Dao God of the Devil's Path

"Ye Chen! You trash! Are you dead or just pretending?"

The shout thundered through the damp, manure filled air of the Spirit Beast Stables. Ye Chen tightened his grip on the rusted shovel, his knuckles turning white, but he did not turn around. He continued to shovel the glowing, blue dung of the Horses into the cart.

"I am talking to you, waste."

A heavy boot slammed into Ye Chen’s lower back. The force was not enough to kill, but it was enough to send a malnourished youth explicitly sprawling into the filth he had just been cleaning.

Laughter erupted from the doorway.

Ye Chen grit his teeth, tasting the iron tang of blood in his mouth. He slowly pushed himself up, wiping the muck from his cheek. He looked at the intruder. It was Li Hu, a servant disciple who had barely reached the second stage of Body Tempering. Three years ago, a man like Li Hu would not have dared to breathe too loudly in Ye Chen’s presence.

"What do you want, Li Hu?" Ye Chen asked, his voice hoarse.

Li Hu sneered, stepping forward to loom over him. "What do I want? I want to see the former Number One Genius of the Azure Cloud Sect rolling in horse shit. And look! My wish has been granted."

"If you have no business here, get out. I have work to do."

"Work?" Li Hu laughed again, a harsh, grating sound. "You call this work? This is penance, Ye Chen. This is what happens when you offend Lady Su Rou. Do you really think anyone in the sect cares about a cripple whose Dantian has been shattered?"

At the mention of that name, Ye Chen’s eyes went cold. Su Rou. The woman he had loved. The woman he had given his resources to. The woman who had drugged him, shattered his cultivation base, and stole his innate Spiritual Bone to offer it to the sect master’s son.

"Don't mention her name with your filthy mouth," Ye Chen whispered.

Li Hu’s expression twisted into ugly rage. He grabbed Ye Chen by the collar, lifting him effortlessly. "You still think you are a Young Master? You are nothing! You are less than the beasts in these stalls. At least the beasts have spiritual energy!"

"Put me down."

"Or what?" Li Hu mocked, shaking him. "Will you hit me? With what cultivation? You can’t even summon a wisp of Qi. I could snap your neck with one hand."

"Then do it," Ye Chen stared directly into Li Hu’s eyes, his gaze burning with a terrifying intensity. "Do it, Li Hu. Kill me. But if you don't kill me today, I swear on my parents' graves that I will return this humiliation a thousand times over."

Li Hu flinched. For a second, he saw the shadow of the old Ye Chen, the prodigy who had once dominated the outer sect. The fear made him angry.

"You dare threaten me?"

Li Hu threw a punch, his fist glowing with a faint, yellow light of earth energy.

Crack.

The blow connected with Ye Chen’s ribs. The sound of bone fracturing was sickeningly loud in the quiet stable. Ye Chen was flung backward, crashing into the wooden partition of a stall. He slid down, coughing violently, red blood staining his gray servant robes.

"Pathetic," Li Hu spat on the ground. "To think I was actually scared for a moment. Listen well, trash. Lady Su Rou sent a message. She is ascending to the Inner Sect tomorrow. She wants you to know that she has thrown out your old engagement gifts. She said she doesn't want garbage cluttering her new pavilion."

Ye Chen clutched his chest, gasping for air. The pain was blinding, radiating from his shattered ribs. He tried to speak, but only a wheezing sound came out.

"Oh, and one more thing," Li Hu grinned, kicking the bucket of water over, soaking Ye Chen’s shivering body. "No food for you today. The Spirit Beasts need it more. Reflect on your station, trash."

Li Hu turned and strutted out, whistling a cheerful tune as he left Ye Chen broken and bleeding in the straw.

The silence returned to the stables, heavy and suffocating.

Ye Chen lay there, staring up at the rotting wooden beams of the ceiling. Three years. It had been three years of this. Every day was a struggle to survive. Every day was a reminder of what he had lost.

"Su Rou..." he rasped, tears of pure fury mixing with the blood on his face. "Zhao Feng..."

He tried to circulate his energy, to heal his ribs, but there was nothing. His Dantian was a broken void, leaking energy faster than he could gather it. He was a leaking bucket. A useless vessel.

"Is this... how it ends?"

His vision began to blur. The cold from the water was seeping into his bones. His consciousness started to drift into the darkness. He clenched his fist, digging his fingernails into his palm until they drew blood.

"I don't accept this!" he screamed internally, his soul roaring against the injustice. "I want power! I want to kill them! I want to burn the heavens and crush them all under my feet! Give me power! Anybody! Anything!"

His blood, warm and rich, dripped from his hand onto a small, dull black ring he wore on his finger. It was the only thing his parents had left him, a simple band of iron that no one had bothered to steal because it looked worthless.

As the blood soaked into the metal, a faint, almost imperceptible hum resonated through the stable.

The darkness in Ye Chen’s vision suddenly shattered.

A strange, mechanical sound, cold and devoid of emotion, rang out directly inside his skull. It was not a sound from the world, but a sound from the soul.

[Ding!]

Ye Chen’s eyes snapped open.

[System Initialization Protocol Detected.]

[Host Bloodline verified.]

[Condition: Critical. Life signs failing.]

[Activating the Supreme Overlord System...]

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[System Integration Complete.]

[Welcome, Host. Your path to godhood begins now.]