One week later.
The day of the first-stage trial finally dawned, and every cadet of the Demon Path Hall gathered in the vast examination grounds.
Each pair of eyes brimmed with razor-sharp intensity, as though eager to prove the skills they had honed over the past week. Ha Jin surveyed his surroundings with a worried gaze from among them.
'I won't run into Cheon Ha-rin—that lunatic—right off the bat, will I?'
He still hadn't fully recovered his mana. A few mid-level spells were the extent of what he could manage.
Getting noticed in this state might drag him into more trouble, so he scanned the area with extra caution. Fortunately, her manic eyes were nowhere in sight.
Ha Jin let out a quiet sigh of relief and took his place near the back of the assembled cadets.
'Is this where I should stand?'
Just then, the martial arts instructor Chae Un-ryang appeared from the far side. His expression was visibly troubled. He approached the cadets standing in formation, cleared his throat once, and cautiously opened his mouth.
"All cadets are hereby informed that the content of today's first-stage trial has been changed."
The moment those words landed, a low murmur rippled through the ranks. Each of them must have poured their blood and sweat into preparing for the previously announced trial.
For Ha Jin, of course, this was rather welcome news. He hadn't known the original content anyway. At least now, everyone would start from roughly the same line.
Regardless, the sudden change was bound to breed obvious resentment.
Yet no one dared voice their displeasure openly. They merely eyed each other in tense silence, and a taut pressure filled the examination grounds as they awaited the instructor's next words.
It was Yun Geom of the Sword Demon Sect who broke the silence. Without a moment's hesitation, he thrust his hand high and called out.
"Instructor, does it make any sense to change the trial overnight? Whose order is this, and who takes responsibility?"
Yun Geom's cry—arrogant even for a cadet—cracked the dam, and the suppressed discontent among the cadets began spilling out.
"He's right! Changing the trial content on the day of?!"
"Isn't this blatant disrespect toward us?"
The murmuring escalated steadily into open protest, and the crease on Instructor Chae Un-ryang's face only deepened. It was at that moment.
From the far end of the grounds, a woman slowly walked toward the restless cadets. The closer she drew, the more her overwhelming presence began to quell the commotion.
Jet-black hair contrasting against porcelain-white skin, and enigmatic violet eyes.
It was the moment the Mad Demon—head of the Mad Demon Sect, one of the Five Demon Lords of the Heavenly Demon Divine Sect—had personally appeared.
"It's the Mad Demon!"
From those cadets who recognized her, gasps of shock escaped in hurried whispers.
"Why is she here? And at the Demon Path Hall, of all places, among mere cadets?"
A Demon Lord was, for all practical purposes, just a step below the Sect Leader in terms of power and status. Why would someone of that stature be here?
"Wh-who is that......?"
"Why is the Mad Demon here?"
The cadets, startled witless, froze like mice before a snake, every trace of their earlier bravado evaporating in an instant.
Even Yun Geom, who had been so boldly airing his complaints, sealed his mouth shut and could only stare at her in disbelief.
'Why is she here? I was told she's not the type to leave her quarters voluntarily......?'
The Mad Demon was spoken of in the same breath as his own father, the Sword Demon. And her personality was said to be unpredictable—a genuine eccentric. Provoking her would do no one any good.
Meanwhile, the Mad Demon seemed to relish every ounce of the attention being poured upon her. With a bewitching smile playing at her lips, she strode to the front of the cadets. Their minds were bursting with questions.
As if to answer them, the Mad Demon spoke in a voice that reverberated across the entire training yard—the Six Harmonies Voice Projection.
"How lovely to meet you all. Introductions are hardly necessary, I assume?"
Utterly devoid of formality—a greeting worthy of the Mad Demon. Not that it mattered. There wasn't a single person here who didn't know her name. Well, aside from Ha Jin.
While the cadets stood slack-jawed at the Mad Demon's appearance, one dared to speak up.
"May I ask one thing?"
"Speak."
"We were told the trial content has been changed. Does that mean the Mad Demon will be evaluating us personally?"
"Evaluating. Close, but not quite."
"I beg your pardon? Then......?"
"Word is there have been some rather entertaining rumors floating around this class. So yours truly personally went to the Sect Leader and had the trial changed."
"Excuse me?"
It was a brazen overreach of authority. But the person before them was the Mad Demon. This was tame by her standards.
In the end, someone asked with trembling lips. The Mad Demon might be the most anti-authoritarian among the Demon Lords, but a Demon Lord she remained.
"We've spent the past week preparing for the first-stage trial. Changing it overnight feels like an unreasonable measure."
"So you're not confident you can pass?"
"I......?"
"I asked if you lack confidence. If a trifling variable like this is enough to make you fail, it means you never had the ability to pass in the first place."
"......"
"If you're brimming with complaints, by all means, attack me. Should you manage to make yours truly submit, I'll graciously accept your objection."
Translation: Come at me if you've got a problem.
Of course, one of the Five Demon Lords telling a mere cadet "come fight me if you don't like it" was a profoundly shameless thing to do. Most martial artists would never stoop to it.
But the Mad Demon did not fit within the normal bounds of a martial artist. Trying to box the Heavenly Demon Divine Sect's Mad Demon into a normal category—now that was the truly arrogant act.
There was no such thing as a bad Mad Demon. Only a mad one.
In any case, after hearing that, what more could anyone say? They had no power, so they had no choice but to follow.
"Rest easy, though—the trial itself is something simple."
The only thing the cadets could do was pray that the trial would at least be sane. And as if to betray that hope in a single stroke, the Mad Demon continued.
"The trial is simple. Land a single successful attack on yours truly."
In that instant, every cadet screamed in soundless agony.
***
The Mad Demon's casually tossed words. The cadets' horror was entirely justified.
As one of the Five Demon Lords, the Mad Demon's level—while not precisely known—was rumored to approach the Transformation Realm. The cadets, at their very best, were second-rate or first-rate.
Land a hit on someone like that, or block her attack? This was practically a declaration that she had no intention of letting anyone pass. Several of the higher-ranked cadets were the first to muster the courage to speak.
"Isn't this far too harsh! How could we possibly stand against a Demon Lord!"
The Mad Demon's martial prowess was in a class of its own even among the Demon Lords. While Demon Lords typically commanded the vast forces of an upper sub-sect, the Mad Demon's faction was, frankly, meager.
In truth, the Mad Demon Sect was maintained almost entirely by the Mad Demon's personal strength alone. And they were supposed to face a master capable of upholding an entire sub-sect single-handedly?
What cadet could accept that?
The mood among the cadets turned bleak. Whether or not the Mad Demon cared, she dismissed the protests without a second thought and spoke as though nothing were amiss.
"Well then, let us begin the trial as stated. Any complaints?"
"......"
Everyone swallowed their bitter words. "As if you'd listen even if we said yes" was what none of them could bring themselves to say.
And so the trial began. The Mad Demon climbed onto the sparring platform and grinned as she looked down at them. With a mocking smile, she spoke.
"Is there any cadet who'd like to come at yours truly first? If so, I'll award bonus points for courage."
The Mad Demon swept her gaze over the assembled cadets like a cat surveying mice. Wherever her violet eyes landed, cadets averted their gaze involuntarily.
While everyone held their breath and watched for someone else to move, a single hand shot up without hesitation. Every eye in the grounds swiveled toward it.
It was Cheon Ha-rin—Cadet Number One, the Sect Leader's daughter. She strode forward with blood-red eyes flashing. Even before the Mad Demon's overwhelming presence, she showed not an ounce of retreat.
Cheon Ha-rin stopped before the Mad Demon, stared straight into those manic eyes, and declared.
"I will challenge you."
Not a tremor in her voice. Only the pure exhilaration of facing a strong opponent. Seeing this, a deep smile crept across the Mad Demon's lips. She slowly licked her lips with a crimson tongue and whispered in a voice dripping with satisfaction.
"Oh my. The precious one steps forward right from the start?"
"It has been a long time."
Cheon Ha-rin offered a clasped hands greeting and bowed to the Mad Demon. Then, raising her sword vertically, her red eyes fixed solely on the Mad Demon.
"Please, attack first."
The Mad Demon snorted.
"Attack first? You dare say that to yours truly? How amusing. Obviously, you should be the one crawling to me."
Naked mockery glinted in the Mad Demon's eyes. At this taunt, Cheon Ha-rin's crimson gaze flashed with chilling light. Further words were pointless.
"Then I shall come to you."
Before the words had fully left her lips, her body launched forward. Her blade extended with a sharp whistle of parting air. The first form of Cheon Ha-rin's Ghost Moon Arcane Sword traced a warped arc as it hurtled toward the Mad Demon.
An eerie yet razor-sharp sword technique that sent chills down the spines of every onlooker.
The cadets involuntarily shrank back, holding their breath before the overwhelming Sword Energy.
But the Mad Demon didn't so much as twitch before the murderous blade. She merely extended two fingers at her leisure.
CHING—!
A sound like steel meeting steel, and Cheon Ha-rin's ferociously charging blade was caught dead between the Mad Demon's two fingertips.
The Mad Demon regarded the halted blade with a look of boredom and murmured softly.
"Is that all?"
At the languid remark, Cheon Ha-rin bit down hard on her lower lip before she could stop herself. Her red eyes shook violently with fury and bewilderment.
The cadets watching this scene were already steeped in disbelief.
'That's impossible......'
'She stopped Cheon Ha-rin's sword that easily?'
Even setting aside her status as the Sect Leader's daughter, Cheon Ha-rin was one of the most outstanding figures among the cadets. And her opening technique had been brushed aside as lightly as a child's play.
In that instant, no one in the examination grounds believed a single cadet could pass this trial.
This was the moment that proved, with every fiber of their being, that the Demon Lords stood on a plane far beyond their reach.
Meanwhile, watching from a distance, the Blade Demon's face had turned to stone. In a rare display, he spat crude profanity.
"That crazy bitch. She's actually...!"
When the Mad Demon had first sprawled out in front of the Sect Leader's Hall and thrown a tantrum about changing the trial, he'd thought she had finally gone senile. And when the Sect Leader actually approved it, he'd pinched the bridge of his nose.
Fine. She was the Mad Demon, but she was still a Demon Lord.
He'd figured she had her reasons for wanting to evaluate the cadets in her own way. But what he was seeing now was not an instructor testing cadets' abilities.
She was nothing but a predator, flaunting her overwhelming power while ruthlessly trampling the tender sprouts trying to break ground.
"This isn't a stage for you to indulge your madness!"
The Blade Demon's insides were being charred black. At this rate, forget the trial—the cadets would be completely broken. What was she doing to the children who would shoulder the Divine Sect's future?
No—could any cadet even pass this trial in the first place?
'How the hell do I fix this?'
The Blade Demon clutched his forehead. This was no longer something he could just watch. He drew the blade from his back and stamped the ground with a thunderous stomp, launching himself toward the Mad Demon.