The Past

.....

"Just what kind of monster do you have to be to be able to kill two Tempering Marrow cultivators from the Black Tiger Family?" A guard with long black hair asked as he lightly tapped his hat, attempting to shield his eyes from the grisly sight before him.

"These guys were stripped of all their belongings and it looks like anything valuable they had stashed away was snatched as well. Could this just be a case of robbery?" he wondered aloud.

"…"

A senior guard, who had been busy writing down stuff on a notepad, turned his head to his fellow guard and asked, "Have you not heard?"

"Heard what??" the first guard replied, his confusion evident in his tone.

The senior guard sighed before his expression turned serious.

"Listen up, newbie. A few days ago, there was an incident in the Yang Forest. And that incident involved a Yang Sect Trial Disciple — the only one of his kind."

"And this boy, who was once known as the trashiest of all cultivators, suddenly had a complete flip. Not only did his power surge but even the way he carried himself changed. He went on to kill four Yang Sect Outer Disciples when they tried to bring him back by force."

"What!? This Trial Disciple actually had the balls to go against the Yang Sect?? Does he not fear death!?" the first guard exclaimed.

"You truly are a moron, aren't you? Didn't I just say that he's part of the Yang Sect? You should know just as well as anybody else that in the Yang Sect, the strongest fist rules," the Senior Guard explained with a touch of exasperation in his voice while still jotting down things on his notepad.

He continued, "Which is to say that this boy was able to do as he wished without being punished. Of course, some of the elders of the Yang Sect were infuriated over this notion. But in the end, it was a dispute between juniors, and thus, they weren't allowed to interfere by orders of the Sect Leader, Yang Fa."

"So you're saying that this Trial Disciple can do whatever he wants without facing any repercussions??"

"Exactly, and he isn't just a Trial Disciple anymore. He won the Outer Sect Admittance Competition less than half a day ago," the Senior Guard replied.

"But what I don't understand is what all of this has to do with this Trial Disciple?? These two assassins are of the 20% Tempering Marrow Realm. There's no way that a kid could have anything to do with their deaths," the younger guard muttered, still puzzled.

"…"

The Senior Guard dropped the pencil from his hands, turned his head over his shoulder and said, "These wounds are exactly the same as the ones we found on the Yang Sect Outer Disciples. It also just so happens to be eerily similar to the marks on the group of assassins we found dead inside the depths of the Yang Forest."

"You can't be implying that—"

"Yes, I am saying that this Azmodeus kid was capable of not only taking out cultivators in the Middle and Late Pulse Condensation Stages but also has enough power to kill two assassins in the 20% Tempering Marrow Stage," the Senior Guard cut in.

Even he could hardly believe his own words, but there was no other explanation that he could think of that would make sense of the events that had been transpiring since the last couple of days.

"B-But sir, surely you jest… I mean, what sort of genius would you need to be to reach the 20% Tempering Marrow Stage at such a young age…?" the younger guard asked with a tone of disbelief.

"I don't know, young man," the senior guard replied. "But the one thing I do know is that a genius beyond anything ever seen before in Spirit River City has emerged, and it doesn't look like he is planning to keep his existence unknown…" 

After he said that, his train of thought was directed toward a troubling question.

'If this boy was considered trash just a few days ago, and if you include the fact that he likely took the weekly power test for all disciples not even a week prior, then could it be that he had acquired such strength within just these two days…?'

'And if that is the case, just what sort of aberration are we allowing to grow in our small city…?'

_____

Meanwhile, in a location a few miles away from where the two Tempering Marrow Assassins had met their ends, a young boy with strikingly handsome facial features strolled through a bustling shopping district. He made his way from one alchemist shop to the next, buying every cultivation supply he could think of.

When the clerks would inevitably ask him where his parents were, he would simply respond by tossing more money in their direction.

Money was one of the only resources in the world that could be used for solving a wide number of problems, and since it wasn't even his money in the first place, he didn't care how spendthrift-like he seemed.

There was a time in his past life when he once cared about the amount of money he used up to advance his cultivation at a snail's pace. But that all seemed to have changed the moment he leveled up the Shadow Cleaver Trait.

Slowly but surely, he was shedding all the remnants of his former self, allowing someone who was capable of infinite adaptation and evolution to rear his head from the flimsy shell that used to be a boy trying to live on a day-to-day basis…

There was, of course, an option where he could recycle all of his traits and regain his old personality, but what would be the point of that?

Why show weakness when it would only be taken advantage of…?

In his past life, there was a girl who worked at a nearby stone-opening shop.

This girl was someone who had shown kindness to Azmodeus that no one had ever given him in his entire life. And for a few fleeting months, he had actually started believing that he had found someone who he could learn to love.

However, just like with all things in life, nothing good seemed to last forever…

The girl soon found herself a powerful boyfriend from a neighboring city's ruling force. With this boyfriend, the first thing she did was come and flaunt him in Azmodeus's face, taunting him with the most cruel and demeaning things.

That day, any growing emotions he had been nurturing died right then and there. He understood, once again, that nothing in his life would ever go right…

However, it wasn't long after this girl came back that he had to take beatings of her boyfriend and his group of hooligans with a blank expression. He soon figured, 'Why whine and sulk when the next day will be just as terrible as the day before? Tears eventually dry up for good…'

His life had always been an endless series of hurdles, and there was no respite for the boy labeled as the weakest and trashiest cultivator in existence…

He was simply someone trying to survive… But in the end, none of it really mattered, as he died at the hands of a drunken bastard who had nothing better to do…

That was the life of a boy named Azmodeus.

Or at least, it 'was'…

...…