Of the Demon Race who remained, apart from a handful of high-ranking members, there were others determined to follow Dijun to the end.
"Back to the Heavenly Court."
Dijun looked over the decimated Demon Race. Countless millions had come, yet fewer than a million remained after the tribulation.
It was a wretched sight.
The Heavenly Court had lost its former splendor. Its leaders were wounded or heartsick. Once they returned, they went into seclusion to await the meeting the Dao Ancestor had called for ten thousand years later.
Dijun cast one last, lingering glance at the Heavenly Court. The Demon Race had once ruled heaven and earth; ten thousand demons had gathered here, at the finest place in all Hong Huang.
But it likely would not belong to them anymore. He did not even know where they would wander next.
Without the plans they had laid beforehand, without having finally survived the tribulation and barely escaped its doom, despair might well have swallowed them.
Three thousand years later, the Demon Race had recovered a little and convened its first meeting since the tribulation.
So many were gone. Of the ten demon kings, only Bai Ze, Jimeng, Ghost Chariot, Nine-Headed Serpent, and Shangyang remained.
The Demon Emperor Fuxi had died. Saint Nuwa had taken his remnant soul away to await reincarnation.
Countless Star Gods and stellar lords had sunk into oblivion once more, awaiting another awakening. But when that time came, they would be new Star Gods and stellar lords, with no memory of this lifetime.
"Battered" could not begin to describe the Demon Race's losses. They had survived by the skin of their teeth.
"You are all still here, and that comforts me. Yet I grieve for the many fellow Daoists we lost." Dijun fell silent, unable to find any