"The Demonic Debtor"
Liu An remembered that there was nothing strange about the clouds that day.
Then the sky split. The duel between the two Nascent Soul cultivators tore open a rift in space and sucked the entire Liujiaao into nothingness. Eighty-seven souls - father, mother, sister with half a tooth missing - were slowly dissipating in the void.
On the verge of death, a bloody copper coin fell into his hand. Heaven chose him to become the "Debt Master": he enters the inner demons of debtors and completes the debt collection for Heaven in exchange for the "Tao Yun" that solidifies the soul. Eighty-seven debts in exchange for eighty-seven souls. On the day they are all gathered, the family can come back.
But he soon discovered that the inner demon was not a monster, but every monk's deepest fear. The man who killed his younger brother did not dare to look back for twenty-three years. The sword cultivator who let down his Taoist companion would rather be devoured by his inner demons than dare to confirm whether she was doing well or not. The righteous elder who was chasing him had an innocent person who was wrongly killed by him hidden in his heart.
What Liu An wants to do is not to eliminate them, but to make them "acknowledge". Let them admit what they owe, what they fear, and what they have escaped all their lives.
Every time a debt is collected, his own karma becomes heavier. Every time the soul condenses, my sister calls out "Brother" one more time in the void. And the man hiding behind the scenes told him: Do you think you are saving people? You are collecting causes and effects for me. The day when the eighty-seven souls gather together, it will be the time for you to die for them.
This is not a story about a monk who changed his destiny against heaven.
It is the story of a mortal who exchanges himself for his family.
