Chapter One: The Blue-Skinned Fiend and the Earthshade System

During the Great Feng era, in Qingqian County, Peijun Prefecture, Yunzhou.

The night was dark and the wind howled across the desolate countryside, the mournful cries of eagles and hawks occasionally piercing the wailing gusts.

Near the edge of the Blackridge wildwood stood a deep, secluded mansion, covering ten acres. Black tiles topped blue-gray walls, within which more than a dozen dim lamps flickered like ghostly fire over forgotten graves.

A woman's terrified, sharp scream suddenly pierced the silence of the courtyards, echoing through the compound. Yet not a single door or window stirred—only the constant wind and the birds' cries remained, as if nothing had happened.

"Strange," muttered a young constable in plain clothes, lying flat along the sloping eave of a side wing. His breath fogged in the cold. "There are dozens of servants and maids in this Lin manor, and yet such a shrill scream brings no response. Did they all go deaf together? Truly bizarre!"

The young man’s features were rather handsome but deathly pale, his large, dark eyes wide and bloodshot. His slightly trembling, rough hands betrayed the training of a novice martial artist.

His name was Han Chong, a constable from Qingqian County. He had lain atop this rooftop for three hours, nearly frozen stiff, yet had not dared to move.

Only now, upon hearing the woman’s scream, did he grit his teeth and, moving stealthily, slid down using the bare branch of a withered willow.

One hand on his blade, the other against the wall, he crept furtively through the shadowy courtyards, searching for something of great importance.

He licked his right index finger and gently poked holes through the paper windows of each room, peering inside.

Within each chamber, he saw the sleepers buried under their blankets, cowering and shivering, their heads covered.

Word had it the master of the Lin family was a wealthy man nearing sixty, origin unknown, who had returned to settle in Qingqian County. He was flush with silver, yet shunned the city, spending a fortune to build this grand estate in the wilds, and hiring many servants and maids with generous wages.

Most astonishingly, in the span of a month, he had taken nine wives—some were virgins, some widows, and even courtesans were among them, all brought in with lavish dowries. The whole county, tens of thousands of people, marveled at the news.

More unsettling, none of these nine wives had ever left the manor since entering. Even the servants rarely went out, and when they did, they looked jumpy and furtive.

Some said the wives had found such luxury they couldn’t bear to leave. Others whispered that Master Lin was a demon in disguise who drained the very life out of his wives.

Relatives who came to visit were kept outside the gates, dismissed with silver and gold. Appeals to the county office were flatly refused.

Han Chong searched every wing, but found nothing of what he sought. Gritting his teeth, brow furrowed, he crept toward the master’s chamber. Gently, he poked a hole in the window paper and squinted through.

Inside, he saw only dim light. Upon a crimson carpet sat ten large, copper-studded chests, all flung open, stuffed to the brim with glistening silver ingots.

Han Chong’s pupils contracted and he held his breath, his gaze drifting involuntarily toward the brocade-draped bed.

“Ghost!” he gasped, his eyes bulging, mouth gaping as if stuffed with a peach, frozen in terror.

Within the room crouched a ghastly figure—its skin a deathly blue, hunched and wild-haired, fangs protruding from a snarling mouth, and blood-red, bulging eyes.

On the bed lay a woman, her body skeletal and pallid, lying stiff within the curtains. On the floor, a wrinkled human skin—the remains of the old master—was sprawled.

The blue-skinned fiend suddenly turned its gaze upon Han Chong, slobbering a greenish tongue, and with a few bounding leaps hurled itself toward the window.

The window frame splintered with a sharp crack. Han Chong, paralyzed with terror, collapsed, then rolled and scrambled desperately away, shouting for help, but the night around him was as silent as a deserted mountain valley—no one dared show themselves.

Whether by a stroke of luck or the fiend’s exhaustion, Han Chong’s mad flight brought him to the rear courtyard.

The garden here was empty, moonlight painting vague shapes of rocks and shrubs—nowhere to hide.

He had barely come to a halt when a terrible force struck him from behind, slamming him to the ground.

A searing pain stabbed through his back, horror and rage flooding his heart as all his grievances surged within. The fiend’s claws struck his head, and all went black—his consciousness faded away with bitter regret.

The ghostly creature, sensing its prey was dead, did not bother to drain his blood or marrow, as if finding a man’s blood beneath its notice. With a look of disgust, it turned and shuffled back to the bedroom.

Just then, a crack of thunder split the sky, and a faint white light descended, striking Han Chong’s corpse.

A shiver ran through his shoulders, his head moved slightly, and his hands clutched at his skull, as if struggling for clarity.

“Hiss! Why does my head hurt so much? Where am I?” he muttered.

After two breaths, the man turned over as if recovering from a grave illness, his gaze slowly taking in the garden.

This seemed to be a southern-style courtyard, yet he froze, heart pounding, for he found himself staring directly into the blood-red eyes of the fiend, less than a hundred paces away.

He gulped hard, forgetting to breathe, feeling as if his heart were gripped by a ghostly claw—or as if ten thousand wild beasts thundered through his soul.

Mind blank, body trembling, cold sweat beading on his brow, only one word echoed in his mind: escape!

The blue-skinned ghost paused, then roared in fury, eyes locked on him, and charged across the garden with bear-like force.

On instinct, Han Chong leapt up, his head darting left and right. With no cover in the open garden, there was nowhere to hide!

In that desperate moment, his eyes caught a gnarled, pitch-black old tree in the corner, its crooked trunk rising two stories high.

Scrambling and tumbling towards it, he found himself climbing with a speed he never knew he possessed, monkey-like, and soon perched atop a slender branch, swaying precariously.

Glancing down, he saw the fiend already at the base, its dark green tongue lashing out to three feet, howling as it tried to climb, the stench nearly suffocating him.

Death loomed—at any moment, he might be torn apart.

“What kind of nightmare place is this? This isn’t a film set!” Reality struck him—this wasn’t an act.

Suddenly, a torrent of memories flooded his mind, agony nearly splitting his head open.

Clutching his skull, legs locked around the branch to avoid falling, he endured the onslaught for the time it took half a stick of incense to burn, finally digesting the life of this body’s former owner.

This body’s original name was also Han Chong, adopted son of Han Deyuan, head constable of Qingqian County. Despite years of private study, he had failed every exam and could not even become a scholar.

Left with few choices, he learned some simple martial arts from his adoptive father, scraping by as a minor constable through family connections, living a carefree life.

But fate turned cruel. Two days prior, ten thousand taels of silver vanished from the county treasury. Han Deyuan was not even present but was summoned by the magistrate and, to Han Chong’s shock, framed for the theft and thrown into the death cell.

Before the family could visit, they learned Han Deyuan had supposedly hanged himself in his cell out of shame.

The blow killed Han Chong’s adoptive mother with grief.

Now Han Chong himself was targeted for dismissal by the magistrate, but vanished before he could be arrested.

He had heard rumors of the Lin family’s strange behavior—the master’s mysterious origins, the nine wives who vanished one after another. Suspicious, Han Chong had sneaked into the manor by night, and in the master’s bedchamber indeed found the missing treasury silver.

But the master was in truth a blue-skinned fiend, feeding on women’s lifeblood. Discovered, Han Chong was hunted through the manor—his soul scattered, his memories ending there.

...

What kind of world was this? What dynasty was Great Feng? Ghosts prowling the night?

Han Chong remembered reading novels all night, drifting into sleep, and now he had inexplicably crossed over!

Luckily, the fiend below had only three fingers per claw. Though it tried desperately to climb the tree over a dozen times, it failed every attempt. Otherwise, Han Chong would have died many times over.

Yet the fiend was no fool. Realizing it could not climb, it began gnawing furiously at the trunk with its fangs.

Bark flew in all directions—the crooked tree would not hold out much longer.

This couldn’t go on—he had to find a way out!

Frantically searching himself and his surroundings, Han Chong suddenly froze. Hanging from his chest, beneath his clothes, was a small jade disk, glowing faintly in the night.

He grasped it in his palm. It was shaped like a pocket watch, its surface resembling a compass, yet completely blank save for a single red dot at the center, like a drop of cinnabar.

By all rights, treasures acquired after crossing into another world should recognize their master by a drop of blood!

Han Chong drew his broadsword, nicked his right index finger, and let a drop of blood fall on the jade disk. It was instantly absorbed.

The disk glowed with a brief, blood-red light, then faded.

[Ding! Congratulations, master, for reclaiming this treasure! The Heavenly Dao Disk system will now activate!

System loading—please do not shut down! Be right back!

Ding! System matched to current world and now officially activated!

Ding! Congratulations, host Han Chong, on automatically learning the Heavenly Dao Classic! No need for meditation or cultivation; each time you slay a being stronger than yourself, you gain experience and level up!

Ding! Congratulations, host, on entering the Refinement of Essence stage. Current vitality: 10 points!

Ding! Congratulations, host, on receiving the reward of the Seventy-Two Earthly Fiend Techniques! You have gained one skill point to select a technique at random.

Once selected, the technique will appear on this treasure’s surface. Focus your will on the pointer to release it!

Ding! The system also rewards you with a storage pouch, which expands as your cultivation grows!]

A string of chimes sounded as the jade disk shuddered in his hand.

The Earthly Fiend Secrets?

Legend claimed these seventy-two techniques contained supernatural arts beyond mortal comprehension—if mastered, they could overturn the very heavens!

If he could learn just one powerful spell now, perhaps he might have a chance to kill the blue-skinned fiend!