Those humans lived beneath a dim, pale-gray canopy of sky, on cracked, hardened earth, within wounds that could never heal, and under a blessing that would never let them die.
But at least those humans could still feel sunlight—even if it was not real sunlight; they could still feel the wind against their skin—even if it carried the stench of decay; they could still feel one another's presence—even if that presence only brought them more pain.
The demons had nothing.
No light, no wind, no warmth, no touch—only themselves and a hunger that could never be filled.
A barrier separated life from death.
On one side was a human Purgatory of undying immortals; on the other, a hellish cage of eternal death without life.
They gazed at each other forever, suffered forever, and could never break free.
Humanity's curse was that they could not die. The demons' curse was that they could not live.
The two extremes confronted and entangled each other across that thin barrier, envying one another.
Wu Heng's consciousness floated in the void of that hell, watching it all as though he were looking at a painting. His face remained expressionless.
His consciousness drifted in hell's darkness for a long time.
The howls, shattering, freezing, and madness of those hungry souls swept past the edge of his perception one by one, without stirring the slightest ripple.
He had not come to pity them, nor had he come to save them. He had come to this world because it contained something he wanted.
That thick, almost overflowing Creation Trait had congealed like grease in every corner of the world.
It was in the air, in the soil, in the plants, in the bodies of the living dead, and in the phantom forms of the hungry souls.
It was