110 Impudent Demon, Marrow Realm Absurdity

"Oh dear..." Jam, upon coming back to his senses was almost disgusted by the actions of demonic counterpart. When the effects of the Scorching Marrow Pill ceased to affect him and the demon within felt abated, he had awoken within an Immortal's cave that the demon had created out of an asteroid.

Within the asteroid, Jam found corpses and storage artifacts; not all were space rings. He felt unease as the memories of his demonic counterpart set in and an odd feeling of both acceptance and disgust manifested in their wake. Who was he? Jam the cultivator or Jam the Sage Slaughtering Demon? Why was he so unbothered by his time reaping and consuming?

The Jam that spent eight years in the mortal world should have rejected such cruelty and needless violence, but in reality there was no discomfort, no disapproval. The increasing realization that he had absent humanity was starting to cloud his tempered "human" psyche and the conflict it raised made Jam question his life itself.

What was he to do? His mind was at odds with what he thought to be his goals. How could he live on as a cultivator and learn cultivator ideals, when his presumably demonic lineage barred him from truly understanding humane culture…

Jam thought of himself as an orthodox cultivator. He wanted to follow the normal path to ascension, but his new demon incarnation brought out a new path for him to traverse; a demonic path, suitable for beasts and devils alike. Worst of all, the rejection he thought he would manifest for these temptation were all but absent! He could easily envision himself as a Death God wreaking havoc across countless worlds, consuming and devouring others to better himself.

As his pondering deepened and Jam consider his original nature — that of a sociopathic one-track-minded working freak — he really couldn't help but question whether he should abandon trying to condition himself to be human as Tzatziki encouraged and instead embrace this budding yet natural demonic incarnation.

Shouldn't he just be true to himself and ruthlessly take, without sparing a second thought for others? Cultivate and grow stronger at any cost? Kill and plunder! Steal and win!! Annihilate the opposition at any cost and become the ultimate omega!!!

Jam didn't know it but the demon in his heart had begun to influence him on a foundational level as it drew a refreshing picture to shift his perspective on life. Alas, the demon grew too hasty and touched the metaphysical reverse scale to Jam's inner dragon. It tried to corrupt Jam's feelings towards his family and friends; the people that had positively impacted his life.

Upon attempting to persuade Jam to abandon his foster grandmother, his Dao Companion, the friendships he had established, the family he had adopted in the mortal realm… The cold and dark light that had been flickering with ever-increasing intensity within his eyes stopped. 'Hmph! Others can be regarded as disposable bags of meat, but not my family!'

That internal demon that settled in his heart trembled ever so subtly as it was chained up by the powers of Jam's will. Jam resolved himself to look into the Dao of Emotions to see if understanding it could contain that nasty personality he knew to be his true self, before returning his focus to the world outside his soulscape.

As Jam looked on at the desecrated bodies of the most powerful Sages his demonic counterpart killed, a bit of regret surfaced as Jam knew that none of the corpses would have anything of value after his demon was through with them. Their blood which would have been excellent materials for Tier 8 pills, inscriptions, and meals were all but drained. Even the essence within their skin, bones, and organs had been consumed as auxiliary demonic energy.

Jam was particular depressed about the bones of the Sage Demonic Beasts because in becoming a Sage, both Demonic Beast and Cultivator alike would see their bodies become spiritual treasures in and of themselves. The bones of Sages could be refined into formidable artifacts, perhaps even rivaling the best ores or even surpassing them; it all depended on the foundation and background of the bones, but anything was possible.

Still, it made sense that Jam found these corpses in his wake as his demonic counterpart, while still a bit undeveloped, had the power and intelligence to use his various Daos; that statement only becoming more valid as it empowered itself with the demonic energy of its victims.

Now, Jam would have liked to pick up where his demon left off and start his Dao Cultivation as soon as possible. But, ten days had passed and after adding the four days he had spent with Latoya, the meeting with the Head of Body Refining was fast approaching. The only upside to the situation was that Jam had just recently completed his ascension into grand perfection of the Marrow Realm.

In those ten days his demon had ran around terrorizing the space biome, it had also followed though his conscious decision to keep ingesting Scorching Marrow Pills. And even though all the pills Jam consumed were his own perfect Tier 7 Scorching Marrow Pills, it still took a couple dozen thousand to transform his bone marrow.

Right about now, Jam was becoming increasingly aware of why people would detest even the thought of practicing his Chaotic Neutral Transmogrification technique. Forget the Marrow Realm, if surpassing the Bone Realm alone almost destroyed Jam's psyche with that terrifying hallucination of pain, who could bare the stress of further realms?

Of course, Jam understood that he was also overestimating the seriousness of his own judgement with regards to the technique. He had read the manual so he would know that normally even the most insanely masochistic psychos would take the pills one by one and train for LONG periods of time before proceeding. They would also take various Ice, Water, and Yin pills to alleviate the burning pain caused by training in the technique. And most important of all, virtually none of the people that trained the technique did so before at the very least reaching the apex of their current realm.

For instance, where Jam had broken through to the Marrow Realm as a Saint Master, the overwhelming majority of practitioners would wait until they at least became Saint Gods. But he had not only broken through as a Saint Master, but also in a short ten days… several tens of thousands of horrific self-mutilating pills were ingested, that amounted to several thousand a day!

Good thing the outcome was worth it. First and foremost Jam would be done with the Head of Body Refining before they even met. And then, there was the special ability that Jam unlocked due to his completion of another realm. An ability that became all the more absurd due to his Blood Dao Cultivation; Essence Override.

Back when Jam had saved Cynthia, he had learned to use Tzatziki's Blood Dao technique to improve his Blood Essence. Up until know he had only experienced the passive benefits that came with improving Blood Essence, things like: "Faster" cultivation, gaining a stronger more responsive body, improving his understanding of Blood. Jam had never dared to use Blood Essence actively, as every use would burn up and vanish, leaving his foundation in shambles and his cultivation would immediately drop.

However, with Essence Override, he could now start using a small amount of his Blood Essence without worrying about the consequences. At the moment, he could only use up a trifling 1% of his Blood Essence and only once a day at that, but even minute quantities of Blood Essence could empower attacks by several times over.

Jam walked through the piles of dead Sage Realm beings and flew out of the asteroid his demon had claimed its home. He had already thrown all the storage artifacts in his own storage dimension, before heading back to find Danger Noodle. Before heading out of the pocket dimension, he would ask her if she wanted to continue training within or head out with him.

But, upon relying on Tzatziki to detected her location, Jam found that she was engaged in a grand battle. He made his way over to her within a separate biome in the second level of the challenge area, the forest biome, and watched from a distance as Danger Noodle fought. Surprisingly, she remained in her humanoid form as she battled.

Within her perfect Thunder Dao Domain, everywhere for over ten thousand kilometers was covered in multicolored sparks of thunder. Her opponent, a Diamondback Sage Ape King, seemed to be losing the fight as it had already reverted back to its true form. It arrogantly, stood headstrong against Danger Noodle's thunder as its metallic body effortlessly mitigated any damage it might receive.

Jam watched for over half an hour as both Danger Noodle and the Ape King tried using a multitude of tricks to kill each other, but they were as equal a match as Jam had seen. All they accomplished was destroying the area around them as their attacks even when met head on would just barely injure the opposing barely.

Since he was kind of in a hurry, Jam involved himself in the fight to help Danger Noodle win posthaste. Alas, the moment he assumed his Lesser Demon Form in preparation for the battle, before even physically exposing himself, the sheer density and malice emanating from his demonified self sent the Ape King into a panic.

Now, if Jam were his usual self he might have ignored the fleeing Ape and just complete the task at hand; talking to Danger Noodle. But, since he now had a demon heart, his demon incarnate influenced him just a tiny bit more when he transformed. And a demonified Jam would not stand for this impudence. It had taken time away from him and still wished to escape? Hilarious.

It didn't help that Jam's efficient normal self replaced the dominant personality over his demon counterpart, as he felt it would be a good chance to test his Essence Override ability now. He charged up the strongest beam he had cultivated up to date, the thunder-space-yang beam, and spit exactly 1% of his Blood Essence onto the focal point of the beam — his palm.

Thereafter, the world seemed to fall silent and time seemed to stop as the beam Jam unleashed moved so fast neither he nor Danger Noodle could detect when it had fired. What they could tell from the aftermath was that a giant abyss had formed over the area Jam's beam passed and the Ape King's body ceased existing.