Dark Designs: Tales of Demons & Gods (Bimonthy Updates)

Liang Yu felt something odd happening to him all of a sudden. He remembered establishing his pavilion deep in the wilderness with his forces before things went black. He definitely remembers the man god Shango saying something in a whisper about the Dimension Collapsing, maybe.

The Deity at least gave a little notice before things happened. Not having reached God/Titan's Level of power, the Champion Liang Yu could not resist what happened.

But he knew the pavilion that was set up survived. Which contained the strength to grow into its own Dimension given time. It was brilliant for himself and those he was Connected with to create safeguards just in case.

It was easy to tell this place was a little different. As well as his overall characteristics weakening some.

His soul felt off. Looking inward, he tried to relax a bit. This allowed the owner of the body Shen Yue to regain control. Senses spread out a little to quickly against others. Checking if anyone else came with was better to be done for later.

A feeling of vertigo hit the moment he looked around. A change in body height and senses for one. It started the moment he looked at an orange-haired boy. He recalled that boy all too well. He was Nie Lie.

Nie Lie. He swears he saw an older version of Nie Lie break down into particles of energy and enter the younger one. Which was something that happy only when "Destiny" was at work or someone was using "Time" based abilities.

Nie Lie looked all around the classroom confused as can be. As he made sense of what happened to him, he missed something happening to someone else in the room.

"Ughh." Shen Yue groaned. His head starting throbbing in pain. As if lighting shot across it with the stabbing of an otherworldly force. Rubbing his temples did nothing as he focused on the cause of it. 'Why is my "Soul Realm" causing me so much pain?!' Looking in on himself did not end well. "What is that?!"

Inside Shen Yue was a Flame Vortex of epic proportions. It expanded burning away inside his soul. Otherworldly essences mixing with the structure of the young man's soul. The burned residue was pulled into the "Core" of the vortex of blue flame.

A dragon slowly appeared out of "Star Energy" from the core. The light was as bright as a star in the sky. It outstretched itself with the wings pushing on the boundaries of Shen Yue's weak little body and soul.

Each area it touched sent a boom Thunder into the meridians and neuro network of the young cultivator.

"Kuff!" Shen Yue coughed up Spiritual Blood. The injuries were severe as can be. Considering the strength differences in the souls involved. Luckily, his classmates and the teacher who happened to be his aunt were paying attention to other matters. An argument between her and the student Nie Lie drew everyone's attention. 'Can't they see I need help here!?'

His pleading thoughts went to know avail. As the man-god Shango was at work. Rewarding his Champion Leroy (Liang Yu) for a job well done in the last Dimension. Shango allowed events to play out undisturbed as Leroy dealt with the soul of Shen Yue.

"They are preoccupied," Leroy said. His hand grabbed the young teen by the throat destroying it in the process, with a toss Shen Yue was sent towards the Flame Vortex. "It will be over soon! Well for you anyway!" He gave pursuit as the flames started spinning. 'I have the feeling this is gonna hurt just as bad as all the other times!'

Leroy was right. His soul was extremely powerful and the process of refining it this time was different compared to usual. Especially with the Star Dragon that was added to his soul from the last Dimension. He just had to use the resources of all those dead Star Martial Artists in his Internal Space for later. Couldn't let them go to waste. Who knew this would have happened.

Well, a few Deities knew but they had no reason to tell a Champion of his status that.

Shen Yue's cultivation was completely abolished as this process unfolded. Which really was nothing at all. His mind and memories were devoured into Leroy who took much longer to break down. The souls merged in a way.

The same as before in the previous Dimension, Leroy was stripped of his name, the name he was accustom to Liang Yu was also muddled a little and he would go by Shen Yue. Which helped to respond to the right names when moving about.

Which was good, since he would most likely write down his name as Leroy on paperwork and whatnot.

As Shango had fun on the outside, Shen Yue went over the differences of the martial ability in this Dimension from the current memories available. Which helped refresh the information he knew from the series itself. It had been a very long time since he read it over. Or viewed any of the adaptations.

Small gaps would slow down work but that was to be expected. Improvement and support was something the Flame Vortex Core reveled in. He would have to focus on those matters before even thinking about Aspect setup.

"Gotta get through the pain!" Shen Yue groaned. The breakdown was just taking to long for his taste. He could swear Shango needed to add Torture to his Aspect list! "Back at the White Realm, which is the first one. Won't take long for me to get through that really. My residual energy will take care of that easy enough once I have the time. But I need to use the other leftover energy to increase the Soul Realm of this body to the highest level. Or pretty high up anyway."

The Soul Realm was equivalent of the mindscape, mind space, soul space, however, you wanted to call it. A different dimension within oneself. In Star Martial God Technique the Dantian could be accessed this way. In other places, A Palace of energy and whatnot could be. As well as a type of spirit point that coincided with meridians or the pathways in a martial artist.

The bottom was the Red Soul Realm. It was the weakest and most common of them all. Next was the Orange Soul Realm, which only had a slight improvement than the former. Soul was a little more durable. But barely so.

Yellow Soul Realm actually had a significant increase in its abilities. Soul more durable and the recovery to it improved.

The Green Soul Realm increased one's natural learning speed. Giving them a bit of an edge in understanding corresponding techniques that went with the soul. Demon Spiritualists that fused with a compatible Demon Spirit found their growth a little better.

The Cyan Soul Realm allowed one to cultivate faster as well as take in medicine better. The mind tended to be better but the emotional state was weak. Prone to depression due to their view on matters.

The Azure Soul Realm contained everything the previous contained. As well as an increase to the mentality in doing certain acts. Can be confused with being extremely goal-oriented at times by others.

As for the Indigo Realm, no one alive currently had one and records were scarce about it.

"The Azure seems just perfect." Shen Yue grinned. "I mean, it is a type of blue and my fire and dragon are blue. Match made in heaven!" As his Qi was broke down and collapsed to fit with the current Dimension, he felt the change in his soul realm take place.

Red turned to orange then to yellow. With a flicker of his Flame Vortex Core, the area started to shimmer. His Soul Realm went to green then to Cyan in an instant. With a simple nudge, it changed to the Azure Soul Realm with no real signs of stopping.

"Un un!" Shen Yue put a stop to the next change right then and there. "Not tempting things and wasting that energy. That is just dumb." The energy was then pushed around to reinforce his Soul Realm altogether. "Have to protect against prying eyes and shit. Plus..."

Shen Yue turned to the Metal Seed that floated in his Internal Space. It served him well developing that in the last Dimension. One of the best defensive techniques he knew that improved his body. And as memory served, there was this thing called the Thunder God Meteorite Sword perfect for the picking to make it even better.

"Thunder Aspect will be easy thanks to this. Or should I really just call it Sound?" Remembering about time, energy started to swirl around once more.

The energy was sent that way to the Metal Seed as it spun in place. He would not cultivate this with the body in class. That would be crazy. He had a plan for that later, that was a long shot but would work just fine.

As this went on, Nie Lie picked an altercation with Shen Xiu again after she said something that set him off. The anger from his previous life clouding decision-making skills, which technically was this life since he travelled through time,

This resulted in him having to stand at the back of the class. Then a few more students joining him in that regard. Something about a bet or something. A total of six kids were there now. Only two of them actually containing any relevance as far as Shen Yue remembered.

"Well.. that is just something else." Shen Yue blinked at them before looking at his "aunt" Shen Xiu. "It is what it is I guess."

His mind dived into what happened the first time he went through this process. Remembering the different choices made.

.

Another Life-

.

Hello Champion, I am Shango. A human ascendant God." The proclaimed man-god said. "Your arrival was an accident as you can tell. As well as that of all your friends. You were not supposed to end up here."

"Well send me home then." Leroy said quickly. That was his actual name. Not really mindful that the individual before him was suppose to be a god. A small part still thought he was hallucinating a bit. But a good portion of him was vary about the floating man-god blatant response. "That frown is telling me that won't happen."

"Correct." Shango said. "Your friend Nguyen was supposed to come here. You were supposed to go to..." The man-god stopped talking and listened to the surroundings of the soul. The waves from the Flame Vortex inside Leroy was growing quickly from his influence. ".. you have cultivated already as well as removed the soul of the original from Destiny. You can not leave anymore."

"To be fair.. it was him or me. But would I have really been able to go home just like that?" Something said that was not the case. Well more to it really.

"Once becoming a God or a Titan, yes." Shango's eyes looked really sad for some reason. Looking at Shen Yue as if he was a long loss family member. 'Haa, we could not protect them but this is better than death. At least I believe so. Maybe the other Deities are having better luck helping their Champions. We didn't even have the benefit of stopping in the Waiting Area before sending them all to the next Dimension. The Unending Army can not be making a move so soon. Every Deity is falling in line for now. Right?'

Shen Yue stopped reminiscing. Thinking how he already took the soul here and ate it. Thinking about those he left behind was a little saddening. But it faded quickly. The same as last time.

Which was the thing about every Champion, theirs souls were just different in that regard. Some did need a little help to make it easier. Such as Shen Yue (Leroy) who needed personal parts suppressed from making mistakes.

'Why was this one so abrupt?!' Shen Yue was at a loss for now.