The Cool and Aloof Immortal Master Has Fallen to the Demonic Path (Transmigration) - Chapter 18

Chapter 18

The Butterfly Demon was named A’Ruan, originally a butterfly demon who concealed herself in the deep mountains to cultivate.

Demons are different from humans; demons can sense anomalies in their bloodline. Her parents sensed that there was a problem with her bloodline, so they warned her to remain secluded from the world.

Compared to the freedom of her older siblings, A’Ruan was lonely. She lived hidden in the deep mountains year-round. Her mother always said that once her cultivation became powerful enough, she could leave the deep mountains. But she already had no demon rivals in the deep mountains. How much more powerful could she get?

A’Ruan couldn’t understand, but she was very obedient. She listened to every word her parents said, including living alone in the deep mountains.

Her parents loved her very much and often searched for spiritual flowers and exotic grasses for her to eat. But she was flawed. She couldn’t absorb the spiritual energy from them. When they discovered the spiritual grasses were useless, her parents became even more heartbroken. A’Ruan overheard them arguing, hearing them say she was a Vessel Body.

From then on, they began finding various precious artifacts for her self-defense, even giving her their own spiritual essence, just for peace of mind.

But the demons in the deep mountains couldn’t defeat her anyway. She had no use for these things.

A’Ruan’s days were lonely and boring, until she found a spider that had just gained initial consciousness.

Spiders and butterflies are naturally enemies, but the Spider Demon had only just gained consciousness, while the Butterfly Demon already had several centuries of cultivation. Since she was much stronger than the spider, she naturally wasn’t afraid of being eaten.

A’Ruan wanted to live with her family. She also wanted to join the world and experience human life. That way, her cultivation would surely advance by leaps and bounds. The old tree spirit in the mountain said so: whether cultivator or demon, one must enter the world to attain the Dao.

Unfortunately, she couldn’t leave the deep mountains.

A’Ruan didn’t have a younger sister, so she named the little spider Little Sister (Xiao Mei).

Little Sister cultivated very slowly. A’Ruan thought she was a bit dull, not cultivating as fast as she did. She thought she should have caught a smarter demon to play with, but the smart demons were all too quick-witted. She couldn’t let her secret be discovered.

Little Sister cultivated for another three hundred years before she could finally speak.

A’Ruan discovered her new flaw: she loved to talk, very noisy. She was always chattering and rambling in her ear. But this Little Sister brought some lively cheer to A’Ruan’s life. Her parents both said she was lucky to have found her. With Little Sister accompanying her, everyone felt more at ease.

However, Little Sister always clamored to eat her.

She said it was only right for spiders to eat butterflies.

Whenever this happened, A’Ruan would use her demon power to seal Little Sister in a leaf, forcing her to shut her incessant mouth.

Later, Little Sister finally stopped thinking about eating her.

She found something more fun: transforming into a human.

There are two ways for a demon to shapeshift: one is to take on someone else’s appearance, and the other is to cultivate into a human form oneself. The former is easy, but the laws of nature stipulated that to gain long-term ownership of the human appearance, the demon must fulfill a wish for that person, making them willingly exchange their appearance with the demon. The latter takes a long time and has many uncertainties; the resulting appearance is either extremely beautiful or extremely ugly.

Little Sister preferred the simpler method. She went down the mountain with a Pig Demon and returned after a long time.

By then, she had transformed into a beautiful woman. She also brought back a man and a woman.

They were a couple. The woman was slender and graceful and willingly lent her appearance, as long as Little Sister fulfilled one wish: to help them catch all the demons in the mountain.

A’Ruan then learned that Little Sister’s appearance was borrowed from their younger sister, and the price was the Pig Demon’s spiritual essence and the bones and blood from a thousand years of the Pig Demon’s cultivation.

She didn’t know where she went wrong to raise Little Sister into someone who would resort to any means necessary.

A’Ruan naturally refused and drove them all out.

But she was worried about Little Sister in her heart. She secretly followed them. She watched them burn, kill, and loot, watching them steal the spiritual essence of their fellow demons and eat their bones and blood. She finally intervened. She injured them and Little Sister.

In fact, they were quite formidable, but she had cultivated faster than other demons since childhood. She also had many artifacts and the blessing of her parents’ spiritual essence. They couldn’t defeat her and were all shattered of their spiritual essence.

The couple had nothing to do with her, but Little Sister was raised by her, and she couldn’t bear for her to die.

She couldn’t find any other way to save Little Sister, whose spiritual essence had been shattered by her, except to feed her own blood. This also allowed the couple, who hadn’t died yet, to discover her secret: she was a Vessel Body.

But so what? The couple was no match for her.

Her parents often said that one must cut the grass and pull out the roots and should not be soft-hearted when it’s time to be ruthless. She suffered this retribution because she didn’t listen.

She was originally going to kill them, but Little Sister said that she had, after all, borrowed their sister’s appearance, and asked her to spare them.

Their spiritual essence was shattered; they couldn’t do any more evil.

What Little Sister said made some sense. A’Ruan listened and didn’t kill them.

A’Ruan took Little Sister back. She was afraid Little Sister would harm her fellow demons again, but she couldn’t bear to punish her, so she planted a Concentric Gu (Concentric Poison Worm) on them. If Little Sister disobeyed again, she would harm herself, and Little Sister would feel all the pain she felt.

She finally cultivated into a human form through her own efforts. Her appearance was very charming.

Her mother said she was more beautiful than any of them. A demon cultivated into a human form by herself is truly more beautiful. Little Sister regretted borrowing the appearance a little.

A’Ruan was extremely proud.

Days passed one by one. Little Sister got better day by day. Her parents would also visit her from time to time. A’Ruan protected everyone, and the demons in the deep mountains became more friendly. A’Ruan lived a happy life that lasted for a hundred years.

Then, the couple came looking for them again. Not only had their spiritual essence recovered, but their cultivation had also advanced a level. They brought over a dozen Daoists with them to besiege and kill them.

They originally couldn’t defeat her, but they abducted Little Sister. When she went to rescue Little Sister, she accidentally entered the array they set up.

Her mother always said that some human cultivators weren’t highly skilled in profound magical arts but were quick to learn unorthodox methods. They naturally had an advantage with arrays.

A’Ruan tried her best, killing nearly half of their people, but she still couldn’t escape the array.

The demons she had saved all came to rescue her, but they shouldn’t have come.

They all sacrificed their lives for her, yet she was still captured.

A’Ruan later learned that the couple were not a couple at all. They became Dao companions only to exploit each other, treating each other as cultivation vessels and extracting the last bit of utility. The woman from whom Little Sister borrowed her appearance was not their sister, but just a fellow traveler. They killed her.

No, it should be said that Ku Mu killed everyone, including his Dao companion.

He wanted to own her exclusively, to own the Vessel Body.

She was confined. Because Little Sister had the Concentric Gu on her, if one died, both would die, so Ku Mu spared Little Sister.

Ku Mu cursed Little Sister, making her his slave to be commanded.

He has been forcing Little Sister to do bad things, helping him capture people, kill people, and set up arrays.

A’Ruan has been imprisoned for ten years. For these ten years, he has drunk her blood and eaten her flesh. She is not a living creature, but meat on a chopping block.

Because of the existence of the Concentric Gu, when she felt pain, Little Sister would feel the pain with her.

A’Ruan felt distressed watching Little Sister suffer, but she couldn’t undo the Concentric Gu. Her mother had only taught her how to plant the Gu, not how to remove it.

She could only beg Ku Mu. Ku Mu probably felt that Little Sister was serving him diligently, so he removed half of the Concentric Gu from her. Little Sister no longer felt pain with her, but their lives were still bound together.

She didn’t dare to die because Little Sister would die with her.

But she hurt so much, so much, truly so much.

A’Ruan missed her father and mother, but she was sealed. Her father and mother couldn’t find her, and it was better that they couldn’t. Without their spiritual essence, her father and mother couldn’t defeat Ku Mu.

Ku Mu’s cultivation had already advanced by leaps and bounds from being nourished by her fresh blood all these years.

She didn’t know how much longer she had to endure. Every day, she had to tell herself:

Live well, not just for herself, but for Little Sister too.

A’Ruan had some regrets. If only she hadn’t planted the Concentric Gu. That way, she might have passed away in peace.

No, even without the Concentric Gu, she still wouldn’t die. She couldn’t let go of Little Sister.

She was so afraid that if she died, Ku Mu would harm Little Sister.

She endured day by day, until finally, she was nearing the end.

The recollection stopped. A’Ruan reached out and tapped her arm twice. There was hardly any flesh left on her arm. Although spiritual flowers and exotic grasses could promote rapid regeneration of flesh and blood, she had been dug for flesh and bled too many times. Her arms were riddled with holes cut by Ku Mu, revealing pale white bone. She was practically tapping on bone, which made Yi Hu wince in pain.

But a number of vibrant beads suddenly appeared in A’Ruan’s hand. They were of various colors and glowing.

Yi Hu recognized them. They were all Spiritual Essences (Ling Yuan).

Previously, when she was still at the Immortal Spirit Sect, the Bamboo Demon had given her one.

The Bamboo Demon’s spiritual essence was emerald green.

These spiritual essences belonged to various beings, whether human or demon, each possessing only one spiritual essence. A’Ruan didn’t know why she had so many spiritual essences. Counting roughly, there were over ten.

Zi Ying’s eyes were glistening at the sight of so many spiritual essences, but they slowly dimmed again.

Spiritual entities do not have spiritual essence. They also have no use for spiritual essence, and it is a pipe dream to absorb spiritual energy from it.

A’Ruan laboriously held the spiritual essences and said to Yi Hu: “Miss, these are for you.”

Yi Hu pointed to herself, looking at A’Ruan in disbelief.

Shen Yin had told her early on that spiritual essence was extremely precious; one spiritual essence represented one life.

Spiritual essence could almost only be given away willingly. To kill a living being and steal their spiritual essence, one would have to extract it at an extremely fast speed before the living being could even react, but this was practically impossible, as the pain of extracting spiritual essence was so intense that one could not be unaware of it.

Of course, there were also cases of threatening people into handing over their spiritual essence, but most were gifts.

If a living being and their spiritual essence were separated early on, the spiritual essence would not perish even if the living being died. Conversely, if the spiritual essence perished, the living being would surely die. Gifting a spiritual essence was equivalent to gifting one’s life.

She was surprised that A’Ruan possessed so many spiritual essences, and even more surprised that she was giving all of them to her now.

A’Ruan held the spiritual essences, lost in past memories. Tears welled up in her variegated eyes: “These are all spiritual essences. There’s Sister Hu’s, Brother Liu’s, and the Old Tree Spirit’s. Most of them are gone. They were all very good to me and left their spiritual essences to me. I’ve been hiding them for all these years and I’m a bit tired. I’ll give them all to Miss.”

“Miss is a good person. They would be willing if they knew.” She smiled, a final radiance facing death.

Her face was haggard and covered in blood, but it was beautiful.

A’Ruan was almost Yi Hu’s alternative way of life.

If she had fallen into Yun Dongyue’s hands, her fate might have been even worse than hers.

Yi Hu’s eyes reddened involuntarily as she watched. She sniffled, hung the jade token on her waist, and reached out to accept the spiritual essences.

“Thank you, Miss A’Ruan. But shouldn’t you keep these for Little Sister?”