After Transmigrating, I Died of Depression Without My Phone - Chapter 92.1

Hua Lanye had never imagined he would fall on such an ordinary day.

It was a day he had been so certain of his victory.

Back during the Great War of the Four Realms, he had never feared the gods. Who would have thought that he would be defeated by a young girl?

Perhaps it was because she appeared so naïve and inexperienced that everyone underestimated her, leading him to this moment.

But fortunately, he still had a card to play.

“If you kill me, you’ll never see Beiting Xue again.”

Hua Lanye’s voice trembled, though he tried to remain calm. “The Monster Lord doesn’t dare defy me. He follows my every command because he needs me to bring back his son and the Monster Queen. You’ve figured that out, so you must know you can’t bypass me.”

He glanced at the divine pillar of the Celestial Ladder. “No one knows more about this thing than I do. Are you really prepared to kill me, leaving yourself without any answers?”

“You may think you’re clever, that you’ll eventually figure out a solution on your own. But it will take time. And the longer it takes, the more dangerous Beiting Xue’s situation becomes. Are you willing to risk his life for the sake of your pride?”

His words grew more confident with each passing second, but Long Xiang seemed utterly unaffected.

Although she didn’t strike the killing blow, what she did next wasn’t far off from killing him.

She wasn’t concerned with preserving the integrity of her own spirit. Instead, she tore apart his heart-soul, piece by piece, leaving no trace unchecked.

This process was far more agonizing than any physical torment. Hua Lanye was in such agony that his mind wandered, and he suddenly found himself remembering his childhood.

The Monster Lord hadn’t always been a powerful figure. As a child, Hua Lanye had been an ordinary boy with no special talent, no celestial roots, and no demonic inheritance. He had been born in the human world, with no parents, surviving by begging on the streets alongside an old beggar.

The old beggar, in order to make Hua Lanye more pitiful and earn more food and money, would often break his arms or injure his skin, leaving gruesome scars on his otherwise beautiful face to evoke sympathy from strangers.

He was always covered in injuries—so much so that he became numb to the pain. The only part of his body the beggar never touched was his legs, as he needed them to run and beg.

As Hua Lanye grew older, the beggar could no longer control him. Unable to physically overpower him, the old man resorted to more sinister methods, secretly poisoning him to keep him crippled, using the antidote to force his obedience.

Even back then, Hua Lanye had managed to endure.

His tolerance finally broke the day the old beggar crushed a butterfly that he had loved.

Hua Lanye had always loved butterflies, a passion that required neither money nor power to sustain.

Every year during butterfly season, Hua Lanye would catch countless beautiful butterflies, carefully placing them in jars he’d found, raising them with care to help them survive the cold.

But the old beggar had destroyed everything.

He crushed each butterfly in front of a poisoned and helpless Hua Lanye, smashing them one by one.

From that moment, Hua Lanye changed. He no longer wanted to be powerless, unable to protect the things he loved. He didn’t want to die, nor did he want to submit to the beggar anymore. He wanted to become strong, but the celestial sects had turned him away.

He had risked everything to find the immortal sects, tracking down their hidden locations. But when he finally met the so-called “immortal masters,” they had only sneered at his tattered clothes and filthy appearance, covering their noses and looking at him with disgust, just like Long Xiang had looked at him when his demonic energy leaked out.

Hua Lanye had been rejected by the celestial sects many times, unable to even become an outer disciple who did menial tasks, all because he lacked celestial roots.

A mere mortal, dreaming of becoming an immortal—what a joke.

But Hua Lanye was adaptable. If he couldn’t become immortal, there were other paths to take.

Eventually, he turned to the demonic arts.

The demonic path wasn’t so picky. If you didn’t have a demonic core, you could make one, as long as you were willing to embrace the darkness.

Hua Lanye sold himself to a low-level demonic cultivator, offering his body to be tortured and drained of life force. He knew this cultivator had no intention of helping him and only wanted to devour him, but that didn’t matter—Hua Lanye had never intended to truly sell his soul.

In the end, he turned on the low-level demonic cultivator, killing him and claiming the demonic core for himself, a step up the ladder of power.

The poison in his body dissipated when he embraced the demonic path. The once incurable poison that had plagued him as a mortal was completely consumed by his new demonic core.

With his newfound power, Hua Lanye immediately sought out the old beggar, wanting to exact his revenge.

But when he arrived, he found only the beggar’s skeleton.

The beggar had died shortly after Hua Lanye had left.

It was then that Hua Lanye realized a critical lesson: whatever you do, do it quickly. Time waits for no one, and opportunities don’t last forever.

Afterward, his rise to become the Demon Lord and his collaboration with Bai Qingyin, who had the imperial purple energy, all unfolded in a flash of memories.

Hua Lanye had once been a beggar, and later, a demon. His journey had made him a master of charming others.

If he so desired, he could make anyone love him, including the so-called gods.

Having been rejected by the celestial sects repeatedly, Hua Lanye often woke from nightmares, haunted by memories of how to resolve his past struggles. He had come to understand these so-called cultivators and immortals well, capable of playing them like puppets.

He had also grown incredibly handsome—his appearance rivaling even the most beautiful immortals.

With this striking appearance and the pretense of a kind heart, he had managed to deceive the War Goddess of the heavens herself.

Jiutian Xuannu was the undisputed War Goddess of the celestial realm.

Ironically, she and Hua Lanye shared the same love for butterflies.

Their meeting had been entirely accidental—one demon and one god, both searching for a rare breed of butterfly in the same location. When their energies collided during the chase, it was like something out of a dream—or a romantic story.

Looking back, the start of their relationship had indeed followed such a fantastical plot.

Hua Lanye had knowledge of butterfly species and care that rivaled any expert. Jiutian Xuannu, hiding her true identity, watched this demon and grew fond of his talents, harboring thoughts of helping him ascend to immortality.

At that time, gods still had the ability to purify demonic energy. If Hua Lanye had been willing, he could have destroyed his demonic core, gained celestial roots, and begun his path to immortality anew.

Though the process would have been painful, the end result would have been worth it. At least, that was what Jiutian Xuannu believed.

Her greatest mistake was assuming that everyone in the world wanted to become an immortal.

Hua Lanye, however, was the exception.

From the moment the celestial sects had rejected him, thrown him out, and spat on him, he had vowed to make these self-righteous hypocrites regret it.

He never wanted to set foot in a celestial sect again.

Once he had figured out the Goddess’s true identity, it made his and the Monster Queen’s plan all the easier.

Both of them wanted to rise to power, to rule the world. They knew they couldn’t achieve it alone, so they temporarily allied with similar groups, with the intention of getting rid of them once they had succeeded.

After all, Hua Lanye’s ultimate goal was to destroy the celestial clans.

He played his part perfectly, earning the Goddess’s trust. After she revealed her true identity, he went with her to the celestial realm.

What happened next, Long Xiang had already witnessed during the Great War of the Four Realms.

The Goddess paid a heavy price for her kindness and talent scouting.

The mortal world was plunged into darkness for centuries, and Long Xiang had seen it all.

Now, as she dismantled Hua Lanye’s heart-soul, she saw his schemes and past in vivid detail, even though he resisted.

When Hua Lanye went to the celestial realm with the War Goddess, she had taught him many things. The Goddess was the War God of the celestial realm, and her specialty was Soul Sacrifice. She could lead thousands of souls into battle, overwhelming her enemies without needing the celestial army.

Hua Lanye had learned everything from her before betraying her, squeezing out every last drop of her usefulness.

As the memories poured through Long Xiang’s mind, she felt a sudden pain in her back, right where her bone wings had once sprouted.

She snapped back to reality, opening her eyes to see Hua Lanye lying weakly before her.

The dull ache in her back brought with it the residual willpower of some lingering soul sacrifice. Hua Lanye’s heart-soul hadn’t been sacrificed yet, and the Monster Lord wasn’t dead. There was no one else in the room—so where was this willpower coming from?

“Kill him.”

A voice echoed in her mind, stirring alongside the ache in her back. Her spiritual energy surged violently, swelling inside her.

She understood now—the willpower was coming from the remnants of the fallen god who had once given her bone wings to escape the Demon Cave.

Who else could have survived having their soul gnawed by demonic creatures for centuries?