Volume One: The Nature of the Devil Does Not Change, and the Dead Devil's Heart Regrets Nothing
"In the vast expanse of boundless existence… within the supreme void—
stood the Devil of Rebirth."
The void trembled.
A bald man with a muscular body stepped forward, a Buddhist mark glowing on his forehead.
His voice exploded with fury:
"You accursed devil! Your fate is death—and the punishment of the heavens!!"
Space behind him shuddered…
And slowly, a colossal golden shadow began to take shape.
The Palm of Buddha.
The palm descended from the sky, pressing everything downward.
But the devil… did not move.
He raised his hand calmly and said:
"The Soaring Demonic Palm."
A black palm formed before him—
smaller… but heavier.
The two palms collided.
A moment of silence.
Then… something was born between them.
A black hole.
It was not large…
but its mere existence was enough to swallow light itself.
Everything began to be dragged toward it—
air, dust… even the necklace hanging from the monk's neck.
The Buddhist man's eyes widened.
"Impossible…"
At that instant—
A white-haired woman vanished.
She appeared directly in front of the devil.
Her blade pierced his abdomen.
Time stopped for the briefest fragment of a moment. Then she laughed and said:
"I expected you to resist a little, but it turns out you're weak…"
Then the devil moved.
One punch.
It sent her flying toward the black hole.
He pulled the blade from his body and spat blood…
but his expression did not change.
Boring.
Always… boring.
He raised his gaze—
And saw the black hole swallowing both of them.
But before everything could end—
Space shook.
"Blade… Sky Severance!!"
The black hole split in two.
It did not explode.
It did not vanish.
Instead… it was divided.
And behind it—
A black rift appeared.
Not emptiness…
But something watching.
Eyes.
Many of them.
And octopus-like limbs moving slowly inside the darkness.
For the first time, the devil clenched his teeth.
"…Cthulhu."
The entity emerged from the rift.
A massive body…
a grotesque face with twisted fleshy appendages.
And in that same instant—
The sky tore apart.
One…
two…
dozens…
No—
Thousands of gates opened.
And from them came his pursuers.
"Today we will carry out the Demon Extermination Decree on you, you wretch!!"
The devil laughed.
Quietly.
He opened his hand—
Another black hole appeared behind Cthulhu.
But this time…
It did not pull inward.
It spat something out.
Black limbs.
They seized the creature…
and dragged it violently inside.
It vanished.
As if it had never existed at all.
"It has been banished to hell."
Then—
With a single strike—
Existence shattered…
and nonexistence with it.
He opened a gate.
And vanished….
…Those were merely memories from a few days ago.
"My devilish nature never changed, even after dying millions of times—and still, my heart carries eternal perseverance."
A man stood in a field where stalks of wheat swayed like waves. The wind whispered through the crops and tugged at his loose black robe. A green bamboo mask covered his face, while a strip of cloth hid the rest of his features, leaving only a faint pale complexion visible—like the skin of a young man long extinguished. He lifted his gaze to the sky, a faint smile on his lips.
Before him stood a scarecrow made to frighten away crows. Above him hung enormous clouds, low and heavy. The ground itself—still and cold after a catastrophic explosion—carried a chill that seeped into the bones, along with an unsettling silence that felt too distinct to be natural.
Behind the man, a tear in spacetime split open like a blue gate with no end.
Someone stepped out of it.
He had long gray hair, a light beard, and eyes overflowing with tears, rage, and hatred. His clothes were drenched in blood. His voice burst out, powerful and filled with resentment and loathing:
"Damn you, you devil!! You won't escape today! Stop running like a rat, you [information deleted]! You will die for your sins—sins the heavens will never forgive for all eternity! We will avenge my wife and my clan!!!"
The man in the wheat field did not move an inch. The faint smile disappeared. He exhaled once, then turned to face the newcomer with suffocating steadiness.
The second man drew a sword from the sheath strapped to his back. The blade bore the golden insignia of the Yang Clan, but it was eaten away by rust—nearly broken, corroded to the edge of collapse. The second man's hand trembled, and fear slipped into his grip.
He lunged, driving the sword straight toward the first man.
The pale devil's expression did not change. The faint smile returned, and he spoke with deep boredom, his eyes fixed on the weapon:
"Hm… that sword? The same sword I used to stab your wife until she was torn into pieces… without ever stopping. Her painful death… was unbearably boring. Repetitive."
He raised his hand. A crow feather appeared in his palm, then crumbled into black ash and scattered into the air.
"I have seen endings like this before. Every life is the same—boring. I lived lives without number, lives that could never be counted or measured… and in the end, they all became identical."
He stepped forward, closing the distance until he was staring directly into the second man's eyes.
When Yi Shang saw the devil's eyes—one pure radiant white, the other a pitch-black abyss—his stomach turned. He nearly vomited from the demonic aura dwelling inside this person… or rather, this devil. In that moment, he understood: the devil's nature had never changed, and his heart would never regret what he had done—ever.
The devil spoke again, louder now:
"Hah… Yi Shang. You are the most foolish and irritating demon hunter among them all. You are moved by emotion, not reason. It is difficult to do anything with someone like you. You act like a puppet, repeating words such as 'clan,' 'family,' and 'loyalty' without a shred of independent thought. Tell me, Yi Shang—do you truly believe your clan would save you if you were the criminal?"
Yi Shang's face twisted with confusion—then hardened again with rage:
"Of course! The clan considers every one of its people the most important! Every person in the clan is talent! Every person is a reason for its existence! And if I—and let's assume that for the sake of argument—were a merciless demonic criminal chasing selfish interests and idiotic goals like you… my clan would still always support me!"
The devil burst out laughing. His smile widened unnaturally—so wide that Yi Shang trembled. It was not a human smile.
It was the smile of a devil.
Yi Shang's fear deepened when he saw blood seeping from the devil's eye, sliding down his cheek, reaching his jaw, then dripping into the golden wheat field.
Then the devil's voice came again—cold as demonic frost:
"Is the individual the most important thing to the clan? Don't make me laugh, Yi Shang. The clan treats everyone like pawns—no, not just clans… everyone does. The strong, the rich, the talented, the intelligent, the genius—those are sacred, desired, protected. The rest are nothing. A gifted young heir is the clan's hope; the one whose talent is lower becomes the joke of the clan—or the joke of the sect.
"And in the end, the clan handed over its most gifted member, Qing Yan, to a Great Emperor to be butchered."
Yi Shang interrupted in a hoarse voice:
"But the clan did that because it feared the Emper—"
A blade of energy sliced across Yi Shang's throat and part of his hair, cutting through the space behind him as well—leaving behind a hollow region devoid of existence.
The devil's aura crashed down like a mountain, pinning Yi Shang to the ground.
"Do not interrupt me again, dog tied to a leash called loyalty."
Yi Shang burst into loud laughter as he forced himself back up, clutching his stomach in pain. His intestines had been crushed.
"Come on… kill me, devil! I won't stop chasing you! I'll become a spirit that hunts you! I'll scream at the heavens to bring me back to life just so I can take revenge on you! But the hope in my heart will never die—the hope of killing you…"
He lowered his head. The crazed laughter disappeared, replaced by despair and grief.
(Damn it… the pain is unbearable. I'll die without revenge. We should have waited for the other hunters… I was angry… reckless.)
The devil shook his head. The smile vanished. He passed by Yi Shang in a blur and replied:
"That is my last piece of advice to you in the sect, Yi Shang. And also, the reason I did not kill you is because…"
His words stopped.
Several spatial gates tore open at once, and many people surged out.
A huge, heavily muscled man with an enormous sword on his shoulder roared:
"Qing Yan, you bastard! You'll die today! May Buddha grant me the strength to kill you!"
From another side, a girl with red eyes and a face twisted by rage screamed, gripping two daggers:
"You stole my chastity, killed my children, and slaughtered my husband! I'll take revenge on you, you accursed devil—rot in hell!"
Weapons slid from their sheaths. Killing intent flooded the wheat field.
The devil returned to stand before the scarecrow. One hand folded behind his back, he spoke in a calm voice—not carrying a single trace of regret:
"Yi Shang… this is your chance to kill me. Go on. Do it."
Without warning, the Buddhist monk moved.
The wooden staff on his shoulder shot toward the devil like a beam of judgment.
The devil's expression did not change. With calm demonic indifference, he raised one hand and caught it.
Then, with a casual motion—
He sent it back.
The staff tore through the right side of the monk's body, severing his arm and ripping away a large chunk of flesh. The monk dropped to his knees in pain.
A moment later, a tiny green insect crawled out of the shattered wound.
Its color was strangely pleasant.
Its presence was not.
As soon as it appeared, the monk's severed arm and torn flesh began regenerating.
The moment the healing was complete, Yi Shang moved at once, gripping the sword of his clan and shouting:
"Die!!"
He drove the blade into the devil's soul.
The devil spat thick blood, yet still said:
"The reason I did not kill you, Yi Shang, is because this is the fifty-seventh layer of hell… where beneficial powers are forbidden. Without that restriction, you would already be dead, my foolish brother."
His body began fading like a blank white page.
Grief spread across Yi Shang's face.
And when the devil vanished completely, he left behind nothing but empty white.
One by one, the others departed. Yi Shang turned to one of the men and asked:
"Was what we did right? I feel… some regret for killing my brother in the sect."
The man opened a green gate in spacetime, then looked at him with pity:
"That devil had to die. What we did was right—he is a dark, demonic being that can never be trusted in any way. What matters is that he is gone."
Yi Shang remained alone in that place of death, swallowed by solitude as the sword slipped from his hand.
[New Rebirth Location:] [World of Bound Shadows]
The devil opened his eyes and found himself in a pitch-black place. Thousands of eyes stared at him, radiating crushing power. His body was a mass of formless black ink floating in a dark void. He smiled coldly and said:
"I have been reborn again… how troublesome. And this place… But the devil's heart does not regret its actions. If my goal demands that I become even more demonic in this life, then I will surpass the very concept of evil itself… and that will be nothing more than a swift return to my original nature."
His form changed rapidly until his body settled into completeness. He appeared as a fifteen-year-old boy, with long black-and-white hair reaching his thighs. One eye was entirely white, the other entirely black. His skin was pale, and his face resembled a corpse—clear features, a small nose, defined lips. He was naked.
He snapped his fingers, and clothes formed on his body: a distinctive jacket with a wide blue stripe down the center, a white belt around his waist, a long loose black cloak with short sleeve openings, and a full headband with black edges across his forehead. Without smiling, he said:
"Hah… I need to leave before the shadows kill me."