Demon Aura

He stamped out the last sparks.

Xia Yi took off his tattered cloth shoes and tossed them into the coffin. After a moment's thought, he stripped off his burial clothes and threw those in as well.

His sword slashed repeatedly, each stroke whipping up a gale out of thin air. Only after roughly restoring the grave mound to its original state did he follow the path Zhou Xiaoxian had taken down the mountain.

He was barefoot, wearing an undershirt and trousers.

It was summer, so he did not look particularly conspicuous.

Just a little scruffy.

His bare soles stepped on the thorny golden pears without suffering a single scratch.

After crossing that patch of golden pears, Xia Yi paused and looked toward the foot of the mountain. His gaze deepened slightly as he murmured, "Demon Aura!"

At the foot of the mountain, a boy of seven or eight skipped over to a yellow ox as massive as a tank.

"Old Yellow! Have you had enough to eat?"

The ox snorted and swished his tail.

"If you're full, let's go home!"

The boy went to untie the ox's rope from a tree, then froze as he looked up. "Big Sister Xiao Xian? Is that the village chief on your shoulder? What happened to him?"

"Zhou Quan?" Zhou Xiaoxian looked over, slightly out of breath. Anxious as she was, she did not know how to explain. Was she supposed to say that a monster in burial clothes had appeared on the mountain and tell him to run?

On the other hand, Zhou Xiaoxian had calmed down a little by now. The more she thought about it, the more she felt that he had been a living person deliberately trying to scare her. Her teachers had never said anything about corpses coming back to life.

"Hmph, he was alive!" Zhou Xiaoxian puffed out her cheeks and looked up the mountain in annoyance, only to hear the boy suddenly cry out.

"Ow! Old Yellow, what are you doing?"

She turned back to see the boy sprawled on the ground. The ox's eyes were blood-red as he lowered his head toward him, poised to charge!

"Hey, Old Yellow, Old Yellow?!"

Thud!

Amid the sound of something heavy hitting the ground, Zhou Xiaoxian sprinted forward, covering the distance in a few strides. Her slender body shot forward like an arrow, and she leaped up, driving her foot into the ox just as he was about to ram the boy!

Boom! Her kick actually knocked the ox over, sending dust billowing into the air!

The boy was still reeling from the fright. After landing, Zhou Xiaoxian flexed her ankle, then suddenly froze. She glanced at her empty shoulder, turned around, and cried, "Dad!"

"Hiss..."

Old Zhou groaned in bewilderment and propped himself up, staring at Zhou Xiaoxian in the distance. Who am I? Where am I? What's that ox behind Xiao Xian about to do... an ox?!

"Xiao Xian!"

The rush of wind behind her made Zhou Xiaoxian's pretty face tighten slightly. She stamped down hard and lunged toward the boy, dodging the ox's charge. But the ox did not stop. He charged straight at Old Zhou!

Having just fallen to the ground, Zhou Xiaoxian had no time to check on the boy. She hastily sprang up and chased after the ox, only to see him suddenly stop dead, as though he had struck an invisible wall!

He went from charging to a complete stop in an instant, utterly defying inertia!

At some point, a white-haired figure of no great height had appeared in the ox's path. He simply extended his right hand and pressed it against the ox's head, instantly stopping the charge of an animal far larger than others of his kind and weighing nearly a ton!

Not only that, the collision of forces made the ox's neck disappear entirely. He stiffened for two seconds, then all four legs buckled, and he died on the spot!

Xia Yi dusted off his hands and turned to Old Zhou. "Your village's..."

Old Zhou looked terrified. Even without the burial clothes and shoes, I still recognize you!

"Gah-"

"..."

"Dad!" Zhou Xiaoxian cried out, taking a wide detour around Xia Yi to help Old Zhou, who had passed out once again.

Meanwhile, the tearful boy finally burst into loud sobs and limped over to throw himself onto the dead ox. "Old Yellow!"

Watching the boy, Xia Yi knitted his white brows and said unhappily, "Girl, who is the cultivator stationed in your village? Have him come see me!"

Seeing that her father was not seriously hurt, Zhou Xiaoxian gave Xia Yi a strange look, as though she were looking at someone not quite right in the head. But recalling the strength he had just displayed, she hesitated a moment before speaking.

"Senior, where are you from? Why did you pretend to be a dead man to frighten my father and me?"

"Never mind that for now. Let me meet your village's resident cultivator first. He actually allowed ordinary people to raise a yellow ox with Ox Demon blood! Does he not know that any Great Demon could awaken it and turn an ox like this into a Demon Soldier? Utterly negligent!"

"...Resident cultivator? Great Demon?"

As Zhou Xiaoxian murmured those words, the annoyance vanished from her eyes, replaced by a further trace of puzzlement. "Senior, have you ever seen a greater demon?"

"Hmm?" Xia Yi paused slightly. It seems this place is deep within Human Race territory? Demon Race incursions must be rare here. In that case, it's hardly surprising that the resident cultivator has let his guard down a little.

But it was still a dereliction of duty.

"Never having seen one doesn't mean you needn't take precautions. Without me, this ox would have fully transformed into a one-star Demon Soldier in another few minutes. With only one star condensed yourself, you might not have been able to keep your father and this child safe," Xia Yi said.

"Demonization?" Zhou Xiaoxian's lips parted slightly. She hesitated, then finally said slowly, "Senior, although I don't know why Zhou Quan's ox suddenly went mad, I don't think it had anything to do with the demonization of legend."

"I couldn't mistake the scent of Demon Aura." Xia Yi shook his head. "It seems you've never seen demonization, girl. Even if this place is far from the Demon Domain, the teacher who taught you to cultivate never found an opportunity to take you out to kill demons for experience? Equally negligent."

"Senior," Zhou Xiaoxian finally could not help saying, "the Demon Race died out four hundred years ago. Where would Great Demons come from? How could there still be demonization?"

Uh, what did she say?

The Demon Race died out?

Xia Yi froze.

The Demon Race had already died out four hundred years ago?!

No, impossible. I only slept for eight hundred years, not eight thousand! Before I fell asleep, demons occupied nine-tenths of the Saint Soul Continent. The twelve demon emperors were unmatched, like twelve dark clouds that could never be dispersed. The Human Race was barely clinging to life. How could it have wiped out the Demon Race in a mere four hundred years?

It's one thing that my worst prediction, waking to find the Human Race fallen, didn't come true. But the reverse couldn't have happened either. Most kings lived for three or four hundred years. Four hundred years was only a single generation. Could eight or ten rulers capable of restoring the Human Race really have appeared in the same generation?

But this girl has no motive to lie to me. Could this be a hidden realm like some secluded utopia? That's more likely than the Demon Race being wiped out. In other words, this girl is already in her teens and has never seen the real world? How could a descendant of my Xia Family be so pitiful?

All sorts of thoughts were running through Zhou Xiaoxian's mind as well.

This senior started saying things I couldn't understand the moment he appeared, and he wore burial clothes and pretended to be dead to scare Dad and me. Is he actually not right in the head?

Great Demons and demonization are all stories in books, far removed from us today.

Is he so confused that he's taking things from books for reality? His clothes are filthy, too. He looks homeless. How pitiful.

One felt tender concern, the other pity. They looked at each other at the same time, and both froze.

Boom! Just then, a tremendous crash suddenly rang out in the distance, making Xia Yi and Zhou Xiaoxian turn to look at the same time.

"More Demon Aura!" Xia Yi murmured. "Girl, are there any other oxen with demon blood in your village, like this one?"

"Zhou Quan's second uncle, at Zhou Yi's House, has one that was bought together with this one..." As Zhou Xiaoxian spoke, she saw Xia Yi lower the bamboo hat that belonged to her father and stride off with her sword in hand.

His pace was extremely swift.

She paused, then looked again toward the place where the crash had just come from. Her expression changed!

Could the senior's mad ramblings be true? Had another ox gone mad too... no, undergone demonization?

"Xiao Xian, what happened to me?" Old Zhou's weak, hoarse voice rang out.

"Dad, you're awake?! Lie down and rest for a while!" Zhou Xiaoxian looked down in delighted surprise, laid Old Zhou on the ground, and dashed off.

"Senior! Wait for me!"

"Huh? Xiao Xian?"

With his head resting on a stone, Old Zhou listened to Zhou Quan's sobbing and gazed up at the sky in slight bewilderment.