In a private room upstairs, three men chew on their pipes as they sit in silence. The smoke slithers around the room, stifling the atmosphere, allowing no one to intrude.
Ren Jiang looks at the other seated man in front of him with a strange expectation in his eyes, the other spectator standing well beneath the shadows.
"Hao Enlai" Ren Jiang cautiously leans forward.
Hao Enlai himself felt edgy. His phoenix eyes lined with dark circles showed that he had lost sleep over this. But he tries not to show that or else this prince in front of him will fall apart with him.
To Ren Jiang, Hao Enlai looks excited. As if the thing he had been waiting for has come to fruit. It wasn't his delusion as Hao Enlai's broad shoulders strain as if waiting to jump in a fight. His eyes wide in deep thought and his lips slightly upturned.
This was the armour that he had perfected over the years under the scrutiny of all ministers.
"Your highness, we cannot let this stand."
Hao Enlai spits the pipe out and catches the prince's eyes "The past centuries would be meaningless once the lord awakens."
"I am aware!"
Ren Jiang's fist slams the mahogany table, sending the ashtray clattering. Sweat dripped onto the lacquered red surface as his breath came in ragged bursts.
Hao Enlai steadily pours him a glass of water, placing it between his quivering fingers. "We have been preparing for this day. Why do you falter now?"
Ren Jiang raises his gaze towards him. His voice drops to a whisper "The Blue Lotus is the key to giving your father- "
Hao Enlai chooses his next few words extremely wisely "eternal rest"
Ren Jiang's breathing steadies. The plan was still intact.
Hope it is not too late…
"What about that Zhang? Did you take care of him?" Hao Enlai's knuckles whiten around his pipe.
The prince's waxen complexion answered for him.
"His strength...is absurd. But more than that,"
Ren Jiang grits his teeth "He reminds me of my father"
Hao Enlai's breath falters. "Nonsense," he laughs sharply. "Your mind plays tricks—"
Ren Jiang moves his gaze at the third figure in the room as he slowly emerges out from the viridescent shadows.
The man's face uncovers, revealing bone deep claw marks covering his face. As if mauled by a large tiger.
Hao Enlai's face turns paper white at this gruesome sight, moving his eyes back at the prince. "Your best warrior. Vyagramukhi. She- "
"Not just her." Ren Jiang's voice hollowed. "Every exile we banished to the Pit obeys him now. Just how they did Father."
"No!" Hao Enlai vaults across the table, seizing the prince's collar. His eyes burning with manic conviction.
"They do not obey him. Your highness! He is not your father! He is just some human gutter rat."
"Hell obeys the Blue Lotus. Not Zhang Xiyu." Hao Enlai spits at his name.
Hao Enlai's words still hung like poison in the air when the knock came - three sharp raps.
"Enter." Prince Ren Jiang's voice is deceptively calm as he reclines on his tatami seat. The dwarf demon who shuffles in keeps a careful three paces from the table, its beady eyes darting between the conspirators.
"Your Highness," it rasps, "Zhang Xiyu and his aide approach the celebration as we speak."
A beat of silence. Then a dismissive wave. As the door slides shut, Hao Enlai's lips curl into something between a smile and a snarl.
The scarred warrior's ruined face twitches. "What now?" The question came out half-growl, half-plea.
Hao Enlai examines his pipe with a sudden fascination. "We've tried blades, spells, entire legions..." He blew a smoke ring that coiled like a noose in the air. "Perhaps it's time to use weapons that can't be blocked."
The prince's eyes gleamed with understanding. "A wound from within," he murmured.
"Precisely." Hao Enlai taps his temple. "Let's see how the mighty Zhang Xiyu fares when his own pet turns against him."
A hush fell over the crowd as the doors swung open.
"Is that—?"
"Zhang Xiyu." Ren Jiang calmly confirms.
His wife Aika materializes at his side like a siren. "Why show his face here?" Her fingers trace idle patterns on Ren Jiang's arm. "After what our men did to him, you'd think he'd learn some fear."
Ren Jiang does not reply. His face turning sour with every passing second.
Ren Jiang's nails bit into his palms. He could still see the aftermath—bodies strewn like broken dolls, his top warriors, all dead.
"Funny thing," Aika purrs, "I don't see a single scratch on him." When Ren Jiang's face darkens, she presses on: "Hasn't he grown more striking since returning from the Pit? Makes me regret going easy when I had him right between my arms—"
Thud. Shatter.
A servant collapsed amidst shattered porcelain. The drunk demons nearby scramble back like startled roaches.
Aika: ". . . "
Ren Jiang's fury evaporates as a familiar silhouette slips through the hall doors. Without a word, he follows the tall figure onto the balcony. The moonlight tinges the white marble red. The night air slapped the heat from his cheeks as he faced—
"Long time, no?"
Yutao turns, surprise flickering across his features. "...First Prince?"
Ren Jiang's smile was as if carved from ice.
Yutao mirrors it instinctively—a reflex that turns his lips stiff. Only when the silence stretches unbearably does the prince speak again:
"How have you been? Since your triumphant return, you've been... remarkably absent from my halls."
"Why is that so?" Zhang Xiyu, who was currently being cornered in a similar fashion by his former sponsor Liu Xue, was the recipient of this blunt question.
"I have nothing to say to you." Zhang Xiyu drawled out.
Liu Xue stands tall, crystal wineglass catching torchlight as he twirls it absently with his pale hand. Liu Xue's smile never wavers, though his knuckles whiten around the stem.
"I told you to not show me your face unless you have the thing with you. So, it wouldn't be wrong to assume that you, have it?"
Zhang Xiyu's gaze flickers meaningfully across the gawking crowd. Demons leaned in from nearby tables; even the musicians had slowed their playing. "This your idea of discretion, Third Prince?"
That's when Liu Xue notices, they weren't as low profile as they should be. In fact, they were the prime nucleus of entertainment, eyes were on them from everywhere.
Liu Xue's jaw clenches. The realization burned—this meeting happened on Zhang Xiyu's terms, not his own. Decades of waiting, and the bastard chose a spectacle. Blood welled where his nails pierced his palm.
One chance. If he doesn't seize it tonight, the Lotus might vanish forever from his grasp.
To catch this old ghost, he cannot afford to wait for another chance encounter. Liu Xue's fingers brushed a stone concealed in his sleeve—smooth as river pebble, heavy with purpose. His gaze flickers to Hao Enlai, lurking among the revellers.
On cue, the advisor surges forward, chalice raised. "A toast!" His voice carries over the din, honeyed and sharp. "To our king's imminent return!"
"CHEERS!" "CHEERS!" "CHEERS!"
Zhang Xiyu finds a bottle pressed into his hand. The crowd's expectant gaze left no room for refusal—not without breaking the fragile masquerade. He drank deeply, the liquor burning like swallowed sunlight.
Amusement curls in him, warm as the alcohol in his veins. How quaint. Did they think him some unruly spirit to be trapped by ceremony and wine?
He let the empty bottle dangle carelessly from two fingers, watching with hooded eyes as the crowd's cheers faded into murmurs, waiting for the real performance.
"What?" Yutao shot to his feet, his chair screeching against marble.
Ren Jiang's chuckle was infuriatingly light. "I know. Historic, isn't it? first time a ghost gets appointed in the royal court. Especially one who survived the Kaigan Pit. You guys shocked us all."
Yutao is speechless. He wants to crack Ren Jiang's brain open and take a good look inside. This entire conversation is so wrong. Where does he even start to dissect the abnormality of this proposition?
As if saved by the bell, Zhang Xiyu's voice resounds in his mind
'Playing a game with Liu Xue. Might get late so you may return.'
"Mr. Ren Jiang, please excuse me. But we will have to cut our conversation short." Yutao speaks with a paper-thin smile.
Ren Jiang rises, dusting non-existent lint from his robes. "My palace. This weekend." His parting pat on Yutao's back lingering a beat too long. "We'll... finalize things."
The moment the prince turns, Yutao was already moving—plunging toward sprints towards the centre of the broiling chaos.
"This old friend of mine is a strange addition to our world" Liu Xue spoke to the crowd.
"If any of you weren't aware, Zhang Xiyu here was my representative in the final Kaigan Pit." he smiles lightly.
"Everyone knows that. We all saw it on the broadcast."
"My nephew who was born yesterday knows that."
Zhang Xiyu fought the urge to groan while Liu Xue ignores the whispers. "He wasn't one of us. Born a human and entered hell as a mere ghost. But after centuries of living in this realm…."
"One can't say whether he belongs to us or them." Liu Xue turns to Zhang Xiyu.
"This prince suggests a proper initiation of our friend to Hell! Are you ready to test your true nature Zhang Xiyu?"
"Human or Demon?"
The inebriated demons yell with excitement. "Let's do it! Show this earthling bastard just what us hell folks are about!" "Yeah bitch!"
Zhang Xiyu was used to facing the immense gravitational pressure in the pit, and the spiritual pressure of countless monsters. This was the first time he was facing the onslaught of the infamous peer pressure.
Liu Xue couldn't understand what was so amusing about Zhang Xiyu's situation that the man in question was chuckling about.
The crowd suddenly rippled, parting away for someone. A tall man dressed in emerald green lazily walks up to them.
"Allow me to be the Pallbearer of this round Xiao-Xue." Ren Jiang enthusiastically smiled.
Across the hall, Yutao aborted his charge mid-stride, pivoting to flatten himself against a pillar.
Why does it feel like I am avoiding an ardent suitor?
He sceptically looks at the princes who were cooking up a very shit plan. Of course, I will protect Zhang Xiyu if the time calls for it.
Ceaseless chatter of the mob divided him from the trio's conversation.
At any rate I am here to support him. Right behind this pillar which I think is close enough...
Zhang Xiyu, meanwhile, found his carefully balanced confrontation upended. His mental note to Yutao had been... perhaps premature.
"Hey! What are we playing?!"
"Rhythm of Screams? Warmth from your cold heart? Skull Ball?"
"Yo man! Skull Ball's a classic!"
Liu Xue coughed over the incessant speculation which in turn went silent. The curious gazes now piled on to the trio.
"We will be playing….."
"Summoner's Death." The two Princes of hell cracked a smile.
The hall turned suffocatingly silent. The once curious and excited gazes suddenly turned very fearful.
"This…. this…. does he want to ruin our entire decade?!"
"That's it! Another ten year long curfew! Like father, like son!"
"Aw man, Skull Ball's way cooler, you bastards."
"If I may…." Ren Jiang's voice projected throughout the long hall; the voice filled with vibrato shut their mouths up while their ears rang.
Ren Jiang patted Liu Xue's shoulder. "Leave them to me."
Liu Xue nodded and obediently stepped back. Only Yutao noticed him discreetly brushing off his shoulder. After a few moments of Ren Jiang enraging the crowd against Heaven with points such as 'The Heaven looks down on us' and 'They shut down our mega hit tournament – Kaigan Pit', the fickle crowd lost their bubbling fear and jumped on the bandwagon of 'Summoner's Death'.
Ren Jiang looked pleased with himself until he turned to Zhang Xiyu who appeared to be drowsy. The First Prince's next words came sharp as ice: "Summoner's Death demands three virtues: concentration to weave through dimensions, speed to outpace Heaven's watchdogs, and agility to dance between worlds."
"From time to time there are our devotees on Earth who long for us to step into their world. They are so considerate that they even set up a tear in time-space fabric on their end, big enough for us to enter."
"But Heaven's surveillance has made our valuable tours impossible. No one prestigious from Hell has set foot in the mortal world since...? Five millennia?"
"But mortals think that the lowly creatures that pass through those tears are one of us."
"Even now, if we were to manifest our entire energy in the mortal world, we would get caught immediately. They have this alarm system up there. They sent a video, a long time ago." Liu Xue chimed.
Zhang Xiyu nodded, indicating that he had seen it.
"The game, then," Ren Jiang continues. "Thread your consciousness through a seance. Evade celestial detection. Kill the lead summoner. Retrieve their soul as trophy." His smile turned feral.
"Question."
"Yes, Mr. Zhang?"
"How are we determining the winner?"
Ren Jiang's eyes twinkled "By who completes the task successfully. But in the favourable case of a draw, the one who expelled the highest mana in the mortal world without getting detected, would be the winner."
"And I take it that the winner gets a prize?"
Ren Jiang looked even more amused. "Why would a simple party game have a prize? It's just for fun. Let's keep it light Mr. Zhang."
Light? Yes, I'll light this fucker on fire when I am done with this.
Zhang Xiyu who regularly sent his envoy Yutao to the mortal world, knew exactly how hard it is to hide his cultivation in a place devoid of it. It's like hiding a rack of cash in an empty white room. If it weren't for the Lotus sisters' kindness and extremely mysterious powers, right now Yutao would be under the famous Ice Flame torture bed of Heaven. A device containing pure white destruction. It's said that the Ice Flame torture bed can even burn out the sins of Satan and turn him into an honest young man. Satan from the West hell is yet to make any comments on this claim.
Zhang Xiyu had no plans of reaching Heaven. Luckily, Yutao had recently made a trip there so he still had the month-long stealth rune. Later he will go back to those old hags and force them to stop being so cheap about these abilities.
Regardless of his situation, Liu Xue and Ren Jiang should not be aware of it. In fact, they expect him to fail gloriously. Except for the royal family, no other person would have the skill to pull this.
They were essentially sending him to his death.
"I will demonstrate first." Liu Xue rolled his neck with a series of audible cracks. The crowd instinctively retreated, forming a wide circle around the impromptu arena.
Ren Jiang raises his hand, fingers slicing downward through the air. A shimmering fissure split open vertically—a jagged, pulsing wound in reality itself. "This size should avoid detection," he murmurs, though his knuckles whiten from maintaining the unstable gateway.
Liu Xue produces the smooth stone from his sleeve, its surface gleaming under the hellfire lights. "Channel your qi through this first," he instructed, though his words were clearly for Zhang Xiyu's benefit. A silver thread of consciousness shot from his fingertip, piercing the stone's centre before vanishing into the dimensional tear.
At this point Liu Xue was no longer conscious of his surroundings. His entire concentration was wrapped around that delicate thread which was weaving through the fabric of time. One little distraction and he would face a serious backlash, shredding his dantian.
The stone's surface shimmered, expanding into a floating screen that pulsed with hellish light. It followed Liu Xue on Earth and displayed the game for everyone to see.
The blurry image came to life. A cavern stretched deep beneath the earth; its walls slick with condensation that reflected the erratic dance of torch flames. The air vibrated with guttural chanting—words too ancient for mortal tongues. At the chamber's heart, a massive pentagram had been carved into the stone floor with ritual precision, its geometric lines intersecting at unnatural angles. Kneeling cultists ringed the symbol, their foreheads pressed to cold stone. Their unified chant hitched as the high priest emerged from the shadows, dragging a limp girl by her hair. Her bare feet left smeared trails on the dusty floor. The red flames mounted on the wall reflected her tear-stained face and the black ink that circled around her throat.
The cult made this sacrifice to entice their 'gods'. Unbeknownst to them, that the demons were drooling over each and every one of them.
"They look even more delicious in their original form." A few demons slurped.
"In this form…. unlike the flimsy ghosts...we can fuck and eat them"
The demons snicker with delight but mindfully restrain their excitement. No one wanted to bear the blame in case Liu Xue fails the task.
The silver thread emerged from the cavern floor like a spectral serpent, coiling upwards until it brushed the ceiling. Liu Xue's closed eyes crinkle at the edges, his lips twisting into a wicked smirk.
As the chanting reaches a fever pitch, the thread flushes crimson. The high priest shoves the girl forward with a cackle, her knees hitting stone as she stared dumbly at the pulsating red line.
"Tasa Mammon on ca lirach!" The chants grew louder as the long thread approached her. Time fractured around the girl - simultaneously crawling and racing. No one notices the thread slither behind her until—
—a wet explosion of crimson mist.
Her perspective breaks in half, sliding down to the ground. Everyone stared in awe at the girl whose body was cut vertically into two clear halves.
"Lord Mammon" they cry out as they kowtow roughly over the floor.
But 'Lord Mammon' was in quite a hurry. The mist condensed into an arrow and rushes straight at the chief summoner.
"My Lord- kgh" , the chief summoner's eyeballs pop out of his skull, rolling onto the ground, meeting with the girl's single one.
At this point, the rest of the cult stood blankly in their places, not even having the time to register the events that just occurred. Didn't the chief summoner say that Mammon would be here to grant them happiness beyond any human can imagine? Why is that person's corpse now lying cold, drenched in their own blood?
The red mist dissipates with the same speed as it had entered. Liu Xue then promptly returns without even sparing a glance at their trembling jaws or their wet pants.
Back in Hell, Liu Xue's eyelids fluttered open. A clear voice announces, "Success! Record twenty-seven minutes!"
The thread gradually rescinded but it had something attached at the end. Among the ruckus caused by the drunk demons, a lost ghost quivered.
The chief summoner's face, which was accustomed to staying under a large black cloak, was now exposed to the viewers. Yutao frowned at the desperate middle-aged man, it reminded him of that psychopath he just killed. The fact that this trash brutally ended a young promising life just for a phony ritual made him feel a little hollow.
The summoner looks around at the boisterous atmosphere with caution. "Where am-"
No one gave a shit about what he had to say. In the blink of an eye, a demon who felt peckish chomps down on the fresh soul.
Liu Xue averted his eyes to look at Zhang Xiyu. The smug satisfaction which was difficult to hide quickly dwindled into exasperation. Zhang Xiyu, who was supposed to look restless, looked like he could not wait to go to bed tonight.
Unable to hide his rising annoyance Liu Xue bit out "Your turn"