu killed the scoundrel who refined the blood pills and then swallowed the pills he had made, he would gain equal amounts of both merit and karma at the same time.

Killing an evil man earned merit.

Swallowing the blood pills incurred karma.

Yes, you heard that right. In Ye Shu’s case, karma and merit never canceled each other out. Regardless of good or evil, karma was borne by the figure on the left, merit by the figure on the right, and cause and effect belonged to the figure at the very top.

This was extraordinary, audacious.

But it was the truth.

The figure on the left had already bloomed three petals. At this point, he possessed roughly the strength of the Golden Core stage, though he naturally would not reveal his recovered power to Liu Ruyi.

That would arouse her suspicion.

For now, lying low was the best course of action.

In truth, Ye Shu had already devised a method to rapidly increase his cultivation: kill those who walked the demonic path, refine them into blood pills, and then consume them.

Slaying demonic cultivators earned merit.

And because the demonic cultivators had gained their power through plunder and slaughter, their flesh and blood were saturated with a vast amount of karma.

By killing them, and then swallowing their blood pills, both merge and merit would grow simultaneously. The three blossoms would fully bloom, and his cultivation would skyrocket.

It was a perfect closed loop.

Ye Shu slowly opened his eyes, fixed his gaze on Liu Ruyi, and a sharp gleam flashed within them.

“If I become the demon, there will be no demons left under heaven.”