The Thousand-Devil Peak had never seen a sun so bright. Usually shrouded in perpetual gloom and lightning, the peak had been cleared of its storms by Lord Mo Jue's own hand, replaced by a sky of shimmering violet silk and floating lanterns.
Ten thousand steps led to the Black Jade Palace, and every inch was carpeted in crimson. Thousands of guests—from the gnarled elders of the Ghost Sects to the stiff-necked masters of the Righteous Path—sat in a silence that was half-awe and half-terror. This was more than a wedding; it was the coronation of a new era.
Mo Jue stood at the precipice of the altar. He was a man carved from shadow and obsidian, his black robes embroidered with gold dragons that seemed to writhe in the light. His gaze, which usually caused armies to tremble, was fixed solely on the woman approaching him.
Ye Bingyao was a vision of celestial grace. Her bridal veil, woven from Lunar Silk, fluttered around her like a mist. As she reached the dais, Mo Jue stepped forward, breaking the rigid protocol of the ceremony.
He took her hands in his—hands that were unusually cold, though he attributed it to the nerves of a woman ending a millennium of war.
"You look as though you've captured the moon itself," Mo Jue whispered, his voice uncharacteristically soft.
Bingyao looked up, her eyes shimmering with what appeared to be tears of joy. "Today, there is no Demon King and no Saintess. Only us."
She leaned in, pressing her forehead against his. It was a moment of profound intimacy, a public display of the love that had supposedly tamed the world's most dangerous man. Mo Jue felt a rare sense of peace. He had conquered the heavens, but in her, he thought he had finally found a home.
"Close your eyes, my Lord," she breathed, her lips brushing his ear. "I have a gift for you. One that will ensure we are never parted by the heavens again."
Mo Jue, the man whose instinct had saved him from a thousand assassinations, did the one thing he had never done: he dropped his guard. He lowered his spiritual shields, inviting her into his soul.
The strike was silent.
There was no explosion of power, only a sickening thuck—the sound of metal sliding through divine flesh.
Mo Jue's eyes snapped open. He didn't feel pain at first, only an impossible, hollow coldness spreading from his solar plexus. He looked down. Protruding from his chest was the hilt of the Glacial Soul Dagger, an artifact forged from the ice of the Seventh Purgatory, designed for one purpose: to freeze the spirit of a God.
He looked at Bingyao, expecting to see a face of horror—perhaps an accident, or a trick. Instead, he found a mask of chilling composure. Her hands were still steady on the hilt, twisting the blade deeper to ensure it pierced his Origin Core.
"Bing... yao?"
His voice was a wet rattle. He tried to raise a hand to touch her face, but his nerves were dying. The betrayal hit him harder than the blade. Every memory of the last three years—the moonlit walks in the Plum Blossom Garden, the way she had tended his wounds after the Battle of the Void—flashed before him, now tainted and rotting.
"The love was the hardest part to fake, Jue," she whispered, her voice devoid of the sweetness it held moments ago. "You were so blinded by your own strength that you never realized a lion is easiest to kill when he thinks he's a housecat."
The heavy doors of the palace slammed shut. The "guests" from the Righteous Sects rose in unison, their festive robes falling away to reveal battle armor. From the rafters, the Seven Venerables of the Cloud-Sea descended, their swords humming with lethal intent.
Among them stood Elder Gu, Mo Jue's own sworn brother and the commander of his vanguard.
"Even you, Gu?" Mo Jue gasped, coughing up a mouthful of golden-black blood that stained the white silk of Bingyao's dress.
"The Sects offered me the Southern Provinces, My Lord," Gu said, his eyes avoiding Mo Jue's. "And the Saintess... she offered a world without a tyrant."
Bingyao pulled the dagger out with a brutal jerk. Mo Jue fell to his knees, his life-force spilling onto the jade floor like liquid night. She stood over him, silhouetted by the artificial sun he had created for her.
"Do not worry, my love," she said, stepping over his collapsing body to greet the Seven Venerables. "Your power will not go to waste. It will be the foundation upon which I build my divinity."
Mo Jue lay on the cold stone, the sounds of the celebratory massacre beginning as his loyalists were cut down outside. His heart was shattered, his cultivation ruined, and his name was being erased.
But as the darkness claimed him, a spark of primordial rage ignited in the depths of his soul. He didn't pray for mercy; he didn't curse the heavens. He focused every remaining drop of his essence on a forbidden, ancient script—the Samsara Devil Art.
If the heavens have no justice, he thought, his vision fading to black, then I shall return as the injustice that consumes you all.
The palace erupted in a pillar of black fire as Mo Jue's physical body disintegrated, leaving nothing but a lingering, terrifying laugh that echoed in the minds of his betrayers.