Ch. 1523 - The Monster’s Memoir, Betrayal

Xu Zimo knew clearly that he didn’t recognize this monster. Yet, the moment their eyes met, the creature grew visibly tense and uneasy.

“You… you… you…” the monster stammered, unable to speak coherently for a long while.

“What about me?” Xu Zimo asked, frowning.

“You shouldn’t be alive,” the monster said at last, backing away several steps. “You died… you clearly died in the Final Battle!”

“Oh?” Xu Zimo sneered faintly. “So you do know me.”

But inside, he already had a theory.

The monster probably didn’t know him personally, it had likely seen the previous Infernal Lord.

That being was from the Demon Descent Era. The former Infernal Lord had perished during the final battle against the heavens. Since then, the history of the demon race had faded into myth. Few in the current age even knew such things truly happened.

If this monster had seen the Infernal Lord, that meant it was a being from the ancient Demon Descent Era, or perhaps even older, one from the Primordial Age.

Such an ancient existence was rare indeed.

“For an old relic like you,” Xu Zimo said with a light laugh, “to end up working as someone else’s hired muscle, that’s quite pitiful.”

“Who… who said I was anyone’s hired muscle?” the monster grumbled defensively.

Xu Zimo tilted his chin toward Shangguan Wan’er.

“She can command you?”

The monster snorted. “She’s not qualified to command me. She sacrifices living beings, and I fight in exchange. Once she summons me, I can devour everyone here.”

“What?”

The crowd’s faces darkened in horror.

They had thought Shangguan Wan’er had simply summoned a monster to aid her, but now they realized that they themselves were part of the sacrifice.

“What a vicious plan,” someone shouted angrily. “Two birds with one stone! She feeds the monster and wipes out her rivals in one go. Then she can claim the Ancestral Flame for herself!”

“She’s worse than the Chaos Fire God Realm’s people!” another roared.

In an instant, fury spread among the spectators.

But Shangguan Wan’er only smiled coldly. “We are competitors. Killing you all is perfectly natural. Did you really think I’d fight for your sake? You’re nothing.”

After saying that, she turned her gaze back to the monster floating in the void.

“I’ve already sacrificed these people to you,” she said coldly. “Now kill him. Why are you hesitating? This isn’t like you, Nine Nether Hell King.”

The creature looked at Xu Zimo for a long moment, then asked, “Do you even know who he is?”

“A human from the Chaos Fire God Realm,” Shangguan Wan’er replied, frowning.

The monster inhaled deeply, its eyes narrowing. A distant, haunting memory stirred within it, an image seared into its mind from ages past.

In that faraway Demon Descent Era, the might of the demon race had thundered across all Nine Heavens. Wherever the demonic armies marched, all races bowed. It didn’t matter how ancient a monster was, or how mighty a sacred sect might be, even a Saint Sovereign was but an insect before them.

Every living being had to kneel beneath the demon army’s iron hooves.

In the deepest corner of the Nine Heavens, hidden from the world, the legends of the Nine Nether Hellfire were not myths, they were real.

And the truth was even more terrifying than the tales.

The one known as the Nine Nether Hell King was the very creature from those legends.

In the depths of the earth, tens of millions of meters below, he had built a prison that was more terrible than any hell. There he performed unspeakable experiments.

Corpses and blood were the colors of that world; screams and wails, its music.

He could no longer remember how many beings he had slaughtered.

For a million miles around his domain, not a single living creature dared approach. It was a wasteland of death.

Then, when the demonic legions arrived, he refused to obey the Infernal Lord’s commands.

He led an army of a million undead against the demon race in open war.

That battle became the nightmare that haunted him for eternity.

A man had descended from the heavens, holding a sky-piercing spear. With just one look, that man froze his very soul and stilled the blood in his veins.

The spear churned the heavens themselves, and even the laws of the world bent to his will.

Beneath that weapon’s might, the army of a million undead was annihilated.

The Nine Nether Hell King, who had once feared nothing under heaven, was struck down in a single blow, his soul scattered to the winds.

Only a fragile wisp of his spirit survived, and he spent countless ages rebuilding his strength, from the ancient age to the middle era, and now to the present day.

He slowly opened his eyes, ending the flood of memories, and said flatly to Shangguan Wan’er, “This time, I refuse.”

“What?” Shangguan Wan’er’s brows knitted.

She knew the Hell King well. Every time he was allowed to devour, he went into a frenzy. This was the first time she had ever seen him decline.

“No reason,” the Hell King replied coolly. “But I’d advise you not to provoke him.”

“You’d better think carefully,” Shangguan Wan’er said, her tone darkening. “If you refuse to devour now, who knows how long it’ll be before I summon you again.”

Xu Zimo chuckled from the side, clearly amused. “You, being threatened by a little girl like her, how disgraceful.”

He could sense how powerful the Hell King was. In his prime, he had likely been even stronger, yet now he was being coerced by Shangguan Wan’er, who was only a Chaos Primordial.

Impressive, but hardly enough to command such a creature.

“This is all your fault!” the monster roared, glaring at Xu Zimo with hatred that seemed to shake the world.

“If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t have had my soul shattered back then! I crawled through the depths for countless years, across several eras, just to regain this fragment of strength! And then I met her.”

He explained bitterly that he had no choice but to make a pact with Shangguan Wan’er. He gave her the Nine Nether Hellfire and part of his inheritance, even agreed to fight for her, on one condition: she had to bring him back to the surface, where he could devour enough living beings to restore his true power.

He needed her for that. Without her help, trapped in the endless darkness underground, he would never recover.

Despite his resentment, he no longer wanted to fight Xu Zimo.

The man before him, whether he was the same being as that figure from long ago or not, had become an indelible nightmare in his heart.

“Don’t threaten me,” the Hell King said coldly, casting a heavy glance at Shangguan Wan’er. His aura flared, oppressive and suffocating.

Then he turned to Xu Zimo. “If you can kill her,” he said, “I’ll serve you.”

“That depends,” Xu Zimo replied with a faint smirk. “How do you compare to Primordial Flame?”

“In my prime,” the Hell King said proudly, “there were fewer than five beings in existence I would even consider cautious of, and it was not among them.”

“Good enough,” Xu Zimo said with a laugh. “Then I’ll take you.”

The monster bellowed a roar that shook the heavens. Darkness surged, and his massive form dissolved into the demonic mists.

Beside them, Shangguan Wan’er’s expression twisted in disbelief.

The monster she had summoned had done nothing, and had betrayed her instead.

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