Over Cloud Province City, dense black clouds hung like a curtain, and a stifling smell of blood filled the air.
The broad streets were strewn with ruined walls and severed limbs. A stray dog, pus oozing all over its body, bent its head and rapidly gnawed at a corpse, its tail held low as though keeping watch for danger.
Lu Li hid in a cabinet in the tavern across the street, watching through a crack.
The fall of Cloud Province City... wasn't this the background menu for the initial version of Martial World?
Lu Li searched his memories, his heart sinking.
The scene before him gave him an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. Unless something unexpected had happened, this was Martial World, the game he had played for a full twenty years.
Martial World was a computer game that had suddenly appeared on Blue Star.
It offered an extraordinary degree of freedom, and as time passed, one new version followed another.
The demon martial path, blood-and-qi martial arts, the true qi martial path, astral martial arts-as a diehard veteran, Lu Li knew them all inside out. He had even heard rumors that future updates would expand into wilderness martial arts and mythological martial arts.
Eventually, the game's excessive realism made the experience so unpleasant that players gradually lost interest.
Only old hands like Lu Li kept at it. Not long ago, on a whim, he had cleared every main quest and side quest, large and small, across more than ten versions.
Then drowsiness had surged over him, and Lu Li had dropped straight into sleep.
But when he woke again, he found himself in this world, wearing the very same pajamas.
The martial world version was the initial release. Its main storyline revolved around various factions fighting over the Heavenly Mandate Divine Weapon, while the fall of Cloud Province City was merely one of the background stories for the next demon version.
Cloud Province City was attacked by demons. In about seven days, the city became a land of blood and white bones. The imperial army wouldn't arrive to suppress the demons until twelve days had passed.
As his memories flowed back, sweat beaded on Lu Li's forehead.
He had no way of knowing exactly which day it was.
But the deadly problem right now was that demons were roaming the city.
Thud, thud...
Heavy footsteps sounded. The stray dog gnawing at the corpse suddenly let out a wail as a calf-shaped demon sprang out and bit through its neck.
The mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind it. Don't tell me another demon is going to show up next?
Lu Li swallowed, not daring to move as he tried to slow his breathing.
According to the game's settings, these demons' stats are only slightly higher than an ordinary person's during the day. Sunlight weakens them...
The demons' weaknesses surfaced in Lu Li's mind. Adrenaline flooded his system, his gaze darting about.
He did not act rashly. Games and reality were two entirely different things, and he had no intention of testing a sliding kick.
Crash!
Just then, several chaotic noises erupted outside, mixed with piercing roars.
Lu Li looked toward the sound. Through the crack in the cabinet, he saw two more demons, their bodies rotten all over, charge down the street and snap at the stray dog's corpse.
The three demons immediately tore into one another.
The wolf-shaped demon reared up and swung its foreclaw with a whistle through the air. The calf-shaped demon was sent flying into an earthen wall in the alley, smashing half the wall and the houses behind it into fragments.
The other demon, shaped like a bear, lunged forward. The flagstones cracked like a spiderweb, and a hardwood support pillar shattered beneath a single swipe.
Lu Li watched with his heart hammering.
If even one of those blows landed on him, he would be lucky to die quickly.
In the martial world version, cultivation was divided into three major realms: Meridian Opening, Qi Solidification, and Divine Intent.
In the Meridian-Unblocking Realm, martial artists cultivated by opening their meridians. The human body possessed twelve hidden meridians, and opening each granted a hundred jin of strength. Once all twelve were open, they could wield nearly ten thousand jin of tremendous force.
Yet even someone who had mastered Meridian Opening was only a second-rate expert in the martial world.
Demons were stronger than wild beasts, but to martial artists, they were merely somewhat troublesome animals. To ordinary people, however, they were life-stealing natural disasters.
Martial arts. I have to begin cultivating martial arts!
Lu Li clenched his fists, rapidly searching his memories for information about Cloud Province City.
Cloud Province City was only background lore, with no connection to the main storyline. But after the demon version launched, there was a character side quest involving a survivor from the city. The reward was the Erosion Essence Scripture, which was connected to Xiangliu.
Lu Li remembered that storyline precisely because of the Erosion Essence Scripture.
The demon Xiangliu was one of the major bosses in the next version. With nine heads, a serpent's body, and deadly poison, Xiangliu turned every place he passed into a toxic marshland and possessed astonishing vitality.
The Erosion Essence Scripture was one of the cultivation methods of the Xiangliu Martial Dao in the next demon version.
Mastering the Erosion Essence Scripture allowed one to cultivate nine apertures within the body. Those apertures stored blood and concealed poison, allowing one to heal by absorbing blood and strengthen one's cultivation by absorbing poison. As long as the nine apertures remained undestroyed, the body would not die.
The Xiangliu school's martial arts were also known as the lifesteal, immortality, and damage-reflection build.
It was outrageously overpowered.
That character was named Liu Yueling. In her recollections, she had survived by hiding in an abandoned shack in the rear courtyard of the Liu Residence in Cloud Province City.
And the item containing the Erosion Essence Scripture was on Liu Yueling!
Roar! Roar!
Frenzied growls continued to ring out. Brick-and-tile houses along and beyond the street kept collapsing in the aftermath of the battle, sending dust billowing.
Caught in the destruction, the tavern was swaying precariously, seemingly ready to give way at any moment.
Lu Li's heart pounded with fear. He was terrified that one wrong turn would bring the tavern down and bury him alive.
Fortunately, the battle between the three demons did not last long. After several clashes, the street was a complete wreck, foul black blood spread everywhere. Only the wolf-shaped demon remained, licking its wounds and feasting on the beasts and dismembered corpses.
The black clouds gradually dispersed, revealing the blazing sun overhead. Dazzling golden light spilled across the street.
The sound of tearing flesh abruptly stopped.
After a flurry of hurried noises, Lu Li looked again. Only a few mangled scraps of meat remained on the street.
The demons that had just fought to the death over flesh abandoned the corpses and fled the moment the sun emerged.
These demons are more terrifying than they were in the game, but they're also more afraid of sunlight.
Lu Li silently noted this and realized his chance had come.
The tavern cabinet was only a little taller than a person and offered poor concealment. If a demon entered the tavern, he would certainly die.
I still have to get to the Liu Residence!
The Liu Residence stood in the northern part of the city. Using the sun's movement to judge his direction, Lu Li quickly left the tavern and ran north.
White bones littered the way. Congealed blood mixed with black stains covered the ground, and the pungent stench made Lu Li's eyes sting.
In the game, it had been nothing more than a brief line of background information. Experiencing it in stark reality delivered a devastating shock.
A stifling weight gathered in Lu Li's chest. He gritted his teeth, the desire to survive consuming him completely, and kept running without stopping for breath.
Soon, he spotted a sprawling residence. Two conspicuous characters were carved into its plaque: "Liu Residence"!
The Liu Residence's vermilion gates were tightly shut, but blood had seeped across the ground beneath them.
Alarm rose in Lu Li's heart. His gaze swept around, and he decisively headed toward the side entrance in a nearby alley.
The wall beside the side entrance was not high. Finding a relatively low section, he scrambled up in a few steps and climbed into the rear courtyard.
Back when Bai Yan had first grinded for the Erosion Essence Scripture, he had become very familiar with the Liu Residence's layout in the game. As he made his way through, he found the terrain was indeed almost exactly as he remembered.
After a series of left and right turns, Lu Li passed a side room and suddenly felt his heart clench. A foul, bloody stench hung in the air.
It was like the breath of some wild beast.
What was that?!
Lu Li jerked his gaze toward the side room. Its door stood half-open, revealing a pair of blood-red eyes.
A mange demon, the lowest class of demon and a beginner monster in the game.
Clearly, this mange demon was hiding in the side room to avoid the sunlight. The room stood beside the corridor, where sunlight could not reach inside.
The instant their eyes met, the mange demon became a black shadow and lunged at him, moving almost too fast to follow.
Lu Li instinctively raised his arm to block.
The mange demon sank its teeth into his left arm. Sharp fangs pierced his flesh, and excruciating pain struck in an instant!
"Fuck!"
Lu Li's heart thundered, adrenaline surging. His face flushed red as he stumbled back several steps and punched the mange demon in the eye.
His fist slammed squarely into the mange demon's eyes and nose, spraying foul black blood.
Huh?
The instant his fist connected, a translucent panel appeared before Lu Li's eyes.
[You have inflicted minor damage on a mange demon...] [Verifying version...] [Current version: demon martial path] [Player: Lu Li] [Sequence: 001 (unique)] [Realm: ordinary person] [Cultivation method: none] [Martial arts: none] [Demon Compendium: awaiting activation]
The game panel!
Lu Li's pupils contracted sharply. He immediately noticed that this panel did not seem to belong to the current era.
In Martial World, every version update added new gameplay while retaining the existing game.
In the initial version, players had only a basic panel displaying martial arts proficiency.
But the demon martial path version added the exclusive Demon Compendium!
Every player could choose a demon martial path, and every martial art they unleashed or cultivation method they practiced would carry that demon's unique traits.
Nor was the Demon Compendium limited to activating a single entry. There was a chance to activate them all.
Demon Compendium!
At Lu Li's thought, the compendium entries for the nine great demons immediately appeared before him.
[Xiangliu] [Bi Fang] [Kui] [Qiongqi] [Taowu] [Fu Zhu] [Nine-Tails] [Dark Turtle] [Bo]
Beneath the nine demon entries, an icon reading "Available activations: 1" slowly lit up.
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