Zhu Yu

Biodata

Feature	Value
Name	Zhu Yu (祝虞)
Alias(es)	Demon King; Old Demon King; Big Cat Zhu; “Beloved Consort Zhu,” a teasing address used by Ning Xiang 53 80 106
Species/Race	Pure-blooded feline demon; his beast form is a tiger 148 203
Gender	Male 101
Age	More than a thousand years old 206
Affiliation	Demon Domain, particularly the Purple Tenuity Domain 53 206
Occupation/Role	Ruler of the Demon Domain; later abdicates, having designated Caiwei as his successor 224 225
Residence	Lotus Palace, Danyang City; later lives in seclusion at Nether Rain Crossing with Ning Xiang 54 225
Spouse	Ning Xiang 224
Children	Two babies born after Ning Xiang becomes pregnant in their twelfth year of marriage 225
Status	Alive; retired from rulership and a father by his final documented appearance 225

Power Progression

Stage / Realm / Level	Chapter	Notes
Low cultivation in childhood	203	His brothers throw him into the Ferocious Beast Pit after torturing him. Despite fighting desperately, he cannot overcome the beasts. No named realm is given.
Cultivation under Yinghuo	206	After rescuing him, Yinghuo teaches him to cultivate. He trains increasingly diligently and challenges her every few years, repeatedly losing.
Surpasses Yinghuo in a challenge	206	After 110 years together, he finally wins while she is distracted by serious concerns. The victory entitles him to have her become his Pallas’s-cat pet for half a month, but urgent business interrupts the wager’s fulfillment.

Background / History

Childhood and struggle for the throne

Zhu Yu’s brothers, who shared his mother, tortured him and threw him into a pit of ferocious beasts. His determination to survive kept him fighting despite his low cultivation and extensive injuries. Yinghuo rescued him when he was fourteen and close to death 203 224.

Hanying’s account places his accession to the Demon King’s throne at fourteen. His uncle Zhu Heng allied with the tribes to force his abdication and offered to spare him only if he crawled from the Lotus Palace to Danyang City’s gates. Isolated and badly outnumbered, Zhu Yu challenged him instead, ultimately driving the God-Subduing Mace through his heart. He subsequently killed three more tribal leaders, establishing his fearsome reputation 191.

Yinghuo and the long wait

Zhu Yu spent 110 years with Yinghuo, who guided his cultivation and made their challenges a recurring game. Whenever he lost, he became a small tiger for her to hold. Her promised penalty for losing was to become his Pallas’s-cat pet for half a month 206.

Before her final departure, Yinghuo gave him the Fire-Illuminating Pearl, Water-Reflecting Pearl, and self-growing soil. He waited for her at Nether Rain Crossing, unaware that her divine palace had fallen from Heaven and sunk beneath the Returning Ruins. Eventually, unrest drew him back to the Demon Domain, where he eliminated his opponents and imposed order. He remained alone for the following 876 years 206 224.

His later reflections distinguish gratitude and admiration for Yinghuo from romantic love. He also rejects the idea that Ning Xiang was merely her substitute: their resemblance and Ning Xiang’s affinity with the Fire-Illuminating Pearl gradually convinced him that the two were connected 224.

Appearance

• Human form: Exceptionally fair skin, ink-black hair, exquisite features, and elongated phoenix eyes. His physique is muscular and sharply defined 100 101.
• Clothing: Favors red; during the devastation of the Purple Tenuity Domain, Ning Xiang cannot tell whether his red clothing conceals injuries 199.
• Beast form: A large, imposing tiger with a magnificent coat and sturdy, powerful limbs 56 148.
• Impression: Under moonlight, his beauty briefly makes Ning Xiang think she is looking at a flower demon 87.

Personality

Zhu Yu is authoritarian, proud, and capable of extreme violence. His early rule was secured through lethal challenges and the elimination of hostile tribal leaders. Nevertheless, he treats the throne itself with apparent indifference when Meng Xin demands it, offering him the Demon King’s ring rather than displaying attachment to the office 191 98.

His relationship with Ning Xiang exposes a jealous and competitive streak. He resents her attention to other men, interferes with their access to her, and later competes with other fathers over having children. His indignation often rests on the expectation that she should coax or comfort him—an expectation she repeatedly fails to recognize 81 94 224 225.

Practical care accompanies his controlling behavior. He adjusts Ning Xiang’s food, provides entertainment and furnishings, equips her for dangerous travel, and shields her at great personal cost. After marriage, he patiently comforts her through pregnancy-related sickness and irritability 55 62 105 106 205 225.

His devotion does not erase his coerciveness: he uses restraints, silencing spells, and sealed spiritual power to prevent Ning Xiang from leaving or resisting him. Later revelations also show that some apparent exercises of authority were performances intended to indulge her rather than genuine magical control 101 148 171 201 224.

Abilities & Skills

Combat and spiritual power

Zhu Yu is powerful enough that few people across the Three Domains can make him draw even one of his weapons 59.

• Fights Mingyuan without either gaining a decisive advantage in their prolonged confrontations 58 63.
• Defeats Ao Yin with a single blow; Ao Yin subsequently acknowledges him as master 169.
• Uses blood-colored spiritual light from the God-Subduing Mace to destroy the avian demon beasts surrounding Ghost-Crying Island 139.
• Catches and crushes Lord Yuyi’s concentrated arrow of light before shielding Ning Xiang from further attacks 205.

Tiger transformation and periodic power loss

• Freely changes between human and tiger forms, sometimes using his enormous beast form to intimidate Ning Xiang 56 148.
• Periodically loses his power and reverts to a child. Hanying attributes the five-year cycle to wagers with the Mars Star Lord, while admitting she does not know the full details 191.
• Lord Yuyi knows when this weakness occurs and exploits it to pierce Zhu Yu’s shoulder and heart with divine chains 205.
• Hanying believes he never won his challenges, but Ning Xiang’s later vision shows his eventual victory over Yinghuo 191 206.

Mind-reading

• Can hear Ning Xiang’s thoughts, including while she is unable to speak in Pallas’s-cat form 53.
• Initially does not understand why he can hear her; later admits that the ability began with their first meeting 63 201.
• Uses her thoughts to detect evasions and respond to private insults, but her constant mental chatter also disrupts his work and sleep 55 150 200.
• His eventual admission angers Ning Xiang, who recognizes how much he has concealed from her 201.

Teleportation, barriers, and restraint

• Teleports himself and Ning Xiang directly into his Lotus Palace bedchamber 101.
• Sends her away in blood-red, firefly-like light despite being gravely wounded 206.
• Seals a bedchamber to prevent her departure and can suppress her spiritual power 101 201.
• Casts silencing spells during their disputes 148 150.
• Breaks into Ning Xiang’s room despite her protective formation 67.

Protection and restoration

• Creates a protective bracelet whose beads each contain ten years of his cultivation; it shields Ning Xiang from Meng Xin’s attack 98.
• Repairs the fractured Five-Colored Stone with a touch 106.
• Places a Tracking Curse on Ning Xiang’s necklace. It provides an approximate location across domains and a precise location within the same domain 177.

Master–servant contract revelations

• Ning Xiang initially believes Zhu Yu has bound her with a master–servant contract while she is a Pallas’s cat 53 54.
• She later places a blood-based contract on his tiger form, and he appears to obey her command to remove her restraints 148.
• He subsequently reveals that her contract does not control him; he had played along to make her happy 171.
• His retrospective account further reveals that he never actually placed the original contract on her 224.

Equipment / Weapons / Items

Personal possessions

• God-Subduing Twin Maces — His paired weapons, also described as swordbreakers. They form a yin–yang pair, with one containing the Fire-Illuminating Pearl and the other the Water-Reflecting Pearl 59 62 203.
• Fire-Illuminating Pearl and Water-Reflecting Pearl — Treasures given to him by Yinghuo before her final departure 206.
• Self-growing soil — Another parting gift from Yinghuo 206.
• Immortal-Binding Rope — Used to restrain Ning Xiang and ordered into use against Mu Jianying to prevent him from competing 95 101 148.
• Dark Yin Water-Reflecting Mirror — A treasure Hanying says should be able to awaken the unconscious Lu Qingchen 135.
• Demon King’s ring — Offered to Meng Xin during their confrontation over rulership 98.
• Nine-Headed Jiao — Draws his flying sedan to the Spirit Fighting Tournament 84.

Gifts to Ning Xiang

• Protective bracelet — Given after their moonlit kiss; later revealed to contain substantial portions of his cultivation 88 98.
• Blood-jade storage necklace — Its pendant is carved as a Pallas’s cat and holds spirit stones, magical artifacts, treasures, and medicines. He later adds the Tracking Curse 106 177.

Relationships

• Ning Xiang — Initially his captive and favored “Little Cat Zhu,” later his lover and wife. Their relationship combines devotion, jealousy, magical power struggles, and her persistent efforts to retain independence. They eventually have two children 54 102 224 225.
• Yinghuo — His rescuer and cultivation mentor. He spent 110 years with her and waited unsuccessfully for her return; his retrospective account describes admiration rather than romantic intentions 206 224.
• Mingyuan — A formidable combat rival and competitor for Ning Xiang’s affection. Their fights repeatedly pause or end because of her needs, but continue even after both become fathers 59 200 225.
• Ning Pingzhang — Ning Xiang’s protective father and Zhu Yu’s eventual father-in-law. Initially confronts him over her capture; later allows him to take her away on condition that she remain unharmed 53 177.
• Mu Fang’ai — Ning Xiang’s mother. Eventually calls Zhu Yu her son-in-law and refuses to help Ning Xiang evade him 148.
• Lu Qingchen — Ning Xiang’s master and a romantic rival. Zhu Yu blocks access to her residence, removes his Communication Talisman contact imprint, and imposes an exceptionally expensive tournament admission fee 81 89.
• Su Lang — Ning Xiang’s protective senior brother. His hostility earns him a place in Zhu Yu’s mental “grudge book,” and he later confronts Zhu Yu at swordpoint 65 67.
• Hanying — A trusted subordinate who assists with Ning Xiang’s care and later recounts Zhu Yu’s early history 54 55 191.
• Caiwei — Hanying and Song Tan’s daughter. Initially jealous of Ning Xiang, she later supports the couple; Zhu Yu eventually designates her as his successor 56 105 224.
• Miaomiao, the Nine-Tailed Celestial Fox — His pet, offered as Ning Xiang’s playmate. Its jealousy leads to punishments when attempts to frame her backfire 57 62.
• Zhu Heng — His uncle and an early challenger to his rule, killed in their life-or-death confrontation 191.
• Ao Yin — A beast that defects to Zhu Yu after being decisively beaten 169.

Story Role / Major Arcs

Soul-Calming Pearl and Ning Xiang’s captivity

An expedition travels to the Purple Tenuity Domain to find Zhu Yu. He has been posing as an unremarkable demon cultivator when Ning Xiang becomes a Pallas’s cat and falls into his custody. Her allies confront him, believing he has captured her 49 53.

Zhu Yu demands that Ning Pingzhang bring the missing Soul-Calming Pearl to Danyang City in exchange for his daughter. He explains to Hanying that the pearl may not be sufficient to restore the afflicted souls, but uses Ning Xiang as leverage to force others to search 54.

At the Lotus Palace, captivity develops into increasingly personal attachment. Zhu Yu feeds and houses her, keeps her close, and offers entertainment. After she regains human form, he continues seeking her company rather than accepting that their arrangement has ended 55 57 62 65 67.

Spirit Fighting Tournament and Meng Xin’s rebellion

Zhu Yu first forbids Ning Xiang from entering the tournament, then relents while secretly arranging favorable opponents. His interventions include intimidating contestants and ordering Mu Jianying restrained, despite publicly claiming to be impartial 80 81 91 95.

Their closeness becomes conspicuous through matching red outfits, public hand-holding, and his extravagant praise of her performance. He kisses her and gives her the bracelet that later protects her from Meng Xin 84 88 90 98.

When the cultivators are trapped, Meng Xin claims that the conspiracy operates under Zhu Yu’s orders. The accusation is challenged by Meng Xin’s subsequent open attempt to overthrow him. Ning Xiang becomes a target specifically because the bracelet exposes her importance to Zhu Yu 97 98.

Intimacy and the Eastern Sea crisis

Zhu Yu rescues Ning Xiang and Jiang Miaomiao from the Nether-Communing Beast, but is infected by its gu while trying to capture it as a gift. He initially attempts to suppress its effects and tells Ning Xiang to leave rather than make her cure him. After she agrees to help and then panics, he binds her wrists to prevent escape; they spend the night together 100 101 102.

He subsequently pursues marriage and equips Ning Xiang for the Eastern Sea expedition rather than preventing her departure. Their later disputes repeatedly involve her efforts to escape his supervision, culminating in her refusal to abandon her family and the threatened Eastern Sea 105 106 148 150 177.

Lord Yuyi and the rescue

Song Tan’s restored memories implicate the Mars Star Lord in the wider conspiracy. Zhu Yu initially doubts the accusation because he trusts the figure he knew 200.

When Lord Yuyi attacks Ning Xiang, Zhu Yu intervenes and declares that Yuyi is not the real Mars Star Lord. Yuyi exploits his period of powerlessness, gravely wounds him, and later imprisons him alongside Mingyuan. Zhu Yu nevertheless teleports Ning Xiang to safety 205 206 210.

Ning Xiang awakens to her identity as Yinghuo and defeats Yuyi, revealing the chamber containing both injured men. Qin Ge brings the group to Azure Nether Valley and treats Zhu Yu and Mingyuan with an extraordinary healing art 210 211.

Marriage, retirement, and children

After marrying Ning Xiang, Zhu Yu prepares to hand over the Demon Domain to Caiwei and travel with his wife. Their domestic life remains volatile: a jealous argument at the Water-Questioning House ends with each spouse destroying half the building 224.

They later live in seclusion at Nether Rain Crossing, where Ning Xiang builds an amusement park. In their twelfth year of marriage, she becomes pregnant. Zhu Yu patiently cares for her and, after their two babies are born, summons the ten great tribal leaders to Danyang City to display them proudly 225.

Notable Quotes

“Be good, don’t look.”
— Covering Ning Xiang’s eyes after divine chains pierce his shoulder and heart 205.

“From the first time we met. It’s the bond of fate between us.”
— Admitting when he began hearing Ning Xiang’s thoughts 201.

“I am utterly fair and impartial. I will never allow anyone to violate the rules of the Spirit Fighting Tournament.”
— Rejecting Bi Xiao’s offer to interfere, despite his own efforts to arrange Ning Xiang’s matches 91.

Trivia

• Zhu Yu dislikes burning incense; his bedchamber is described as clean and fresh-smelling 101.
• Spicy beef makes his lips swell after he ignores Ning Xiang’s warning that cats should not eat spicy food 200.
• Ning Xiang owns a recording of him dancing and uses it to provoke him 171.
• In preparation for helping his children with schoolwork, he studies modern textbooks 225.