Du Household

Biodata

Power Progression

History

Rise and Southern Expansion

The Du Household governed Cuckoo County for hundreds of years. According to Du Yuxian, its original rise to Ninth-Grade True Spirit status came at the expense of another lineage of the same rank 56 136.

Three hundred years before Kong Wenxuan’s journey to Demon-Suppressing Pass, the household began expanding southward. It added nearly two thousand li to its original thousand-li territory and built three successive Demon-Suppressing Passes. The first two eventually became First Town and Second Town; the third remained the active frontier 12.

This expansion supported its ambition to become an Eighth-Grade True Spirit Lineage. Such a promotion required both an upgraded Cuckoo True Spirit Star and a Third-Tier Purple Mansion cultivator. Bringing its territory to a three-thousand-li span supplied the minimum territorial extent associated with an eighth-grade lineage 12.

The household also accepted wandering bloodline families into its service. The displaced Kong Household settled under its protection, earning Peacock Ridge through participation in the expansion war 2 12.

Preparations for Promotion

As the promotion attempt approached, the Du Household recalled the expansion-minded Du Ziting from Demon-Suppressing Pass and replaced him with Du Zhimin. The frontier shifted from offensive operations to defense, which Kong Changgeng interpreted as preparation for an imminent breakthrough attempt 13 64.

The household continued gathering resources. At Wolf Fang Mountain, the Shrike Lao Household offered it a damaged Dark Iron vein despite objections from its former allies. Du Zhimin suppressed the protesters with Spiritual Consciousness and threatened to raze their lineages if they resisted 38.

Rumors then exposed the household’s alleged dependence on stealing its servants’ bloodlines. Servant lineages resisted conscription and demanded the removal of the Cuckoo True Spirit Star projections implanted in their cultivators. Meanwhile, the Kong Household secretly restored its own True Spirit Star and neutralized those projections 45 53.

The Cuckoo Secret Realm Calamity

Representatives of forty-three servant lineages, numbering more than five hundred cultivators, assembled to pressure the Du Household. The Shrike Lao Household brought support from the eighth-grade Fire Crow Ya Household, but the gathering had itself been manipulated by Du agents 55 56.

Du Yuxian used the Hummingbird Feng Household and several other loyal servant families to draw the protesters into Cuckoo County City. He revealed that the Ya Household was his true target, then activated an array that transported the gathering into the Cuckoo Secret Realm 56.

Inside, the household deployed its three legions and activated the forbidden A Hundred Birds Pay Homage to the Phoenix ritual. Du Yuxian intended to conceal the destruction of the servant lineages behind a Demon Beast attack and eliminate witnesses to the forbidden technique 57 58.

Kong Wenxuan and Kong Changgeng broke through much of the Dao Soldier and Beast-Taming forces. Together, they killed Du Zikai, Du Ziting, and Du Zhimin. Ya Zhaoying defeated Du Yuxian and the False Phoenix, while the destruction of the Cuckoo True Spirit caused its star to fall and its secret realm to collapse 61 67 83.

The collapse also covered the survivors’ escape. Du cultivators sacrificed their tamed flying beasts to obstruct pursuit, allowing members of the household to flee 67.

Fugitives and Demon Race Alliance

The household had prepared for failure: its Foundation Establishment cultivators carried supplies sufficient to preserve the lineage’s inheritance and support rebuilding. Kong Wenxuan and Kong Changgeng inferred that other members might already have been sent into hiding 83.

Following its use of the forbidden technique, the household became wanted by the imperial dynasty and joined the Demon Race. The Ya Household took over Cuckoo County City and renamed it Cuckoo Town; the Bi Household confiscated the Du estate in Bifang Commandery City 81 137 227.

The surviving Du forces used their knowledge of the former county and its hidden arrangements to pursue revenge. At the Five Peaks, a Third-Tier Cuckoo Demon identified the destruction of Demon-Suppressing Pass, Cuckoo County, and the former servant lineages—especially the Kong Household—as their objective 136 137.

The Five Elements Demon Array concealed Du cultivators while they looted a Fifth-Tier Demon’s Spirit Medicine Garden. When the array broke, they escaped south in Cuckoo Feather Boats. A Third-Tier Flame Sparrow protected a damaged boat from pursuing bloodline cultivators 152 153.

These operations inflicted further losses on the Du Household but also damaged Ya prestige and devastated weaker lineages caught between them. Despite losing its official rank, the household’s Third-Tier demon forces made it a greater immediate threat than before 159.

The Kong Household later suspected Du involvement in the Flame Sparrow attack that destroyed more than half of the developing Peacock County Seat. This responsibility was presented as a suspicion rather than an established fact 186.

Final Ritual and Destruction

The survivors eventually sheltered in a Demon Race stronghold in the South Lake Mountains. Kong Wenxuan spent more than six months searching South Lake without locating them, then used a Cuckoo Feather Boat to provoke a response 233 243.

During the later confrontation in the Demon Race Secret Realm, the Du Household performed A Hundred Birds Pay Homage to the Phoenix again. The Bi Household forces prevented interference while the ritual drained avian demons, demon-blood cultivators, and demon gods to revive the Cuckoo False Phoenix 254.

A Du cultivator openly accused the Bi Household of seeking the False Phoenix Essence Blood, as the Ya Household had before, and declared that the surrounding forces would instead nourish the revived creature. The household nevertheless destroyed itself through the forbidden technique 255 256.

Governance and Resources

Abilities & Skills

The Cuckoo Occupies the Magpie’s Nest

The household’s true Bloodline Divine Ability stole bloodline power and controlled hosts; its outward reputation emphasized beast taming 7 45 94.

• Extracted servant cultivators’ bloodline power to nourish the Cuckoo bloodline 45 94.
• Used Starlight Cuckoos to seize and control flying beasts in combat 62.
• Worked alongside implanted Cuckoo True Spirit Star projections to extract bloodlines and Law Power 423.
• Could be resisted by another True Spirit Star’s projection, as demonstrated by the restored Peacock True Spirit Star 53 423.

Cuckoo True Spirit Star

The household’s star supported both its legitimate authority and its control over subordinate cultivators 6 39 423.

• Suppressed demonic bloodline tendencies at a dedicated county-city breakthrough site. Both the Kong and Yan patriarchs successfully reached Foundation Establishment there 6.
• Supplied the power needed to suppress, bind, and relocate mineral veins and Spirit Veins 39.
• Sustained the Cuckoo Secret Realm; its fall triggered the realm’s collapse 57 67.
• Left behind a Star Stone later consumed by the revived False Phoenix 254.

A Hundred Birds Pay Homage to the Phoenix

A bloodline-strengthening secret technique expressly forbidden by the Golden Crow Imperial Dynasty 58 94.

• Combined with the household’s bloodline-stealing ability to feed extracted power into its advancement ritual 94.
• Raised Du Yuxian to Purple Mansion and advanced the Cuckoo True Spirit, though the lineage’s eighth-grade promotion remained incomplete 94.
• Later compelled avian beings to bow toward the Phoenix Terrace before harvesting their blood and essence 254.
• Ultimately caused the household’s destruction when used again in the Demon Race Secret Realm 256.

Resource Relocation

The Du Household possessed specialists capable of moving valuable resource veins 39.

• Combined array work, restrictions, geomancy, and True Spirit Star power 39.
• Prepared the damaged Wolf Fang Mountain Dark Iron vein for relocation into its secret realm 38 39.

Military Forces

• The county-city confrontation featured more than a dozen Second-Tier Feather Boats and five or six hundred tamed birds 56.
• Five Foundation Establishment Du cultivators each commanded three or four Second-Tier flying beasts against Kong Wenxuan and Kong Changgeng 62.
• After joining the Demon Race, the household acquired demonic inheritances and fielded Third-Tier Cuckoo Demons 137 152 154.

Notable Members

Equipment and Holdings

• Cuckoo Feather Boats — Cuckoo-shaped vessels fashioned from spirit-beast bones and feathers; a Second-Tier example was gray and white and veiled in starlight 38.
• Cuckoo Secret Realm — An inferior secret realm beneath Cuckoo County City, spanning more than 150 li and containing fields, plants, mines, and other resource sites 57 67.
• Phoenix Terrace — Ritual platform used for A Hundred Birds Pay Homage to the Phoenix 58 254.
• Du Household Manor — Commandery-city estate confiscated by the Bi Household and later purchased and renovated by the Kong Household 227.
• Five Elements Demon Array — Third-Tier formation supported by five Third-Tier Demon Beasts, used to obstruct Ya Zhaoying and cover resource extraction 152 154.
• Emergency inheritance supplies — Storage bags containing materials, Spirit Stones, artifacts, talismans, pills, and inheritance Jade Slips, distributed to Foundation Establishment cultivators before the first ritual 83.

Relationships

• Kong Household — Former servant lineage and later enemy. Its restored True Spirit Star freed it from Du control; Kong Wenxuan and Kong Changgeng helped defeat the household’s first ritual 2 53 83.
• Fire Crow Ya Household — Rival targeted as the means to eighth-grade advancement. Ya Zhaoying defeated Du Yuxian, while surviving Du forces later attacked Ya territory and dependents 56 67 137 159.
• Hummingbird Feng Household — Loyal servant family that helped lure the protesting lineages into the Du trap 56.
• Shrike Lao Household — Offered the Dark Iron vein to the Du Household, then organized resistance with Ya support without realizing Du agents had manipulated the gathering 38 54 56.
• Demon Race — Refuge and ally after the household became wanted. Supplied inheritances and a setting for its later operations 137 152 233.
• Bifang Bi Household — Confiscated the Du commandery estate. Later allowed the second forbidden ritual to proceed while blocking interference 227 254.

Notable Quotes

“Back then, our Du Household attained the rank of a Ninth-Grade True Spirit by stepping on the blood and bones of another Ninth-Grade True Spirit lineage.”
— Du Yuxian 56

“As long as you all die here in the Cuckoo Secret Realm, who will know that our Du Household practiced the forbidden technique A Hundred Birds Pay Homage to the Phoenix?”
— Du Yuxian 58