Inside the rift it didn’t seem like there was an up or a down. There was only the violent tearing sensation of being dragged through the esophagus of some massive creature.

  Li Yu floated in the center of the crimson isolation cube. Outside the transparent walls of his prison, the tunnel was a blur of kaleidoscopic colors and destruction. Colors that didn't exist in the visible spectrum tore past them and seemed to be stripping away layers of reality. It was the space between worlds. A chaotic and unformed void that would shred a cultivator’s body and soul in nanoseconds.

  But Li Yu was safe. Safe in the worst way possible. He was trapped in the grip of Demon Lord Balor.

  The massive demon was tumbling through the tunnel ahead of him. Balor was a mess of broken armor and silver blood. His chest was caved in where the Black Tortoise had hit him. His skin was burned black from the Leviathan’s frost. One of his upper arms hung limp and had been shattered by the Thunderbird’s lightning.

  Even with all of that, he was still dragging Li Yu behind him like a child dragging a toy wagon into a furnace.

  "Let me go, you ugly bastard!" Li Yu screamed at the demon. His voice vibrated against the walls of the cube. "You lost! Just go home and lick your wounds! Why drag me with you!?"

  Balor turned his massive, horned head to look back at his captive.

  His white hot eyes were dimming, his life force was leaking out into the void but his grin was wide and manic. He didn't look like a defeated general. He looked like a spiteful child who had managed to break one toy before being sent to his room.

  "Quiet, vermin," Balor’s voice boomed directly into Li Yu’s mind.

  Balor pulled the cube closer. The massive bloodied face filled Li Yu’s vision. Li Yu hated that face.

  "Do you know why I took you?" Balor rasped as blood was bubbling at the corners of his maw. "It was not because you are special. It was not because I thought you were a threat that had to be killed before you grew up."

  Balor laughed. It was a wet, hacking sound.

  "It was because I hate you, not you specifically. Your kind, the humans! I hate your world. I hate those three beasts. I spent hundreds of years gathering the resources for this moment. I sacrificed a million souls to build out my plan. And in a matter of minutes... it was gone."

  The Demon Lord grips the cube tighter. The red cube groaned as tiny hairline fractures appeared on the surface.

  "I cannot kill the Tortoise," Balor whispered. "I cannot kill the Snake or the Bird. They are strong. Too strong for me right now with all of their treasures. But you? Hahahaha. You are soft, mortal meat."

  Balor’s eyes flared with a dying spiteful light.

  "I needed a win. Just one. I could not go back to the Demonic Realm with nothing but scars. I needed to snuff out one light from that wretched ball of ice. To come back without even killing a single human? I would be laughed at by everyone!"

  He shook the cube violently, rattling Li Yu’s bones.

  "You are my consolation prize, human. You are the trophy I will break to make myself feel better. I will peel you slowly. I will make your soul scream for a thousand years. I will make sure you live long enough to see me come back to your realm before I truly kill you!"

  Li Yu stared at him. Whatever fear he might have had remaining had been burned away by a cold, white hot rage. He was powerless. He knew it. This entity was far beyond his level. Even wounded, Balor was a being that Li Yu could only dream of hurting.

  But he wouldn't die silent.

  'If I am going to be tortured to death.' Li Yu thought. 'I am going to insult and curse you until I die!'

  He opened his mouth to shout, to pour every insult he had learned into the Demon Lord’s face. He gathered his breath for his first verbal rant.

  THUMP.

  The lights went out. There was no pain. No warning. Li Yu was knocked out. Li Yu slumped forward in the cube. His body went limp instantly. His defiance was cut short by a force he never saw coming.

  Demon Lord Balor was confused.

  He stopped shaking the cube. He stared at the human inside. One moment, the boy was glaring at him with eyes full of fire. He even had his mouth open to scream. The next, he was unconscious, hanging suspended in the red light like a puppet with cut strings.

  "Fragile," Balor scoffed. "His mind broke before his body. He passed out in fear. Pathetic."

  Balor turned back to the tunnel ahead. He could sense the exit. The chaotic energies were thinning and being replaced by the familiar aura of this Demonic Realm. Home.

  He would arrive wounded, humiliated and stripped of artifacts that he had acquired at great cost.

  "He has spirit. You have to give him that." A voice said.

  Balor froze.

  The voice didn't come from his mind. It didn't come from the void. It came from right beside him. Balor spun in the air, ignoring the agony in his shattered chest.

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  There, standing in the middle of the chaotic spatial tunnel as if he were standing on a solid floor, was a man. His face was handsome, almost painfully so, but it was his eyes that stopped Balor’s heart.

  Khaos.

  He was standing next to the red prison cube. He didn’t pay any attention to Balor and was instead examining the unconscious Li Yu with the casual interest of a man looking at a fish in an aquarium.

  Balor’s instincts, the instincts of a predator that had survived for thousands of years in the brutal hierarchy of the Demonic Realm screamed one word.

  ‘Run.’

  "Who... who are you?" Balor stammered. The arrogance that had allowed him to mock the Guardian Beasts evaporated instantly. Khaos didn't turn to look at him. He didn't even acknowledge the question.

  "This could be a good trip for you," Khaos muttered to the unconscious Li Yu. "You can face the consequences of your actions. This place will be different from what you have experienced so far. New experiences to grow. New horrors to overcome. It was your own actions that brought you here. Hopefully you grow from this all."

  Khaos raised a hand and lightly tapped the red spatial cube Balor had created.

  Ping.

  The cube didn't crack. It simply ceased to exist. The red light vanished into particles and left Li Yu floating freely in the chaotic tunnel. Khaos waved his hand again.

  A gentle white light enveloped Li Yu’s body. It was a protective layer of Qi, infinitely complex and dense. It wrapped around the unconscious boy like a cocoon and was shielding him from the void all around.

  Balor trembled. He tried to summon his Qi. He wanted to try to prepare an attack but he found he couldn't move. The space around him hadn't been locked; it had simply ceased to acknowledge his authority. He was a Demon Lord, a Lord of his domain, yet here he felt like the gnat.

  "You..." Balor hissed at Khaos, his fear turning to aggression. "You are not a demon. You are not a human. What are you doing in my tunnel?"

  Khaos finally turned his head. Those empty eyes landed on Balor.

  Balor felt his soul shrivel. It wasn't pressure. It was the sensation of being looked at by something so large that you realized you didn't matter. You weren't an enemy; you were background noise.

  "Your tunnel?" Khaos asked. His voice sounded almost amused.

  He looked around at the swirling chaos of the rift.

  "I suppose you created this. Quite the investment."

  Khaos took a step forward. He stood face to face with the colossal Demon Lord.

  "But look at you," Khaos said. He pointed to the caved-in chest, the shattered arm and the leaking essence. "A Demon Lord weakened by this much... would no longer be a Demon Lord."

  Balor snarled at the comment. His pride stinging even in the face of this anomaly. "I will heal! I will return! I will—"

  "No," Khaos interrupted gently. "You won't. A Demon Lord hurt this badly and without any success. You would simply be killed and turn into power for someone else."

  Khaos tilted his head.

  "Why don't you help out here instead?"

  Khaos raised his hand. He curled his middle finger and thumb together.

  Balor stared at the hand. A memory flashed through his mind. He remembered flicking his own finger to crush the Charm Demon only moments ago.

  "You..." Balor gasped. "Wait! I am Lord Balor! I command legions! I can serve—"

  Flick!

  Khaos flicked his finger. There was no explosion. There was no flash of light. An invisible force, simple and absolute, slammed into Demon Lord Balor.

  It hit him with the weight of what felt like a collapsing universe to Balor.

  Balor didn't even have time to register the pain. His physical body was instantly pulverized. His bones turned to dust. His flesh turned to mist. But he didn't scatter.

  Before the mist could dissipate, a golden thread shot out from the unconscious Li Yu’s chest.

  It moved with the speed of a striking cobra. The Fisherman’s Hook bypassed the destruction and snagged the translucent, screaming shape of Balor’s soul.

  Yoink.

  The soul was dragged into Li Yu’s chest and vanished. Used to feed Li Yu’s soul. Khaos smiled. He looked at Li Yu and then at the empty space where the soul had been.

  He chuckled. A genuine and warm laugh.

  "Greedy little thing," Khaos shook his head. "Taking the soul before the body is even cold? You have no manners."

  He turned his attention to the cloud of pulverized Demon Lord. Khaos clenched his left fist.

  The cloud contracted.The blood, the bone, the Qi and all other kinds of energy, such as the laws that made up Balor were crushed inward by an irresistible force.

  Crunch.

  In the blink of an eye the massive Demon Lord was gone.

  In his place was a single crystal. It was the size of a fist, deep crimson in color and pulsing with the condensed essence of an entity that used to be a Demon Lord of his realm.

  Khaos reached out and plucked the crimson crystal from the air. From his sleeve, Khaos produced a gourd. He popped the cork.

  The crystal flew into the gourd. Khaos shook it, hearing the satisfying rattle of the demon gem settling against something else inside.

  "That makes two things recently," Khaos murmured. "The arm from before and now the essence of this fool. Good resources."

  He re-corked the gourd and tucked it away into his robe.

  "I'll keep these safe for him," Khaos said to the empty air. "He's not ready for this yet. But later... later it will be useful."

  He turned his attention back to Li Yu.

  The spatial tunnel was beginning to destabilize without Balor’s holding the path steady. The walls of the tunnel were trembling. They were threatening to collapse into the true chaotic void.

  "Now," Khaos said while looking at the floating boy wrapped in white light. "Time to go."

  He looked down the tunnel toward the Demonic Realm exit.

  "If you land at the exit point, you'll be surrounded by Balor's armies. They'll kill you before you wake up."

  He looked at the wall of the tunnel. Beyond that swirling barrier of color lay the vast territories of the Demonic Realm. The places where the ancient things slept and the tribes warred.

  "Perfect," Khaos decided.

  He reached out and grabbed Li Yu by the back of his robes. He lifted him like a sack of vegetables.

  He just swung his arm and threw Li Yu. He threw him straight at the side of the spatial tunnel.

  Crash.

  Li Yu’s body slammed into the tunnel wall. Protected by Khaos's Qi, he didn't break. Instead, he punched through. The fabric of the tunnel tore open and ejected the unconscious cultivator out of the safe lane and into the wild turbulence of the inter dimensional slipstream.

  Li Yu vanished into the darkness. He became a streak of white light tumbling toward an unknown destination in a hostile world.

  Khaos watched him go while dusting off his hands. The tunnel around him began to collapse in earnest now. Khaos faded away after Li Yu. The spatial tunnel collapsed.

  And somewhere in the dark and falling through the sky of a hostile world, Li Yu slept.