In the underground catacomb, a throne of bones loomed, a bizarre tableau shattering what people think they know.

“Spit it out. Where’d you stash the treasure?”

“In… in the palace! In my palace!”

Kooson’s head rang like a cracked bell under Ouyang’s pickaxe. He finally broke. Ouyang frowned. Left hand gripped the pickaxe, right hand held a shovel. He slid the pick’s sharp tip over the iron blade.

The metal shriek sliced the air, like winter steel tearing ice. The four spying from afar all sprouted goosebumps.

“Ah! Stop—stop it!”

Kooson feared that sound like a rabbit fears a hawk. Ouyang knew that weakness. Same Demon Kings, but Ouyang didn’t want to push him too hard. Yet the guy dared to insult Ouyang’s wit.

Most Demon Kings stash their hoard in their palace, like a tortoise hiding in its shell. Ouyang didn’t. Since Ouyang didn’t, Kooson, who shadowed his habits, wouldn’t either. Back then, what Ouyang wore in the morning, Kooson copied by noon, strutting out in the same cut. If Ouyang pummeled a Demon King, Kooson arrived soon after, pounding that Demon King again, like thunder following lightning.

Ouyang called it blind bandwagoning, a fever of imitation.

Kooson wasn’t alone, but he was the most thorough. Ouyang took a stroll; Kooson traced the route step by step, a tail that wouldn’t shake off.

Too many sealed years had passed. Kooson forgot who Ouyang was.

If Kooson mimicked that deeply, Ouyang should’ve known where Kooson hid his treasure. But only if Kooson knew Ouyang’s spot first, so he could copy it.

No way would Ouyang let Kooson learn his stash. Kooson didn’t know where Ouyang hid his hoard, but Ouyang was sure Kooson wouldn’t use the palace. Deeply influenced, Kooson wouldn’t dare.

“Cute. Trying to fool me? Think I’m three?”

Ouyang swore, rough as gravel. The four looked uneasy. In their eyes, scholar Ouyang never overlapped with this street Ouyang.

Kooson panted. Ouyang was about to scrape steel again. Kooson blurted, “Wait! We can talk—I'll tell!”

“Hah… the treasure… I put it in an alternate space…”

Clang. Ouyang smacked Kooson’s skull with the shovel. “Less fluff. Hit the crux. Crux. Got it?”

Kooson’s eyes welled like storm clouds. “Yes! The crux… the crux is… I forgot!”

“What? Playing me?” Ouyang’s voice dropped like a blade. “Looks like you need a reminder why blood runs red.” An Oil Paper Umbrella appeared in his hand, its tip leveled at Kooson. “Heh. Better spit it out.”

The moment the umbrella flashed, Kooson’s pupils shrank. Death pressed like frost on his neck. “A Supreme… Artifact…”

“Damaged nine-tenths, sure. Still enough to end you. It tasted Ancient God blood. Even a Primordial Deity died under this umbrella.”

Ouyang’s grin turned shadowed. Kooson folded instantly. “I’ll talk… On the River of the Dead’s bank, there’s a white sphere. That sphere opens the alternate space with the treasure.”

The quartet exchanged looks. Ang pulled out a white ball, snow-pale in his palm. “This one?” Shuo muttered, disbelief thick as fog. “The river earlier was pitch black, like a death current.”

“Go on. You have the sphere. Then what?”

“Just roast it over fire. That’s it.”

A corner flared with sudden firelight, like dawn stabbing mist. Ouyang and Kooson turned. A white flash slid past. Ouyang caught a glimpse of the four, ghost-shapes on the edge.

“Someone… just entered the vault…”

“What?” Ouyang pressed the shovel to Kooson’s skull. “That fire was someone roasting the ball?”

“Y-yes…”

Clang.

Ouyang slammed Kooson’s head. “Kooson, you idiot! A switch this cheap? You shame us!”

Truth be told, it wasn’t that simple. Without Kooson’s hint, who would roast a random white ball? In a place steeped in death like the River of the Dead, most folk wouldn’t pick up stray junk.

But fate likes quirks. Someone noticed that little white sphere, grabbed it, and heard Kooson’s words.

“You… you’re… Ouyang, boss?” Ouyang’s scolding unlocked old memories. Kooson finally put the face to the dread.

Ouyang ignored him. Black haze coiled off his body like storm smoke. He lowered his head, ready to snap.

“I worked myself to the bone, only to dress someone else.” Rage built like a furnace. He wanted to stew the quartet who’d tailed him, scavenging his scraps. “Unforgivable.”

“So…” Ouyang grinned at Kooson, a wolfish curl.

“No, boss Ouyang, mercy—!”

Kooson thrashed on the throne, but a dark-golden longsword through his heart pinned him like a butterfly on a board.

Ouyang drew a Divine Grace Crystal from his spatial ring. Left hand cradled the crystal, right held the pickaxe. Brown light bloomed, like earth-fire, and flowed over him. The glow sheathed the pickaxe. Ouyang hammered the floor like a storm pounding drums.

“Don’t, boss Ouyang! That’s my last stack! You can’t—” A Demon King wailed, raw as a broken reed.

Clang. Clang.

Soon Ouyang set the pick down. He’d punched through the floor. Below lay a chamber flooding with light. Gold gleamed. Crystals breathed a gentle glow, like fireflies swarming wheat.

“Boss… mmph—”

“Ah-hahaha. When I move, I don’t walk away empty.”

He stood by the golden mouth of the hole, hands on hips, smug as a cat with cream. This was his usual play. Keeping all wealth in one spot is the height of folly.

Hide it anywhere, and discovery still stalks like wind. Once found, years of savings vanish. Ouyang split his hoard in many shares, each tucked in a different nest. Kooson learned that trick in full.

Ouyang guessed that idiot Kooson had a few more spots. He’d pried up floors before; old habits stay like scars. After so many years, that fool hadn’t shifted the stash.

In truth, Ouyang wronged Kooson. “So many years” indeed. Cut out the sealed ages and not much time remained. Kooson only managed to replace the floor tiles Ouyang had pried. He hadn’t moved the hoard. Thus, disaster bloomed.

While Ouyang basked, the sigil on the back of his left hand burned hot, a brand from his pact with Xi.

“This eyesore needs erasing.”

He raised the Divine Grace Crystal, ready to rip the contract by force. The ground flashed. A magic circle flared, bearing the same sigil as his hand.

He understood at once and bolted, feet biting stone like deer across frost.

“Damn it. Monster luck today. Two treasures found, twice denied. Some bastard’s cursing me.”

Not far from Terracafe, in a forest smelling of rain and pine, a White Elf in white priestly robes cradled a crystal ball. Her pointed ears twitched like willow leaves, then she sneezed. “Bad. That Demon King noticed me. I need to move.”

Truth is, Ouyang had forgotten the White Elf like a leaf blown past the gate.

In the catacomb, two figures lifted from the magic circle’s glow. Xi and Irina stood there.

“This place… so dark. That vile Demon King must be preparing some wicked rite.” Irina gritted her teeth. It was a rare academy break. She should be stretched on her chair under courtyard sun, sipping juice. Instead, she was running to save the world.

All because of that Demon King.

“Demon King? You mean me?”

A rough voice rolled like thunder. Irina and Xi finally looked up.

A hulking figure in heavy armor stood there, with curved horns crowning his head. Bone spurs bristled along his arms like frozen thorns. His armor was dark red, and a thick blood-reek clung to it, as if time couldn’t wash it clean.

Most of all, a dark-golden longsword pinned his heart, a sun-black nail through a storm.

Everything before them said one thing. This was a sealed Demon King, and he was awake.