The Demon Lord Ye Zhi raised seven disciples.
His eldest disciple was born under a star of calamity, and he took him in.
His second disciple was consumed by madness, and he kept him by his side.
His third disciple was a half-demon castaway, and he protected him.
His seventh disciple was a parricidal wretch, and he taught him.
The world said only that the Demon Lord raised fierce beasts to lay waste to cities and kingdoms and bring ruin to the people.
No one knew Ye Zhi was simply writing seven death warrants for himself.
As someone who had transmigrated here, he came from too far away, and the road home was gone. The method of ascending in this world was bizarre: one had to use a sworn enemy as fuel, burn away all worldly ties, and sever one's karma with this world.
And that sworn enemy had to be someone close and trusted, someone who had personally planted the seed of hatred.
So Ye Zhi treated them exceptionally well. He taught them, passed on the Way, took their side, and cleaned up after them.
Seven people, ten years, twenty years, a hundred years. The villains grew from useless wretches into fierce beasts, then from fierce beasts into the backbone of the demonic path. They revered the Demon Lord as a god.
Once the villains had been raised, Ye Zhi had only one last step to take: to be abandoned by everyone, let his heart die, and complete his cultivation.
Then Ye Zhi personally taught them what "hatred" meant.
On the night everyone turned against him, the seven disciples surrounded the Demon Hall. The instant their swords pierced his chest, Ye Zhi finally smiled.
It worked!
When he woke again, Ye Zhi was lying amid unfamiliar seas of clouds, his spiritual energy clear and pure as a newborn's. His dantian was empty, and all his cultivation was gone.
This was neither possession nor reincarnation. Three hundred years had passed. The villains Ye Zhi had painstakingly raised had become the people who hated him most in the world, and they were hunting him across heaven and earth.
Former. Demon Lord. Now. A boy with a ruined spiritual root. Ye Zhi: ...Fine, fine. So this is how Heaven's Will wants to play.
There was no way to turn this game around. But he had no intention of doing so.
If the Demon Lord's path was closed, he would simply take another.
Three hundred years later, the immortal sects had fallen into decline, and the righteous path needed someone to hold the fort.
For the next hundred years, Ye Zhi stood in the heart of a sea of lightning, his three thousand strands of white hair and his spiritual radiance like an ancient sword drawn from its sheath.
Tens of thousands from the immortal sects prostrated themselves before him and called him, "Immortal Venerable."
*[The cover is a rough draft. I'll replace it once it's been finished.]
Artist: Just Your Riches (Got a big brain boost)
Theme: Every legend about me is wrong. They're all scraps of paper, and every one of them needs rewriting.
