After I Transmigrated into the Villain's Heart Demon

[My next book is I Hate Dragon-Slaying Heroes More Than Anything. The blurb is at the very bottom. Save it if you’re interested ^^]

Jiang Qunyu transmigrated into a ridiculously melodramatic cultivation novel, where he became the inner demon of the villain, Wei Xun.

In the original story, Wei Xun was a dazzling young genius of the Lingxiao Sect. But during a trial, he was injured by demonic energy while saving a fellow disciple, leaving his meridians completely destroyed. He fell from the heights into the mud: his fiancée broke off their engagement, his fellow disciples bullied him, and his family turned their backs on him. In the end, he became a mad, ruthless Demon Venerable feared throughout the cultivation world, only to be slain by the novel’s male and female leads working together.

Naturally, as the villain’s inner demon, Jiang Qunyu was doomed to vanish alongside him. What good could come of opposing the leads?

Jiang Qunyu: ...Whoever wants to be this stupid inner demon can have the job!

1.

On first entering Wei Xun’s sea of consciousness, Jiang Qunyu trembled at the sight of the crimson demonic energy roiling around him.

From outside came the faint clink of chains. The dungeon was cold and damp. The future demonic tyrant, who would one day shake the world, was curled up quietly, his breathing faint.

According to the plot, every time Wei Xun succumbed to darkness, he would crush his inner demon to temper his sword. He was supposed to kill Jiang Qunyu seven times in all.

And this was exactly when Wei Xun first fell to darkness.

Jiang Qunyu rubbed the back of his neck, already growing cold. Is it too late to apply for reincarnation?

2.

The first time he was killed, Jiang Qunyu accepted it peacefully. “Better to die sooner and be reborn sooner.”

The second time, Jiang Qunyu cursed him out. “Can’t you stab me somewhere else, you bastard?!”

After the third time, Wei Xun suddenly gripped his half-shattered consciousness and asked, “Why do you keep coming back to life?”

Jiang Qunyu sneered. “Obviously, so I can watch the leads turn you into a pincushion one day!”

The two of them couldn’t stand each other, and spent a hundred years tormenting one another. But no matter how much Wei Xun hated having Jiang Qunyu in his consciousness, he couldn’t truly get rid of him.

3.

Later, on the day of the final battle between the righteous and demonic factions, the male lead pointed his sword at Wei Xun’s heart.

At the critical moment, Jiang Qunyu instinctively leapt out to take the sword for him. Even as his soul scattered, he couldn’t resist one last jab. “The seventh time... I can finally... clock out... Wei Xun, you bastard. You got your wish.”

4.

When he opened his eyes again, a hundred years had passed in the Immortal Realm.

Jiang Qunyu was sitting inside a bridal sedan, surrounded by the blaring of suona horns as he was carried all the way to the Netherworld Abyss to bring good luck to its ruler.

He vaguely remembered this part of the story.

In the original, the ruler of the Netherworld was stunningly beautiful, but sickly and short-lived.

He also had a mercurial temperament and was cruel and bloodthirsty. Every groom sent to bring him good luck had ended up as a dried-up skeleton by the River of Forgetfulness.

Jiang Qunyu could only think that his life was in danger again.

Before he could escape, a pale hand lifted the sedan curtain. The face that appeared before him was one he knew down to his bones.

Jiang Qunyu: ...

Wait. Wasn’t Wei Xun supposed to be in Yunque City, being the Demon Venerable?

How had he become Jiang Qunyu’s short-lived husband?

And weren’t they supposed to have settled their scores and never see each other again?

Why was Wei Xun holding him and kissing and licking him while he slept?

“Jiang Qunyu,” he said in a hoarse voice, sounding both sorrowful and resentful. “Try abandoning me one more time. See what happens.”

At first, Wei Xun hated the cloud of black mist in his consciousness. Every time he saw it, he crushed it.

Until Jiang Qunyu’s soul dissipated for the seventh time, and Wei Xun’s swordsmanship reached perfection. He no longer needed an inner demon to temper his sword.

At last, the familiar noise in Wei Xun’s consciousness was gone.

He thought he would be happy.

But in the years that followed, through lonely nights and cold jade steps, the silver bell tied to the tassel of Wei Xun’s Soul-Eating Sword never rang again.

Later, in the realms above and below, people heard that the Demon Venerable had once knelt before the Hall of Eternal Life for hundreds of years, just to light a soul-returning lantern for that one inner demon.

Thanks to @Yan Yu Ping Sheng for commissioning the character card

And to @Jia Mu-Elen for drawing the little black puffball

Reading guide:

① Cultivation levels: Qi Condensation, Foundation Establishment, Golden Core, Nascent Soul, Great Ascension, Deification, Void Refinement, Body Integration, and Ascension. This is my own take on cultivation, and I reserve the right to explain any original settings. In the cultivation world, you aren’t considered an adult until you’re a hundred.

70% of the book is behind a paywall. See Chapter 2 for specific content warnings.

② Enter with caution. The early part is genuinely harsh. While Wei Xun thinks Qunyu is really his inner demon, he kills him twice himself. The other five deaths aren’t at his hands. If you don’t want to read about the first two deaths, skip straight to Chapter 18. If you don’t mind them, I still recommend starting from the beginning. I really love their early interactions 🥺

The Yunque City arc will include some time-skipping, and Qunyu will fake his death later.

③ The original male and female leads aren’t a couple, so don’t ship them. The original female lead has no romantic pairing.

④ One more thing, this involves spoilers, but it’s necessary to say: starting from the fifth time Qunyu dies, the pain is transferred to Wei Xun. So in the first four deaths (1/2/3/4), Qunyu dies, and in the last three (5/6/7), Wei Xun dies. There’s one fewer because the later part focuses on putting Wei Xun through the wringer. This story isn’t for people who are extremely particular about their ships, since everyone ends up cursing me out in the end 🤓

⑤ You can tell me what you don’t want to read, but don’t insult my leads. I’ll delete comments that insult them.

Saved on June 6, 2025

Next book preview: I Hate Dragon-Slaying Heroes More Than Anything

Blurb:

Yu Zhuxue’s life was miserable and bleak. His innate sword bones were stolen, his cultivation was destroyed, and because he had a pure yin constitution, he was imprisoned by his sect and made to offer his heart’s blood day and night to help others cultivate.

Yu Zhuxue couldn’t understand why, though they had the same parents, his younger brother could secretly sleep with his fiancée after he lost his sword bones, kick him while he was down after his cultivation was destroyed, and enjoy the pills and spirit stones bought with his heart’s blood without a shred of guilt.

His parents told him, “Your brother is young. Don’t compete with him.”

His sect told him, “As the chief disciple, you should devote yourself to the sect.”

It wasn’t until the tenth year after Yu Zhuxue fled the sect, when he died by the villain’s sword and became a wandering soul, that he learned the truth. His closest family had plotted to have his sword bones taken. They weren’t his real family at all. He was just an orphan his parents had picked up by the roadside.

When Yu Zhuxue opened his eyes again, he had been reborn on the day his sword bones were stolen.

Yu Zhuxue lowered his eyes, his gaze empty of sorrow or joy.

He thought, if that’s how it is, he needn’t cling to their false affection anymore. They owed him everything, from his sword bones to his cultivation, and they would have to repay him many times over.

Swallowing the Heavens is an action-packed progression novel that has topped the men’s fiction bestseller list for years. Its satisfying story of Yu Zhuxue being reborn, reforging his sword bones, defying fate, and eventually becoming the ruler of the three realms has won countless readers’ hearts.

But what they didn’t know was that You Yan, the author, truly hated the character Yu Zhuxue.

Unlike You Yan, Yu Zhuxue was a dragon-slaying hero who had endless opportunities after being reborn. His birth parents were people of high status, and after they recognized him, they doted on him. He was even betrothed to the daughter of the leader of the Immortal Alliance...

But You Yan had no parents and had wandered the streets since childhood.

So he envied Yu Zhuxue’s life, and envied even more the many people who loved him.

Thus, even after readers raged at him for ruining the ending, You Yan once again gave Yu Zhuxue a fate in which the villain ran him through the heart with a single sword, taking a secret pleasure in it.

Unexpectedly, when You Yan opened his eyes again, he had transmigrated into the novel.

You Yan was vicious and cold, like a venomous snake hiding in the shadows. He decided to lie in wait at Yu Zhuxue’s side, biding his time.

He curled his lips as he watched Yu Zhuxue, newly reborn, walk away. He thought with a sigh that he would get to see for himself how Yu Zhuxue took one step after another toward the ending he had written for him.

You Yan was so excited that his hands trembled.

Of course, at that moment he had no idea that, far in the future, he would see that person truly fall, his clothes soaked in blood, never to open his eyes again.

In that moment, he would panic, as if he had lost his soul.

From then on, he would find no rest day or night, whether in the mortal world, the Immortal Realm, or the Nine Nether Demon Domain.

[Reading guide]

Yu Zhuxue is the shou, You Yan is the gong.

Theme: Growing up well.