The moonlight illuminated the darkened forest as a cloaked figure moved stealthily through the trees. Its movements were quiet, and every now and again it stopped to listen, as though checking to see if it had attracted any attention.

  Around an hour later, the figure arrived at a cliff wall.

  In that instant, the moon broke through the canopy of the trees and cast a horizontal ellipse of light onto the face hidden under the hood.

  There was the same bold posture, the same strong facial features — Li Yuan, or at least someone wearing his face. However, his eyes were different now; there was a hollowness in them that wasn't there before.

  Li Yuan gave the area one last look over. There was complete silence, aside from the occasional squawking of birds or the rustling of small animals moving through the underbrush. Once he was confident that he wasn't being followed, he entered a cave that was partially camouflaged by a curtain of vines.

  The cave entrance was deceiving.

  What initially appeared to be a narrow opening quickly expanded into a massive cavern system.

  Li Yuan heard the echoes of his footsteps reverberate off the high ceiling as he moved further into the depths of the caverns. The walls were smooth, much smoother than they would naturally appear, and veins of glowing crystalline structures emitted a dim glow at irregular intervals.

  He kept walking until the passageway opened into a large, circular room.

  The ceiling disappeared into the dark, lost to sight. The walls of the room were lined with alcoves containing various items: jade containers, spirit herbs, arcane objects that emitted subtle vibrations of energy.

  The items weren’t organized in a manner typical of a sect's treasury.

  Instead, they were haphazardly distributed throughout the room as if the person responsible for arranging them didn’t fully understand their intended use or purpose.

  At the opposite end of the room, on a throne carved from a single piece of black crystal, sat a figure. Its surface was twisted into patterns that were visually disorienting, as though they existed in multiple dimensions simultaneously.

  The being was dressed in pitch-black robes and a mask fashioned from the same material as the throne.

  Li Yuan climbed the stairs to the throne and knelt down.

  "Master," he bowed his head. "I have accomplished my mission."

  The figure on the throne nodded slightly and spoke, although there was something peculiar about the voice, as though multiple individuals were speaking in perfect synchrony, yet each individual voice originated from a different temporal location.

  "And I have fulfilled my promise to you," the masked being replied, “now your soul is mine to command as I will."

  Li Yuan kept his head bowed and tried to remain calm, but memories threatened to overwhelm him. He distinctly recalled the moment of his death: the intense, burning sensation as the spiritual flame of the Elemental Realm cultivator incinerated his skin and flesh; the horror as his soul began to fragment. He had been resigned to his impending doom, resigned to fall into whatever fate awaited cultivators once they died.

  However, at that moment before everything turned black, he had sensed a pull — a gentle pull at first, but it quickly became irresistible. His dissolving soul had been drawn through something, reassembling itself within this very chamber. He found himself before the being he would eventually come to refer to as the Masked One, and he was presented with a choice: serve and get his revenge or cease to exist.

  At that time, Li Yuan was consumed by fury. His death was unjust. And what was worse was the public humiliation. He had stood up for the weak, but no one did anything as he was not only bullied but brutally killed.

  Stolen story; please report.

  So, he hadn’t even thought about the consequences of accepting the offer.

  It was a way to get revenge on those who had nonchalantly taken his life.

  Which was why he had agreed without hesitation.

  The Masked One did end up fulfilling his promise.

  He provided Li Yuan with a new vessel for his soul and granted him abilities exceeding anything he had achieved in life. Abilities sufficient to kill not only Xiao Feng, but the Elemental Realm cultivator who had torched him.

  But now that he had gotten his revenge, he felt empty, hollow.

  Why?

  That didn’t make sense.

  Seeing the fear in Xiao Feng’s eyes as Li Yuan drained his cultivation base should have provided satisfaction. It should have filled the gaping void in his soul. Instead, it only made the emptiness grow larger.

  Even killing the Elemental Realm cultivator, watching him burn as Li Yuan had burned, didn’t bring him peace.

  It was only now that he was beginning to understand that he had made a terrible mistake.

  He had sold his soul to the devil, and for what?

  Nothing.

  "Give up any thoughts of trying to escape our contract," the Masked One's words pulled Li Yuan from his thoughts. "Your efforts will be futile."

  Li Yuan glanced up at his master and watched as the masked figure made bizarre motions in the air.

  This behaviour had first confused Li Yuan; he had thought that perhaps it was some kind of technique or formation art. But nothing ever came of these gestures. His master would simply wave at the air for minutes or hours at a time, occasionally mumbling to himself.

  The Masked One dismissed whatever he had been studying with a wave of his hand and let out a deep sigh.

  "There isn't anyone interesting nearby," he muttered to himself.

  Li Yuan steeled himself and asked, "Master, what are you looking for?"

  The masked figure turned toward Li Yuan and remained silent for a considerable amount of time. Then he shook his head. "Is there any point in telling you? You're just an NPC. You wouldn’t understand."

  Li Yuan struggled to suppress the surge of rage that flared through him.

  He had no idea what that strange word “NPC” meant, but the way his master used it with such disdainful condescension, it could only be an insult. And even though Li Yuan was a slave, he still had his pride as a man.

  The Masked One chuckled at Li Yuan's expression. "Fine, I will humor you. Tell me, do you know someone who was born with a rare constitution allowing them to absorb spiritual energy at a faster rate than most others? Or someone who stumbled upon an ancient technique or inheritance in their humble village?"

  Li Yuan shook his head, perplexed by the bizarre line of questioning.

  "What about someone who was wronged by a young master, but survived using some unknown resource? Or maybe someone who appears to be ordinary, but possesses a mysterious past and unfathomable potential?"

  Once more, Li Yuan could only shake his head.

  "What about a cultivator who claims to act righteously, and appears to be weak, but is actually..." The Masked One trailed off as he noticed that Li Yuan still looked confused. "You see? You NPCs are oblivious to protagonists. Only I can find them. Or, as I did with you, I can create them."

  Li Yuan maintained a neutral expression, but his thoughts were racing.

  This man was insane.

  Why was he rambling on about protagonists as if this world were some sort of novel?

  But even if he was a madman, he was a force to be reckoned with.

  When Li Yuan eventually discovered a method to extricate himself from this monster’s control, he would have to kill him. It would be a favor to the world to remove such a dangerous lunatic.

  "The search for protagonists will have to continue at another time," the Masked One sighed. "My reserve of Life Realm energy has run out."

  Li Yuan's eyes narrowed slightly at that particular detail. It was an intriguing weakness — either his master was a Stellar Realm cultivator who somehow obtained a finite quantity of Life Realm energy, or he was in the early stages of the Life Realm and couldn’t sustain his maximum potential continuously.

  In either case, he was still too powerful for Li Yuan to confront directly.

  So, patience would be necessary.

  "The energy you gathered from your two kills should allow you to remain useful for a while longer," the Masked One continued, "but you should enter my inner world and rest. I will summon you when I need you."

  A swirling vortex of darkness appeared next to the throne.

  Li Yuan felt his body begin to move towards it without his permission.

  Whenever his master didn’t need him, he would throw Li Yuan into his inner world, or at least a portion of it that he was allowed to access. It was simply empty space, a void where he would await the next summons.

  As Li Yuan stepped through the portal, he caught a final glimpse of the chamber before the darkness enveloped him. Then he was in the void, that familiar nothingness which was his prison between assignments. He could sense his body stiffening as the animation drained from his limbs.

  The last thing he saw before his eyes closed were the two other statues beside him.

  They were clearly fellow puppets in the Masked One's collection.

  Li Yuan couldn’t help but wonder what it was that the devil offered them for their souls.

  And whether or not they regretted it.