Malcolm nodded in satisfaction, raised his hand, and with a flick, a palm-sized gray-white token shot from his sleeve, landing in Soul Devourer Puppet’s hand. The token was made from the special bones of the Reincarnation Realm. On the front was a twisted character for “Puppet”, while the back was covered with densely packed command runes.
“This is the Puppet General Token. With it, everyone in Malevolent Path Hall, save for me, must treat your word as mine. All resources, puppets, and Soul Hunters are yours to dispatch.”
Soul-Devouring Puppet clasped the token. Runes flashed in its eyes, and the bone slipped beneath the skin of its palm, leaving only a faint gray sigil.
“Go on, then.”
Malcolm, cloaked in night-black silk that drank the hall’s torchlight, swept his sleeve in a single, unhurried arc. The gesture bent the incense smoke and rattled bronze braziers along the red-stone walls.
“Let the whole of level twelve taste the power of reincarnation…” he declared, each word landing like a war-drum.
The Soul-Devouring Puppet tipped forward in a precise, ceremonial bow, then turned on its heel and strode from the throne hall, joints clicking with clockwork certainty beneath lacquered bone. Its gait never wavered, each footfall measured to the width of a palm, as though an invisible ruler marked the marble. Six membranous wings tucked half-closed against its back. Dark-crimson flames licked their ragged rims, subdued yet lethal, and the mere scent of that heat drove every attendant, guard, and mindless automaton to their knees, shivering.
That was the crushing aura of a Top Level High Immortal Realm cultivator, fused with the death-chill of the Reincarnation Realm, ice so absolute it clamped around every watching soul.
Beyond the bronze doors, nine ribbons of pearlescent reincarnation aura circling the palace stirred the moment the puppet appeared. They tightened their spiral, releasing an eager, resonant hum that tremored through the stone like harp strings plucked by unseen gods.
Soul-Devouring Puppet promptly stepped onto open air as though the sky were a paved road. Its ash-colored eyes surveyed the palace complex that stretched for a thousand kilometers below; every roof tile fell beneath that dead light. Slowly, it raised its right hand, palm facing the heavens, as if weighing the entire realm upon a single, silent scale.
“Soul Hunters, assemble.”
The mechanical words were quiet, yet they rang with the finality of law and raced through every corridor of the Malevolent Path Hall. A chorus of tearing wind answered—sharp enough to flay stone. Black shapes erupted from the deepest vaults, the training grounds, and the sealed meditation chambers, streaking upward like arrows loosed from a single monstrous bow.
For three thousand years, Malevolent Path Hall had bred the Soul Hunter Corps. Now, more than thirty thousand Soul Hunters filled the sky, every one at least Heavenly Immortal Realm Level Five, with over a thousand Heavenly Immortal Realm Level Eight cultivators. They wore matching midnight armor and carried Soul Binding Chains, Soul-Capturing Banners, and Soul-Refining Furnaces. Each of them was a specialist who hunted souls the way others hunted deer.
Obedient as a tide, the legion formed a vast black square beneath Soul-Devouring Puppet, waiting, silent, heads bowed before the cloak that breathed laws. The ash eyes drifted across the ranks, and the Puppet spoke again, voice still without inflection.
“Our target is the whole of level twelve. Our objective is to harvest all souls at Heavenly Immortal Realm Level Eight and above. Our mission begins now. Go.”
No stirring speech followed, only commands as cold and simple as the blade of a guillotine. As one, the thirty thousand Soul Hunters dropped to a single knee and roared, their reply crashing like surf against stone.
“Understood, Mr. Puppet General!”
Soul-Devouring Puppet’s gray-white cloak suddenly unfurled, broadening into a curtain of light that spanned the heavens from horizon to horizon. Wherever that light touched, spatial laws twisted, and a web of portals bloomed—doorways leading to every dominion of level twelve. The Puppet strode into the nearest gateway without a backward glance. The Soul Hunter Army poured after him, a flood of armor and weapons vanishing into the rifts.
When the last shadow slipped away, the light collapsed, folding back into the cloak and settling once more against the Puppet’s spine. The portals sealed. The sky became tranquil, as though nothing extraordinary had occurred. But from that quiet instant on, the fate of level twelve had already veered onto a darker path.
***
Back at Malevolent Path Hall, Malcolm stood before the colossal bronze doors of the hall. His ashen eyes followed the path along which the Soul-Devouring Puppet had vanished, and a thin, icy smile refused to leave his lips. Even without sight, he felt it—the moment that construct moved, every hidden teleportation array woven throughout level twelve stirred awake.
He had spent ten millennia planting those secret nodes, one in every city, one in every forbidden realm. Each node was an eye and a corridor. Through that web of endless cycles, the Puppet could surface anywhere it pleased, then hurl captured souls back to Malevolent Path Hall in a single breath, straight into the Door of Reincarnation. More importantly, the same web let Malcolm taste every ripple of power, every shifting alliance, and every heartbeat across the heavens. It was a spider’s net flung over the world, and nothing escaped its threads.
“At last…” Malcolm whispered, a tremor of anticipation coating every syllable. “It begins…”
With a skeletal finger, he tapped the empty air, as though pressing the first key of a symphony only he could hear. A ripple of ashen light spread from his fingertip. At its center, a three-dimensional star map blossomed, rendering the entire level twelve in cold relief—every sect hall, every family seat, and every hidden ruin.
More than three hundred pinpoints now flashed across the projection, each sliding along invisible routes. Those lights marked squads of Soul Hunters. The brightest and fastest lone point was the Soul-Devouring Puppet. It had already reached the prosperous eastern quadrant, a territory jealously guarded by the Three Great Celestial Sects.
“Yes… We will feast on the richest prey first,” Malcolm murmured, eyes glinting like broken ice. “Three Great Celestial Sects, huh? They’ve been hoarding level twelve’s best resources for ten millennia. It’s time for them to pay the price for that.”
He pivoted, gliding back into the cavernous hall. Before the yawning Door of Reincarnation, he folded his legs and sank into silence. The moment his eyelids met, his mind dove into the vast web, ready to witness the hunt he had scripted for level twelve.
***
Far beyond the range of his perception, in an expanse of rolling chaos, a palace of flawless white jade drifted like an island of stillness. Inside, an elder in a teal robe opened his eyes. Mist veiled his features, yet a spark of alarm cut through the haze.
“The power of reincarnation has suddenly surged a hundredfold…” he whispered, his voice echoing off jade pillars. “Worse, it is laced with an old, repulsive devouring aura. Could it be that damned fiend again? No, wait… It’s even colder, emptier, and more lifeless. It seems like a puppet…”
The old man rose in a single, graceful stride and stepped to the palace’s edge, gazing toward the distant level twelve. Only after a long, troubled breath did he speak again, weighted syllables scattering the surrounding mist.
“Looks like the calm we have enjoyed is ending,” he conceded. “I dread to tally how many lives this storm will swallow, or how many living beings and great powers it will drag into this cruel mess…”
Shaking his head, he turned back inside and began summoning the other reclusive masters who, like him, had slumbered too long. The storm had begun, and no one could remain uninvolved.
