After a Demon Stole My Body

There are so many things I want to write, but I'd rather read this novel than write it myself.

So I've officially handed it over to a certain little bee who's delighted to fulfill all my wishes. She'll start writing it after she finishes Yilezao.

Look for the author "Boli Sui Tang" on this site. I believe she can handle dark, damp emotions better than I can.

I'll also make sure she doesn't suddenly stop updating, haha.

Dorian died, but he was happy.

Because after leaving that beautiful body, he could finally admire the desperate, agonized expression he'd worn before he died.

Dorian envied everyone but himself, because they could admire him in all his vividness, while he could only see a secondhand version of himself reflected in mirrors. The self in the mirror was so perfect, yet so hollow. When Dorian looked at him through the glass, his emotions were always so steady, his eyes always full of affection.

Now his followers had sealed his corpse inside a crystal coffin and painstakingly carved magic arrays into it to keep the body from ever decaying. Watching himself from a ghost's point of view was a novel experience. Dorian circled around his corpse, unable to get tired of the sight.

--Until, three days later, his followers held a resurrection ritual. They summoned a demon at the cost of their own lives, hoping to bring Dorian back. When the ritual ended, Dorian was still floating in the air as a ghost, but the demon named Leviathan opened his eyes inside Dorian's body.

"A very fine body. It's mine now," Leviathan said.

Dorian was furious beyond words. He answered the wish of some reasonably attractive first-year student at a magic academy, took over his body, and used the powerful magic attached to his soul to fight his way into his own castle.

"Thief, get out of my body!" he shouted.

"Really?" Leviathan blinked. "Are you sure, darling?"

Dorian looked at that familiar, beautiful face, now vivid and full of life thanks to the soul inside it.

Dorian fell silent. Dorian gave in.

Dorian chose to be with Leviathan. That way, his body would still belong to him, and he would get to see even more expressions. He was quite satisfied.

At first, Leviathan simply thought the body was pleasing to the eye.

It was gorgeous, powerful, and extraordinarily gifted, effortlessly earning everyone's respect and affection.

He made bored use of those excellent qualities, getting everything he needed from Dorian's remaining followers. He couldn't understand why there were so many traitors, or why people thought he was a fake.

When it came down to it, they were only staying for that pretty face, weren't they?

He read Dorian's notes on alchemy and magic, then stood in front of the huge mirror in Dorian's room. He stared blankly at the body he'd acquired without lifting a finger, then at Dorian's image from before his death inside a crystal ball.

They really were different.

This body should be more dazzling, more radiant, shining with an even more brilliant light.

Leviathan thought he might be in love.

He followed in Dorian's footsteps, gathering everything that belonged to him with an aching, obsessive devotion. He rushed to Hell, hoping to find that man's ghost.

No, he wasn't there.

Leviathan returned to Dorian's castle, heartbroken and lost. He thought his first love would come to nothing, until one day someone fought their way into the empty palace.

"Thief," the stranger said. "Get out of my body!"

Leviathan looked at him and smiled with delight.

"Really?" Leviathan blinked. "Are you sure, darling?"

At last--

I've found you.

Reader's note:

* A pseudo-selfcest romance. Since a person can't have sex alone unless they have split personalities, I decided to add someone else.

Oh, wait, Leviathan counts as one person, and the magic academy student Dorian replaced counts as another. If I count Dorian's followers too, I added... about twenty or thirty people?

Don't worry. In this world, people are assigned to Hell or Heaven after death. No one is truly harmed. They're like innocent puppies lying by the roadside who get kicked by some crazy jerk for no reason.

* Leviathan is one-sidedly in love with Dorian, while Dorian is mutually in love with himself, in bold. He's absolutely smitten.

Theme: I want everything in this world that's rotting away. I don't want to wait. I want it now!